Fellow St Jude parishioners:
On the evening of August 14, at our 7pm mass, we will be honoring Our Lady, by celebrating the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven, a wonderful aspect of our faith that is summed up in the following prayer.
Almighty and everlasting God, you have taken up body and soul into the heavenly glory the Immaculate Virgin Mary, Mother of Your Son. Grant, we beseech you, that, ever intent upon heavenly things, we may be worthy to be partakers of her glory. Through Jesus Christ Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
In 1950, Pope Pius XII officially stated: “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.”
As Mary’s assumption into heaven was a just reward for her devout life lived here on earth, so we hope that at the end of our lives here one earth, we too will be welcomed into the heavenly kingdom.
And in looking to that devout life of hers that she lived here on earth, we now imitate her faith-filled years that preceded her assumption.
From the moment of her fiat, her saying ‘yes’ to bringing Jesus into the world, Mary spent a life living out God’s will. And it was this strong faith of hers that gave her the strength to face the challenges that she encountered. Her journey to Bethlehem on the back of a donkey, only to give birth in a stable was far from comfortable, and soon after Jesus’ birth, she and her husband St Joseph had to flee to Egypt to save the life of their infant son Jesus.
From the day in the Temple when Simeon said that a ‘sword would pierce her soul,’ to watching the crowds turn away from Jesus, to the foot of the cross where she witnessed her son die on the cross, Mary held fast to her faith, always consenting to God’s Will, no matter how challenging her life became.
Whenever we find ourselves questioning our faith, wondering how and why God can allow bad things to happen, we can look to Mary, as an example of how to allow our faith to be stretched and grow as we continually turn ourselves over to the Lord and consent to what life throws at us. As did Mary, we make the choice not to give up on hoping that God will bring good out of the bad — will write straight with crooked lines — and we remain faithful.
Mary gives us hope that after a life of faith, we too will share in the Heavenly Banquet. A hope that we pray for as we honor of Our Lady, at mass on Friday evening August 14.
In our shared devotion to the Blessed Virgin,
Fr Henry
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