Phil 2: 5-11
Luke 10:38-42; 11:27-28
Today, August 15, we celebrate the Dormition of the Mother of God, or, as our Western brothers and sisters call it, the Assumption.
What’s it all about? As Pope Pius XII officially defined it, “The Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.”
On the surface, someone might think that it’s somehow a glorification of Mary, for her own sake. But our readings tell a different story. The Epistle is about Jesus emptying himself of the prerogatives of Divinity. And the Gospel concludes with a woman saying “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that you sucked!” And how did he respond? “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!” And when Gabriel told Mary that the Holy Spirit would come upon her and that she would bear the Savior, how did she respond? “Be it done unto me as you have spoken”.
Everything about Mary points back to Jesus.
Everything about Mary points back to Jesus, but sometimes we have to think a little out of the box. The Church didn’t always know the science that makes sense of it all, but the Holy Spirit nevertheless led the Fathers to declare her blessedness.
Let’s start with this. Modern science tells us that by the 20th week of pregnancy, every egg that a female human embryo will EVER have already exists in her. Think about that. The egg that the Holy Spirit would later fertilize to become Jesus already existed in Mary before she was born. In Exodus 25, God gave Moses instructions for the construction of the Ark of the Covenant, instructions for a dwelling place for him, a perfect and pure dwelling place. Would God make His living dwelling place any less pure? Of course not. Mary was made a pure dwelling place. That is why she was conceived without Original Sin. Gabriel called her κεχαριτωμένη - female for whom the reception of grace is complete, or as Jerome translated it, gratia plena - full of grace.
But, there’s more.
The National Institutes of Health report, “During pregnancy tiny cells from a developing baby cross the placenta and enter the mother's body. This process is called fetal microchimerism. These foreign cells can settle in the mother's organs, including her heart, brain, and liver, and remain there for decades or even a lifetime” In other words, long after His Ascension, living cells from our Lord remained on this earth, within his mother’s heart.
You see, everything about Mary points back to Jesus.
There are some, though, who say that she died and that should be it. So, let’s look at scriptural history.
In Genesis, Chapter 5 we read about Enoch, the great-grandfather of Noah, “All the days of Enoch were 365 years. Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him”.
Enoch did not die. God took him.
Elijah was a great prophet of God, confronting king Ahab and his wife Jezebel, confronting the priests of Baal. At the end of his mission on earth, he and his disciple Elisha were next to the Jordan River. As we read in 2 Kings, “As they walked on still conversing, a fiery chariot and fiery horses came between the two of them, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind”.
Elijah did not die. God took him.
At the end of Deuteronomy, we read that Moses DID die, and that God buried him.
But here’s the interesting thing.
In the 17th chapter of his Gospel, Matthew writes, “Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them; his face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as light. And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them, conversing with him.”
Moses and Elijah, who had lived centuries before, stood there conversing with Jesus.
So, what have we learned?
- Those who serve God, once they depart this life, are still alive. The soul is immortal, and how we live here is our way of choosing how and where we will spend eternity.
- God may sometimes take someone to heaven directly to heaven when they’re done with their life here.
- The body of Jesus actually began to be formed in Mary when her body was being formed in her mother’s womb, when the egg that would become Him was being formed.
- Cells that were part of Jesus - the physical body of Jesus - remained within Mary’s body as long as she lived here on earth - specifically in her heart among other organs.
- Our reason for believing that Mary was made sinless is that she was formed as a dwelling place for the sinless God.
- Our reason for believing that Mary remained sinless is that, even after the Birth of Christ, cells from the body of the sinless God remained within her body.
- Our reason for believing that, when her life was over, her body was taken to heaven is that it was the completion of the Ascension of Christ, because his sinless cells could not see corruption.
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