Homily for Ascension Thursday, St. Ignatius Church, May 13, 2010
Father Joseph T. Nolan
If a child asks you, after Jesus said goodbye, did he go up to heaven, you would probably answer
yes. But there is no up in the new creation and we ourselves do not go up when we die. Both
space and time limit us, but we hope to go to heaven. So where is it? The late pope, John Paul,
put it correctly: “Heaven is where God is.” Yes, and God is everywhere.
One way to explain that is to think about being. We all exist, but that verb means “to come out
of.” But out of what? Being that begot us and shares life with us. Being that at every moment
sustains that all life, keeps us in being.
It was a pagan philosopher whom St. Paul quoted in Athens when he said, “In him, God, we live
and move and have our being.” If we really believed that we would understand why a father of
the church declared, “Let us undertake nothing without first being gladdened by the thought of
God.”
Talking or thinking about God became easier when God entered uniquely into human life. The
Incarnation. Jesus. And Jesus told us that God is more than being, more than power. God is
love, and he loves us.
When the Greek philosophers, four centuries before, reasoned superbly to the existence of God,
they used terms like “being” and “One”. But nowhere do they say this eternal One loves us.
Socrates came close then he said, “It behooves us, befits us, to go to God as swiftly as possible.”
How? By becoming like God, and he added that this likeness consists of becoming just, holy,
and wise. But no mention of love and loving. For that we need the prophets, and supremely, the
teaching and example of Jesus.
Now Jesus returns to the Father and we give him new titles like Lord, King, and Christ, which
means Messiah. But this exaltation doesn’t take him from us. We await the third great feast of
the year, Pentecost, the gift of the Spirit. And the work of the Spirit is to make Jesus, the Risen
One, present to us, part of our world. But how?
Two of those ways you could guess. Through the word, and the sacraments. The Mass is the
great sacrament where we both offer and receive him. But there is a third way we often do not
advert to. It is the presence of Jesus through people. Through people when they are sick or
hungry or homeless and we minister to them. Remember, he said, when you do this to others,
you do this to me. Through people when their gladness inspires us. Remember, he said one alone
is good, God. And through people when they love. Remember, the apostle John said, “Where
love abides, God is there.”
The Ascension glorifies the Son of God. But it doesn’t take him from us, a real presence in our
lives.