Throughout the Easter season – Paschaltide – we’ve seen the appearances of the risen Christ to the Apostles and the life of the early Church. Today we celebrate the conclusion of Paschaltide with the Lord’s Ascension into Heaven. The 40 days of celebration of Christ’s Resurrection ends with a crescendo as we sing with the Psalmist: “God mounts his throne amid shouts of joy; the LORD, amid trumpet blasts. Sing praise to God, sing praise; sing praise to our king, sing praise.”

          The Feast of the Ascension concludes our celebration of the Lord’s Resurrection by recognizing that the Christ who came back from the dead to give new life to believers and to found the Church is to be worshiped and adored. To believe in the Lord’s Resurrection is not enough for salvation if we will not worship Him as God. Thus the Communion antiphon from Psalm 67 tells us: “Sing ye to the Lord, who mounteth above the heavens to the East, alleluia.” And the collect of today’s Mass beseeches the Lord that those celebrating Christ’s Ascension “may in spirit dwell already in heavenly realms.” Where are we more dwelling in heavenly realms than right here, when we celebrate the mysteries of our redemption?

          How, though are we to worship the Lord? I had the privilege a few years ago of working with a young man who decided to become Catholic at age 16. It all started when his pastor told their congregation around March 2020 that – for reasons that will be unmentioned – they would be “worshiping online.” But it would be the same! It would just be online!

          This astute young man realized right away that if what they were doing to worship God could be done just the same online, it probably wasn’t how God wanted to be worshiped. Several hundred hours of Bishop Barron, Fr. Mike Schmitz, etc. later, he was talking to me.

          To this quintessentially Catholic question – How does God want to be worshiped? Not, how do I want to worship God, or how does worshiping God make me feel – the Feast of the Ascension provides a quintessentially Catholic answer: God wants to be worshiped with our bodies – one of the many reasons why “worshiping online” is so woefully insufficient. The prayers at Mass today emphasize that the human body was meant for the worship of God – both here, and, after the general Resurrection, when our bodies too will rise to be reunited with our souls once again, for eternity in Heaven.

          One of today’s prayers recalls that Christ “placed at the right hand of [the Father’s] glory our weak human nature, which he had united to himself.” The word choice here is fascinating: Christ placed not His human nature at the right hand of the Father when He mounted His heavenly throne, but “our weak human nature, which he had united to himself.” He has united our weak humanity to Himself. He has redeemed those parts of you that only know how to be a slave by taking your servitude onto Himself – ut servum redimeres, filium tradidisti – to ransom a slave, You gave away Your Son. And now, that weak but redeemed humanity is placed at the very right hand of the Father. A part of you is already there, worshiping God in celestial perfection, even as the rest of you struggles to be faithful to what He has done for you here below.

          This is truly incredible in the literal sense: It is hard to believe. But it gets even better. We next recall that Christ, “was taken up to heaven in [the Apostles’] sight, that he might make us sharers in his divinity.” An incredible divine exchange has taken place: God has become man, so that man might become God. He has taken on your servitude, so that you might take on His perfection. [Note again the incredible difference between the ancient theology present in the Ascension (that man might be transformed from within to become like God), and Luther’s teaching that salvation means that God arbitrarily decides to call us justified even though we really aren’t – a dung heap, covered in snow. It’s no wonder that young man’s pastor thought that God could be worshiped just as well online, when he doesn’t think that worshiping God actually does anything to the one who worships!]

          Again, Christ’s Ascension emphasizes to us that the body is meant for the glory of heaven, and that heaven is primarily the place for worshiping God. The human body is meant for the worship of God, and is essential for authentic worship. Thus, this human body must come into contact with the sacred. This is what happens in the sacred liturgy: We encounter something that is utterly beyond ourselves. Yet mysteriously at the same time, we encounter Someone who is closer to us than we are to ourselves.

          The root meaning of “holy” is “set apart.” This is why the sacred liturgy – the right worship of God – not only engages all our senses but pulls us into something unlike anything we experience outside these doors. To do so, the Church’s worship uses things that are set apart, that have strong connotations of association with divine worship. This is why She uses the Latin language, organ music, beautiful sacred vestments, sacred vessels in shapes very different from the plates and cups we use at home – to show that all this is set apart for the worship of God.

          Of course, the organ isn’t necessarily any more holy than another instrument, and words in Latin are not in and of themselves holier than words in English. (In case you’re doubtful about that, I can show you some bawdy ancient Latin poetry that will clear up those doubts very quickly.) But in our world, the organ, Latin, incense, ornate chalices, silk vestments, etc. are set apart – they are generally not encountered outside the setting of divine worship. And so, we can rightly say that there is something holy about them, and we can see a fittingness in the Church’s preference for them in the bodily worship commanded by Her Master.

          A common obstacle to appreciating this set-apartness for those who have a sincere desire to understand and appreciate the Church’s rich tradition, is intellectualism. Intellectualism is the result of the Enlightenment, a Protestant-influenced movement from the 18^th Century – still very powerful today – that convinced us that things only have value when I understand them. Intellectualism minimizes the importance of worshiping in the body by an overemphasis on the mind, by placing an overemphasis on mental understanding.

          Of course, it’s good to understand what’s happening when we’re worshiping God. It’s good to understand the meanings of the rich and beautiful ceremonies taking place at Mass. But if we understood everything, we’d have a really big problem: There would be nothing left to understand! The Church’s worship is intentionally pre-modern. It has incredible depths to be plumbed. And we ought to explore those depths! But when something happens at Mass that you don’t understand, the Catholic attitude is not to freak out and think that something has gone terribly wrong because you didn’t understand. The Catholic attitude is to pause and reflect, “Wow, there’s something beautiful here. There’s something new that I never noticed before. There’s something I get to explore.” Or, simply, “There’s a mystery here that I don’t totally understand, and it reminds me of God.” I’ve seen countless crowds at the Fort Wayne Philharmonic be profoundly moved by music that they don’t understand at all, music that has no words to be understood, but that has a power in its beauty to move us to contemplate the divine. I

          So much of what God does far surpasses our understanding. We worship in mystery in the One who acts mysteriously, the one who to ransom us slaves, gave away His Son. Forty days after Easter, our celebration of the Lord’s Resurrection is now complete. Today, the Church cries out with the words of the Psalmist, that as the Lord ascends into Heaven, He “has lead captive [our] captivity” – captivam duxit captivitatem. Today, with the Lord’s Ascension, His work of redemption is complete. The victorious One who mounts His heavenly throne to trumpet blasts has taken captive our captivity. Just as the victors of old would lead a parade that included the conquered peoples in chains, the sins over which He triumphs become the prizes of His victory.

          The Paschal Candle has now burnt down to the Cross. And the end of our journey through Lent and Easter, we come back to the place where we started, and we know it for the first time. The divine flesh of Christ, the ultimate mystery with which we come into contact at Holy Mass, is the veil through which we must pass to enter the Heaven where our weak human nature has already been placed at the Father’s right hand. His flesh has been pierced and His side has been opened so that we might not only pass through the waters of a parted sea, but through His flesh which sanctifies ours. When we are enveloped by the beauty of the Sacred Liturgy, when we encounter what has been set apart, we too are set apart for Him, the slavery in you is snatched away, and your captivity is lead captive in His triumphant train.

The Rev. Royce V. Gregerson

Parish Church of Our Lady of Good Hope, Fort Wayne

1 June, A.D. MMXXV