Ascension of Jesus to facilitate the obligation to attend Mass. Saint Jerome held that it was of Apostolic origin, but in fact the ascension was originally part of Pentecost (the coming of the Holy Spirit), and developed as a separate celebration only slowly from the late 4th century onward. In the Catholic tradition it begins with a three-day "rogation" to ask for God's mercy, and the feast itself includes a procession of torches and banners symbolising Christ's journey to the Mount of Olives and entry into heaven, the extinguishing of the Paschal candle, and an all-night vigil; white is the liturgical colour. The
Resurrection of Jesus of what is happening. The death and resurrection of Jesus are treated as the climax of the story, the point to which everything else has been moving all the while. Another characteristic of the gospel accounts is that they include only a plain description of the events. Unlike elsewhere in the gospels, there is an absence of any citation of the Hebrew scriptures to contextualize or interpret the resurrection appearances. N.T. Wright calls this "The Strange Silence of the Bible in the Stories." Wright explains that "[t]he very strong probability is that when Matthew, Luke and John describe the risen