Dear Rev. Know it all;

Why do we celebrate the Assumption and why do we believe it?

Yours truly, 

Ariel Vieux

Dear Ariel,

We celebrate the Assumption and believe it because it happened.  I suppose you’re going to want more than that. Well, it all goes back to the Council of Chalcedon, where, in 451, Emperor Marcion asked Juvenal the patriarch of Jerusalem, for the relics of the Blessed Virgin. Juvenal said that he was unable to comply because there were no relics of the Blessed Virgin. He told the emperor the story that had been handed down since the very first days of the Church in Jerusalem that Mary’s tomb had been found empty a few days after her death and that she had been taken up body and soul into heaven. We’ve always believed it, but Pope Pius XII defined it as dogma in 1950, I imagine he did so in order to remind a cynical generation of the promise of the resurrection. People might believe in the Resurrection of Jesus because He was the sinless Son of God, but Mary, like you and I, is God’s child by adoption. Her assumption into heaven is the promise of our own glorious destiny.

Beyond the universally held tradition of the whole Church, there is further evidence for the truth of the Assumption in that there are no relics of the blessed Mother. In a more credulous age which produced three heads of John the Baptist and feathers from archangels’ wings, there never was a relic of the Blessed Mother. You may have her tunic, or her veil or her belt, or some such, but never a part of her flesh. This testifies to the universal belief in her bodily assumption. Mary was not the first person to be assumed into heaven, you know. In the Old Testament we read that Enoch, the father of Methuselah was assumed into heaven. “And Enoch walked with God and he was no longer here, for God took him.” (Genesis 5:24) Elijah the prophet was assumed into heaven. “And Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind and when Elisha saw it, he cried out, ‘My father, my father, Israel’s chariots and horses!’” So you see, the doctrine of the Assumption is quite biblical. It’s the way God works in certain circumstances and will be true for all the saints someday. 

In a similar vein, our Blessed Mother is not the first person to be immaculately conceived. Adam and Eve were “conceived” without the effects of sin, though they, as was she, were free to sin. Mary became the new Eve by accepting the vocation of her Immaculate Conception, whereas the first Eve, the mother of us all, rejected that gift and so left her children in darkness. These doctrines of the Catholic Church are not mere invention, but are the fulfillment of the Bible’s promises. What they were, we too, shall be if we accept God’s love and grace. If your non-Catholic friends insist on arguing with you about the feast and the doctrine of the Assumption, just tell them that it is the day when we Catholics celebrate the coming rapture of the saints and wish them “Happy Rapture Day!” Every time I think of the doctrine of the Assumption, I start humming that old song, “some bright morning when this life is over, I’ll fly away...”  It fills me with hope and longing for our heavenly home and our own blessed resurrection.

Sincerely,

Rev. Know it all