Today we commemorate the fact that Jesus Christ, 40 days after His resurrection, ascended into heaven in order to take His proper place “at the right hand of God the Father.”
Jesus is present with us in the most Blessed Sacrament of the altar, but His place and location is heaven. This physical absence of the Glorified Christ from the Earth is compensated for by the presence of what Saint Paul calls “the mystical body of Christ” which is the Church.
In today’s reading, before Christ ascended to heaven, He told the apostles, “I am sending forth upon you the promise of my Father” (Luke 24:49).
And in Saint Matthew’s account of the same event, Jesus told the disciples, “Behold, I am with you all days, even unto the consummation of the world” (Matthew 28:20).
It is quite logical that Jesus should have left some kind of assurance to those who were supposed to continue His salvific task here on Earth. If we had no guarantee that Jesus’ words and actions could continue unadulterated, then we would be subjected to a great insecurity regarding such an important matter as our eternal salvation.
That is why these words of Jesus constitute the basis for that prerogative of the Church that we call “indefectibility.” It means that the Church cannot fail in its mission.
Individual members of the Church at different times and epochs may fail. But the Church itself pushes on despite the limitations of its members and ministers. The Church will never be destroyed, even though it may pass through difficult moments.
Part of this charism of indefectibility is the gift of infallibility. The Church cannot err when it teaches on matters affecting our eternal salvation.
We need a sure guide to teach us authoritatively what Christ wanted to teach his followers. Without infallibility somewhere, Christ’s work would have been a failure because there would be no way of being certain about what He taught.
Individual members of the Church can make mistake either in teaching or in accepting teachings. But the Church as such can never err in these matters.
These charisms of indefectibility and infallibility are found in the Church as a whole. But if we want to know where to find it more specifically, then following the actions of Christ, we can find it in the college of apostles.
And among the apostles, we can find it personified in Peter. Bishops are the successors of the apostles, and the pope is the successor of Saint Peter.
In the Church, there is an unbroken line of continuity in the sacrament of Holy Orders that can be historically traced, from the apostles to the present college of bishops and the pope.
By being united to the bishops who are in union with the pope, we can avail ourselves of that sense of security contained in the promise of Christ to remain constantly with the Church, despite the vicissitudes of time, “even unto the consummation of the world.”