Luke 24:46-53; Solemnity of the Asencion

Brothers and sisters,

This week, the world caught its breath as Google unveiled Veo 3—a revolutionary AI (artificial intelligence) video model capable of generating hyper-realistic films, documentaries, and even fake news clips with scary accuracy. Imagine these scenarios: seeing a video of a war that never happened. A documentary about famous people showing things they never did. Fake sports competition. Fake concert performances. A world where seeing is no longer believing.

In an age of AI, our eyes and ears are no longer the gatekeepers of truth. In this new digital era, what’s real can be mimicked, distorted, and manufactured. Even our deepest instincts—to trust what we see—are now unreliable.

And this presents a dangerous question:

How do you know what to believe when everything can be faked?

And today, the Church gives us a strange Gospel—Jesus disappearing into the sky.

Imagine being a disciple. For 40 days after the resurrection, you’ve seen him. Eaten with him. Touched his scars. And now… he’s gone again. This time, no angel rolled back the stone. No voice thundered from Heaven. He simply… vanished.

And all you’re left with is a promise of a promise:

“I am sending upon you what my Father promised; so stay in the city… until you have been clothed with power from on high.”

It happened in the blink of an eye. Just a brief showing of his face. A voice. A memory. A promise. But no tangible proof.

The disciples were asked to believe not in what they see, but in what they’ve been told.
They were asked to trust in a Spirit they haven’t received yet.
They were asked to wait—not with eyes, but with faith.

This is the original crisis of belief:

Will you trust the Truth even when He is hidden from view?

• In the Acts of the Apostles, the men of Galilee are rebuked for standing still and refusing to believe what they heard:

“Why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

The message is clear: Don’t be mesmerized by what is fantastical, act immediately on what you were commanded from above.  

• In the Book of Psalm, chapter 47, we sing:

“God has gone up with a shout! The Lord with the sound of a trumpet. Clap your hands, all you peoples; shout to God with loud songs of joy. For the Lord, the Most High, is awesome, a great king over all the earth.”

It’s a victory song—not a funeral march. It’s not the song of people who feel abandoned. It’s the song of people who trust that God reigns even when unseen.

• In the Letter to the Ephesians, Paul doesn’t pray for better eyes.

Whereas Luke wrote about “all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning until the day when he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen.” Paul prays for “a spirit of wisdom and revelation” so that the faithful may “know the hope to which God has called them.”

In other words: Paul wanted the Holy Spirit to become the evidence that people were looking for.

Let’s put it this way: the apostles and those who first heard about Jesus could not recreate his miracles; they only had stories and testimonies to rely on.

But the sufferings they willingly endured, their tenacity to proclaim the Good News despite great opposition, their willingness to be thrown into prison, fed to wild beasts and made to die agonizing deaths.  These are the proofs that the Holy Spirit remained with them.

• And in the Gospel of Luke, when Jesus departs. The curtain suddenly falls. The light dims. It’s the end of a great show. 

But the apostles? They leave with great joy. Not despair. Not doubt.
Why? Because now they believe not in appearances, but in the unshakeable truth of His Word that transformed their very lives. There is no turning back to being fishermen.

Now more than ever, the world will show you digitized prophets,edited miracles, false Christs, deepfaked Messiahs.  

Your icons of faith will be attacked—not with swords, but with tiny but almighty screens. Priests and nuns in scandalous behaviors, bishops and even the Pope in acts only with the horrid of imagination can conjure.

They will be vilified. Not by persecution, but by confusion. Cancel culture will reign supreme over factual news reporting because the world is hungry for the sordid, sleazy and sensational.

In the age of Veo 3, of ChatGPT clones, of digital sorcery, the great challenge is this:

Will you still believe in Jesus Christ, even when the world manufactures “proof” that he never existed, or distorts his message?

Jesus said:

“You will be my witnesses… to the ends of the earth.”
Not because you’ll have strong evidence and undeniable proofs.
Not because you’ll have photos and videos of me doing miraculous things.
But because you will be clothed with power from on high.

They will harm you in every possible way, but your cloak as children of my Father will protect your soul.

You won’t win the world by having better visuals because even eyes deceive the beholder.
You’ll be witnesses to the world and testify by having deeper truth.
And that truth is a Person:

Jesus Christ—who cannot lie, who cannot fade, and who cannot be faked.

So I leave you with this, dear friends:

Don’t let AI, or headlines, or flashy conspiracy theories unravel your faith.

Don’t fall into the trap of needing visible proof.

The Holy Spirit is the only “verification” you need.
The Word of Christ is the only “deep truth” that matters.
And the Church, built on witnesses—despite centuries of maligning and persecution with fake testimonies and false accusations—is still here.

Clap your hands, not because you’ve seen him go up,
But because you know He reigns.
Wait patiently, not because you’re uncertain,
But because you know He will send you power.

And above all, believe—
Not with the eye, but with the fire of the Spirit.

Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations!

*image from Forbes.com