THE ASCENSION OF THE LORD

12 MAY 2024

 

          Today, the disciples find themselves in a place of uncertainty, in an in-between time.  They had left everything to follow him.  In their three years with him, they had listened to his teachings and witnessed his miracles.  They were convinced that he was the long-awaited Messiah.  However, their hopes were dashed when his life was ended by the cruelest tool of Roman occupation.  It seemed that Rome had won again in their work of domination.  However, he not only survived Rome’s power.  He was raised from the dead.  Saint Luke tells us in the Acts of the Apostles that the risen Lord had appeared to them over the course of forty days.  That symbolic number  indicates that they had been given sufficient time to appreciate his incredible victory over death and to deepen their faith in his risen presence.

            In the Ascension, their risen Lord is taken from space and time to return to the right hand of the Father.  In this in-between time, they do not know what to do.  All of us have been stuck at one time or another in an in-between time.  Mothers, you know what the in-between time is like.  You have carefully nurtured your children, and now you have to let them go to school.  Or, you have invested all of your time and energy in your vocation of being a mother, and your adult child has left the nest to begin a new life.  Graduating students, you are in an in-between time.  You have completed your years of education.  And now you await the next step into an unknown way of living.  To be honest, I am in an in-between time myself.  I know what it is like to be the pastor of a parish.  I have no idea what it will be like to be a retired priest without that role.

            Anyone caught in an in-between time can learn from the experience of the first disciples.  Like them, we need to pay attention to the two men dressed in white garments.  They were the same ones at the empty tomb on the day of resurrection who asked the question, “Why are you looking for the living among the dead?”  Today they ask, “Why are you standing there looking at the sky?”  Their questions challenge the disciples to see this in-between time as a new beginning both for the risen Christ and for them.  They tell them to stop looking up to the sky and begin the mission of proclaiming the Good News they learned from the risen Lord.  The Kingdom of God is in their midst, and that the victory has been won by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

            Of course, they will remain in the same messy occupation by Rome when they emerge from their in-between time.  That is why the risen Christ assures the disciples that signs will accompany their mission.  In their mission to proclaim the good news, they will have the power to drive out the demons of hatred and division.  They can speak the new language of love.  They can pick up the serpents of oppression and persecution.  They can drink the deadly poison of lies and fake news.  They can become instruments of God’s healing for the sick.

            They will be able to do all these things, because they will receive the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.  The Holy Spirit will drive them out of their isolation in that upper room in Jerusalem and give them the courage for their mission.  As we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit on each of us and on our Church next Sunday, we can have that same confidence.  The Easter Season has not changed our world.  We continue to live in the same world of division, conflict, lies and half-truths, war, and a general disrespect for the dignity of human life.  But we can emerge from any in-between time confident that we are not alone in our mission, and confident that we will succeed.  As the risen Christ promised, he is with us always.

 

 

 

SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER

5 MAY 2024

 

          The first Letter of Saint John tells us that God loves us.  God revealed his love by sending his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him.  Not only did Jesus take on human flesh, but he loved us so much that he gave himself completely by dying on the cross for us.  Because God loved us first and showed what that love looks like, God invites us to imitate his self-giving love by loving one another in this same way.  We come to know God in the way we behave toward God and each other.

            This is the message Jesus gives to his disciples at the Last Supper today.  Jesus call them friends, because they have remained with him for three years and have freely accepted his love.  He shows them how to love one another by washing their feet like a humble slave.  He promises that he will be present whenever they do what he does at the Last Supper – taking bread, blessing it, breaking it, and giving it to them.  He will demonstrate his most incredible love by allowing himself to be sacrificed as the Lamb of God on the next day on the cross.  He commands them to love as he has loved them.

            He gives this same message to us at this Mass.  We became his friends when we passed through the waters of Baptism.  Boys and girls, you will go back to the Baptismal Font walking on your own legs.  When your parents brought you to the waters of Baptism, they carried you, with many of you crying.  Your parents and your godparents made the promises for you.  Now, you will renew those promises and bless yourselves with the water from the font.  As you were clothed with a white garment to demonstrate that you had put on Christ, you wear these white garments to connect you with your baptism.  Then, you will bring up the gifts of bread and wine and the sacrificial tithe and receive Jesus for the first time in the Holy Eucharist.

            The sacrificial gift of Jesus in the Paschal Mystery happened only one time.  Only once did he share the final meal with his disciples.  Only once did he give himself out of sacrificial love on the cross.  Only once was he raised from the dead.  Only once did he ascend to the right hand of the Father.  But those saving acts are made present at every Mass when we do what he told his disciples to do at the Last Supper.  After renewing your baptismal promises, we will take gifts of bread and wine.  In the Eucharistic Prayer, we will bless the Father for the sacrifice of Jesus made present here.  As we sing the Lamb of God, we will break the consecrated host.  Then we will give it to you.  Because we are doing what Jesus told us to do, those saving actions are made present as we remember.  You will eat the bread transformed into the Lord’s Body.  You will drink the wine changed into his blood.

            As friends of Jesus, we need to receive this Eucharist often so that we can love one another as Jesus has loved us.  Saint Peter understood the importance of the Eucharist in his life.  As a faithful Jew, he had never entered into the house of a pagan.  And yet, he followed the promptings of the Holy Spirit and dared to enter the house of Cornelius.  Not only was Cornelius a non-Jew, but he is also a Centurion who was part of the oppressive Roman occupation of his people.  In taking this risk, Peter baptized Cornelius and began to understand that the message of Jesus Christ must go to all people.  Peter realized that he was the instrument of God’s initiative to proclaim the Gospel to the ends of the Earth.

            As we receive the Lord’s body and blood, we need to trust that we will be strengthened to make difficult choices and embrace sacrifices to love as Jesus has loved us.  And boys and girls, you lead the way for us today!