Heavenward
May 30, 2019
The Ascension of Christ, Hans Süss von Kulmbach
Certainly it is odd, a “hard saying,” that Jesus rose by His own power into the sky — the Ascension celebrated today — and was bodily assumed into heaven. You can imagine the oddness of it by gazing at the faces in this great painting. But is a miracle any odder, really, than the existence of everything?
That God can work miracles, cannot be denied. God has made the laws of nature, and at any time it pleases Him, He can suddenly suspend them, and that God has at times done so, we have more solid and undeniable proofs than we have for the most renowned and best authenticated facts of history; for far more witnesses testify to miracles, the whole world has believed them, and been converted by them; these miracles have been sworn to by far more credible witnesses; more than eleven millions of martyrs have died to confirm and maintain their truth; no one gives up his life for lies and deceptions; the Jews and pagans have admitted them, but have ascribed them not to God, but to witchcraft and the power of demons; and precisely by this did they prove and acknowledge the truth of miracles, because in order to deny them, they were driven to false and absurd explanations of them. [Source]
It was by the energizing force of this miracle that the whole world would come to learn of God on earth. Many believed because they witnessed it and others because the testimony of witnesses was so convincing and their sincerity not in doubt.
When Christ rose into heaven before many witnesses, He took His human nature with Him. And therefore by this miracle, we too rose in our supernatural potential.
[B]y His ascension He teaches us, though dwelling on earth, to raise ourselves in thought and desire to heaven, confessing that we are “pilgrims and strangers on the earth,” seeking a country, ” fellow citizens with the saints, and the domestics of God,” for, says the same Apostle, “our conversation is in heaven.” [Source]
But why are there so few miracles today to help us believe?
Because the Church is no longer in need of such extraordinary testimony to the truth of her teachings. Thus St. Augustine writes: “He who in the face of the conversion of the world to Christianity demands miracles, and strives to doubt those which have been wrought in favor of this most wonderful change, is himself an astonishing miracle of irrationality and stupidity;’ and St. Chrysostom says: “The question is sometimes asked: How happens it there are no miracles now-a-days? The answer is, because the knowledge of Christ is propagated all over the earth, and the Church is like a tree which, having once taken deep root and grown to a certain height, no longer needs to be carefully watered and supported.” [Source]
