“To look at Mary is to see God’s original plan for humanity. In her, we see the way God wanted us to be. Mary shows how to receive the marvelous gift of God’s love, and how to respond to God’s saving action in our lives.” Fr. Henri Nouwen
If Mary does, indeed, show us “God’s original plan for humanity,” so does her glorious Assumption. In the Assumption, preserved forever before the face of God, Mary not only fulfills her great destiny – but she also offers us a beautiful glimpse of our own. This is what God wants for us, this is what God dreams for us, this is God’s design for the world.
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“The New Testament does not demonstrate a meek woman (as we popularly understand meekness), devoid of creativity and initiative. It shows a strong, noble woman who put her free will at the disposal of God’s will. That is what the Feast of the Assumption celebrates: that because God will never be outdone in fidelity and generosity, He remained utterly faithful to Mary through death, as she was utterly faithful to Him in life.” Fr. Richard Leonard, S.J.
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In the Gospel on this Feast of the Assumption (Luke 1, 39-56), Mary hears that Elizabeth is pregnant, she leaves behind her own concerns and affairs and asks, “What does my cousin Elizabeth need?” When a visit seems appropriate, Mary acts; she goes in haste to the hill country to visit her cousin. What we see here is the pattern of ordinary days: “asking” and “acting.” What we see is “what does someone need,” followed by “an action responding to that need.” As simple as this pattern is, the result is often more than we might imagine. Following the pattern of pregnant Mary, we not only take ourselves to others, but we also carry Christ (who is in us) to everyone we meet and serve.
The glory of Mary, assumed bodily into heaven, is simply a preview or foretaste of our glory. Her risen body is with the risen body of Christ in a new creation. So it shall be for us who have lived every blessed and ordinary day “asking” and “acting.”
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Let us pray. “God in heaven, all creation rightly gives you praise, for all life and all holiness come from you. In the plan of your wisdom, she who bore the Christ in her womb was raised body and soul in glory to be with Him in heaven. May we follow her example in reflecting your holiness and join in her hymn of endless love and praise. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
