15th August - Mary and the Hope of Heaven

On 15th August, the Orthodox Church here in Romania celebrates the Feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God (Adormirea Maicii Domnului) – and it is a big deal! For us in the Church of England, it is also a feast of the Mother of God, marking her passing into heaven - her ‘Assumption.’ And whilst this feast is marked in Anglican circles with a little more reserve, it is a feast worth celebrating!

Some in the Reformed tradition – including some Anglicans – can be a bit nervous of devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary in general, and of this feast in particular. But what we celebrate today is simply the glory that will be ours – the hope we have in Christ’s saving death and resurrection.

What we say about Mary on this feast is what we proclaim as our hope for ourselves: the resurrection of the body and life everlasting. After the completion of her earthly life, Mary was taken body and soul into the glory of Heaven, and so we look forward to the completion of Christ’s saving work in us, the resurrection of our bodies and the glory of eternity with God.

We human beings are made up of body and soul; and we trust that body and soul, created and loved by God, will be redeemed. For us, salvation is not an escape, the soul fleeing from the wicked world of flesh and blood. Salvation is a share in Christ’s resurrection.

In Mary, we see the beginning of this saving work. Chosen by God from before she was born, she is full of grace. We see her body, her flesh and blood, made holy as she says her ‘yes’ to the angelic message, as the word becomes flesh in her womb. ‘The Almighty has done great things for me.’

This work of God reaches its culmination in Christ’s death and resurrection. Even after he has risen from the dead, Christ bears the scars of his crucifixion, and our humanity is taken up into the life of God as he ascends into heaven.  

But that is not the end of the story. Christ promises us in John’s Gospel: ‘And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.’

The story ends with us. The God who created us from the dust of the earth, whose love sustains our very existence, will take us to himself, and we will be with him in glory. That is our hope, and we see the beginning of its fulfilment in the Assumption of Mary.

As she is received into the glory of heaven, Mary shows us that we too will go where Christ has gone - that our flesh and blood, the fullness of our humanity, which the Lord took from her in the womb, can be made holy, sanctified and redeemed. Our bodies – fragile, failing, broken – will be transformed and made whole.  Death has been destroyed.

The work of redemption has come to fruition in Mary first of all –  she who is full of grace and the first disciple of the Lord. But this feast teaches us that we will follow.

God has done great things for Mary – God has done great things for us.

In Mary’s Assumption, we see the glory that will be ours. As we continue our earthly journeys, let us keep before us the hope of heaven.

‘The Almighty has done great things for me.’