Assumption: A Harvest Feast
August 15, 2010: The Solemnity Mary’s Assumption
Revelation 11:19; 12:1-6, 10 I Corinthians 15:20-27 Luke 1:39-45
Second reading
Brothers and sisters: Christ has been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through man, the resurrection of the dead came also through man. For just as in Adam all die, so too in Christ all shall be brought to life. But each one in his proper order: Christ the first-fruits of the harvest; then those who belong to Christ at the time of His coming. Then the end will come; Christ will overcome all spiritual rulers, authorities and powers, and will hand over the Kingdom to His God and Father. For Christ must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. The last enemy to be destroyed will be death. For Scripture says, “God has put everything under His feet.[1]”
The Word of the Lord
Thanks be to God
Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Luke.
Glory to you, Lord.
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
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Introduction
August 15 -- Feast of the Assumption
Introduction
August 15 -- Feast of the Assumption
Today would ordinarily be the 20th Sunday of Ordinary Time, but since it’s August 15, the feast of Mary’s assumption into heaven, the feast takes precedence over the 20th Sunday. GK Chesterton said: "I love my religion and I love especially those parts of it which are generally held to be most superstitious." Many suspect that the bodily assumption of Our Lady into heaven is one of those superstitious aspects, despite the fact that it has been universally observed in both Eastern and Western churches at least from the late 7th century. The origin of the precise date of August 15 is not clear. Theological debate about Mary’s assumption into heaven climaxed on November 1, 1950 when Pope Pius XII
defined it a dogma of faith: By the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that 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.
Assumption – a harvest feast
In this hemisphere the middle of August is always a turning point. Soon the first hints of fall will appear. Driving along we’ll suddenly come upon small swaths of gold and red on herds of maple trees grazing on a hillside. Soon from wide-opened windows at night we’ll drink in wafts of cool fresh air, as we lie cozily under an extra blanket, listening to crickets singing of summer spent. As the first fruits of the harvest come rushing in, some of us old-timers, who aren’t addicted to supermarkets, will hasten to preserve the fruits of summer in canning jars for the long winter ahead.
The feast of Jesus’ Ascension into heaven in late spring is a harvest feast. It proclaims that one of our own, a man, has been harvested body and soul into heavenly glory and now sits on a throne at the right hand of the Father. In the second reading today, Paul calls Jesus raised from the dead "the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep." (I Cor. 15:20) The feast of Mary’s assumption into heaven is also a harvest feast. It declares that another one of our own, this time a woman, has been harvested body and soul into heavenly glory and now sits on a throne at the right hand of her Son and reigns as Queen of Heaven.
At the end of the day, the feast of the Mary’s Assumption declares that the harvesting which began in the body of Jesus in His resurrection has now spread to the body of Mary his mother, and will eventually spread to all our bodies, when “in the twinkling of an eye, the trumpets shall sound and all the dead shall rise incorruptible from their graves, and we shall all be changed.” (I Cor. 15:52) The Assumption is a singular participation of Mary in her Son's resurrection, and it is also a singular anticipation of our own resurrection when on the last day the trumpets will summon us from our graves.
The feast of Jesus’ Ascension into heaven in late spring is a harvest feast. It proclaims that one of our own, a man, has been harvested body and soul into heavenly glory and now sits on a throne at the right hand of the Father. In the second reading today, Paul calls Jesus raised from the dead "the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep." (I Cor. 15:20) The feast of Mary’s assumption into heaven is also a harvest feast. It declares that another one of our own, this time a woman, has been harvested body and soul into heavenly glory and now sits on a throne at the right hand of her Son and reigns as Queen of Heaven.
At the end of the day, the feast of the Mary’s Assumption declares that the harvesting which began in the body of Jesus in His resurrection has now spread to the body of Mary his mother, and will eventually spread to all our bodies, when “in the twinkling of an eye, the trumpets shall sound and all the dead shall rise incorruptible from their graves, and we shall all be changed.” (I Cor. 15:52) The Assumption is a singular participation of Mary in her Son's resurrection, and it is also a singular anticipation of our own resurrection when on the last day the trumpets will summon us from our graves.
