It's 40 days after Easter. Is it the Ascension?

Liturgically, that depends on where you live.

Thursday marks 40 days after Easter, which the Church observes as the Solemnity of the Ascension.

“The Ascension.” Pietro Perugino, 1510. public domain.

Traditionally, the Ascension is a day of precept, meaning Catholics are required to attend Mass.

But after a change to canon law — and a 1998 decree from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops — many U.S. dioceses have transferred the observance of the Ascension to the seventh Sunday of Easter, meaning that many U.S. Catholics are not obliged to attend Mass on Thursday.

Except, of course, for Catholics who live in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, or Vermont. In those places, the solemnity is observed on the actual Thursday, where it remains a holy day of obligation.

So why the confusion? It's complicated.

As your questions “ascend” about the Ascension, The Pillar’s got some down-to-earth answers.

Just so we're clear… What's the Ascension?

Celebrated 40 days after Easter, the Ascension commemorates Jesus Chirst’s ascension into heaven, as his apostles watched from the Mount of Olives. Read Acts 1: 6-11 to learn all about it.

Before he ascended into heaven, Christ reminded his apostles of the great commission to be his “witnesses,” and he affirmed that the Holy Spirit would be present with the Church.

Then, “a cloud took Him into the sky” so he could take his place at the right hand of the Father in Heaven.

St. John Paul II eloquently expressed the significance of this feast day in his 1979 Feast of the Ascension homily, in which he urged Catholics to “be imbued with the hope that is so much a part of the mystery of the Ascension of Jesus.”

“Be deeply conscious of Christ’s victory and triumph over sin and death. Realize that the strength of Christ is greater than our weakness, greater than the weakness of the whole world… Renew your faith today in the promise of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has gone to prepare a place for us, so that he can come back again and take us to himself,” the former pope taught.

So, yeah, it’s an important feast day.

How has the Church celebrated this feast day in the past?

In the fourth century, Christians built the Church of the Disciples on top of the Mount of Olives to mark the site of Christ’s Ascension. Three centuries later, Persians destroyed it. But in the 12th century, Crusaders rebuilt the octagonal Chapel of the Ascension to mark the site.

But the chapel was converted soon after into a mosque.

Today, the Islamic Waqf of Jerusalem controls the Chapel of the Ascension, which is open to visitors. There, pilgrims flock to the center of the chapel, where a bedrock stone has an imprint which piety has long claimed to an impression of Christians own foot.

Liturgically, Christians have commemorated the Feast of the Ascension since the fifth century.

In the eyes of the Church, Easter ranks as the highest feast day of the liturgical year, followed in importance by four solemnities - the Nativity of the Lord, the Epiphany, Pentecost and, yep, the Ascension.

To commemorate this significant feast day, the feast of the Ascension was for 1,500 years customarily preceded by “Rogation Days” — three days of fasting and prayer meant to prepare Catholics for the feast.

Hold up… What are Rogation Days? Never heard of ‘em.

Great question.

“Rogation” is derived from the Latin word “rogare” — which means “to ask.” So “Rogation Days” are really “asking days.”

An ancient custom dating back to the fifth century, Rogation Days began when Saint Mamertus, bishop of Vienne, France, set aside four days in his diocesan calendar to petition God for bountiful fields, the protection of livestock, and the blessing of laborers.

The Rogation Days took place on two separate occasions: Major Rogation was commemorated on April 25, and Minor Rogation on the three days preceding the Ascension.

Traditionally, the days were marked by processions in which Catholics would chant the Litany of Mercy, the Litany of the Saints and other prayers asking for God’s intercession.

Those processions would follow the route of parish boundaries, as the parish priest would bless trees, rocks, fields and other landmarks along the path.

Processions would be followed by the celebration of a special Rogation Mass asking for God’s mercy and protection.

Alongside the Masses and processions, Catholics fast, and make time for additional prayer, as a way to petition for God’s mercy and favor.

The revised 1969 “General Norms of the Liturgical Year and Calendar” included the celebration of Rogation Days — but stated that local bishops' conferences could change the time and manner in which the days were celebrated to fit local needs.

Since the revision, Rogation Days have largely fallen out of practice in the United States, although some rural parishes continue to recognize them.

So why are Rogation Days connected to the Ascension?

As a bishop, Saint Mamertus held Rogation Days on the three days leading up to the Ascension to encourage his flock to spiritually prepare for the solemnity through prayer and fasting.

By some accounts, Saint Mamertus also chose the rogation’s timing as a response to the ancient Roman tradition of Robigalia. Robigalia was a Roman feast day on which farmers would pray and offer sacrifices to the pagan gods for good weather and bountiful crops before the coming harvest season.

If the feast of the Ascension is so important, why is it not a holy day of obligation?

