{"id":5008,"date":"2024-05-12T09:07:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-12T08:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/?p=5008"},"modified":"2024-05-17T11:56:29","modified_gmt":"2024-05-17T10:56:29","slug":"commentary-on-the-ascension-of-the-lord-b","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/commentary-on-the-ascension-of-the-lord-b\/","title":{"rendered":"Commentary on the Ascension of the Lord (B) 12.05.2024"},"content":{"rendered":"

Commentary by Fr Donagh O\u2019Shea OP, www.goodnews.ie<\/a><\/h3>\n

Mk 16:15-20<\/b><\/h4>\n

Jesus said, \u201cGo into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation.\u00a0 The one who believes and is baptised will be saved; but the one who does not believe will be condemned.\u00a0 And these signs will accompany those who believe: by using my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes in their hands, and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.\u201d\u00a0 So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God.\u00a0 And they went out and proclaimed the good news everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by the signs that accompanied it.<\/em><\/p>\n

Mark\u2019s gospel gives no detail at all about the Ascension: just a matter-of-fact statement that Jesus \u201cwas taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God.\u201d\u00a0 It is like a description of someone who went upstairs to sit in his favourite chair.\u00a0 Is there still some trace in us of that childhood notion of heaven as the spacious upper storey of the world?\u00a0 It seems there is, because some people were surprised a few years ago when pope John Paul II said heaven was not a place.\u00a0 Only material objects can be said to be in place.\u00a0 Christ\u2019s glorified body after his Resurrection was not subject to material conditions: for example, he did not need to knock on the door nor use a key to enter the room where the frightened disciples had hidden themselves; instead \u201che came and stood among them\u201d (Luke 24:36; John 20:19,26).\u00a0 At the Ascension he disappeared, or as Luke says, \u201che withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven\u201d (Luke 24:51).\u00a0 To say he ascended into heaven means that he returned to the Father.\u00a0 He came from the Father and now returned to the Father.\u00a0 This is easiest way to say it; it avoids all spatial words.\u00a0 This is how Jesus himself says it in John\u2019s gospel: \u201cI am going to the Father\u201d (14:12, 28; 16:10, 17, 28).\u00a0 We could also say that heaven is \u2018God\u2019s dimension\u2019, as someone put it, but does this add anything?\u00a0 Matthew, being Jewish, did not like to use the name of God, so where the other gospel-writers more commonly say \u2018Kingdom of God\u2019 he says \u2018Kingdom of heaven\u2019.\u00a0 (I saw a modern book by a rabbi who consistently wrote G-d for God.)\u00a0\u00a0 But we can just say: Jesus came from the Father and returned to the Father.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe withdrew from them,\u201d Luke says.\u00a0 What did this withdrawal mean for them, and what does it mean for us?\u00a0 \u201cIt is to your advantage<\/em> that I go away,\u201d Jesus said (John 16:7).\u00a0 This seems puzzling, and he added, \u201cfor if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you.\u201d\u00a0 The Advocate is the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 Jesus withdraws so that the Holy Spirit may come.\u00a0 What sense can we make of this?<\/p>\n

But that is next Sunday\u2019s story.\u00a0 In the meantime we are to resist the temptation to think only of loss.\u00a0 This must have been the temptation of those first disciples too when Jesus withdrew from their sight.\u00a0 \u201cWhy are you people from Galilee standing here looking into the sky?\u201d (1st reading of today\u2019s Mass).\u00a0 The sequel says they returned to the city.\u00a0 Life goes on.\u00a0 From now on he will be closer to them than the eye can see.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Commentary by Fr Donagh O\u2019Shea OP, www.goodnews.ie Mk 16:15-20 Jesus said, \u201cGo into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation.\u00a0 The one who believes and is baptised will be saved; but the one who does not believe will be condemned.\u00a0 And these signs will accompany those who believe: by using<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2659,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5008"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5008\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8203,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5008\/revisions\/8203"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stmarys-tallaght.ie\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}