Sunday homily for the Feast of Assumption Year B
Theme: The Ark is taken up!
By: Rev Fr Oselumhense Anetor (Uromi Diocese).
Homily for Sunday August 15 2021
Rev.11:19,12:1-6,10; Ps.45:10, 11,12,16; 1 Cor.15:20-26; Luke 1.39-56
There are those who fail to realise that the Old Testament prefigures the New, and the New fulfills the Old. These same persons fail to acknowledge dogmatic teachings of the Catholic Church on the pretext that one man (the Pope) does not have authority to make such declarations. But they seem not to have a problem swallowing (hook, line and sinker) the personal ‘dogmatic’ reflections of their own individual preachers and pastors. How ironic! These set of people fail to realise that Jesus Christ himself founded the Catholic Church and gave her authority to preach the Gospel to the ends of the earth.
What do we celebrate today? On November 1, 1950, in the Apostolic Constitution ‘Munificentissimus Deus”, Pope Pius XII declared the Assumption of Mary as a dogma. He writes, “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” (MD, 44).
Friends, today’s Solemnity is not about arguments. It’s a divinely revealed truth that Mary was indeed “taken up” body and soul into heavenly glory. In the New Testament, she is the Ark; the one who bore the Word in the flesh. We get this picture clearly from today’s first reading. She is also the Queen in garments of gold (Ps 45). Mary did not “ascend” (as Jesus did by his own power). She was assumed (taken up) by God’s power, who destroyed death through the death of his own Son. What we do now is a fulfilment of Mary’s own prophecy, that all generations will call her Blessed. It is only FITTING that the most Blessed of all women; she who was first honoured by God himself, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory. He who has ears, let him/her listen to what the Spirit has revealed to the Church.
Happy Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven. Happy Sunday! Try to go to Mass today; It’s a Holy Day of Obligation.