Vigils Reading – Assumption B.V.M.

                                                                                                                        08SN1501

                                                                                                                        08/15/21

Sermon of St Aelred of Rievaulx on the Assumption [1]

            Among all those who are Christ’s, she who tastes his goodness more intimately and more delicately is of greater excellence, more blessed, and more attractive. She is to him not only a creature, a handmaid, a friend, and a daughter, but also a mother. So then it is only right that we welcome her feast with greater delight and gladness. But today even more we should rejoice with her because today her joy was completely fulfilled. Great was her joy when the angel greeted her. Great was her joy when she felt the coming of the Holy Spirit, when that marvelous fusion of the Son of God with her flesh took place in her womb, so that he, one and the same, was the Son of God and her Son. Great was her joy when she held such a Son in her arms, when she listened to his words, when she saw his miracles. And because her sorrow was so great at the Passion, she took wondrous joy again in his resurrection and greater still at his ascension. But all these joys were surpassed by the joy which she receives today.

            Up to this day, brothers, Mary, the blessed Mother of God, knew her dearest Son in the flesh. Although she fastened all her desires and all her love there, where he was, after her dearest Son and Lord ascended into heaven, so long as she remained in this corruptible flesh, what she had seen of him in the flesh could not fade from her memory. For his deeds and words were always coming to her mind and above all there lingered in her heart the features of his exquisite face. Today, however, she passed from this world and went up to the heavenly kingdom. There she began to contemplate his brightness, power, and divinity, and her joy and her longing were fulfilled. So with good reason could she say: “I have found him whom my soul loves”. She holds him and she does not let him go.

            Previously she had found him whom her flesh loved, since the flesh still appreciated flesh, a human being another human nature. She held him but she let him go. She held him – but in the flesh – and therefore through death she lost him to some extent – but in the flesh. Today she found him whom her soul loves because, although she was taken up into heaven with her body, that body had, however, been made spiritual, so that all the love with which she loves her Lord, her Son, is not according to the flesh but according to the spirit. Today she has found him whom her soul loves, she has found him in spirit, she loves him in spirit, she holds him in spirit and therefore she will never again lose him. Today she has found him because today the shadow of night has retreated and the Light of light has risen on her.  

First, before the coming of the Lord, she sought him and longed for him. She sought, that he might come to earth as he had promised, that he might redeem the world, that he might set her, together with others, free from their miserable captivity. This is Our Lady, Saint Mary, in whose most sacred breast the flame of love had not died down. She loved him more than anyone else did, so she yearned for him more than anyone else did, and therefore sought him more persistently. But him whom until now her flesh loved, now her soul loves. And now she says: “I will rise and go the rounds of the city”. Today the Blessed Virgin went up into heaven and went round the whole of that heavenly city in the full natural vigor of her mind. Today she entered that heavenly court. She saw the white robes of the virgins, the ruddy crowns of the martyrs, the thrones of the apostles, and in the midst of them she found her Son reigning. Ascending higher that the very highest of the saints, she has arrived at such knowledge of the divinity that she then glories in having found him for the first time.

            O blessed soul, who left behind not only the patriarchs and prophets, the apostles, martyrs, confessors, and virgins, but also the angels, thrones and dominations, the cherubim and seraphim and all heaven’s array, and so reached her dearest Son. Then she utterly found him whom now her soul loves utterly. She found him and she held him. She holds him in the embraces of an utterly perfect love and she can never lose him because she can never love him any less.

            Let us lift up our hearts therefore, brothers, to Our Lady, our Advocate. Let us reflect on how much hope we have in her. Just as she surpasses every creature in excellence, so also she is more merciful and kinder than any creature. Let us then confidently entreat her who can by her excellence assist us and by her mercy chooses to do so, that she may implore her Son for us so that as he deigned to be born of her for us, he may through her deign to have mercy on us.

[1] Aelred of Rievaulx – The Liturgical Sermons – Cistercian Fathers Series #58 – Cistercian Publications – Kalamazoo – 2001