“Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ...We rejoice in our hope of sharing the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.” Romans 5:1-5
I believe this Scripture verse sums up what we experienced during Lent, following the Sorrowful Mother through the events of her Son’s life. I hope that you held Mary in your heart during the events of Holy Week, wondering what she was experiencing it through it all. I myself was left wondering what she was experiencing after His burial. When she finally sat down to digest everything that had happened. Had she experienced any hope?
Her hope was made complete, her joy was complete when she encountered Her Risen Son. He had come back! He came back for her; He came back for us all!
We know that Mary is referred to as “The Mother of God.” She IS the Mother of God, for we know that Jesus is God, and she is the mother of Jesus, so she is the mother of God Himself.
We have dwelled on the beautiful union that this mother and son experienced. Those of us who are mothers understand the deep bond that a mother and child experience. But Mary’s child wasn’t just ANY child; her child was the Son of God, the Incarnation of God, God made flesh. So their union isn’t like just ANY mother/child union. It is a very deep, supernatural union, that words cannot even come close to explaining.
St. Paul tells us in the Letter to the Romans 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Christ’s work of Salvation, the work that he performed through the events of Holy Week, was all a free gift bestowed to the whole human race. Sin entered the world through Adam and Eve and the possibility of heaven had been closed to humans. Sin brought death; so Christ comes to give us the GIFT of himself so to conquer sin and death, making it possible for us to be united back to the Father.
If Christ wants to bestow gifts upon us, how much more does he wish to bestow gifts on His Most Blessed Mother? That is the nature of being a son - to honor your parents and gift them with your love and affection.
Like I said, this union between Christ and Mary is similar, but also very different from the average mother/son union. Christ, being God, dwelling in existence in the Trinity before He became flesh, had the unique ability to CHOOSE his Mother; to choose the woman who would bear Him to the world.
You see, the Son existed before His mother and he was able to choose the mother that would be best for him. Further, he was able to bestow on this woman all the gifts he would wish as well; there is no limit to God’s giving power.
One of the gifts that Christ gave to his Mother was at her conception: it is known as the Immaculate Conception. Many people think this refers to Christ’s conception in the Virginal womb of Mary; but indeed it refers to MARY who was conceived naturally by her parents, Anne and Joachim. Christ chose to give his gift of salvation to His mother at the moment of her conception - she was “conceived without sin”. When her soul was created, Christ, in union with His Heavenly Father, kept her free from Original Sin (the sin that we inherit from Adam and Eve; all humans are born with this sin on our soul).
This teaching of the Church, that Mary was conceived without sin, also applies to her whole life. She was sin-less. In the gospel account of the Angel appearing to Mary and announcing that she would conceive a son , the Angel first greets Mary as “full of grace.” “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you” (Luke 1:28). These words refer to an abundance of grace that is apart of Mary’s very nature. A theologian and professor at Franciscan University of Steubenville, Mark Miravalle, says, “It is true that no person with a fallen nature could possess a fullness of grace, a perfection of grace appropriate only for the woman who was to give God the son an identical, immaculate human nature” (emphasis added).
With the Original sin by Adam and Eve, our human nature tends toward sin. That first sin also lost grace, which was then won for us on the Cross by Jesus. He opened up the floodgates of grace, which is help from God to be like Him. Sin and grace do not exist with each other; when we sin, we lose grace. St. Paul says, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue to sin that grace may abound? By no means!...For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.” (Romans 6:1-2, 14). So if Mary is full of grace, then there is no room in her soul for sin. This points to, really, the great mercy of God! In her Magnificat, Mary’s says, “My soul rejoices in God my Savior”. “To save men from their sins is a great mercy, but to save one woman from ever sinning is an even greater mercy. Not only that, sinless as she was...she was still a member of a fallen race, a race to which heaven was closed. The Savior’ redeeming act opened heaven up for her as well.” (F.J. Sheed).
All of this is background for the Assumption. Have you ever wondered what happened to Mary at the end of her life. Did she die? Was she buried somewhere? Why don’t we know about HER tomb, like most of the tombs or places of death of many saints and martyrs?
Along with the teaching of the Immaculate Conception, that declares that Mary was conceived without sin and lived a sinless life, the Church declares that she was “assumed into heaven.”
“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.” Pope Pius XII in an Infallible Statement, making this teaching a Dogma.
