The Assumption of Mary refers to the taking up of Our Lady into heaven (body and soul) when her earthly life was over.  This coming Saturday we celebrate the Feast of the Assumption. 

From the beginning of the sixth century various churches celebrated Mary’s bodily assumption into heaven.  The belief originated not from biblical evidence or the saintly writers of the early centuries, some of whom would have known the Apostles, but as the conclusion of a so-called argument of fittingness.  It was “fitting” that Jesus should have rescued his mother from the corruption of the flesh and therefore the assumption was that he must have taken her bodily into heaven. 

The first trace of belief in the Virgin’s Assumption can be found in the apocryphal accounts entitled Transitus Mariae  (Latin, “The Crossing Over of Mary”), whose origin dates from the second and third centuries. In the Eastern Orthodox tradition, it is known as the Dormition of the Theotokos (the falling asleep of the mother of God).

 One of the passages in the Old Testament that resonates, at least, with the concept of the Assumption goes as follows; “Arise, O Lord, into your resting place: you and the ark, which you have sanctified” (Ps.131:8). Some have interpreted the Ark of the Covenant, built of incorruptible wood and placed in the Lord’s temple, as symbolising the most pure body of Mary, preserved and immune from the corruption of the tomb.  This woman had carried the Son of God and played a singular role in the Incarnation so her union with God in Christ was unique from the beginning. She was to bear no comparison with any other human being. 

Mary is, by reason of her faith and obedience to the Word of God, a disciple par excellence. In the words of the New Testament: “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women” (Luke 1:28).