Whether Christ's Ascension Is the Cause of Our Salvation?
Objection 1: It would seem that Christ's Ascension is not the cause
of our salvation. For, Christ was the cause of our salvation in so
far as He merited it. But He merited nothing for us by His Ascension,
because His Ascension belongs to the reward of His exaltation: and
the same thing is not both merit and reward, just as neither are a
road and its terminus the same. Therefore it seems that Christ's
Ascension is not the cause of our salvation.
Obj. 2: Further, if Christ's Ascension be the cause of our salvation,
it seems that this is principally due to the fact that His Ascension
is the cause of ours. But this was bestowed upon us by His Passion,
for it is written (Heb. 10:19): "We have [Vulg.: 'Having'] confidence
in the entering into the holies by" His "blood." Therefore it seems
that Christ's Ascension was not the cause of our salvation.
Obj. 3: Further, the salvation which Christ bestows is an everlasting
one, according to Isa. 51:6: "My salvation shall be for ever." But
Christ did not ascend into heaven to remain there eternally; for it
is written (Acts 1:11): "He shall so come as you have seen Him going,
into heaven." Besides, we read of Him showing Himself to many holy
people on earth after He went up to heaven, to Paul, for instance
(Acts 9). Consequently, it seems that Christ's Ascension is not the
cause of our salvation.
_On the contrary,_ He Himself said (John 16:7): "It is expedient to
you that I go"; i.e. that I should leave you and ascend into heaven.
_I answer that,_ Christ's Ascension is the cause of our salvation in
two ways: first of all, on our part; secondly, on His.
On our part, in so far as by the Ascension our souls are uplifted to
Him; because, as stated above (A. 1, ad 3), His Ascension fosters,
first, faith; secondly, hope; thirdly, charity. Fourthly, our
reverence for Him is thereby increased, since we no longer deem Him
an earthly man, but the God of heaven; thus the Apostle says (2 Cor.
5:16): "If we have known Christ according to the flesh--'that is, as
mortal, whereby we reputed Him as a mere man,'" as the gloss
interprets the words--"but now we know Him so no longer."
On His part, in regard to those things which, in ascending, He did
for our salvation. First, He prepared the way for our ascent into
heaven, according to His own saying (John 14:2): "I go to prepare a
place for you," and the words of Micheas (2:13), "He shall go up that
shall open the way before them." For since He is our Head the members
must follow whither the Head has gone: hence He said (John 14:3):
"That where I am, you also may be." In sign whereof He took to heaven
the souls of the saints delivered from hell, according to Ps. 67:19
(Cf. Eph. 4:8): "Ascending on high, He led captivity captive,"
because He took with Him to heaven those who had been held captives
by the devil--to heaven, as to a place strange to human nature.
captives in deed of a happy taking, since they were acquired by His
victory.
Secondly, because as the high-priest under the Old Testament entered
the holy place to stand before God for the people, so also Christ
entered heaven "to make intercession for us," as is said in Heb.
7:25. Because the very showing of Himself in the human nature which
He took with Him to heaven is a pleading for us, so that for the very
reason that God so exalted human nature in Christ, He may take pity
on them for whom the Son of God took human nature. Thirdly, that
being established in His heavenly seat as God and Lord, He might send
down gifts upon men, according to Eph. 4:10: "He ascended above all
the heavens, that He might fill all things," that is, "with His
gifts," according to the gloss.
Reply Obj. 1: Christ's Ascension is the cause of our salvation by way
not of merit, but of efficiency, as was stated above regarding His
Resurrection (Q. 56, A. 1, ad 3, 4).
Reply Obj. 2: Christ's Passion is the cause of our ascending to
heaven, properly speaking, by removing the hindrance which is sin,
and also by way of merit: whereas Christ's Ascension is the direct
cause of our ascension, as by beginning it in Him who is our Head,
with whom the members must be united.
Reply Obj. 3: Christ by once ascending into heaven acquired for
Himself and for us in perpetuity the right and worthiness of a
heavenly dwelling-place; which worthiness suffers in no way, if, from
some special dispensation, He sometimes comes down in body to earth;
either in order to show Himself to the whole world, as at the
judgment; or else to show Himself particularly to some individual,
e.g. in Paul's case, as we read in Acts 9. And lest any man may think
that Christ was not bodily present when this occurred, the contrary
is shown from what the Apostle says in 1 Cor. 14:8, to confirm faith
in the Resurrection: "Last of all He was seen also by me, as by one
born out of due time": which vision would not confirm the truth of
the Resurrection except he had beheld Christ's very body.
_______________________