May 21st

Dear Friends,

After Jesus rose from the dead he appeared to his disciples on and off over the course of forty days. This weekend we mark His return to the right hand of God the Father, the feast of the Ascension. With His Ascension, Christ’s presence has passed into the Sacraments of the Church- this is where we know we can find Him, where we can encounter Him. Of course, His presence is not limited to the Sacraments. We often encounter Him in our relationships, and in the Scriptures, and in the poor. As Members of Christ’s Body, we ourselves can transmit the presence of Jesus through our words and deeds, as we live out our own discipleship. Jesus’ final words in Matthew’s Gospel are powerful and important:
“All power in heaven and earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold: I am with you always, until the end of the age.”

On this Feast of the Ascension I have a wonderful announcement to make regarding our own need for ascending… ascending our church stairs: I signed a contract with the architect who will work with us to install a vertical platform lift at our Nativity of Our Lord church. Our hope is to have this up and running by Christmas. We will have a sidewalk level entrance on the front of the church leading to a small vestibule, where the lift will be accessed. People will exit from the space that is currently being used as the reconciliation room (I’ll have to find another spot for hearing confessions). A vertical platform lift is much less expensive than all of the elevator options we investigated, and I believe it will serve our purposes just fine. The only downside is that it will not accommodate coffins- we’ll still need to carry those up the stairs. I’ll have more information about design and pricing in the coming weeks, but couldn’t pass up letting you know about this on this particular feast day!

May your week reflect the encounter with Christ
we experienced at Mass today!