Image: Ascension II
© Jan Richardson
Reading from the Gospels, Ascension Day (often celebrated the Sunday after): Luke 24:44-53
On this Ascension Day, I am struck all over again by how, in Luke’s account of the Ascension, he tells us that as Jesus is leaving the disciples—and the earthly life (and death, and life) he has known with them—he blesses them. With this last gesture, this final word, Jesus acknowledges that blessing and leaving are deeply bound together, and that love somehow endures within every aching distance that happens in this life.
This is a wondrous and difficult grace.
Jesus is not trying to sugarcoat his leaving. He is not giving his beloved disciples a blessing as a consolation prize for having come through these wild years with him, only to see him go. Instead, with this blessing, Jesus shows that the substance of grief is also the substance of love. They are made of the same stuff. If we can stay with both the grief and the love, the love will become more clear, and more clarifying. In time, it will show us the way to go.
Blessing the Distance
It is a mystery to me
how as the distance
between us grows,
the larger this blessing
becomes,
as if the shape of it
depends on absence,
as if it finds its form
not by what
it can cling to
but by the space
that arcs
between us.
As this blessing
makes its way,
first it will cease
to measure itself
by time.
Then it will release
how attached it has become
to this place
where we have lived,
where we have learned
to know one another
in proximity and
presence.
Next this blessing
will abandon
the patterns
in which it moved,
the habits that helped it
recognize itself,
the familiar pathways
it traced.
Finally this blessing
will touch its fingers
to your brow,
your eyes,
your mouth;
it will hold
your beloved face
in both its hands,
and then
it will let you go;
it will loose you
into your life;
it will leave
each hindering thing
until all that breathes
between us
is blessing
and all that beats
between us
is grace.
—Jan Richardson
from Circle of Grace: A Book of Blessings for the Seasons
P.S. I want to let you know about this online event happening this Saturday with Cranaleith Spiritual Center:
Bearing the Light in Unbearable Times: A Conversation with Jan Richardson
Online via Zoom, 12-2pm EDT
(In-Person Watch Party available at Cranaleith, Philadelphia)
I am so looking forward to this online event offered by Cranaleith Spiritual Center on May 16! As fractures in our society continue to widen, how do we tend what is broken without losing heart? This conversation will explore how we might become bearers of healing light in a broken world, trusting that even in places of deep rupture, light is already at work, not erasing the scars, but shining through them. We would love for you to join us from wherever you are!
Info & registration: https://cranaleith.secure.retreat.guru/program/bearing-the-light-in-unbearable-times-a-conversation-with-jan-richardson
If you have any questions, please contact Cranaleith Spiritual Center, and they will be glad to help.
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Using Jan’s artwork
To use the image Ascension II, please visit this page at janrichardsonimages.com.
Using Jan’s words
For worship services and related settings, you are welcome to use Jan’s blessings or other words from this blog without requesting permission. All that’s needed is to acknowledge the source. Please include this info in a credit line: “© Jan Richardson from Circle of Grace: A Book of Blessings for the Seasons. janrichardson.com.” For other uses, visit Copyright Permissions.
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