Let’s go back to what St. Paul said, “The wages of sin is death…” If Mary’s soul was not touched by sin, then it makes sense that her earthly body would not suffer the same consequences: death and corruption of the body. Yet, another gift given to her from her Son - that her body would not suffer the corruption and pain of death. We don’t know the details about HOW the assumption actually happened, but we DO know that Mary is in heaven - BODY AND SOUL.
One of the scripture accounts that is used to back up this teaching is Genesis 3:15. Actually, much about what we understand about Mary comes from this account! It says, "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; He will strike at your head, while you strike at his heel." Adam and Eve have just committed the first sin and God is pronouncing judgment and punishment upon them. But then he turns to the Serpent, who we know is Satan, and declared that there will be a woman who will basically be his enemy (that is what "enmity" implies) and that her "seed" aka "offspring" will also have victory over the Serpent. This "woman and her seed" is Mary and Jesus.
Again, here is Dr. Miravalle’s wisdom on Mary’s Assumption (he is a Marian theologian, so he devotes his life’s work to studying all things related to Mary): “Genesis 3:15 foreshadows (looks forward toward) Mary as intimately sharing in the same absolute victory of her Son over Satan: ‘I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed’...The consequences of Satan’s seed, evil, are twofold: sin and death (which specifically refers to bodily corruption). Therefore the Mother of Jesus, who shared in her Son’s victory over Satan and his seed, would also have to be saved from the two consequences of sin and death (bodily corruption). She did triumph over sin in her Immaculate Conception, and triumphed over death in her glorious Assumption at the end of her earthly life.”
Let’s again go back to this union between Christ and Mary. We know that Christ loved Mary so deeply, that even during his greatest agony, he turned to console his mother at the foot of the cross by giving her to St. John. Along those lines, once Christ Resurrected and Ascended to the Father to take his place at His Right Hand, do you think Christ would want His mother with him? And not just her soul, but her WHOLE SELF, body and soul united? Yes, this is what Christ wanted, to have his most beautiful mother next to Him in heaven.
”For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the Love of Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38). Jesus willed that SIN COULD NOT separate him from the love he had for his own mother. And the GOOD NEWS is that he also wills that sin would not keep Him from US. That one day we will also be united with Christ, body and soul.
Now Mary is in heaven, alive, fully alive, to love her Son and to continue to give her Son to those of us on earth. Jesus and Mary do not exist in order to keep each other for themselves. They are not selfish. Yes, Christ wants Mary to be with Him in heaven, but he wills this so that Mary would continue to be united with Him in His work of salvation. Their mission is the same: to win souls over for the Father.
The fact that Mary is alive in heaven, body and soul, means that she has all the faculties, all the tools she needs to keep fighting for us in prayer before the Throne of God. Mary is our ADVOCATE. She is standing before the King of Kings, right now, at this very moment, waiting for us to ask for her help. She is waiting for us, physically waiting for us, to give her our hearts so that she can take our hands and lead us to her most adorable son, Jesus.
Is it possible to attain Salvation and union with Christ without Mary? Yes, it is possible. But it is quicker, it is much more enjoyable to do so with Mary by our side. Christ wanted his mother close to him throughout his entire life, including his life now in heaven. If we seek to be like Christ, we should seek the same thing - to remember Our Mother at all moments of our life. She is the most sweetest, most loving, most caring, most gentle of all mothers. It wasn’t until college, when I really began to have a personal relationship with Mary and to begin to learn these great things about her. It has caused me to have so much AWE AND WONDER at the work of God. His plan for Mary’s role in our salvation is so detailed, so intricate.
Any “season” of my life that I devote myself to Mary is ALWAYS blessed; it is always a time where I experience great intimacy with Christ. I find so much solace and consolation in knowing that Mary’s maternal heart understands MY maternal and feminine heart. There are so many times, in the midst of suffering and heartache, that I cry out to Our Lady to be with me and to mother me. I am in need of so much healing from God. I often envision myself with Mary. She is seated upon a throne, and we are in a dark, quiet, cozy room. I approach her and put my head on her lap and she strokes my hair. She is my mother.
Some of us here have maybe felt abandoned by loved ones; I myself have felt abandoned by people in my life at various times in my life. Jesus and Mary, though, do not abandon us. They are BOTH alive, both are readily available to us. Neither of them is affected by sin, so we know FOR CERTAIN that they will not let us down, THEY WILL NOT BREAK OUR TRUST.
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