The Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary is celebrated each year on August 15 as a Holy Day of Obligation. However, since it falls on a Saturday, the obligation to attend Mass is lifted this year. That being said, this is a solemnity, meaning that it is a Holy Day of the highest importance. We will celebrate a bilingual Mass in observance of this beautiful feast at 9:00 am this Saturday; all are encouraged to attend!
In 1950, in the Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus, Pope Pius XII proclaimed the Assumption of Mary a dogma of the Catholic Church in these words: “The Immaculate Mother of God, the ever-virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heaven.”
The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary completes God’s work in her, since it was not fitting that the flesh that had given life to God Himself should ever undergo corruption. The Assumption is God’s crowning of His work as Mary ends her earthly life and enters eternity. The feast turns our eyes in the direction of Heaven, where we hope to follow when our earthly life is over.
“Finally, the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all guilt of original sin, on the completion of her earthly sojourn, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory, and exalted by the Lord as Queen of the universe, that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of lords and the conqueror of sin and death.”
Lumen Gentium 59
