Jesus wants us to have the oneness he has with the Father! And how the devil has sought to destroy the unity of God’s people! Christians are divided by ethnicity, nationality, economics, sexuality, and doctrine––just to mention some of the most significant. How can we be one? In our fractured world, what could possibly be a unifier? The simple answer is another of the desires we hear from Jesus: Consecrate them in your truth.
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The Ascension of Jesus from the realms of earth to the realm of heaven tells us more about him. As well, it tells us about ourselves, our own lives and prospects. 

 Our belief in the Ascension is really rooted in our faith in the Resurrection. And as a matter of fact, the Incarnation and the Ascension are like corollaries—they go side by side. Just as in the Incarnation, Christ humbled himself and took our human flesh, at the Ascension, he now picks up all the glory that he poured into us at the Incarnation. That’s why this feast reminds that our faith in Christ is not in vain. 

Early Christians went back and took this word out of mothballs, and they dusted it off and they reintroduced it to describe God’s love. Because really, how can you “love God” the same way you “love chocolate”? You just can’t do it. You need a bigger, better word for love. And so they introduced this word agapeo. Some linguists have described this as “love which seeks the best for the other, even at the expense of yourself.” 

People need to know who Jesus is and what God has done in the death and resurrection of his Son. The Church needs faithful preachers. Parishes need faithful teachers. But beyond the roles that are rooted so visibly in the Church, every person who owns the name of Christ needs to be showing (and when possible, telling) the wonder of belonging to God through Jesus Christ.
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Although there’s much in our world to cause us fear and anxiety, we know Jesus walks into our Upper Room, where we have locked away our hopes, our fears ,and our anxieties, he walks into that Upper Room and boldly, quietly proclaims, ‘Peace be with you.’ So that you and I, together with Thomas, can look confidently to the Lord and say, ‘My Lord and my God, show me the way.' 

The ‘new’ Thomas is really where we want to be as believers in the risen Christ. Yes, as humans, sometimes we will have anxieties, we will have worries, we will have concerns, we will have fears, but like Thomas, we should be able to say, ‘My Lord and my God.’ That is faith in the risen Christ—the ability to totally surrender, even when reason cannot capture it.

The message of Easter is that the very Life of God breaks into our world––this world where there is little escape from fear and sadness. It seems there is no escape…. unless there is something bigger and stronger and longer lasting. The Resurrection of Jesus Christ is God shouting into our wolrd that death itself is not greater than the Life available to us in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
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