The Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord concludes, or better to say completes, the period of the forty days which passed from the Day of the Resurrection. It was the span of time which was marked by appearances of the Risen Lord. He was coming to his disciples. He spoke to them. He ate with them. He consoled them. What wouldn’t we give for being there! What wouldn’t we give for such appearances today! We may think, or hope, that it would heal our doubt, that it would increase our faith. How strange it may sound that we prayed at the beginning of this Mass: ‘Gladden us with holy joys, almighty God, and make us rejoice with devout thanksgiving.’ Why should we be gladdened with holy joys or rejoice with devout thanksgiving at Jesus’ ‘departure’? If we love someone we don’t want the person to leave us, do we? If they do we are sad. On the contrary we are happy when people whom we dislike leave us, aren’t we? How does Jesus’ Ascension fit into this?
            My Dear Sisters and Brothers! The Ascension of the Lord moves our focus. First it moves our focus from our own issues to the mystery of heaven. We are like those disciples from the Acts ‘staring into the sky.’ There are lots of happenings in our life, happy or sad, which can cloud our vision, which can overpower our attention. The mystery of the Ascension faces us with a new horizon. Of course the sky above our heads is not the limit but the beginning of searching for something deeper and more profound. This is the explanation for our joy at Jesus’ ‘departure’: ‘for the Ascension of Christ… is our exaltation.’
Secondly the Ascension of the Lord after having focused us on the mystery of heaven moves us back to the mystery of our own life. Can you remember where the disciples saw the angels after ‘a cloud took Jesus from their sight’? The angles ‘were standing near them.’ The Gospel of Matthew, of which the final verses we have just heard, begins with the announcement to Joseph that the Son of his fiancée Mary will be Emmanuel which means God-is-with-us. The final words Matthew wrote in his Gospel are the words of Jesus who said: ‘Know that I am with you always; yes, to the end of time.’ He is not just in our thoughts. He is with us because he is in heaven. Because Jesus loves us to the end he is with us to the end. He is with us along all the way to the end. He has drawn the Holy Spirit into this presence as well. The Holy Spirit who fills him fills us as well. We become ‘his witnesses… to the ends of the earth.’ Look what is happening here: We don’t want to keep Jesus for our benefit but we give ourselves to Jesus and for the benefit of his mission. Do you have weak faith? Don’t despair! Look at the disciples from the Gospel for today. When they met Jesus on the mountain, just before his Ascension ‘some hesitated.’ It means they had doubts. How did Jesus deal with that? He gave them a mission, or to be more precise he had included them in his mission of saving people. He said: ‘As you go, make disciples of all the nations; baptise them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to observe all the commands I gave you.’ The disciples of the mountain of the Ascension were given a mission not because they were ready and strong. They were given a mission as a remedy to their doubts. Participating in the mission of Jesus was to heal them of their doubts. Participating in the mission of Jesus was to increase their faith.
This is the remedy Jesus offers us. If you find in yourself doubts and little faith ask yourself very concrete question: What can I do to help other people to grow in faith? How can I be a witness of Jesus to the people around me? If you dare to ask yourself these questions and if you dare to answer these questions you will find that your faith grows. This is what St John Paul II reminded all believers: ‘Faith is strengthened when it is given to others.’

Tomorrow, May 18, marks the birth centenary of St John Paul II. I would like to open this homily with a prayer which the little Karol Wojtyla was given by his father. It happened when as a nine year old boy he became an altar server in his parish church. However the little boy wasn’t very focused on his duties. He was rather unsettled. It was understandable as his mother had just died. His father watching him said: ‘You are not a good altar server. You need to pray to the Holy Spirit.’ Then he taught him a prayer which became a daily prayer of the little boy. In fact he prayed it daily as a high school student, as a university student, a seminarian, a priest, a bishop and Pope. In 1979 John Paul II shared this prayer with some young people. Please listen to the prayer which was so dear to the Pope:
Holy Spirit, I ask you for the gift of wisdom to come to know You and Your divine perfections better.
I ask you for the gift of understanding for a better grasp of the spirit of the mysteries of the Holy Faith.
I ask you for the gift of knowledge so that I could follow the principles of this Faith in my life.
I ask you for the gift of counsel, so that in all things I will seek counsel from you and will always find it in you.
I ask you for the gift of fortitude so that no anxiety or earthly motivations could take me away from you.
I ask you for the gift of piety, so that I could always serve your majesty with filial love.
I ask you for the gift of the fear of God so that I could always dread the sin that offends You, O God.
