This Saturday, we celebrate the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary. That feast highlights the constant faith of the Church that Mary, at the end of her life, was taken up body and soul into the glory of heaven. 

 

The dogma or definitive teaching to be held about Mary’s Assumption was declared for by Pope Pius XII in 1950. That did not make the Assumption to be a new element of faith, however. Even though Mary’s final days are not part of the Scriptures, the memory of the Church and of the faithful, recounted and handed on over time, is itself a part of revelation and so worthy of our belief.

 

We do well to recall the full meaning of Mary’s Assumption and its implication for each of us. First, Mary’s closeness to Jesus is always marked by the mother-son relationship. The closeness of Mary to Jesus in this world was natural and deep, a model for every mother’s love for her son. But the Assumption of Mary goes far beyond any sense of infinitely extending that earthly joy.

 

Beyond Mary’s role as mother is the gift of sinlessness that she not only accepted but guarded and lived during her every earthly and eternal moment. For that reason the Assumption is linked to the Immaculate Conception of Mary. Unlike the rest of us who were born as fallen descendants of Adam and Eve, Mary was the new beginning. She alone was conceived without original sin.

 

While Mary, growing up and living among us, would have externally appeared like one of us, hidden from us was a soul totally given to God. It is hard to imagine one who never for a moment gave in to selfishness or willfulness that would separate her from God.

 

As Jesus grew and began His ministry, He chose Apostles and gathered a following. But always the most faithful to Him and to the message of His Father and the Kingdom was Mary. At the end of her life then, she had never for a moment been separated from her Son.

 

Another lesson for us, badly needed in our world, is that the Assumption displayed the reality of Mary and of every human person. We are meant to be saved and glorified in the fullness of what we are. Because we are both body and soul, our redemption or our eternal hell will involve both. Mary’s Assumption was the fullness of who she is, taken up and glorified. Even now, along with Jesus who ascended to the Father in the body, Mary is in heaven, body and soul. That is what we are offered if we are faithful in our belief, our charity and our moral lives.

 

What is important is to recognize that our bodies are not simply instruments in support of our mind, the real me. Each of us is wholly body and soul. That means that our bodies must be respected and prepared for glory.

 

The moral life, especially lived in our time of the sexual revolution, is tempted to reduce the body to much less. Our Catholic faith teaches us the correct use of the body, especially through chastity and the avoidance of contraception and sterilization. Our acceptance of the gender of our body as a gift from God, whether we are male or female, is part of our receiving God’s creative love, as Mary did.

 

The good news of the Assumption is that the first among those saved is not only Jesus’s mother, she is also our mother. Her glory, body and soul, is the glory we are called to. She is a mother praying to join all of her children. That means she seeks to join us to Christ for all eternity.