Concluding Rites: Sent Out on Mission
These Sundays in Easter we’ve been reflecting on the ways God is at work in the Mass. Even when it doesn’t look or feel like it, there’s so much happening at Mass. God is always working to transform us into the Body of Christ for the world! In the Introductory Rites, God invites, we gather. In the Liturgy of the Word, God speaks, we listen. In the Liturgy of the Eucharist, God gives, we receive. Now, on Ascension Sunday, it’s fitting that we reflect on the Concluding Rites: God sends, we go.
Mass isn’t a town hall meeting or a seminar or a play. We don’t end Mass with, “Alright, same time next week!” or a round of applause or by just getting up and leaving. “Mass” comes from the Latin root word missio – mission, sending. We’re not meant to just wander back into the “real world.” We’re people on a mission. We are sent out to do something. That’s why Mass concludes with a blessing and a dismissal (there’s that missio word again!). The dismissal usually sounds something like this: Go forth, the Mass is ended … Go and announce the Gospel of the Lord… Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life… Go in peace…
What’s the common thread? A simple, two-letter action verb: Go! Let that word reverberate into your soul at every Mass you attend. You’re not just leaving, you’re not just carrying on with your day… you’re being sent out on a mission! And it’s the same mission the disciples received as Jesus ascended into heaven: “All power in heaven and on 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.” In other words: Go and do the things that I did!
Sometimes we think that faith is just about following rules we barely understand. Sometimes we think that faith is just a decoration for our identity. Sometimes we think that all Jesus really wants is for us to be nice. Sometimes we think that our “faith life” should be separated from our “professional life,” “political life,” or “family life.” But that’s not the faith that the Lord equipped the disciples for. Jesus didn’t call His disciples to be private, individualized, or disconnected. He sent them out for much greater things! All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me… Now I give it to YOU! Go out into the world and share my good news!
Our faith is incomplete if it does not compel us to go outward – out of our comfort zone, out of self-interest and into service, out of isolation and into community, out of complacency and into deeper holiness, out of exclusivity and into greater inclusion. This is what we call evangelization. Sharing the good news: God is real. Hope is real. God is for us. God is with us. God wants us to be truly alive. The Ascension reminds us that, even though He no longer walks on two feet on this earth, Jesus is always with us. Even though His ministry in first-century Galilee is over, Jesus’ mission in the world carries on through us, guided by the Advocate (the Holy Spirit). We go to Mass to participate in this mission.
United by our gathering, heartened by our listening, and nourished by our receiving, we are sent out into the world to help others encounter the heights and depths of God’s love. God does not call you to be a passive bystander in life. Even now – at whatever stage of life – the Lord is calling YOU to share in Christ’s mission. That’s what the Ascension is all about. That’s what the Concluding Rites are all about. That’s what Mass (missio) is all about.
