The Kings Daughter

A Rosary Meditation: The Fourth Glorious Mystery, The Assumption.

“All glorious is the kings daughter as she enters; her raiment is threaded with spun gold.” Psalms 44:14.

Like everything, excepting eternity and God and God’s love, the Assumption had its beginning and its end. In a way Mary’s Assumption had its beginning with her Immaculate Conception. Beyond this there were what we might think of as stages. The Annunciation, the Visitation, and etc. Of course breaking things down in this fashion is just a human way of understanding a thing, or an attempt at understanding. Time, and those of us who live in time, is (I think) a continuous flow. God, and those with Him, aren’t hampered by time and its limiting view. Anyway …

“All glorious is the kings daughter as she enters … ” Think about the word “glorious”. Compare it to, given Mary’s entry into Heaven, the word “ready”.

Do you think Mary was ready for the Assumption the day prior to it? We’d be tempted to say yes, and given her God-given perfection we could say she was always ready. But she wasn’t. Mary had given her heart and will over to God. Always. So she wasn’t ready the day before because He wasn’t. She was only ready in accordance with His timing. A “part” of her perfection (and I’m breaking things down here just for the sake of human understanding again, primarily my own understanding) is found in waiting on God.

Do we ever get ahead of God? Or do we try to hurry things up because that’s the way we want it or think it should be?

“Expect the Lord, do manfully, and let thy heart take courage, and wait thou for the Lord.” Psalms27:14, Douay-Rheims.

Just a thought … There are, metaphorically speaking, a variety of assumptions. There’s an Assumption like Mary’s. It takes place in God’s time, not ours. And then there’s the all to human assumption of thinking that we know best when it comes to the timing of anything.

Just Prior to the Assumption …

I’m told that after Jesus was tempted by Satan in the desert that Satan left Him. For a time. No where in the Gospel account does it say he came back. Most theologians consider it a safe assumption that, because it says he left for a period of time, at some future point he made his way back. And because we’re not told about it at any later point in time most feel that it was just prior to Jesus’ death. Say from the garden to the cross. Paul tells me that Jesus was just like me in every way but sin. That’s a two-sided coin, or so it seems to me. If He is like me in all things but sin then it stands to reason that I’m a lot like Him too. Not in all ways, but at least in some. If Satan tried hard to tempt Jesus during the last moments of His life I can probably expect the same. Most Catholic scholars seem to think this last-minute Satanic attack to be the norm. Its pretty much a given. It is, after all, the last chance the Devil has to take us to hell with him. If he can’t have us prior to death we are lost to him after death. Death settles eternity one way or the other. And Satan knows that. For some reason all of this came to mind while I was praying my Rosary. I was thinking about the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin, the 4th Glorious Mystery. There has been debate for some time as to whether or not Mary died before being assumed into Heaven. Some think she didn’t because death is a punishment for sin and she was sinless. But then I think, well, Jesus died and He never sinned. Other folks think she died for any number of reasons. To take part fully in what her Divine Son had suffered. To attain a sort of solidarity with all her children so that, as a good mother, she could have sympathy for us in all things. I’ve read things that sounded logical either way, but there’s never been a dogmatic statement that I’m aware of so I guess until there is we’re free to choose. But my meditation on the Assumption took me in a direction I’d never gone before. It was that point in time just prior to the Assumption. Whether she died or not before she was taken to Heaven isn’t the point. The point is Satan probably had a clue she was leaving one way or the other and it was his last chance at the Mother of God. How would he know she was going? How does he know anything? I’m not sure, maybe her age? Maybe circumstances in the Church? Maybe God called his attention to her approaching death in the same way He mentioned to Satan how upright Job was. But for whatever reason I just feel like he knew it wouldn’t be that much longer. So … He couldn’t keep Jesus in the tomb. This was his last opportunity to toss a wrench into God’s plan. I can imagine his frustration and his desperation. But I can’t imagine what he did. I’m rather glad of that, I’m not sure I could take it. He must have unleashed every hellish weapon he had against her just as he had Jesus. I’m not sure what those would be against one who is sinless. For the rest of us I can see how he would bring up the past to foster doubt, or taunt us with an uncertain future because it is human to fear death. Consider, death is fearful because it isn’t natural for us. We were not created to die. Ever. We were created to live for ever with God. I think that’s why all living creatures struggle so hard not to die. Death came upon the whole world, not just humanity, via the sin of one man. See Romans 5:12a and 8:19-22. But think about what SHE went through. And think about the “why”. She stood at the foot of the cross and suffered with Him. She shared in all His sufferings as no other person could. His Mother, and sinless. What suffering to see such a One murdered, love such a One in His death agony, be the Mother of such a One, and be there through it all. What new sufferings just prior to her Assumption? And why? Not because she deserved it because she didn’t. She didn’t deserve it anymore than He had. So WHY?! For the same reason He did. He loved us, He loves us. And so does she.

A Rosary Prayer & Meditation Tool

I really wish I could claim the following idea as my own but I can’t. I found it on Facebook. I’ve tried it and it is WONDERFUL. I will continue to use it on a regular basis. Because it has proven itself with me I share it here …

Take a sticky-note and use it as a marker in your New Testament. You’ll move it down, line by line, “marking” each line with it as you go. Note that you’re going line by line, not verse by verse. As you pray the Rosary, with each new mystery you go to a new line and meditate on what that line tells you about that mystery, or vice versa. Personally the only lines I skip are the “begats” and “begots”. Don’t worry if the mystery and line seem not to match. With the exercise of a bit of gray matter, and with help from above, you’ll be amazed at the insights even from seemingly unrelated thoughts. Don’t give up if at first it seems a tad hard. It’ll grow on you, and you’ll grow as a result.

Example: I’ll share this because I think it is a good example of “unrelated” thoughts. I was about to pray the Fourth Glorious Mystery, the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. I drop down to the next line in my Bible and its about Joseph, finding Mary pregnant, and going to “put her away privately”. So, how do these relate? I looked, I thought, I believe the Holy Spirit revealed. To me at least, for my edification. I saw a play on words. God looked upon Mary and assumed her into Heaven. Joseph, being human, looked upon Mary and assumed something logical but incorrect. The lesson? Two fold: Don’t make assumptions because I don’t have all the facts, and God doesn’t see like I do. My vision is limited, leading to assumptions that aren’t correct. God’s vision is 20-20 in all directions and sees the reality of the situation.

 

Note: By “line” I mean a sentence.