Solemnity of the Ascension
Installation of Fr. Francis Ouma
May 21, 2023
St. Patrick’s, Havre de Grace
The Interim
Writing in the 5th century, Pope St. Leo the Great offers us insight into the forty day period between the Lord’s Resurrection and Ascension; he writes: “God’s providence was at work to instill this one lesson into the hearts of the disciples, to set this one truth before their eyes, that the Lord Jesus Christ, who was truly born, truly suffered, and truly died, should be recognized as truly risen from the dead…” Pope Leo goes on to say that God sought to strengthen the disciples so that, “when their Lord ascended into heaven, far from feeling any sadness, they [would be] filled with great joy.”
This Jesus did, as our reading from the Acts of the Apostles tells us, by offering the disciples many proofs of his Resurrection and by instructing them more deeply about the Kingdom of God, while at the same time reminding them of his promise to send the Holy Spirit. Yet it seems that the Apostles’ hopes remained mis-directed. They asked him: “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” They are still thinking of a restoration of those glorious days when David was king. Still looking backwards, they could not yet envision his kingdom “not of this world”. Undeterred, the Risen Lord continued to instruct the Apostles about his true mission.
At the end of the forty days, Jesus summoned his disciples to a mountain in Galilee. As they assembled before their Lord, their Master, and their Friend, the Apostles must have sensed that they would no longer see him in the flesh. Even so, the Gospel tells us that “[the Apostles] worshipped, but also they doubted” – and this, at the very moment when the Risen Lord was about to ascend into heaven.
Mis-directed Hope
Taking all this in, let us ask ourselves if we are much different from the Apostles. Do we not sometimes hope for things the Lord did not promise? Like the Apostles, do we sometimes look backwards instead of forwards, hoping to return to a happier, more tranquil time in our lives, or hoping to go back to a time when the Church’s place in society was more secure. We may also pray and hope for things that we deem good and necessary, for example, solutions to our problems and the healing of our ills. These are good things, earnestly to be prayed for, but not the substance of our hope.
And like the Apostles who worshipped yet doubted, we may find ourselves praying often, even daily, attending Mass regularly, but also find that we may experience doubts about our faith, living as we do in an age highly skeptical of religion and of religious claims. So too, when we are confronted with heartbreaking betrayals of trust, we may be tempted to doubt the validity of our faith. True, we may continue to worship God, but we may also feel as though our faith has been “hollowed out”.
St. Paul “The Theologian of Christian Hope”
If so, then let us turn to St. Paul who has been called “the theologian of hope”, for in his life and ministry, Paul did not look backwards but was always pushing ahead. He describes his own life as a pursuit in hope of Christian maturity, a maturity that consists of belonging to Christ, of being taken possession of by Christ. He adds, “I do not consider myself as having taken possession – but just one thing, forgetting what lies behind but straining forward to what lies ahead” (Phil 3:13).
In today’s reading from his Letter to the Ephesians, St. Paul prays, for his flock in Ephesus and for us: that the Holy Spirit may enlighten our minds and hearts so ‘that we may know the hope that belongs to his call’ – that is to say, the hope that was implanted in us in our baptismal call to holiness. Paul prays that, in the Holy Spirit, we too will belong wholly to Christ and so strain forward in hopeful pursuit of Christian maturity. But on what basis do we dare to hope for such a thing?
The basis for our hope, as Paul tells us, is not our expectations for a better life, but rather the greatness of God’s power on behalf of those of us who believe. If we are open to it, God sends us the power, the energy, the grace to overcome the obstacles that hinder us from believing and hoping. If we are open to it, God enlightens us in the Holy Spirit, so that we can profess our faith with eyes wide open and a heart that is on fire – professing with joy that Christ suffered for our sins, rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven, where he is seated bodily at God’s right hand in the heavens. What does this mean except that the Risen Lord bore our humanity to God’s Throne. It is in our humanity that the Crucified, Risen, and Exalted Lord intercedes for us, pleading for us at God’s right hand, continually exercising his priesthood on our behalf.
In ascending into heaven, Christ did not abandon us, but remains with us always. Through the Holy Spirit, he is present and active in us and among us both intimately and in a universally powerful way, as he speaks to us in Scripture and gives us his Body and Blood in the Eucharist. This he does so that we might belong to him, as individuals and as a community, so that we might strain forward to the goal of our existence: to be possessed by Christ and thus to be in the bosom of the Father – to experience the tranquility, peace, and joy of sharing fully the life of the Trinity – to fulfill the whole purpose of our existence – this is our hope on this day of the Ascension.
On Mission on the Banks of the Susquehanna
Once this beautiful vision of hope takes root in our lives, then we will no longer be able to be quiet, complacent Christians. Rather, we will want to participate in the great commission Christ gave his Apostles: “God, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit…”
This is the mission that the Risen Lord entrusted to the Apostles and indeed to us. Here at St. Patrick Parish you could not have a better leader to guide this mission than you do in Fr. Francis Ouma – and how happy I am to install you today. Father Francis: As you proclaim and teach the faith, celebrate the Mass with reverence and love, in your service as a confessor, in your efforts to instruct the young and to reach out to those who no longer practice the faith – you are a witness to hope. And more than that, you have inspired many parishioners to join with you in accomplishing the Church’s mission here in Havre de Grace and beyond. You have recognized the gifts the Spirit has bestowed in this parish community, and you have invited your people to participate, to be co-responsible with you for building up the Body of Christ in this part of the Lord’s vineyard.
For that, Fr. Francis, I thank you and I thank your parishioners, as you strain forward towards life eternal, we will live differently in this world, teaching by example the freedom and peace of observing all that Jesus taught. True, this may prompt criticism, but it may also prompt curiosity – thus opening the door for us to give a reason for our hope to those who do not yet believe or those who have abandoned the faith. As we celebrate the Ascension, may our hearts be filled with hope and joy, an infectious hope and joy and peace that the world cannot give, a joy and a hope that is the foundation of this parishes next 175 years of this parish’s life and ministry! May God bless us and keep us always in his love!