ASCENSION: Acts 1:1-11; Eph 1:17-23; Mt 28:16-20

 

A little boy returned home from Sunday School and seemed very concerned. His mother asked him what was wrong, and he said, "The teacher told us today that Jesus is sitting on the right hand of God."

His mother smiled and said, "Yes, that’s right. But why does that upset you?"

The boy looked at her with wide eyes and asked, "Well, if Jesus is sitting on His right hand, then how does God get any work done?"

We profess every Sunday in our creed that Jesus ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the Father. Today we celebrate that Solemn event of faith.

The Ascension is the culmination of Jesus’ earthly ministry—his “mission accomplished”—but it is not a conclusion. Christ, now seated at the right hand of the Father, continues to guide the unfolding plan of salvation through the Holy Spirit.

The phrase “seated at the right hand of the Father” signifies authority and sovereignty. As the Catechism reminds us, this fulfills the vision of the prophet Daniel: a kingdom that is everlasting, embracing all peoples and nations (CCC #664). The Ascension, therefore, assures us that Christ reigns even now, beyond the limits of time and space.

In the reading of the gospel, we would expect to hear the account of the Ascension in the gospel. But this account is missing from St Matthew’s gospel which ends with our Lord summoning His disciples to an unnamed mountain in Galilee where He commissions them to “make disciples of all the nations; baptise them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to observe all the commands” that He had given them. Both content and location differ sharply from Luke’s account of the Ascension which takes place on the Mount of Olives, just outside Jerusalem. This seeming discrepancy has less to do with a contradiction or an error than it must possibly do with two different events. The Great Commission, as many would call the episode described in today’s passage, would have taken place on a hill or a “mountain in Galilee, whereas the Ascension as described in the gospel of St Luke and the Acts of the Apostles, took place outside Jerusalem on the Mount of Olives.

Scholars and theologians suggest several reasons why Matthew chose to end his gospel this way instead of referring to the Ascension as do St Luke and the longer ending of St Mark’s gospel.

In Matthew’s Gospel, the evangelist begins with Jesus being called "Emmanuel" (God with us) and the gospel then ends with the Lord’s promise "I am with you always" which form a pair of literary bookends  emphasising that the Lord remains spiritually present with His Church despite His physical departure. The Ascension marks the completion of the Lord’s earthly mission. He came to teach, to heal, to suffer, die and rise again. After His resurrection, His final act was to return to the Father. This signals that His saving work was done. Mission accomplished! Yes and no. Although His work of salvation is complete and He is no longer present with us physically until His return in glory at the end of the ages, He continues to remain with us sacramentally through the Eucharist and continues to act in and through His Church, His Mystical Body on earth - teaching us, guiding us, and sanctifying us.

Hence, even though He is ascended, He is not absent. In fact, His presence has become all the more pervading through us, the Church and the Sacraments.

Finally, today’s feast is not just about a recollection of the story of how the Lord ascended to heaven, which is a nice thing to know, nor that we have been entrusted with a mission, which is something challenging if we truly grasped it. Today’s feast also provides us with the ultimate reason for our hope. Through our Lord’s Ascension, we know for certain that the gates of heaven are opened and He awaits to welcome us to stand before His seat of glory, where He is seated at the right hand of the Father. But His exaltation is also “our exaltation” (collect for the Vigil Mass). As the collect for the Mass of the Day tells us, His Ascension “is not to distance Himself from our lowly state but, that we, His members, might be confident of following where He, our Head and Founder, has gone before.”

As we celebrate this feast, let us ask for the grace of the Holy Spirit to strengthen us in our mission. May our lives become a living proclamation of Christ’s love, so that others, seeing our faith in action, may come to know that the Lord who ascended into heaven is still with us, guiding and sustaining us every day.