ASCENSION:
GLIMPSES AND QUESTIONS
INTRODUCTIONGLIMPSES AND QUESTIONS
The title of my homily is, “Ascension: Glimpses & Questions.”
Traditionally the Feast of the Ascension was a Holy Day of Obligation and we celebrated it on Thursday – the 6th Thursday after Easter.
Because the Ascension can get lost in mid-week, some dioceses – like our diocese – move it to this Sunday – so that we can reflect upon it – as a Sunday community – at our regular Sabbath worship.
Yet even today – at this time – with all that is happening during these May days – graduations – weddings – Memorial Day Weekend – travel and cookouts – the feast of the Ascension still can get lost.
NEW TESTAMENT GLIMPSES OF THE ASCENSION
The Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles picture Jesus appearing here and there to the apostles and disciples after the Resurrection – giving last minute instructions – trying to get them to connect with what he had said when he was with them before he died – and then the day came – 40 days after the Resurrection when he ascends into the heavens as we heard in today’s first reading from the Acts of the Apostles as well as today’s gospel from Mark.
1943 PAINTING
Here in this church we have a big painting, a glimpse of the Ascension, up here in the front of our church. In Robert Worden’s wonderful book, St. Mary’s Church in Annapolis Maryland, A Sesquicentennial History 1853-2003, the painting of the Ascension along with two other paintings, The Good Shepherd and The Holy Spirit and Angels, were put here in 1943. He adds, “Prior to this time, these walls were bare, having been designed for the future placement of windows which were never installed.” (Cf. p. 127)
QUESTION
What would help us more: a painting of the Ascension or a window that looks out and up into the heavens? As a side note, perhaps also as a distraction, it was interesting to read in Robert Warden’s book that the windows in this church were originally plain glass. He writes, “On Wednesday, June 8, 1885, services in the church ceased and for six months, parish liturgies were held on the second floor of St. Mary’s Hall.” (Cf. p. 81) It was then that stained glass windows were installed. Only three of these first stained glass windows remain – the two up here in the sanctuary and the one big window back there on the left which you can partially see here in the church and partially see in the choir loft. In 1918 the present eight stained-glass windows along the sides of this church were installed. (Cf. p. 126) [In May of 1977 these "eight stained-glass windows were removed, releaded,and reset in new aluminum frames.... To commemorate the connection of saint Mary's to Saint John Neumann and Father (now Blessed) Francis X. Seelos, two large sets of stained-glass windows were installed on eaither side of the rear entrance to the church."] (Cf. p. 146)
Stained glass windows and paintings obviously help our religious sensibilities – but how about clear glass windows – that get us to look into and out of our homes and churches to see the world and the sky around us?
Which helps us more – pictures or nature – to reflect upon religious themes like the Ascension?
ASCENSION: QUESTIONS & GLIMPSES
Where did Jesus go after he ascended into heaven? Where was he these 40 days after Easter? How does this work?
Where do we go after we die? Where is heaven? Where is hell? Where is purgatory? How do we get our hands on these theologial issues?
Do we need a modern Dante to present a new Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso?
We have to deal with these questions from time to time – especially when we deal with our family deaths – or when we think about our own hereafter?
Does the Ascension help us?
Have we sat looking at a campfire – or a candle – sending smoke up into the air – rising – and then disappearing?
Have we ever seen the smile on a kid’s face holding a free helium balloon on a string – and then the kid accidently lets the balloon go and it sails up into the sky? The kid is at first fascinated at the rising balloon and then when it disappears the kid cries – experiencing loss.
I remember being at a first anniversary memorial service of someone from this parish who died and we all let go of balloons – I heard it’s now environmentally not recommended – and I watched the face of this little girl who was without her daddy for a whole year at that point. What was going through her mind?
Getting our mind on the meaning of Ascension is slippery and elusive – like getting spaghetti on a fork or eating with chop sticks. I avoid chop sticks and cut my spagetti.
QUESTION: WHERE IS HEAVEN?
Where is heaven? The human tendency is to think upwards. This is obvious. Here is earth – here is what we know – homes, flowers, macadam, mulch, green trees, as well as traffic jams, dog do do, cemeteries, empty or half empty Starbuck cups left on ledges, windshield flyers on sidewalks, tossed beer cans in church parking lots, etc. We know well the ground beneath our feet, so the skies – the heavens, the beyond our feet, have always been a great image of heaven.
The scriptures were written with a flat earth paradigm – a flat earth scenario. We know we’re a globe, a spinning sphere orbiting the sun at 18 ½ miles per second, a round planet. Yet sometimes at night, we stop to stand still and the earth too feels like it’s standing still. We look up into the above and we are amazed at the what’s up there. Vincent Van Gogh painted what we are looking at and called it, “Starry Night.” We look at it and our imagination kicks in as well our questions.
Where is heaven? Where is God? Is there a great beyond, beyond all this, and if there is, where is it?
Since Galileo – since Copernicus – since the Moon Landings, since Hubble – since seeing pictures of earth from outer space – new thoughts – new wonderings certainly enter into our imagination, prayer, consciousness, wonderings.
Is there a great garden, great green pastures, paradise, a place with a zillion mansions, somewhere way beyond where we can see?
Or we have seen documentaries of telescopes being switched for microscopes and we are taken into long journeys into atom and cells and their components and in and in and in. Will the inner journey ever end? Is there an ending in inner space? Is there an end to outer space?
Where is heaven? Is it up or is it in? Or where is it? Or do we get glimpses of it when we make life heaven for each other here on earth – when we put into practice Jesus’ teachings about the Kingdom – the prayer in every Our Father, “Thy Kingdom Come”?
QUESTION: WHERE IS GOD?
Atheists say there is no God.
Pantheists say all is God.
Mystics say there are glimpses of God all around us.
The Judeo-Christian tradition says God created all – and all is good.
We can catch glimpses of the God’s creations every day. We know beauty – the oceans – the mountains – Deep Creek Lake or an evening on the Bay – children on swings – folks playing outdoor basketball. Just go out the front door of our church – cross Duke of Gloucester Street carefully – go down Newman Street to the bottom and see the kids, the athletes playing there. Then go to Ego Alley. Watch the people and watch the birds and the boats. If you’re in your car – don’t just curse those undeciders who suddenly decide to cross the street. See their faces. See the faces of tourists enjoying Annapolis. See the smiles they bring to our store keepers faces. See couples – even couples over 50 walking and holding hands – see families enjoying ice cream – folks – folks – folks everywhere celebrating life.
These are glimpses of "Where is God?"
Did Jesus tell us to make an Inner Ascension, an inner change, a conversion, to knock out some walls, and put in some windows and see all the good, all the beautiful people and places and realities around us. when he told us to see the birds of the air and the flowers of the field – when he got stopped by all kinds of folks on the streets and roads he walked?
CONCLUSION
Ascension is illusive – like the jumbled thoughts and words of this homily – yet when we realize there are no time limits to our existence – that like Christ – we too will die – that like Christ we will rise, ascend into God – into mystery – but in the meanwhile, hopefully what becomes clearer and clearer – is we become more and more the Body of Christ each day – each day eating each other up like bread and wine – becoming Thanksgiving for each other – and after we die, becoming a Wonderful Memory for those left behind.
Amen.
