THE ASSUMPTION
For centuries, there was no allusion by the Church Fathers to the bodily Assumption of Mary. Saints, for example, Ambrose, Augustine, Irenaeus, Jerome, and further Church Fathers were mute on the matter. The Church Father Epiphanius Inscribes in 377 AD, that Mary’s end is undetermined. In the 5th century, the feast of the Assumption of Mary was celebrated in Syria. In the 5th and 6th centuries, the Apocryphal Books bore testimony to the reluctance of the Church to accept the fact that the body of the Mother of God should lie in a grave. In the 6th century, the feast of the Assumption was celebrated in Jerusalem and conceivably also in Alexandria.
The first ‘unarguable’ written allusions to the Assumption come from writers living during the sixth and eighth centuries. It is revealed in the homilies of St. Andrew of Crete, St. John Damascene, St. Modestus of Jerusalem, et.al. In the West, St. Gregory of Tours indicated to it first. Gregory lived in the sixth century, while St John Damascene belonged to the eighth century. The feast of the Assumption was celebrated in Spain in the 9th century. From the 10th to the 12th centuries, there was no barrier as to whether the feast could be celebrated in the Western Church. In the 12th century, it was observed in the city of Rome and in France. Since the 13th century right up to the present day there has been undisputed faith in the Assumption of Mary throughout the universal Church. In 1950, Pope Pius XII taught infallibly: ‘Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul to heavenly glory’ (Munificentissimus Deus, 44), defining the dogma of the Assumption.
Like every dogma, the Assumption of Mary is most importantly, a mystery, in the biblical and Catholic meaning of an occasion of salvation history, which symbolizes the saving power of God. The Church doesn’t decree dogmas without sound justification. All the major doctrinal determinations in the history of the Church were stimulated by a pastoral concern for the health of the faithful.
Pope Pius XII formally described and broadcast this dogma in his encyclical (Munificentissimus Deus) (August, 15 1950). The fact of the Assumption was stated this way: “It is a dogma revealed by God that the Immaculate Mother of God, Mary ever Virgin, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into the glory of heaven.” But we must also ask what the Holy Father anticipated would be the pastoral benefit for the people of God. We must be grateful to St Luke for his striking gospel representation of Mary’s visit to her cousin, Elizabeth. The representation is partial, yet it is so forthright, precise and attractive that in the Hail Mary petition, we paraphrase Elizabeth’s blessing: ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.’ We venerate Mary as a youthful woman, undoubtedly no more than fourteen at the time, for placing her complete life and individuality at the service of God’s design, allowing the Holy Spirit to empower her to come to be the Mother of our Saviour, Jesus Christ.
St. Luke portrays her as correspondingly, astonished and frightened of what God was asking of her. But she failed to allow that astonishment and fear halt her from expressing ‘yes’ to God’s request. In envisioning her uttering ‘yes’ to God, St. Luke divulges her as inhabiting principles, ideals and values which her adult Son will communicate and teach; that to be a disciple of Jesus, we must hear and attend to the word of God by living it! Mary’s Assumption has its source in the collective faith of the Christian people going back numerous centuries. Christians just couldn’t envisage, that following her virtuous and blessed life that Mary’s body would deteriorate when she died. She was too near to her Son, Jesus, for that to transpire. So they became certain that just as God had raised Jesus from the dead, so God also raised his Mother. Furthermore they saw her as present with God, present as a whole person, present with body and soul intact, and enjoying the joy and profusion of everlasting life. That collective certainty of the entire early Church was declared by Pope Pius XII in 1950 as a truth revealed by God. But the East and the West equally and passionately believed this, myriad centuries previously.
This assurance and faith points to the future and to what God will do for us. We have faith and trust in our entire person, body, mind, heart and spirit, being elevated to a new existence in the presence, peace, and joy of God.However, Mary offers us assurance not just in the hereafter, but for the many encounters and exertions of this life, the challenges, trials, struggles and encounters we routinely meet with daily. St. Luke describes her as the one who praised God because ‘the Almighty has done great things for me’. She goes on to voice the desires and aspirations of human beings in need when she sings: ‘He has pulled down princes from their thrones and exalted the lowly. The hungry he has filled with good things, the rich sent empty away.’ For many people in hardship, the song of Mary extracts their own desires and aspirations in the power and love of God to set them free from all that is cruel, hostile and wicked, and suggest a new life.
She is for individuals not enabled and functioning in statues and images, rather, she is in the transformation taking place when the redemptive and transforming love of God triumphs over all sinfulness. She is mother of all who are heavy burdened, forgotten, rejected, abused, or deserted. She articulates God’s opposition to heavy-handedness and his determination to put down the powerful and merciless who discount, deride, or mistreat God’s people.
Mary, therefore, is no weak, silent, passive woman. Why would we be surprised that poor, grieving individuals continue looking to her for petition, encouragement, support and security. At her Shrine here at Schoenstatt Scotland thee are circa eighty people visiting her per day, in this one place. Add to this every other Shrine and every other chapel or cathedral in the land, and you gain some idea of the power of this woman, our Mother. Unambiguously believing that the lady we honour; Mary, is a powerful, yet gentle mother, who makes their optimism for the world hers, and their prayers for the world her prayers also, and as is her nature, perfecting them, before they reach the ear of her Son, Jesus.
Let us wrap up these reflections on Mary’s Assumption with the moving words of Benedict XVI, spoken at his weekly General Audience at Castel Gandolfo on August 16, 2006. He said: ‘By contemplating Mary in heavenly glory, we understand that the earth is not the definitive homeland for us either, and that if we live with our gaze fixed on eternal goods we will one day share in this same glory and the earth will become more beautiful. Consequently, we must not lose our serenity and peace even amid the thousands of daily difficulties. The luminous sign of Our Lady taken up into Heaven shines out even more brightly when sad shadows of suffering and violence seem to loom on the horizon.
We may be sure of it: from on high, Mary follows our footsteps with gentle concern, dispels the gloom in moments of darkness and distress, reassures us with her motherly hand. Supported by awareness of this, let us continue confidently on our path of Christian commitment wherever Providence may lead us. Let us forge ahead in our lives under Mary’s guidance’.
