The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1914-05-16
THE ASCENSION-JESUS IN
HEAVEN.

Let us go to Mount Olivet. Thither
Jesus brings His Apostles for the last
time. He recalls to their minds their
divine mission, confirms the powers
conferred upon them, again promises
the Holy Spirit, gives them His bles-
sing, bids them adieu, and rises to-
wards heaven.
Thus Father Monsabre, o. P, pic
lures the scene of the ascension in
his 'Mediations on the Mysteries of
the Rosary" translated by Very Rev.
Stephen Byrne, 0. P.
The hearts of the Apostles, divided
between grief and wonder, follow
with their eyes their adorable Master,
who is leaving them, and whom they
will never see again on earth. A
bright cloud intercepts their view of
the triumphant humanity of their Sa-
viour, but they continue to look to-
wards the heavens whittier He has as
cended. Now they understand all;
and their hearts, so recently gross and
carnal, break all earthly chains.
Let us with them raise our hearts to
heaven. Sursum corda! If Jesus
leaves us He does not forget us, nor
does He abandon us to our exile with
out hope. His going is not to put an
immense distance between His glory
and our misery; it is to prepare a
place for us: II go to prepare place
for you" John xiv. p. This is His
promise; can we suppose that He will
not keep it?
o Jesus, our only love! we have
need of hearing this good word fall
from Thy adorable lips to console us
in Thy absence. Thou goest to pre-
pare a place for us; is this world,
therefore, not our most suitable home?
All! no. 1t is too full of troubles to
give that joy to the heart to which
g it aspires; it is too narrow to satiate
the immensely of our desires; it is
too uncertain to give us any assur-
ance of eternal possession, the idea
of which is inseparable from all our
dreams of happiness. The eternal life
of God, His infinite projections, the
perfect love of God, the boundless
space which His immensely fills
this is the length and breadth and
depth" of which ST. Paul speaks; this
is the place to which we should direct
our course, and in which we should
anchor our bark of life, the place
which Jesus went to prepare for us.
He is there indeed. 1t is our hui
mainly which triumphs in His person
and sits at the right hand of God.
nf 10
ticipation in His glory and beatitude
we ought to be anxious to know where
it is and to register His victory in our
human records. If He belongs to God
He belongs to us also; if He is of the
divine substance He is also of our
flesh and blood, and we may we'll de-
clare with holy doctor: where a
part of me reigns, 1 believe reign
also; where my flesh is glorified, I
am glorifed; where my blood is King,
l too am king"
But listen, Christian! Jesus does
not wish to reduce you to the sterile
honor of knowing His triumph. By
His ascension He enters into the
bosom of God the Father, not as a
delegate, but as a precursor of hui
manity. This is the expression of st.
Paul in his sixth chapter to the He
brews. The precursor prepares the
way for those who follow Him, and
the place in which they are to rest
after the fatigue of the journey. The
precursor puts all things in order;
He waits for His friends and calls
them in. But how much more certain
and efficacious His Office is when, in
stead of being a servant merely, He is
Master of those for whom He prepares
a place, and Master of the place as
we'll!
Christ, our precursor, is all this.
Let us consider carefully the words of
the apostle. He teaches us that
Christ asserted our rights by His very
presence in the bosom of God. For
we are His property, and He has
right to enter into heaven with what
belongs to Him. "He is our head;
we are the body and members of that
head" But where the head is there
likewise ought to be the body and
the members. But Jesus would be
our precursor only halfway if, by His
action, He did not put us in condition
to realize our rights-that is to say
if He did not prepare God to receive
us and did not prepare us to take
possession of God.
He is our priest forever" or, in
other words, He presents eternally to
God the most sacred gifts that hui
mainly has to offer, and to humanity
the most sacred gifts of God. Our
acts of religion would never have PEN
etrated this sanctuary, in which they
ought to mark out place for us, if
they did not pass through the hands
of Jesus Christ. And IL we return to
God after our transgression, our re-
pentance is only acceptable because