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We have something a little different this evening because, what is normally a weekday feast honoring the assumption of Mary replaces the Sunday Masses with its own proper songs and prayers and texts. Let me point out just a few interesting and, in fact, I think surprising things about this feast and then, a fascinating story about the gospel that we just read..... five surprising things about this feast!

Surprise #1: The doctrine of Mary’s assumption into heaven is very, very new. Although devotion and prayer and celebrations around the welcome of Mary into heaven go back certainly as early as the sixth century, with, at times, enormous popularity among all believing Christians, with sermons and hymns and decades of the rosary. Still it was only November 1st, 1950, that Pope Pius XII offically declared as part of Catholic belief, declared infallibly, “that when the course of her earthly life was finished Mary was taken up, body and soul, into the glory of heaven.” 1950, the first surprise!

Surprise #2: “body and soul” We throw that phrase around as if it means, on the one hand, an anatomy, a corpse, a cadaver, and, on the other hand, a kind of inner invisible spirit, a kind of ghost-like non-substance. But when the Church uses that language (It uses “body and soul” of Christ in the Eucharist.) it means the whole person. It means the real person. Here it is used to describe Mary’s unique historical personality and to say that Mary, who she was and who she is now, is safe with God.

There are three more surprises. They all have to do with what we call “Papal infallibility.” Most of the time when we hear the phrase “The Pope is infallible” or “Papal infallibility” we don’t figure he is using that infallibility all the time. (He gets up in the morning and he says, “It’s going to be a beautiful day,” and then it rains! Oh, my goodness! Where did infallibility go?!) But, rather, we figure it is frequent enough whenever he comes out with a major edict, proclamation, encyclical, and that he must gather the information somehow mystically, almost as if by magic. Well, the 1950 declaration by the Pope about the assumption of Mary suggests something very different, in fact, just the opposite.

Surprise #3: Guess how the Pope went about making this declaration. He contacted every bishop in the world and all the major universities and theologates and their faculties, and said, “Is this what you and your community believe as Catholic Christians?” ....He checked it out with the People of God. That’s what he did.

Surprise #4: Since the Church has officially declared and announced that the Pope can exercise infallibility, how often has it happened? In the many, many years, how often has it happened? .... Once! This is it! Once and once only. This is it.

Surprise #5: Why did he decide to make this declaration and underline this feast? We know, because in the declaration, Pope Pius XII said explicitly why he was doing it. He said clearly and explicitly because the previous fifty years had included the slaughter and genocide of the Armenian people, the loss of ten million lives in World War I, the loss of forty million lives in the Russian Revolution, the loss of six million Jewish lives in the Holocaust, the loss of fifty million lives in World War II, and the invention and use of a new weapon of massive destruction called the atomic bomb. Pope Pius XII referred explicitly to this history. He deplored the destruction of human life, the desecration of human bodies right and left, and the increasing loss of reverence and respect for the God-given identity of every human being. And he said, “What I intend, I intend that the celebration of the Assumption of Mary might make clear the sacredness and the high destiny of every single human person.”

Well, I read the newspaper this morning. The loss of life from terrorism and organized assault is, if anything, increasing. We still very much need this feast. By honoring the destiny of a poor young girl from Nazareth, we might remember to honor one another, all our brothers and sisters on earth, as well.

Now, the gospel designated to be read at this Mass each year on August 15th has a fascinating story connected with it. Two decades ago, Pope John Paul II visited Latin America and including all the then military dictatorships. And he found his visit carefully censored by government officials. One text was removed from his planned visit. It was never allowed to be read, never allowed to be heard. The forbidden text is today’s gospel. “Our God has shown the strength of his arm and has scattered the proud in the conceit of their hearts. God casts down the powerful from their thrones and he lifts up the lowly. God fills the hungry with good things and the rich he sends off empty-handed.” That was forbidden.

I want to suggest that I think there is a need for ourselves to be careful, not to censor that out of our lives either. There are two driving forces that come up again and again in our lives and in our society. One is the sheer self-interest and the other is the use of power to get our own way. And that needs to be challenged again and again in our society and in our own hearts. This past Thursday morning we had an interfaith meeting over here in the parish hall, representatives and parishoners and ministers from a variety of churches, around the issue of health coverage for uninsured workers in our state. And an African-American preacher very eloquently recalled at least his recollection that once upon a time in America the common good seemed to be the standard for making decisions, and not all, but many major corporations, saw as their constituency their customers and their employees. Things like a living wage, decent working conditions, health coverage and job security were seen either as their responsibility or, at least, as an acceptable price for doing business in this land. He lamented that today for many major corporations stockholders are the constituency, and the profit margin is the major concern and every other possible concern is a distant, distant second.

Now, I know business and economy and politics and our personal lives are enormously complicated. They are not simple. And all of us may well argue and disagree and debate over the wisdom of specific plans or proposals and ways of doing things. And that’s fine. But we need to keep ourselves in tune with the values and vision of the gospel. That’s got to be a starting point. And we need to keep ourselves in harmony with the song of Mary, who celebrated and became an instrument of a God Who raises up the lowly and is faithful to all people. May our lives magnify the Lord. May our spirits rejoice in God, our Savior. Amen.