Fr Rory Writes

The Feast of the Ascension

There is simply great reward in giving this Feast all the care and attention that is possible for us.  During these troubled times due to the coronavirus implications, it well rewards our great attention and that bit of extra effort.  Visualise what it was like for those disciples, as this takes place.  In prayer we say,

“Let us lift up our hearts.  Let us raise them up to the Lord our God”

As the disciples looked on, their hearts were drawn up towards Heaven.  The seasons of Lent and Easter, especially for me this year, concentrated my attention through the mass, the divine office, the rosary, and the other prayers.  Today the office of readings, a long discourse on the Psalms by St Augustine Bishop is really worthwhile so please give it your care and attention.  I highlighted this because it can be a great foundation for our lives of faith in the church as we move forward, and please God, overcome the virus.  To continue with the words of St Augustine: –

Our thoughts in this present life should turn on the promise of God, because it is in praising Him that we shall rejoice forever in the life of God, and no one can be ready for the next life unless he trains himself for it now.  So, we praise God during our earthly life, and in the same time we make our petitions to him.  Our praise is expressed with joy, our petitions with yearning.  We have been promised something we do not yet possess, and because the promise was made by one who keeps his word, we trust in Him and are glad, but in so far as possession is delayed, we can only long and yearn for it.  It is good for us to persevere in longing until we receive what is promised, and yeaning is over; then praise alone will remain.

Lent                                                                                                   Easter

Because there are these two periods of time, in the one that is now, beset with the trials and troubles of this life, and the other yet to come.  A life of everlasting serenity and joy, we are given two liturgical seasons.  One before Easter and the other after.  The season before Easter signifies the troubles in which we live here and now, while the time after Easter, which we are celebrating at present, signifies the happiness that will be ours in the future. 

Both these periods are expressed and demonstrated for us in Christ Our Lord.  The Lord’s passion depicts for us our present life and trial – shows how we must suffer and be afflicted and finally die.  The Lord’s resurrection and glorification show us the life that will be given to us in the future.

Now (therefore) brethren, we urge you to praise God.  That is what we are all telling each other, when we sing Alleluia.  You say to your neighbour “Praise the Lord” and he says the same to you.  We are all urging one another to praise the Lord, and all thereby doing what each urges the other to do.  But see that your praise comes from your whole being in other words, see that you praise God not with your lips and voices alone, but with your minds, your lives and all your actions.

We are pleasing God now, assembled as we are her in the church, but when we go on our various ways it seems as if we cease to Praise God.  But provided we do not cease to live a good life; we shall always be praising God.

You cease to praise God only when you swerve from justice, and from what is pleasing to God.  If you never turn aside from the good life, your tongue may be silent but your actions will cry aloud, and God will perceive your intentions; for as your ears hear each other’s voices, so God’s ears hear our thoughts.