Full of Grace is God’s proper name for Mary.

 We say “Hail, Mary, full of grace” but the archangel Gabriel simply said, “Rejoice, Full of Grace!”

In the moment in which God created Mary in the womb of St. Ann, we can imagine God’s all-powerful Word command:

“Exist, Full of Grace!

Exist, that through you I might come to exist as man!

Exist, that from you I might take the flesh and blood which will one day be the Bread of Life and the Drink of Eternity for all who hunger and thirst for that fullness of grace they see in you!”

 Mary received her fullness from the One who is Fullness itself.

She was like the pearl hidden in the barren field of mortal humanity, and herself became the fertile field which held that other Pearl, the Pearl of great price, the Son of the Father.

That Pearl of great price would render all barren fields fertile with the waters of immortality, pouring forth from his wounded heart.

He who carried within himself the full plenitude of divinity would, through his death and resurrection, cause that plenitude to burst forth into the very mortal flesh he had assumed from Mary.

And because she was full of the grace of that plenitude, her own mortal flesh would itself be assumed into the fullness of glory of the Risen Christ.

 From her he assumed mortal flesh; to himself he assumed her immortal flesh.

 Mary did not belong to the old creation, old because of its sin, both original and personal.

She was not so much daughter of the old Eve as the new Eve herself, mother and daughter of her divine Son, the new Adam.

The new Adam is new because his obedience crushed the oldness of sin, and his death itself did unto death the consummation of that oldness, which was death.

The new Adam is father not by the begetting of the flesh, but by generation through the Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life.

In this sense, Jesus begat Mary to the fullness of grace at the moment he created her. In the assumption, he simply completes that work, by drawing her, body and soul, to himself.

 But fullness of grace did not mean emptiness of freedom!

God asked her to accept his gift, and could not have crowned that gift without her free collaboration.

For, if the Immaculate Conception marks the beginning of her journey, and the Assumption its end, it nevertheless had to pass through Bethlehem, Egypt, Nazareth, Cana, Jerusalem and Calvary.

Grace does not suffocate freedom: it allows it to breathe, and to breathe fully, deeply, expansively.

 Mary belongs to the new Creation, to the new heavens and earth.

She does not now belong to the world of evolution but to that of consummation.

And just as Christ did not abandon us when he ascended into heaven, but rather ascended into the mystical depths of the sacraments, of the Church and of each one of us, so Mary has not left us, but stands beside her glorified Son as she stood beside him crucified.

As, at her Son’s behest, she welcomed John as her son and was welcomed by him as his Mother, so now, at the behest of the glorified Lord, she continues to welcome all of us as her children and seek welcome by us as our Mother.

 In the end, the Assumption of Mary into heaven simply means the definitive union of her full humanity with the full humanity and divinity of Jesus.

As such, she is the anticipation of what we all shall be, please God, at the resurrection of the dead.

As such, she is no more absent from us than is Christ - that is, not at all.

On the contrary, as with Jesus, her withdrawal from the gaze of our mortal eyes in the fragility of our space and time gives her a universal presence in that “spiritual dimension” which lies at the most intimate core of every human soul.

Mary assumed into heaven is, like Jesus, closer to us than we are to ourselves.

As she did at the Wedding of Cana, she sees and perceives with her ingenious feminine intuition the needs, the situation of every heart. She ponders over it and she says to her Son, “See, they have no wine!” – whatever that wine may be.

 So do not feel “alienated” by the Assumption.

It is an immense gift to us in the most practical needs of our lives.

She who is Full of Grace desires no less grace for us, in the here and now and above all in the life to come!

Mary, you who are the Full-of-Grace,

Queen and Mother of the new creation,

This generation, our generation, joyfully proclaims you as

Magnified by the Lord, as

The one truly blessed by all generations!

Hear us, come to visit us, o Blessed Mother of the Lord, as you visited Elizabeth!

Help us and lift to the highest heaven our hopes of divine mercy, grace and holiness! Amen.

Msgr. Peter Magee

Solemnity of the Assumption; Annunciation, DC: 8.00 am