Thoughts on Ascension Day

"Ascension" by Jesus Mafa

The Ascension of our Lord is political. 

It is much more than a pious belief or a line in an archaic statement of faith. It is about the reconciliation of heaven and earth, the reunion of God and God's creation. It is the symbol of God's own words at creation, "It is good." 

Jesus' earliest followers viewed heaven and earth in profoundly different ways than most of us do today. For the early Christians, heaven was not a physical place so much as it was a spiritual reality. Earth was viewed as the realm of mortals, the stewards of God's creation. Heaven, on the other hand, was the realm of God, the space of the supernatural, of angels and spirits and saints, the very kingdom of grace, justice, and truth. 

Thy kingdom come, is the prayer of the Church each time it gathers to remember the story of salvation. God's kingdom--the reign of God--is not a fortress in the sky or a castle in the clouds. It is the dwelling place of the One who brooded over the chaotic waters of creation, the One who set the Pleiades and Orion in place, the One who breathed life in the world. Our prayer is not for a physical heaven to take over a physical earth. Instead, we pray for God's justice and God's peace to conquer our own contrary impulses, our desire for greed, power, and self promotion. 

Jesus' ascension to heaven continues the reconciliation begun in the Triduum. Jesus, as a human, rises to heaven and, in doing so, dares to reconcile humanity and divinity. The Church, following its Risen Lord, does just that. It rises above the squabbles and sins of humanity and restores itself once more to the perfection of divinity. In Christ--and with Christ--we are reunited with the God who once walked with us in the garden, whose heart was broken by sin, and who--in spite of  a broken heart-- never stopped loving us. 

The stuff of earth--Jesus Christ-- rises today and bids humanity and divinity be reconciled. Likewise in a few days, the stuff of heaven--the Holy Spirit, the Comforter-- will descend and confirm in tongues of fire the desire of God and of human to be reconciled. On that day of Pentecost, the Church is given the tools of reconciliation and is commissioned by God's own self to move into the world, to baptize, to preach, to heal, to be agents of God's love. 

Come, Lord Jesus! 

Amen.

Rest in peace, dear Mother.

At the risk of sounding cliche, I feel as if I've lost a great friend today.

Dr. Maya Angelou--Mother Maya, as I often called her in Facebook posts--was fully human. I say that only because I tend to idolize writers, particularly black women writers. Lucille Clifton and Audre Lorde are just below the Virgin Mary in my cosmology of influence. Their work is lofty--filled with theory and psychology, religion and philosophy. Maya, on the other hand, has always seemed approachable to me, sort of like a grandmother. Maya's writing is no less powerful or profound than the writing of Lucille Clifton or Audre Lorde, but it is so much more accessible.

As with most celebrities with a social media presence, I wonder whether or not it was actually Maya posting quite often on Facebook. Actual Maya or not, I looked forward to her status updates. She did not post about her lunch or share photos of cats. She wrote what she might very well speak to somebody in person. And not just to anybody. She did not write to students or devotees, although all who "liked" her page were surely both students and devotees of the Uncaged Bird. No, dear Mother Maya wrote to friends, to beloveds, to her own flesh-and-blood. For that, I'm sure, is how she viewed the world--an extended family with quibbles here and there, but with the extreme capacity to love.

Rest in peace, dear Mother, and rise in glory.