Precious the gift this earth of ours sent up to
heaven today, sealing a fruitful friendship with an exchange of presents and
joining the human to the divine, the earthly to the heavenly, the depths to the
heights. The best that earth has ever produced went up to the place whence
whatever gifts are worth having, whatever endowments are perfect of their kind,
come down to us. And as she has mounted up on high, the blessed Virgin too will
make gifts to men. How could she fail to, when she lacks neither the means nor
the will? She is the queen of heaven and she is merciful. She is also the
mother of God's only Son. Nothing could vouch for her great power and pity so
well as that. Otherwise, we should have to believe that God did not honor his
mother, or that Mary's heart was not wholly possessed by charity; even though
God's Love in person rested in her body for nine whole months.
This I say for our benefit, brethren, knowing as I
do how unlikely it is that in such a dearth of love that perfect charity should
be found which does not claim its rights. l Not to mention, for the moment, the
blessings we obtain from her entry into glory; if we really love her, we shall
be glad that she has gone to her Son. Of course, we shall rejoice with her,
unless we are content to find no favor with her who found favor with God and
God forbid that that should be. When he came into this village, we call the
world, she it was who welcomed him; and now today he welcomed her as she
entered the holy city. Imagine the honor, the rejoicing, the glory! There was
no higher place on earth than Mary's virginal womb, the temple where she
received the Word of God. There is no higher place in heaven than the royal
throne on which her Son set her today. Fruitful the reception each gave the
other. Words fail to express what the mind fails to conceive.
No one can explain how it was, even if he speaks
with every tongue that men and angels use, that the Holy Spirit came upon Mary
and the power of the Most High overshadowed her, so that the Word through whom
all things came into beings was himself made flesh,6 and the majestic Lord whom
the entire creation is too small to contain shut himself into a virgin's womb
and became man. And no one can even
imagine the pomp with which the queen of the world went forth today, the
affectionate devotion of the whole army of heaven as they went out to meet her,
the hymns that accompanied her to the throne of glory, the peace and serenity
on the face of her Son, or the glad embrace with which he welcomed her and set
her above every other creature, as the honor due to such a mother and the glory
of such a Son alike required.
Mary's assumption, like Christ's birth, is beyond
our knowing. On earth she received more
grace than others, and in heaven too her glory is unique.
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