Assumption of Mary
One
The 4th Glorious Mystery – The Assumption of Mary into Heaven body and soul
The Assumption is not recorded in Scripture, but we know it is true because the Apostles were present at the home of Mary in Jerusalem when her earthly life came to an end, they carried her body and placed it in a tomb near Gethsemane, and the Apostles were witnesses to her bodily Assumption into heaven.
St. Germanus of Constantinople in a homily given in the year 720 presents the ancient tradition that Mary’s Assumption into heaven was witnessed by the Apostles, who could then confirm the truth with their authority. St. Germanus writes: “Your departure did not lack witnesses…Heaven tells the glory of those who ran to meet you then; earth presents the truth about it; the clouds cry out the honor they paid you, and the angels tell of the offering of gifts that was made to you then, when the Apostles were at your side as you passed away above Jerusalem.” The Church has celebrated the Feast of the Assumption in Jerusalem on August 15 from the earliest times of the Church.
Two
The First Reading from Mass today is from Revelation 11-12
The sanctuary of God in heaven opened and the ark of the covenant could be seen inside it. Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman, adorned with the sun, standing on the moon, and with the twelve stars on her head for a crown. She was pregnant, and in labor, crying aloud in the pangs of childbirth. Then a second sign appeared in the sky, a huge red dragon which had seven heads and ten horns, and each of the seven heads crowned with a coronet. Its tail dragged a third of the stars from the sky and dropped them to the earth, and the dragon stopped in front of the woman as she was having the child, so that he could eat it as soon as it was born from its mother. The woman brought a male child into the world, the son who was to rule all the nations with an iron scepter, and the child was taken straight up to God and to his throne, while the woman escaped into the desert, where God had made a place of safety ready.
From the time the devil rebelled against God and led 1/3 of the angels with him, there has raged a cosmic battle. The devil and his angels were cast out of heaven. Then the devil, the prince of this world pursued the woman, Mary but had no hold on her for she is the new Eve, "full of grace" of the Holy Spirit, who is preserved from sin and the corruption of death (the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption of the Most Holy Mother of God, Mary, ever virgin). Because the devil could not touch Mary he went off to make war on the rest of her offspring – we are the offspring, the children of Mary, she is our spiritual mother. The devil is bent on one thing and one thing only, our destruction. But if we belong to Mary, he cannot touch us. Mary was Assumed into heaven, but she has not left us alone. She is present. I sense her presence. She is the one who crushes the head of Satan in our lives. Belong to her. Practice living under her influence and care. She will protect you from the deceptions of the devil, the destroyer and she will lead you to the calm harbor of the will of God.
Three
Since Mary is our Spiritual Mother and she is the one who crushes the head of Satan the Church recommends 3 things:
1. Entrust ourselves to Mary as Jesus did in the Incarnation
2. Live in union with Mary as a little child with his mother
3. Sit at the school of Mary each day in the Rosary
We should imitate Jesus and consecrate ourselves to Mary
The very first thing Jesus did to save the world was to entrust himself entirely to Mary to be an embryo in her womb and a little child in her care. What did Mary do for Jesus? Everything…Gave birth to him, educated him, formed him, protected and cared for him. What will she do for us? Everything! Then what should we do if we want to live in imitation of Jesus? Accept the gift of her Spiritual Motherhood; give yourself to her to be her little child. This is Consecration to Mary
St John Damascene, who lived near Jerusalem proposed Consecration to Mary in one of his sermons on the Assumption (Dormition) of Mary in the 700s: We today also remain near you, O Lady. Yes, I repeat, O Lady, Mother of God and Virgin. We bind our souls to your hope, as to a most firm and totally unbreakable anchor, consecrating to you mind, soul, body and all our being and honoring you as much as we can with psalms, hymns, and spiritual canticles.
Four
Many people make the Consecration to Mary but very few live it. Devotion to Mary is to live in imitation of the personal relationship Jesus had with Mary as he grew under her influence and care. Imagine the way Jesus lived his relationship with Mary at the different stages of his life: as a child, a young man, throughout his public ministry, and especially during his Way of the Cross. Live in imitation of that! We live the consecration by living a personal relationship with Mary. Maximilian Kolbe reminds us when we think of Mary we are not thinking of an abstract concept, but we come into contact with a living person who loves us. Developing a profound personal relationship with Mary forged his great confidence in Her. He said: I see Mary everywhere. I see difficulties nowhere.
Five
We should sit at the School of Mary each day in the Rosary to allow Mary to teach us to be like Jesus. St. John Paul II in his letter on the Rosary writes: The Rosary mystically transports us to Mary's side as she is busy watching over the human growth of Christ in the home of Nazareth. This enables her to train us and to mold us with the same care, until Christ is “fully formed” in us (cf. Gal 4:19).