The problem with the Assumption
What bothers Protestants in general and Lutherans in particular about the Catholic feast of Mary’s bodily assumption into heaven is that it lacks a clear explicit scriptural basis. They’re right in that. At the end of the day, however, that really shouldn’t be a sizeable obstacle for Bible people. For it simply says that the heavenly glory which began in the resurrected body of Jesus (and which scripture promises will spread to all our bodies) in Mary’s case has simply been anticipated.
More importantly, what particularly bothers Protestants is the “dangerous proximity” it posits between Mary who is the Deipara (the God-bearer) and Jesus Himself who is God: both are now seated side by side on the throne of eternal glory! That, good Lutherans say, endangers the unique supremacy of Christ, from which no true son of the Reformation will budge. Despite that fear of Lutherans, we note that in his sermon of August 15, 1522 (the last time Martin Luther preached on the Feast of the Assumption) he stated: “There can be no doubt that the Virgin Mary is in heaven. How it happened we do not know. And since the Holy Spirit has told us nothing about it, we cannot make it an article of faith . . . It is enough to know that she lives in Christ.[2]"
More importantly, what particularly bothers Protestants is the “dangerous proximity” it posits between Mary who is the Deipara (the God-bearer) and Jesus Himself who is God: both are now seated side by side on the throne of eternal glory! That, good Lutherans say, endangers the unique supremacy of Christ, from which no true son of the Reformation will budge. Despite that fear of Lutherans, we note that in his sermon of August 15, 1522 (the last time Martin Luther preached on the Feast of the Assumption) he stated: “There can be no doubt that the Virgin Mary is in heaven. How it happened we do not know. And since the Holy Spirit has told us nothing about it, we cannot make it an article of faith . . . It is enough to know that she lives in Christ.[2]"
Man’s inhumanity to man in the 1st half of the 20th century
Was it simply coincidental, or was it a very meaningful and opportune moment when Pope Pius XII declared and defined Mary’s bodily assumption into heaven at the beginning of the second half of the 20th century (Nov. 1, 1950)? The first half had been horribly tumultuous and cruel. It had endured two world-wide wars. Out of the dust and ashes caused by the bombs which leveled Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it had ominously witnessed the dawn of the atomic age. In the Holocaust which had annihilated six million Jews in the gas chambers and crematories of Auschwitz, Dachau and Buchenwald, the first half of the 20th century had experienced man’s inhumanity to man in a way which had never been experienced before.
A response to that inhumanity
Was the Pope’s declaration of the bodily assumption of a woman into heaven a response to this inhumanity of man to man, which peaked to an unspeakable height (or rather sank to an unfathomable depth) in the first half of the century? Was that declaration a response to the masculine element of creation which had gone absolutely mad in two world-wars, the Holocaust and the bombings which ushered in the atomic age? Was the Pope’s declaration of a woman’s bodily assumption into heaven a strong affirmation of the feminine and gentle element built into creation? Was the declaration meant to awaken the slumbering power of that feminine and gentle element, and summon it to address the woes inflicted by the masculine element gone mad in the first half of the 20th century?
Carl Jung and the Assumption
While some Protestants pulled back from the Pope’s declaration as not very conducive to ecumenical relations, the Swiss psychologist Carl Jung startled everyone by his very positive reaction to Pius’s proclamation of the dogma. Jung grasped the profound significance of that declaration in the middle of the 20th century. In fact, he considered it to be “the most important religious event since the Reformation.[3]." For Jung the Church's
declaration of Mary’s bodily assumption into heaven addressed “the profoundest problem afflicting the human psyche: an imbalance which favored masculine principles and archetypes over the feminine ones.[4]” For Jung the papal declaration went a long way towards redressing that balance. In the declaration that Mary had been physically assumed into heaven, Jung saw the Church as accepting at long last the physical world. But more importantly, in that declaration which affirms that a woman has been bodily assumed into heaven and has taken her seat on the throne of glory, Jung saw the Church as harvesting and celebrating the feminine and gentle element built into creation. In his work Answer to Job Jung writes,
One could have known for a long time that there was a deep longing in the masses for an intercessor and mediatrix who would at last take her place alongside the Holy Trinity and be received as the Queen of heaven and Bride at the heavenly court.[5]
The feminine element built into a nesting robin
One spring a robin nested on the elbow of a downspout outside my kitchen window. I watched her go through all her appointed rounds. Following an eternal blueprint, she built her nest according to specifications. With patient fidelity she kept vigil over her eggs, and with blind obedience to an internal law she brought them to term. With maternal instinct she sheltered her chicks against a late winter blizzard. Out of the sparseness of late winter and early spring she managed to scrounge up a daily feast for them. Then bulging with growth and well-being they burst their nest and flew away. That’s the feminine and gentle element built into creation. That’s what the Assumption of Mary celebrates and harvests.
