THURSDAY, NINETEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME
Solemnity of the Assumption of the Bl. Virgin Mary
Rv 11:19; 12:1-6,10 Ps 45: 10-12, 16 1 Cor 15: 20-27 Lk 1: 39-56
CALLED TO COMMIT TO BEING CHRISTIAN
When we celebrate a saint, we generally remember the day of his death. This is because according to our faith, the death of a believer is not the end of his life; those who know they have placed their trust in the One who never dies, are fully convinced that the end of their earthly life means being welcomed, into the arms of a Father who awaits us. This is what we hear Paul talking about in the second reading. Death has been defeated by the resurrection of Christ, the first fruits of those who have died. The death of believers, therefore, becomes an imitation of the death and resurrection of Christ, just as the life of a believer must seek to be in imitation of Him.
The solemnity of the Assumption celebrates the ‘death’ of Mary; i.e., the passing of Mary from earthly life to that of eternity. It was proclaimed as an essential truth of our faith in 1950 by Pope Pius XII: “The Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.” Mary is the first who shared in the fruits of the resurrection of Christ, not so much because He had to give this gift first to his mother, but because she is the first follower of Christ; she is the first true Christian. Hence, she shows us the way by teaching us how to make our life, and not just our death, an imitation of the life of Christ.
Let us therefore not contemplate this solemnity solely as a gaze towards the sky, towards that destiny of glory to which God awaits us and for which He has opened the way for us; let us not forget that this destiny is built first and foremost here, on earth, through a life of faith worthy of being called Christian and at the same time profoundly human. The phrase “soul and body” that constitutes the definition of the dogma of the Assumption of Mary into heaven indicates to us precisely that our destiny of eternity (the soul) will be glorious to the extent in which we build it here and now ‘with the body’; i.e., with the labours and burdens of daily life. Living in expectation of a glorious destiny, crossing our arms on our chest and reclining our heads towards the sky, waiting for the sky to be torn apart and for God to come and take us up into the clouds, without ever getting our hands dirty with the daily commitment of being deeply believing men and women is meaningless, and certainly cannot be called a Christian attitude. We will be ‘taken up’ like Mary in the glory that God reserves for his faithful to the extent that we too ‘take up’ a serious commitment here and now in favour of life and of the world.
That we Christians take on a series of commitments in favour of life and of the world is an essential need for the Church and for society as a whole:
- the commitment to allow everyone to live and proclaim their own religious belief without any discrimination, but also without claiming any privilege;
- the commitment to give everyone the possibility of a fair wage, because that is what justice demands;
- the commitment to guarantee everyone the freedom to express themselves, to love, to live, respecting everyone’s rights and asking everyone to take responsibility for their own duties;
- the commitment to fight against discord and alienation of every kind, starting with our daily lives, which unfortunately are less and less permeated by a culture of tolerance and respect;
- the commitment to teach our youth, primarily by example, to live life meaningly, recognizing the things that truly matter;
- the commitment to safeguard creation in our own ways without waiting for major political decisions so as to help preserve the goodness in which it was created.
This call is especially significant to us Indian Christians who commemorate today our nation’s Independence Day. Let us take on the commitment every day to live a life worthy of being called ‘Christian’, and we will find ourselves one day with Mary in the bosom of the Father.
Response: On your right stands the queen in gold of Ophir.
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