10 Quotes on the Assumption of Mary
The Assumption of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary is quickly approaching. Here are 10 quotes about the Assumption that you can bring to your prayer and ponder:
“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 to heavenly glory.”
~Pope Pius XII
“The feast of the assumption of our Lady prompts us to acknowledge the basis for this joyful hope. Yes, we are still pilgrims, but our mother has gone on ahead, where she points to the reward of our efforts. She tells us that we can make it. And, if we are faithful, we will reach home. The blessed Virgin is not only our model, she is the help of Christians. And as we besiege her with our petitions — ‘Show that you are our Mother’ — she cannot help but watch over her children with motherly care.”
~St. Josemaria Escriva, Christ is Passing By
“Mary’s Assumption is an event that concerns us precisely because every human being is destined to die. But death is not the last word. Death – the mystery of the Virgin’s Assumption assures us – is the passage to life, the encounter with Love. It is the passage to the eternal happiness in store for those who toil for truth and justice and do their utmost to follow Christ.”
~Pope St. John Paul II
“Mary is assumed into heaven: small and humble, she is the first to receive the highest glory. She, a human creature, one of us, attains eternity in soul and body. And there she awaits us as a mother waits for her children to come home.”
~Pope Francis, Angelus
“It was fitting that she, who had kept her virginity intact in childbirth, should keep her own body free from all corruption even after death. It was fitting that she, who had carried the Creator as a child at her breast, should dwell in the divine tabernacles. It was fitting that the spouse, whom the Father had taken to himself, should live in the divine mansions.”
~St. John Damascene
“Like the bodies of the saints, however, she has been held in honor for her character and understanding. And if I should say anything more in her praise, she is like Elijah, who was virgin from his mother’s womb, always remained so, and was taken up, but has not seen death.”
~St. Epiphanius, Panarion
“Theologians have frequently come up with similar reasons to explain in some way the meaning of the abundant graces showered upon Mary and culminating in her assumption to heaven. They put it this way: “It was fitting; God could do so; therefore he did.” This is the clearest reason why our Lord granted his Mother, from the very moment of her immaculate conception, all possible privileges. She was free from the power of Satan. She is beautiful, spotless and pure in soul and body.”
~St. Josemaria Escriva, Christ is Passing By
“And with regard to ourselves, how deservedly do we keep the feast of the Assumption with all solemnity. What reasons for rejoicing, what motives for exultation have we on this most beautiful day! The presence of Mary illumines the entire world so that even the holy city above has now a more dazzling splendor from the light of this virginal Lamp. With good reason thanksgiving and the voice of praise resound today throughout the courts of Heaven…let us not complain for here we do not have a lasting city, but we seek one that is to come, the same which the blessed Mary entered today.”
~St. Bernard of Clairvaux
“When finally the Blessed Virgin had fulfilled the course of this life, and was now to be called out of this world, all the apostles were gathered together from each region to her house…and behold the Lord Jesus came with his angels and, receiving her soul…at the break of day the apostles lifted the body with the couch and laid it in the sepulcher, and they guarded it awaiting the coming of the Lord. And behold the Lord again stood by them, and commanded that the holy body be taken up and borne on a cloud into paradise, where now, reunited with (her) soul…”
~St. Gregory of Tours
“By a special privilege, she was enriched by divine grace from the moment of her conception, and Christ, who ascended to the right hand of the Father, opened the doors of his kingdom to her, first among human creatures. Now from heaven, where the Queen of the angels and saints is crowned, the Mother of God and of the Church is close to the Christian people before whom she shines as the ‘new and immaculate woman (who) mediated for the guilt of the first woman.’”
~Pope St. John Paul II