Thought for the week - 1 May 2008

Ascension Day

Today is Ascension Day. It used to be a public holiday and was very much in everyone’s consciousness but has now almost disappeared from view. It still pops up here and there: as in one of my favourite pieces of stained glass which is a brave attempt to depict it. At the bottom of the window is a group of people looking upwards. As you look up the window you see what it is upon which their attention is fixed: a pair of feet. There is nothing else at all on the window except a cloud into which the feet are disappearing.

It is sad that the significance of the Ascension has been largely lost since, for Christians, it is as crucial  as the resurrection which we celebrate at Easter.  Its importance is connected to the empty tomb. The gospel writers are very keen to make absolutely clear that the risen Jesus is not a ghost. This is why they include accounts of him eating and drinking.  Just as the scriptures are clear that the risen body of Jesus was real and fleshly and not just spiritual they also press home the fact that it was this whole body, flesh and spirit, that ascended to God.  

Christianity is unique among the major religions in taking the material so seriously, teaching that the spiritual and material belong together and cannot be separated – in this world or the next.  This gives Christians cause for hope and celebration for it means that, just as God came to share in our humanity so, too, he calls that humanity – all of it –  to share in his divinity. We have hope for an embodied eternal future with God.

The Rt Revd Dr John Inge

Bishop of Worcester