Well, according to canon law, it is meant to be a holy day of obligation.

Canon 1246 §1 identifies Sunday as the “primordial holy day of obligation” and lists a series of other feast days that Catholics must observe as a holy day of obligation, including the Nativity of the Lord, the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, All Saints Day, and the Ascension.

But canon 1246 §2 allows that, “with the prior approval of the Apostolic See, the conference of bishops can suppress some of the holy days of obligation or transfer them to a Sunday.”

Thus, bishops conferences, with the Holy See’s approval, could vote to transfer certain holy days to the nearest Sunday.

So the U.S. bishops’ conference voted to move the Feast of the Ascension to the seventh Sunday of Easter?

Correct.

Sort of.

In November 1998, the U.S. bishops’ conference approved a plan that would allow U.S. ecclesiastical provinces to transfer the liturgical observance of the Ascension from Thursday to the following Sunday.

It had taken the bishops several tries to approve that plan — it had been brought before the conference a few times during the 1990s, but did not get approval from two-thirds of the voting bishops until the fall USCCB meeting of 1998.

After the bishops approved the plan, the Vatican’s Congregation for Divine Worship gave it an ok in 1999, and several provinces began moving the feast to Sunday.

The USCCB was not the first to get Vatican permission for a transfer. With a Vatican ok, the Church in Australia moved the feast to Sunday in 1992, and some countries in Europe followed suit. While dioceses in England and Wales moved the feast to Sunday in 2007, bishops in 2018 moved it back to Thursday.

Wait, you said province, not diocese. What is a province?

An ecclesiastical province, or a metropolitan province, is a group of dioceses (suffragan sees) that are affiliated with an archdiocese (metropolitan see). Provinces in the US are usually confined to state lines with a few exceptions, such as the province of Boston encompassing dioceses in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont.

Since 1998, ecclesiastical provinces in the U.S. have been free to transfer the liturgical feast of the Ascension to the Sunday following, the seventh Sunday of Easter.

After the Holy See approved the USCCB’s request to allow individual provinces to move the celebration of the solemnity to Sunday, provinces across the United States began discussing whether or not to move the feast.

Some immediately moved the Solemnity to Sunday, while others waited years to do — with the province of Baltimore transferring the feast in 2002 and the province of Newark transferring the Solemnity of the Ascension in 2022.

So why do some dioceses observe the traditional feast day, celebrating the Ascension on Thursday?

The bishops in each province, as a council, determine whether or not to observe the Ascension as a Holy Day of Obligation, as stated by the 1998 decree.

Each council has various reasons for deciding to transfer the solemnity to Sunday or observe it on Thursday. For instance, a statement published on the Archdiocese of Omaha’s website explains that the province celebrates feast day so that local Catholics can celebrate the paradox of the Ascension.

“By marking this a holy day, the Church teaches us that Christ definitively has not left us orphans. Not only does He send the Holy Spirit upon the apostles at Pentecost and upon us in Baptism and Confirmation, He continues to communicate His presence to men and women in every era and in radically different cultures and circumstances through His body, the Church.”

Are other feasts moved in the United States?

Yes. The dioceses of the United States observe the solemnity of Corpus Christi on a Sunday instead of on a Thursday, and observe Epiphany on a Sunday instead of on Jan. 6, its customary date of observance.

Some other days of obligation — the Solemnity of Mary, the Assumption, and All Saints’ Day, lose their perceptive character if they fall on a Saturday or a Monday.

So who has to go to Mass on Thursday?

Anybody can go to Mass on Thursday to celebrate the Ascension, but only a few provinces observe Thursday as a Holy Day of Obligation.

Catholics in the provinces of Boston, Hartford, New York, Omaha, and Philadelphia, are obliged to attend Mass on Thursday.

If you live elsewhere, or are a member of the Archdiocese of Military Services, you can still go to Mass, it will just be a weekday Mass.

Are you a member of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter — the “Anglican ordinariate”? If so, Thursday is a Holy Day of Obligation. So too if you’re an Eastern Catholic, as the Eastern Catholic eparchies of the United States celebrate the Ascension on Thursday.

After reading this, I want to celebrate the Ascension… but I live in an ‘Ascension Sunday’ place. Can I still commemorate this feast day?

Of course you can!

Perhaps you might visit an adoration chapel, meditate and pray with the story of the Ascension, or pray the rosary.

To be extra festive, throw an Ascension party to celebrate with family or friends, enjoy an extra dessert or pour yourself a celebratory drink (I suggest the Phoenix Bird from “Drinking with the Saints”).

Of course you can still attend Mass — but the missal will be set for the sixth Thursday of Easter, or the optional memorial of Pope Paul VI. You’ll have to wait until Sunday to liturgically celebrate the Ascension.

Jack Figge is a summer journalism intern at The Pillar.