Together on the Journey: A Weekly Word from Archbishop Hebda
Over the next ten days, the Church celebrates two important feast days dedicated to our Blessed Mother: the Assumption on August 15 (a Holy Day of Obligation!) and the Queenship of Mary on August 22.
Throughout the ages, the Tradition of the Church had helped us to believe that Mary was brought into heaven, body and soul, an event that we mark as the Assumption, and which is remembered each time we meditate on the glorious mysteries of the rosary (it’s the fourth glorious mystery). That teaching was dogmatically proclaimed by Pope Pius XII in 1950 and bears the mark of infallible teaching. It’s closely related to the other Marian dogma taught infallibly: the Immaculate Conception. Given that Mary was immaculately conceived and was never stained by sin, it’s reasonable that her sinless body would be immediately assumed into heaven as she took her last breath.
Tradition tells us that the Blessed Mother was surrounded by the apostles at the moment of her Assumption. That’s a powerful theme in art. I love those images because the apostles gathered around Mary represent the whole Church. Just as Mary was present at the moments that were most significant for Jesus (from his birth to his crucifixion) and most significant for the Church (think about Mary in the Upper Room at Pentecost), it seems fitting that the Church would be present to Mary—and with Mary—on the day of her Assumption.
We’re still called to be present to Mary in a special way on the Solemnity of the Assumption (that’s in part why it’s a Holy Day of Obligation). Why wouldn’t we want to celebrate with her? The Assumption is a beautiful feast that reminds us of what our destiny will be, if we stay faithful to Jesus and die and rise with Him. When Pope Pius XII definitively proclaimed the dogma of the Assumption, he noted that “it is our hope that belief in Mary’s bodily Assumption into heaven will make our belief in our own resurrection stronger and render it more effective.” I say “amen” to that.
The feast is so important that the Vatican gives its employees a three-day vacation to celebrate the Assumption. One year when I was working in Rome, I took advantage of those three days to celebrate the Assumption with the monks of the Monastic Community of Bethlehem at their monastery near Gubbio. We began our liturgical celebration of the Vigil at 5:30 on the 14th and didn’t conclude until the wee hours of the 15th (pausing only for a brief interval, literally, of milk and honey). The community’s tradition is to parallel in the vigil of the Assumption what the rest of us do at the Easter Vigil—emphasizing that the Assumption is Mary’s resurrection. I’ll never forget our post-midnight candlelight procession through the Umbrian hills as we sang a Byzantine chant in honor of Mary, with each verse looking at the Assumption through the eyes of a different apostle.
While the feast of the Queenship of Mary doesn’t have the same liturgical or doctrinal weight as the Assumption, it too is important (as reflected in our meditation upon this event as the fifth glorious mystery). We celebrate Mary’s queenship on the octave (eighth day) of the Assumption, showing the close connection between the feasts. What is it that Mary does in heaven? She serves there as queen, bringing our needs to the throne of her son in the tradition of the great Queen Mothers.
The Book of Revelation tells us that it was revealed to John that he saw “a great sign” that appeared in the sky: “a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars” (Rev 12:1). We believe that to be our mother, Mary, and know that crown to be the diadem of our Queen. May she rule in our hearts this month and always.
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