to seat at the right hand of the Father: 13th week Tuesday 2013

The sixth article of faith says that Jesus ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.  In the Summa, St. Thomas Aquinas has some funny objections, which of course he answered, about Jesus sitting at the right hand of the Father.  If Jesus sits ar the right hand of God, does that mean that God the Father has a right hand and therefore also a left hand?  Isn't it that God is spirit and therefore God has no body, so how can he have a right hand?  And also, Thomas Aquinas asked, if Jesus is seated at the right hand of Father, then it follows that the Father is seated at the left side of Jesus?  Amo ina ang rason why in the past it was not allowed to draw the Father as an old man sitting on the throne because the Father is spirit  and only Jesus was incarnated – only Jesus, the second person of the Trinity assumed human flesh.  The Father is simply symbolized by a triangle or the all seeing-eye to symbolize God’s omniscience.

St. Thomas Aquinas explains this stating that when we say “sit” it really means “to stay with.”  In other words when we say that “Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father,” we are actually saying that Jesus is now with the Father. 

When we say at God’s right hand, we recognize that now Christ is in bliss in the same way that the sheep separated from the goats at the end of time will also stay at the right hand of the Father – they will experience bliss, there will be no more misery – to be on the right hand of God is to possess the happiness of God. 

And finally when we say Jesus is seated - to sit means Jesus is now seen as judge, he is now seen as the reference, he is now seen as the measure, ang talaksan amo si Kristo.

Today in our Gospel when the disciples experienced a violent storm tossing to and fro their boat, putting their lives at a great risk, they saw and they felt that Jesus was asleep – daw waay labot, daw wala pakialam, daw wala sing pagsapak.  I believe many of us felt that way too many times in our lives, when we felt we were abandoned, when we felt God has left us, when we felt that God is asleep.  In the ascension Jesus left this world physically not to abandon us but to become even more present to us, to be present not just to a few people but to all of us.  In the boat with his disciple he slept because he was a man, but now in God’s right hand he can never sleep again and he is watching us, interceding for us to the Father even while we sleep.

(That is why some sleep during the sermon of the priest and it is alright.  For St. Augustine this is a sign that we are still on earth but a time will come when we will stand at the right side of the Father in heaven and there will be no more sleep.)

Jesus, by ascending to the Father and sitting on God’s right hand has become even more present to us in the sacraments when we receive him in communion, when we hear his word – he is alive, he is with us.

Jesus is even more present now that he sits at the right hand of the Father because he is with our neighbor  he is with the needy person that we serve, he is with the poor that we welcome, and the disadvantaged that we help.

Yes the disciples were right when they said that Christ was asleep in their boat.  But now seated at the right hand of the Father Jesus never sleeps, Jesus will never sleep again for in the glory of God there is no more sleep.