Monday, August 12, 2019

St. Bernard: Sermon 1 on the Assumption, 2-4: The assumption of Mary corresponds to the Incarnation of her Son



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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