A WOMAN CLOTHED WITH THE SUN

 A WOMAN CLOTHED WITH THE SUN

As we’re all very well aware, death is something that cannot be avoided.  It is something that we have a tendency to fear, as it’s something unknown that none of us have ever experienced firsthand, and none of us know anyone else who has experienced it for themselves either.  In his Epistle to the Romans, St. Paul explains to us that death is the result of sin.  And heaven knows, we’re all sinners.  Even the greatest of saints, every single one of them, were sinners to some degree or other.  They may have sinned a lot less than we do, but their souls were all stained with at least original sin, and probably quite a few actual sins too. 

All of them, that is, except one.  The one whose feastday of Marymas we proclaim today with great solemnity, the Assumption of the blessed and glorious ever-Virgin Mary, Mother of God—she alone neither committed any actual sin, nor was she even stained with the original sin of our first parents.  She was conceived immaculate, her life, her morals, every fiber of her being was immaculate, free of the stain of any sin whatsoever.  And for that reason, the end of her earthly life was also like none other.  She was free from sin, and therefore free from the punishment due to sin.  The decay and corruption of the grave was not permitted to stain the body of one whose soul was never stained.

In today’s sermon, you’ll hear why our Blessed Lady is referred to sometimes as the Ark of the Covenant.  A further hint as to the reason why can be found in today’s Gospel reading of the Visitation.  The description of Mary visiting her cousin Elizabeth in our Gospel today is a strong reminder of something that happened in the Old Testament, when King David brought the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem for the first time.  Here is yet another example of the Old Testament looking forward to the New, with the Ark of the Covenant in the Old Testament looking forward to Mary as the greater Ark of the Covenant in the New Testament.  In the Second Book of Samuel, King David dances for joy (2 Sam. 6:5), while the unborn child John the Baptist leaps for joy in the womb of his mother Elizabeth (Luke 1:44).  In 2 Sam. 6:9, David cries out “How shall the ark of the Lord come to me?” while Elizabeth calls out in Luke 1:43, “Whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?”  The ark of the Lord remained in the house of Obededom the Gittite a few miles outside Jerusalem for three months, and the Lord blessed Obededom and his whole house in 2 Sam 6:11, while Mary remained about three months with Elizabeth in Luke 1:56 a few miles outside Jerusalem.

As final confirmation that our Blessed Lady is indeed the Ark of the New Covenant, turn to the Book of the Apocalypse and compare the last verse of Chapter 11 with the first verse of Chapter 12.  Because they are separate chapters, they are very rarely considered together.  And yet these two verses immediately follow one from the other:  First, Apoc. 11:19 — “And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the Ark of his Covenant: and there were lightnings, and voices, and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail.”  And then, the famous verse of Apoc. 12:1 — “And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars.”