Today is the Feast of the Ascension. This Feast is when Jesus disappears but does not really depart because of his promise that his Spirit will remain for the work he has given his disciples to do. I suspect that the disciples had to learn how to recognize the Spirit within them, just as each of us has had to learn to recognize the movements of the Spirit within us.

We have followed Jesus and his disciples from Holy Thursday when Jesus tried to tell his friends that he was about to embark on a journey, but they did not understand. Jesus knew this and so he told them he would send his advocate to be with them, but again they really did not know what he was talking about.

And we are just like those disciples of Jesus. Just as they lived through the realities of those days after the Last Supper, so we live through the journey we have been given. But it seems to me that we have one advantage. Each year we enter into the days of Holy Week, from Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday to Easter Sunday knowing how it all turned out. The disciples and Jesus’ friends had to come to know this by living through it.

And now, we come to the Ascension when he gathers a few of them again and tells them once more that his Spirit will be with them as they continue his work. And once more, we know the next step of this event that the disciples did not know. We know that the Spirit did come in a profoundly tangible way and the Acts of the Apostles verifies this. Remember Peter during the passion denied Jesus three times, and in the Acts of the Apostles we can read that wonderful passage when Peter says: “Neither silver nor gold do I have, but what I have I give you”.

So, our work is just like those disciples, and there are people who share their insights with us in a way that strengthens us for the journey. I would like to share a few of those insights that have helped me to understand God’s plan for us.

The first one I want to mention is Walter Wink, a theologian who has written several books about Jesus. His thought is that Jesus came to show us how to be truly human. Jesus confronted many types of authorities and mindsets in his travels, and yet he responded to individuals in ways unheard of by the people of the time. You know the stories—the woman caught in adultery, the Syro-Phoenician woman who changed his mission because Jesus was willing to dialogue with her, the man born blind, and the time he gave food to a hungry person on the Sabbath. In his books, Wink tells us that we haven’t even begun to understand the height and the depth of becoming truly human. All we have to do is to read the newspapers and see the news on television, or at times to search the depth of our own hearts, to know that he is right.

The second person I want to name is a writer. I watched the last edition of “Bill Moyer’s Journal”. Moyer told the audience that he chose very carefully from all kinds of wonderful possibilities to ask the writer, Barry Lopez, to be the last person he would interview for this program. I was deeply moved by this man who told us that his Jesuit education “awakened in him a capacity for metaphor”. In his experience of visiting many cultures and countries, he kept listening for the metaphor that came to his mind as he heard the words of those he met. At one moment in the program Bill asked him, “What is the passion that drives you to write the way you do?” Barry thought for a moment, and then he said:”I do it for the sake of humanity.” He said that he cared deeply about making a difference in the lives of those who read his books and that his effort is about the recovery of a sense of reverence for life. And as I listened to him I thought about how Jesus used parables in talking with hose who gathered to listen to him during his public life.

And finally, I just made my retreat using Barbie Bowe’s book, Biblical Foundations of Spirituality. What a gift she has given us! I had 8 days to ponder the scripture she selected, to probe my own heart, and to take time with Barbie’s insights about those scripture passages. Every page of that book was about reading scripture with a view to reflect on how we act because of it. Several years ago Barbie had come to Miami to give a talk on Paul and she told us how much she loved Paul. In the chapter about him she agreed with Paul, that our lives should make a difference about building up the community whether it is those with whom we live and work, or the Church, or the People of God wherever we gather. And is this not what our Constitutions call us to do?

This Easter journey continues for us just like it continued for the disciples. And so we look forward to the Feast of Pentecost, so that we might celebrate the presence of the Spirit always urging us to complete what each one of us is to do to build the Kingdom of God.

Rosemary Bearss
Area Directors Meeting, May 15, 2010