Homily for the week of August 15, 2010

Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary , 2010

Revelation 11:19a; 12:1-6a, 10ab

Psalm 45:10, 11, 12, 16

1 Corinthians 15:20-27

Luke 1:39-56

Nearly everyone except the very young have had an experience of death. And for the very young the death of a pet is often their first reality of the fact that all things die. Belief in some kind of afterlife or rebirth has been a central aspect of most religions. What happens to us after we die? People in every age wonder whether this present life is all there is. Some bury food and favorite items with their deceased, believing that they will need such things in the afterlife. Some hold that people are reincarnated in another life on earth. Catholics place their hope in resurrected life, with Christ having already preceded us, then raising all who belong to him, as Paul assures the Corinthians in the second reading.

In subsequent verses of this same chapter, Paul speculates on what kind of body we will have at the resurrection. For Paul and other Jews of his day, there could be no existence without a body. Paul speaks of us having transformed, glorious, spiritual and imperishable bodies, bearing the image of the One who has preceded us in resurrected life.

Today we take one of those rare time outs to focus our Mass and our faith on Mary the Mother of Jesus, the woman who said to the angel of the Lord: LET IT BE TO ME ACCORDING TO YOUR WORD. Many of us may also use this as an opportunity ot get acquainted with Mary a little more. We know very little the Mother of Jesus from the Scriptures. She is mentioned in only about 10 places. She was a quiet and hidden woman. Yet to know and love Mary leads us to know and to love her son Jesus better.

Her Mother was Anne, her father was Joachim. She was born and lived in Nazareth. There is a tradition that says she the house in which she was born was also the house where the angel Gabriel asked her to be the Mother of Jesus. Elizabeth was probably her cousin, because the bible mentions that when the angel Gabriel spoke to Mary, he referred to “Elizabeth, your relative.” Early Catholic church tradition mentions that wrote that Sobe, the mother of Elizabeth, and Anne, the mother of Mary, were sisters.

What we do know from the Gospel of Luke is that Elizabeth was married to a priest named Zechariah, and that she was of the tribe of Aaron. Luke tells us that they were Zechariah and Elizabeth were “advanced in years” and that Elizabeth was “barren” as she had borne no children. While Zechariah was serving in the sanctuary keeping the incense burning, Gabriel appeared to him “at the altar of incense” to announce that Elizabeth would finally bear a son and that Zechariah was to name him “John.” This is John the Baptist, the cousin of Jesus.

Luke tells us that after Zechariah had finished serving in the temple, he and Elizabeth returned home where Elizabeth conceived and went into seclusion for five months. Luke quotes her: “This is what the Lord has done for me when He looked favorably on me and took away the disgrace I have endured among my people.” Six months later, Gabriel visited Mary and announced God’s request of her. As Mary’s pregnancy was just beginning, she went to Elizabeth to assist in the final weeks of Elizabeth’s pregnancy. Mary probably stayed for the birth, helping to care for Elizabeth and Zechariah and their new-born son John.

It is our faith that Mary was conceived without the influence of original sin. With this freedom Mary was able to choose to live completely as God created us to live, that is, she lived a life of love. Yet, Mary was free to choose otherwise, as were Adam and Eve. Fortunately, unlike Adam and Eve, Mary chose God over all her personal wants or desires. This sense of humble love for God is given voice in Mary’s beautiful Magnificat which we hear today from Luke’s Gospel: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.”

Our belief is that Mary, uncorrupted in life, remained uncorrupted in death. As a consequence of her holy life of humble service, she was “assumed,” that is, taken bodily into heaven. Although several legends exist, we have no details about Mary’s death, but the belief of the early Christians is that she was taken up into heaven. Through the grace of baptism, we have the hope of heaven, and we believe that our bodies will be raised at the end of time.

With Mary, we are called to be disciples and witnesses of the Christ story before us: As Mary welcomes the Christ child into her life despite its many traumatic complications, we are called to welcome the Christ into our homes and communities; as she journeys with her son to Jerusalem, we are called to journey with him and take up our crosses; as she cradles the broken body of her son on Good Friday, we are called to hold and support and heal one another; as she realizes the promise of her son’s resurrection at the end of her days, we are called to live in the joyful hope that death is not the end, but there is life in a place called heaven after death.