Ascension of Our Lord

All four Gospel writers as well as St. Paul make it clear that the period of the risen Jesus's appearances was limited. St. Luke concludes his Gospel with "Then [Jesus] led [the disciples] out as far as Bethany, and lifting up his hands he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them, and was carried up into heaven. And they worshiped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple blessing God." Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) explains,

"Ascension" does not mean departure into a remote region of the cosmos but, rather, the continuing closeness that the disciples experience so strongly that it becomes a source of lasting joy....The departing Jesus does not make his way to some distant star. He enters into communion of power and life with the living God, into God"s dominion over space. Hence he has not "gone away," but now and forever by God's own power he is present with us and for us. [Jesus of Nazareth, Part Two, pp. 281, 283]

St. Luke (Acts of the Apostles) locates the Ascension on the Mount of Olives, forty days after Easter. Today on the Mount of Olives, just down the road from Bethany and Bethphage, is the Convent of Pater Noster. The cave at the center of its courtyard was, in pre-Constantinian tradition, where Jesus would seek refuge, teach his disciples, and was associated with his Ascension. Eusebius reports that Constantine built three churches over three caves which were sites of the three chief mysteries of the faith: the stable in Bethlehem, the tomb cave near Golgotha, and the Ascension here. Helena built the first church dedicated in 334, the apse of which can be seen in the cave, using the title “Church of the Disciples and of the Ascension.”  When the focus of the Ascension moved further up the hill to the Mosque of the Ascension, the significance of this cave was increasingly associated with the teaching of Jesus, then specifically the giving of the Lord’s Prayer. In 1102 a pilgrim reported a marble plaque with the Lord’s Prayer and in 1170 another pilgrim likewise saw a Greek inscription beneath the altar. The sisters are trying to post the Lord’s Prayer in every language of the world and are now approaching 200.  The Aramaic of Jesus is just outside the cave.