Why was Mass on TV today not the Ascension?

[Ronbembe]

I watched the mass on EWTN this morning. They did not celebrate the Assension. Isn’t this a Holy Day of Obligation?
I am a well informed Anglo Catholic who wants to become Roman Catholic.
Thanks for your help
Ron

 

[Fr.Charles_Grondin]

The Ascension is indeed a holy day of obligation. However, what day it is celebrated on differs from region to region.

Canon 1246 §2. With the prior approval of the Apostolic See, however, the conference of bishops can suppress some of the holy days of obligation or transfer them to a Sunday.

The USCCB decided that a 2/3 vote of bishops in an ecclesiastical province could petition the Vatican to move the Ascension to a Sunday. Essentially dioceses are clumped into ecclesiastical provinces. In the United States most ecclesiastical provinces have done this with the feast of the Ascension. As far as I know only the ecclesiastical provinces of Boston, Hartford, New York, Newark, Philadelphia, and Omaha (the state of Nebraska) continue to celebrate the Ascension of Our Lord on Thursday. The rest of dioceses in the United States will celebrate the Ascension this upcoming Sunday.

EWTN is in Alabama. Therefore they too will celebrate the Ascension on Sunday. Today’s Mass in Alabama was simply Thursday of the Sixth Week of Easter.

For further reading:
USCCB’s Canon 1246, §2 - Holy Days of Obligation