Assumption is the Feast and Mystery of Hope and Joy

(August 15, 2011) Pope Benedict XVI said that the feast of the Assumption is a great mystery that we celebrate today, a mystery of hope and joy for all of us in Mary as we move towards our ultimate goal, Jesus. This feast speaks of our future and tells us that we too will be with Jesus in the joy of God and invites us to have courage, to believe that the power of the Resurrection of Christ which works in us and makes us men and women who are to dispel the darkness and be light to the world. The Pope said this during the Mid Day Angelus Prayer on Monday, the feast of the Assumption at his Summer Residence at Castel Gandolfo, just outside Rome. The Pontiff referred to the Dogma of the Assumption proclaimed by Pope Pius XII in 1950 but the special honour to Mary is rooted in the faith of the early centuries of the Church. The Pope referred to the Gospel that in those days Mary arose and hastened from Galilee to a town near Jerusalem, to visit her cousin Elizabeth and today we contemplate the climb to the mountain of God and enter into the heavenly Jerusalem, the first to be with Him in glory of heaven. After the reflections, Pope Benedict XVI welcomed the English-speaking visitors gathered for the Angelus prayer on this solemn feast day. He said that the example and prayers of Mary, Queen of Heaven, may inspire and sustain them all on their pilgrimage of faith, that they too may attain the glory of the Resurrection and the fulfilment of our hope in her Son’s promises. Then the Pontiff imparted his Apostolic Blessing.