The feminine element built into a mama cat
One day a very sick cat appeared at my door. She was practically dying. Matter was running from her eyes. Her long hair was matted with mud. I put her under a faucet, washed away the mud, cut away the hair tangled into knots, fed the poor thing and then let her go. Daily she would come to my door for a feast of Purina One and Fancy Feast. Day by day good health began to transform her. Eventually she grew plump not only because of her fancy feasting but also because she was pregnant. She eventually gave birth to three kittens which she secretly deposited for safe keeping near my shrine of St. Francis. When I discovered her secret deposit, I built a little `cat house,’ and there the four of them took up housekeeping.
One day when a thunderous rainstorm threatened, they all disappeared. Lo and behold, through a window left open in my car (parked in the garage with the garage-door open) mama cat had safely deposited her little ones in the driver’s seat of my car! In short order I re-deposited them right back into their little `cat house.’ But to no avail! An hour later she had them all re-deposited in the driver’s seat! “You win!” I said to myself. I took the whole gang into the house, and in the following weeks and months I was treated to a first class course on the feminine and gentle element built into creation. That’s what the Assumption of Mary celebrates and harvests.
One day when a thunderous rainstorm threatened, they all disappeared. Lo and behold, through a window left open in my car (parked in the garage with the garage-door open) mama cat had safely deposited her little ones in the driver’s seat of my car! In short order I re-deposited them right back into their little `cat house.’ But to no avail! An hour later she had them all re-deposited in the driver’s seat! “You win!” I said to myself. I took the whole gang into the house, and in the following weeks and months I was treated to a first class course on the feminine and gentle element built into creation. That’s what the Assumption of Mary celebrates and harvests.
Machismo
That feminine and gentle element is built not only into nesting robins and mama cats but also into tigers and lions. It’s built not only into women but also into men. But down through the millennia, machismo, which proclaims that this is a man’s world, has diminished, hampered, belittled, suppressed the feminine and gentle element built even into man. If women, whose wombs bear the world’s babies, and whose breasts nursed them, were in the driver’s seat, we ask: would world wars be possible, would gas chambers and crematories even be conceivable and would the atomic bomb still be waiting to be invented?
It's Machismo which puts burqas [6] onIslamic women in order to make them invisible. It’s machismo which demands that a woman caught in adultery be stoned to death, but not the man[7]. Yes, it’s machismo (in a very refined and insidious form) which puts woman on a pedestal where she can be venerated, but where she doesn’t have to be taken seriously. With the Church’s declaration of Mary’s bodily assumption into heaven Mary has been transported from an earthly pedestal to a heavenly throne where she now has to be taken seriously. Conclusion
“A vein of rich spiritual ore”
The Assumption of Mary is a harvest feast, and what it reaps is the feminine and gentle element built into creation. The Assumption of Mary is a liberation feast. It liberates men from machismo. It liberates the feminine and gentle element built not only into women but also into men. Some might call that `liberation theology.’ Others might call it “a secret hidden from generations past but now [in the middle of the 20th century] revealed in the fullness of time.” (Col. 1:26) Eugene Cullen Kennedy calls the Assumption a “vein of rich spiritual ore that runs beneath the surface of a teaching that is radically diminished when it is presented literally. [8]”
