Ascension: Nine Fruits and Benefits

1. The bringing down of divine love: "For if I go not, the Paraclete will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you." John 16:7

2. Better knowledge of God: "If you loved Me, you would indeed be glad, because I go to the Father: for the Father is greater than I." John 14:28 As Augustine says: "Therefore I take away this form of a slave, in which the Father is greater than I, in order that you may in another manner see God the Spirit."

3. The merit of faith. As Saint Leo says: "Then a more enlightened faith begins to march with the stride of the spirit toward the Son in His equality with the Father, and no longer needs to handle Christ in His corporeal substance, in which He is less than the Father."

4. Our confidence. Christ ascended to be our advocate with the Father: "We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the just, and He is the propitiation for our sins." 1 John 2:1-2

5. Our own dignity. By the ascension our own nature is irrevocably exalted above all creation, even to the stature of the right hand of God.

6. Firmness of our hope. Saint Leo says: "Christ's Ascension is our exaltation; and whither the glory of the Head hath gone before, thither the hope of the body tendeth also."

7. Pointing out the way. "He shall go up that shall open the way before them." Micah 2:13

8. Opening of the gates of Heaven. "Tu devicto mortis aculeo, Thou, having conquered the sting of death, hast opened the Kingdom of Heaven to them that believe!"

9. Preparation of our place in Heaven: "I go to prepare a place for you." John 14:3 Augustine says: "Lord, prepare what Thou preparest; for Thou preparest us for Thyself and Thyself for us, when Thou preparest a place for Thyself in us and for us in Thyself."

Cf. The Golden Readings of the Saints

Cf. The Golden Legend of Jacobus de Voragine, Part One, London: Longmans, 1941, 292-294.

Bishop Barron on the Ascension

According to Scripture, Heaven and Earth are not Two Separate Metaphysical Spaces