Sunday of Ascension

First Reading

Acts 1,1-11

In my earlier work, Theophilus, I dealt with everything Jesus had done and taught from the beginning until the day he gave his instructions to the apostles he had chosen through the Holy Spirit, and was taken up to heaven. He had shown himself alive to them after his Passion by many demonstrations: for forty days he had continued to appear to them and tell them about the kingdom of God. While at table with them, he had told them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait there for what the Father had promised. 'It is', he had said, 'what you have heard me speak about: John baptised with water but, not many days from now, you are going to be baptised with the Holy Spirit.' Now having met together, they asked him, 'Lord, has the time come for you to restore the kingdom to Israel?' He replied, 'It is not for you to know times or dates that the Father has decided by his own authority, but you will receive the power of the Holy Spirit which will come on you, and then you will be my witnesses not only in Jerusalem but throughout Judaea and Samaria, and indeed to earth's remotest end.' As he said this he was lifted up while they looked on, and a cloud took him from their sight. They were still staring into the sky as he went, when suddenly two men in white were standing beside them, and they said, 'Why are you Galileans standing here looking into the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will come back in the same way as you have seen him go to heaven.'

Psalmody

Psalm 46

Antiphon

Shout to God with the voice of joy.

All peoples, clap your hands,
cry to God with shouts of joy!

For the Lord, the Most High, we must fear,
great king over all the earth.

He subdues peoples under us
and nations under our feet.

Our inheritance, our glory, is from him,
given to Jacob out of love.

God goes up with shouts of joy;
the Lord goes up with trumpet blast.

Sing praise for God, sing praise,
sing praise to our king, sing praise.

God is king of all the earth,
Sing praise with all your skill.

God is king over the nations;
God reigns on his holy throne.

The princes of the peoples are assembled
with the people of Abraham's God.

The rulers of the earth belong to God,
to God who reigns over all.

Second Reading

Hebrews 9,24-28; 10,19-23

It is not as though Christ had entered a man-made sanctuary which was merely a model of the real one; he entered heaven itself, so that he now appears in the presence of God on our behalf. And he does not have to offer himself again and again, as the high priest goes into the sanctuary year after year with the blood that is not his own, or else he would have had to suffer over and over again since the world began. As it is, he has made his appearance once and for all, at the end of the last age, to do away with sin by sacrificing himself. Since human beings die only once, after which comes judgement, so Christ too, having offered himself only once to bear the sin of many, will manifest himself a second time, sin being no more, to those who are waiting for him, to bring them salvation. We have then, brothers, complete confidence through the blood of Jesus in entering the sanctuary, by a new way which he has opened for us, a living opening through the curtain, that is to say, his flesh. And we have the high priest over all the sanctuary of God. So as we go in, let us be sincere in heart and filled with faith, our hearts sprinkled and free from any trace of bad conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us keep firm in the hope we profess, because the one who made the promise is trustworthy.

Reading of the Gospel

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Yesterday I was buried with Christ,
today I rise with you who are risen.
With you I was crucified;
remember me, Lord, in your kingdom.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Luke 24,46-53

and he said to them, 'So it is written that the Christ would suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that, in his name, repentance for the forgiveness of sins would be preached to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses to this. 'And now I am sending upon you what the Father has promised. Stay in the city, then, until you are clothed with the power from on high.' Then he took them out as far as the outskirts of Bethany, and raising his hands he blessed them. Now as he blessed them, he withdrew from them and was carried up to heaven. They worshipped him and then went back to Jerusalem full of joy; and they were continually in the Temple praising God.

 

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Yesterday I was buried with Christ,
today I rise with you who are risen.
With you I was crucified;
remember me, Lord, in your kingdom.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Homily

"Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up towards heaven?"
The Word of God invites us to look at Jesus and not at our heaven. The feast of the Ascension tells us that heaven is not empty anymore rather it has become the place where we have to expect Jesus' return: He "will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven." To hope means to believe that certainly he "was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of [our] sight" but that he is alive and will come back. If Jesus is not among us anymore it does not mean that he has dissolved, on the contrary his presence has diffused: he is with us and with the entire world; he distanced from a limited way of being among people; he distanced from our possession and our narrow heaven. Like the apostles we may lift our eyes and not see anything for we see only what we want to see, that is many confirmations to the sad feelings that are within each one's heart. The message from the Ascension is another one.
The Lord invites us to "ascend" that is to go to the ends of the earth. And he will always be next to us. It is essential to leave your own little heaven and embrace the universal dimension of the Gospel. The sky has closed over too many men and women them because of indifference and wickedness that are like a dark cloud that closes and saddens people. And there are so many men and women to whom people in white robes announcing that "Jesus will come back one day" do not appear. We do not see them, as we do not see the Son of Man ascending to heaven, but they are there. They are those who live outside our country, outside our city, outside our nations and continent; they are the immense crowds of the peripheries of our cities, on which an atmospheric cloud is added to that of indifference. Sometimes they speak our language, other times the colour of their skin is different. But Jesus ascended to heaven for all, also for them, that they may be part of that family of God of which we are children by grace. Ascension means that there are not so many heavens, but one heaven, that of God that gathers all peoples to form a single family.