Ascension of Christ

Forty days after Pascha, on a Thursday, Christ led His disciples out to the Mount of Olives, blessed them, and was taken up in the body until a cloud received Him out of their sight, and two men in white told them He would come again in the same way. The feast follows the Leavetaking of Pascha on the day before. The Church sees in it human nature, our own nature, taken into the life of God and seated at the right hand of the Father, and it does not read it as a departure: its kontakion has Him ascend not being parted from those who love Him, but remaining with them, and crying, I am with you, and no one will be against you. In the icon the Theotokos stands at the centre beneath Him, among the apostles and the angels, for she is the image of the Church He leaves on earth. Ten days later He sends the Spirit.