Mary's Assumption and creepy, holy body parts of saints
Happy Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary! What's that mean, you wonder? Read farther on for my homily, given on this great feast day.
The Catholic Church has always had, from its beginning, a rather creepy tradition of keeping around the body parts of dead saints. In 2009, for example, I saw Saint John Vianney’s actual, physical heart on television at the opening of the Year for Priests, 150 years after his death. You can go and see it in person in Ars, France, if you want.
In Rome, the skulls of Saints Peter and Paul are kept above the altar at the Basilica of St. John Lateran. Closer to home, most altars—including this altar right here—contain relics of saints, often pieces bone or hair. Relics like these remind us that saints are real persons, like you and I, and that we can learn from them, imitate them, and ask for their intercession.
There is one saint, however, the greatest saint of all, of whom no such relics exist, and that is Mary, the mother of Jesus. Some places claim to have 2nd or 3rd class relics of Mary—things she owned or touched, like pieces of clothing. But her skull and her Immaculate Heart are not to be found on earth and I am positive they never will be found.
Why? Because Mary was given a very special and unique grace by her Son. Jesus loves his mother and desired that she be with him in Heaven. So after her earthly life was over her whole person—body and soul—was “assumed” into Heaven. That means that, by God’s grace, not her own power, she was taken up to heaven. That is what we celebrate today on the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
This great event, Mary’s Assumption into heaven, is not directly described in the Bible, but there are passages that seem to support the Assumption of Mary in the Books of Genesis (3:15), Luke (1:28), and Revelation (12:1), and the Catholic Church’s Sacred Tradition has held that Mary was assumed into heaven at least as far back as the fourth century.
It was only in 1946, however, that Pope Pius XII sent out a questionnaire to all the bishops of the world asking if the people in their dioceses wanted him to clarify that the Assumption of Mary, already long believed by Catholics, be defined as an infallible dogma—meaning something we must believe as Catholics. 1,191 bishops responded back and only 22 of them said no. 98% of them encouraged the Holy Father to infallibly declare that Mary was assumed, body and soul, into heaven. He made that declaration on November 1st, 1950, with these words:
-
We pronounce, declare, and define as a divinely revealed dogma: The Immaculate Mother of God, Mary ever Virgin, after her life on earth, was assumed body and soul, to the glory of heaven (Munificentissimus Deus).
So her body is not on earth. It is already in heaven, with her Son, Jesus.
That is what we celebrate today. But, you may be wondering, why is this such a big deal that the Church makes us come to Mass on a weekday?
Catholics make a big deal of Mary because where she is, we hope to be. She’s not a god. We do not worship her—that would be idolatry. She’s a woman, purely human. But she is in heaven, body and soul, with the Lord. That is what God desires for each and every one of us, and Mary shows us the way and gives us confidence that we, too, can one day enjoy that reward.
Every one of us will die, someday, and our bodies will decay. Death is defined as the separation of the body from the soul. Depending on if we die in a state of mortal sin or not, our souls will end up either in hell or in heaven. But that’s not the end of it. In the Creed we will say in just a few moments we will say that we look forward to the resurrection from the dead.
At the very end of time, we will all rise from the dead, meaning our bodies and souls will be reunited. If we’re in heaven they’ll be “glorified” bodies, probably something like the body of Jesus after his resurrection, when he could walk through walls and so on. These glorified bodies will also be, and here’s the key to today’s feast, like the body Mary already has.
It’s the general rule that we will all stay dead until the end of time when we get our bodies back at the general resurrection. But Jesus, because he is God, has bent those rules for his mother. He preserved her, alone, from the decay of the grave and has assumed her, raised her, into heaven—body and soul.
So the big deal about today is that what Mary enjoys now, we will hopefully enjoy at the end of time.
But no matter how holy and great a saint is—think of the great Apostles Peter and Paul—their bodies are still with us on the earth. But these relics of dead saints will not remain dead forever. At the end of time, all will be raised up—just as the Lord has already assumed the body and soul of his Mother, Mary, into the glory of heaven.
May we all look forward to that day with great anticipation.
The above photo is a snapshot taken (with my cell phone) of the Berthold von Imhoff painting in the Church of St. Mary, Hague, ND. It depicts the coronation of Mary as Queen of Heaven and Earth, which is closely linked to her Assumption. Source for facts in this homily: Mary, Mother of the Redeemer, by Juan Luis Bastero, pp. 197-211.
-Fr. Jason
