(Ascension Thursday 2019: This homily was given on May 30,
2019 at St. Pius X Church, Westerly, R.I., by Fr. Raymond Suriani. Read Acts 1:1-14; Psalm 47:2-9; Ephesians
1:17-23; Luke 24:46-53.)
[For the audio version of this homily, click here: Ascension 2019]
How do you deal with the
loss? What do you do to cope?
Those are very important
questions, since we all face losses like these throughout our lives.
Let me share with you today
a few lessons on how to deal with such situations, courtesy of the 12
Apostles. Lest we forget, they
experienced a terrible loss in their lives on the first Ascension Thursday—the
loss of Jesus! After living with these
men for 3 years, and then appearing to them for 40 days after his resurrection,
our Lord ascended into heaven, never to be with them in exactly the same way
again.
But, to their credit, the
Apostles handled this loss much better than they had handled the loss of Jesus
on Good Friday. Back then, they ran away
and did everything wrong; this time, they did almost everything right.
First of all, Scripture
says, they prayed. They dealt with their loss through
prayer. And this wasn’t just casual,
half-hearted prayer that they engaged in.
Scripture says, “They devoted
themselves to constant prayer.” To
be perfectly frank, they probably prayed as hard as they had ever prayed in
their lives!
And they engaged in this
prayer together. That’s also significant. Scripture says that after Jesus ascended, the
Apostles went to the Upper Room as a
group. Back on Holy Thursday, they
had scattered after Jesus was arrested; now they gathered together and
prayerfully supported one another.
Whenever we suffer a loss in
our lives, we should also turn to prayer, believing that God’s grace can help
us deal with our pain. And we also need
to reach out to good friends—especially Christian, Catholic, believing
friends—who will give us the human and
spiritual support we need.
Of course, if we want an
even greater measure of help we should
look beyond the friends we have on this earth and look to the “friends” we have
in heaven—especially our Blessed Mother.
This is something we also learn from the Apostles: the Bible tells us
explicitly that Mary was with them in the Upper Room after the Ascension and
until Pentecost.
Notice, if you would, our
last stained glass window. Pictured in that
glass is the moment the Holy Spirit descended—10 days after the Ascension—and
Mary is in the center of the group. You
could say that there, in that window, you have 12 men dealing with their loss with the help of Mary.
As many of you I’m sure
already know, young Karol Wojtyla—who would someday become Pope John Paul
II—lost his entire family (his mother, his father, his sister and his brother)
before he was 21 years of age. In the
midst of those losses, he developed a very strong devotion to our Blessed
Mother—so much so that when he became pope he took as his motto, “Totus Tuus”
(meaning “I’m totally yours, Mary—I’m totally consecrated to Jesus through
you”).
Like Peter and the Apostles,
Karol Wojtyla dealt with his losses by seeking support from the Blessed
Mother. That, in and of itself, is a
good reason for all of us to do the same.
The Apostles, I think it’s
safe to say, also turned to the Eucharist
during this difficult time. After
Pentecost, the Bible says that the early Christians devoted themselves to “the breaking of bread” (the “breaking of bread,” of course, was the
Eucharist). Well, if that was the case
after Pentecost, I think it’s pretty reasonable to infer that the Apostles also
celebrated this sacrament before
Pentecost when they were with Mary and the others in the Upper Room.
I know many people who began
to go to Mass daily at some point in
the past after someone close to them
died—and they’ve continued the practice to the present day. They continue to do it because they have
found strength and comfort in the Blessed Sacrament, as the Apostles most
probably did after the Ascension.
And finally, these 12
followers of Jesus persevered. They prayed, they supported each other, they
looked to Mary, they most likely received the Eucharist—and they kept it up for
10 days until the promise of Jesus was finally fulfilled and the Holy Spirit
descended on them.
Jesus had told them it would
happen “within a few days.” They probably interpreted that to mean “1 or
2,” but they didn’t give up even after a week had passed.
The bottom line, my brothers
and sisters, is this: the Apostles could not stop Jesus from ascending into
heaven; they could not prevent that “loss.”
Most of the time, we can’t control the losses in our lives: neighbors
move, friends change jobs, loved ones die—and we are powerless to stop any of
it from happening. But what we can
control is our response to the losses
we experience, as these Apostles controlled their response to the loss of
Jesus.
May God help us to respond
as they did—and to persevere—so that we will eventually experience the strength
and consolation of the Holy Spirit that they all experienced at Pentecost.
