Dear Parish Family,
The Sunday after Ascension Day. The Sunday before Pentecost. Behind us is the life of Jesus, his death, his mighty resurrection and glorious ascension. In front of us is the unknown, the very new thing that God will do among his people. Living in the ‘threshold of uncertainty’ is very challenging! All of us are living through such times only difference is the intensity. How do the disciples feel in this sort of no-man’s land in time?
They don’t know how long they’re going to be there in the upper room where they were told to go . All they know is that in his physical form Jesus seems to have finally left them – taken up in the brilliance of the light of heaven – and that he has told them to wait in Jerusalem where God will come to them in a new way. What did they talk about? The revelation that the Mother of God was with them might give us an insight into an expectation.
The disciples were ordinary folk from the surrounding villages around a small town called Capernaum, some fishermen who were engaged in a lucrative but challenging job. Then Jesus, told them to follow him and they did – they just did. They followed and saw and heard and experienced things they sometimes can still hardly believe. And they loved him, they still do. All of them at some point or another they all said they’d be willing to die for him yet all of them failed him, some more spectacularly than others.
They lived through the tension, the mounting danger and the terrible execution that ended the life of their Lord in Jerusalem. They’ve lived with that terrible sense of loss and grief when life had no meaning or purpose, and their hearts were heavy, dreading the bleak future ahead of them. Then the light of resurrection exploded around them. Jesus was alive again, talking with them, eating with them, teaching them. His appearances were unpredictable and sometimes very brief but after the initial shock none of them doubted the reality of his resurrection. But his appearance and disappearance trained them to expect a time of another parting.
Two things we can learn from them as they waited anxiously for the future. Both these are explained to us in the Gospel narrative taken from what the scholars call the ‘high priestly prayer of Christ’. During the Holy Mass there is a prayer before we sing the Holy, Holy which is called the Preface. This prayer Jesus prayed is very similar in character as what follows is very central for coming to earth – to die on the cross to save mankind. He calls this ‘the glory’ because through this act of surrender to the Father’s grace flows into every believer, just like the rays pierce through the clouds and we say it is glorious, as the sun is shining and we can look at the light!
Again the disciples together with Mary were engaged in prayer. In anxious moments we need to bow in prayer not in doubt, not in fear but in faith. It is only in this track of expectation and prayer that we can experience the day of Pentecost, whenever that ‘immersed with grace’ event comes to us.