My Dear Sisters and Brothers! Today I have said this prayer because the prayer itself and the life situation which marked the future Pope learning it echo the Gospel reading for this sixth Sunday of Easter.
The Disciples from the Gospel were also facing a departure of someone they loved, someone who was their consoler, comforter and helper. For the Disciples it was Jesus Christ, whose arrest was imminent. However in that unsettling situation Jesus made a promise: ‘I shall ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you for ever, that Spirit of truth.’ When St John the Apostle wrote the Gospel he used the word: Paraclete which in Latin and many modern European languages was translated as Advocate. Both words focus on someone who is called or sent to assist another in their need, someone who makes the right judgment-call because he is close enough to the situation. This closeness was demonstrated when Jesus became Emmanuel, God-is-with-us. He is our Paraclete, our Advocate. This was what the Disciples enjoyed when they followed him.
When the time of Jesus’ passion and death was approaching he revealed that the Holy Spirit who descended upon him during his baptism had the same sentiments for the Disciples. Last Sunday we heard Jesus assuring that: ‘To have seen me is to have seen the Father.’ Every word Jesus spoke, every gesture he made, was that of his Father. The comfort, forgiveness, patience, support the Disciples found in Jesus were also expressions of the sentiments of the Heavenly Father for them.
When Jesus was about to be taken from the Disciples he revealed to them, and to us as well, that the Father, he and the Holy Spirit are on our side. In these days of Eastertide leading to the Solemnity of Pentecost I encourage you to hold fast onto faith that we are not orphans in this world.
In the course of our life we may farewell many people who were close to us. In the course of our life we may say a goodbye to many of our dreams and plans. In the course of our life we may even send off the positive image of ourselves, which we have tried to build over years. However the promised Paraclete, the promised Advocate will be with us forever. He will be with us forever in all those situations as our Paraclete, as our Advocate. The loses we experience are the spaces to be filled by him.
To finish this homily I would like to pass onto you the prayer which Karol Wojtyla Senior passed onto his nine-year-old son. From Thursday we will begin the ancient novena of Pentecost. This Novena was first held by the Disciples and Mary when they waited for the coming of the Holy Spirit in the Cenacle. I encourage you to hold the 2020 Pentecost Novena by praying the prayer, which was a daily prayer of St John Paul II, from this Thursday until Pentecost. I also hope that you may come to love this prayer so much that it will become your daily prayer too.

       It has been a month since we celebrated Easter Sunday. However the Gospel for today takes us to the day, or rather the night, when Jesus had the Last Supper with his disciples. Then Our Blessed Lord gave the Church the sacraments of the Eucharist and Holy Orders as well as the commandment of love. This Sunday we witness a conversation from the Last Supper, between Jesus and two of his disciples: Thomas and Philip. Should we block our ears in order not to eavesdrop on them?
            My Dear fellow disciples! Don’t block your ears bur rather pay a close attention to every word of this conversation. It is not a private conversation, though it is a personal conversation. It is as personal as the Eucharist is personal. It is personal because it makes us who we are as Christians. So let us gather the words of the conversation from the Holy Thursday night, which we have just heard.
            Answering Thomas Jesus said: ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.’  These are mysterious words, however their mystery reveals God to us and draws us into God.
The beginning of the sentence brings us into the moment when Moses saw a burning bush in the desert from which God revealed his name to him: ‘I Am Who I Am. Say this to the people of Israel: I Am has sent me to you.’ In the Cenacle there was no burning bush but there was the Son of God burning with love to save people.
            This Son of God burning with love to save people reveals himself: ‘I am the Way.’ He is the Way with a clear direction. He is the Way to the Father. This Chapter 14 of St John’s Gospel, which is the second chapter about the Last Supper, is filled with the language drawn from the family reality. It will be the language used by Jesus for the rest of the Last Supper. ‘I am the Way’ reveals to us that Jesus is going to the Father as the Son. ‘I am the Way’ reveals to us that this is our Way too to the Father, that this is the only Way to the Father. We can only go to the Father as his sons and daughters in Jesus Christ who is ‘the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.’ Jesus saves women and men by making them his brothers and sisters and thus bringing them to his Father as Father’s daughters and sons.
            This Son of God burning with love to save women and men by making them his sisters and brothers reveals himself: ‘I am the Truth.’ The following day, on Good Friday, Pilate asked Jesus: ‘Truth? What is that?’ He didn’t wait for Jesus’ answer. However soon he faced the answer when after having Jesus scourged he brought him out for everyone to see. Then Pilate said: ‘Here is the man.’ This man bitten and humiliated was the answer to Pilate’s question. St Albert Chmielowski, who was close to the heart of St John Paul II, produced a painting which captures that scene. The painting shows that the saint recognised what Pilate missed. The scarlet robe forms the shape of a heart because St Albert is his contemplation of the Gospel was struck by the insight that the bitten and humiliated Jesus was the revelation of God’s love. Jesus is the Truth. He reveals to us God’s love for us. The Truth is that God loves us. I invite you to spend some time before this image. I hope it can be engraved on your soul too. Accept the Father and Jesus’ love for you.
            This Son of God burning with love to save women and men by making them his sisters and brothers reveals himself: ‘I am the Life.’ Three days later, on Easter Sunday, He was the Life resurrected. He was the Life coming to his sisters and brothers to reassure them that nothing could kill God’s love for them. Neither Pilate nor their sins.
            My Dear Sisters and Brothers! We have listened attentively to words of Jesus from the Last Supper. They are personal words. They are personal for Jesus. They are personal for us. Can it be otherwise? They reveal that He is ‘the Way, the Truth and the Life.’ They reveal also who we are so that with faith, hope and love we can say after St John: ‘We have come to know and to believe in the love God has for us.’ This love has the name and the face of Jesus.

            Three weeks ago, on Holy Saturday, the Shroud of Turin, was displayed for veneration to bring comfort to the humanity suffering from coronavirus. Although the pilgrims were prevented from visiting the church the livestream connected the venerable Italian shrine preserving this precious relic with houses, apartments, hospitals, nursing homes and many other places to which people were confined due to the pandemic. We could say that the words of Jesus: ‘If anyone wants to follow after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me’ were fulfilled. In our Christian imagination we saw our Blessed Lord, whose suffering is made visible in the Shroud, appearing in the midst  of the multitude of suffering women and men to invite them to follow him in suffering and death.
            My Dear Sisters and Brothers! The Shroud of Turin reveals to us the extent of Jesus’ suffering. The scientists who have studies the Shroud have been able to identify nearly every single wound and scratch imprinted on the Body of our Saviour. I don’t want to focus on these studies today. Instead I want to focus on what still leaves the scientists dumbfounded: how the Body was removed from the Shroud and how the image was imprinted on this long piece of linen. It looks that the Body somehow rather evaporated.
Here St Peter comes to our help with his announcement made at Pentecost: ‘God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ.’ What was Peter saying that Jesus was made Lord and Christ? Did he say that God gave a posthumous award to Jesus who was crucified? Let us listen to another sentence from that announcement of St Peter: ‘God raised this man Jesus to life, and all of us are witnesses to that.’ God didn’t give Jesus a posthumous award. God raised Jesus to life so that as Lord and Christ he could appear after his Resurrection. That’s what Peter and his fellow Apostles announced at Pentecost. That’s what the Shroud of Turin silently bears witness to. Jesus Christ is risen. He is not an inspiring episode in the history of humankind. He is not a tragic figure caught in unjust political and religious polemics of antiquity. He is risen. He is life giving. Therefore after 2000 years after those saving events of Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday we, like so many generations of Christians before us, say in response to his Resurrection: ‘The Lord is my shepherd... Near restful waters he leads me, to revive my drooping spirit. He guides me along the right path; he is true to his name.’ The words which for centuries were a prayer and a faith profession of the People of Israel when they turned their thoughts and hearts to God we, Christians, have made our own prayer and faith profession which arises from our thoughts and hearts filled with the power of our Lord’s Resurrection.
The sheep follow a shepherd not a thought or an idea of a shepherd.
We follow the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ, not a thought or an idea of someone kind and nice from 2000 years ago.
That’s why ‘walking in the valley of darkness’ which we experience these days we can say with faith and confidence: ‘no evil would I fear. You, my Risen Lord and Christ, are there with your crook and your staff, with these you give me comfort.’
My Dear fellow believers!
If you are a visualizer I encourage you to find an image of the Shroud of Turin. Absorb the gentle and life giving glow of the Resurrection radiating from it.
If you are an audile I encourage you to read aloud the words of St Peter from the Acts of the Apostles 2: 22-41. Be infused with joyous and firm testimony of those disciples who saw Jesus after his Resurrection, who ate and drank with him and who also witnessed his Ascension.
When three weeks ago the Shroud of Turin was displayed it was a manifestation of the Resurrection in the midst of our suffering. This manifestation was not a odds  with the reality of our suffering but in a merciful way invited us to unite our suffering with Jesus’ so that we could also experience his Resurrection.