Up in heaven, Jesus gave a very special job to Peter to guard the beautiful pearly gates. When Jesus spoke to Saint Peter, he very carefully told him how important it is to make sure that the wrong people did not get past those gates. He said to him, "Now Peter, I am entrusting this job to you so please do not fail me. It is very important that you do not let those who overly sinned into heaven. Remember that I am counting on you." Peter took his job very seriously and told Our Savior that he would guard the gates of heaven with all his love for Him.
Time passed by and Jesus started to see strange things around heaven. He would notice a soul walking here and there that he knew should NOT be there, at least not yet. So he approached Peter.
He said, "Now Peter, I trusted you with this special job. What is this that I am seeing all over heaven?!"
Peter bowed his head and said, "Please Lord, you know that I would never disobey you and I have certainly listened to everything you have instructed me to do."
Jesus asked, "Then how could this be happening?"
Peter replied, "My Lord, I have been very careful in guarding the gates of heaven but while I am keeping such a close watch on the gates, your Mother has been opening the windows!"
The joke is not theologically correct, of course - Mary would not sneak around behind Jesus' back and anyway Jesus, being God, would know what's going on. But the joke points to an important truth about Mary.
Saint Padre Pio of Pietrelcina
August 15th is the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. This posting comes 2 days after the feast, but nobody thinks the event happened on this specific date and no one seems to know why this date was chosen. The event is relevant every day and for eternity.
Eileen Clare Grant puts it nicely in August's Magnificat:
The Dwelling Place of the Word
The Catholic Church teaches that "the most Blessed Virgin Mary, when the course of her earthly life was completed, was taken up body and soul into the glory of heaven, where she already shares in the glory of her Son's Resurrection, anticipating the resurrection of all members of his Body." This doctrine - the Assumption - was defined by Pope Pius XII in 1950 on the grounds that it had always been an intrinsic part of Catholic belief. But why?
We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the humble girl who trusted God and said "Yes" to bearing the Redeemer of the world. Surely, the Father who had been generous enough to send his only Son to save us would reward Mary at the end of her earthly life. He would not let her rot in the tomb, but take her to heaven to be with her Son for eternity.
"And who, I ask, could believe that the dwelling place of the Word of God, the temple of the Holy Spirit, could be reduced to ruin? My soul is filled with horror at the thought that this virginal flesh which had begotten God, had brought him into the world, had nourished and carried him, could have been turned into ashes or given over to be food for worms" (Saint Robert Bellarmine).
"What son would not bring his mother back to life, and would not bring her into paradise after her death if he could?" (Saint Francis de Sales).
Such declarations bear witness to the love and veneration with which Mary has been regarded ever since her Son gave her to his newborn Church as Mother.
Eileen Clare Grant is a Benedictine oblate and RCIA catechist at St Mary's Cathedral, Aberdeen, Scotland
August 15th is a national holiday in Poland. When I first came to Poland to do my 4-week teacher certification course in August 1997, in Cracow, this day fell on a Friday. We had the day off from our course and so had a long weekend.
I had become friends with a couple of the other trainees on the course - Andrew from Vancouver, Canada and his girlfriend Becky, who was born in England but moved as a child to Vancouver. For the holiday on the 15th another American on the course, Tom, suggested going swimming in a lake near Cracow. He told us the lake was an old flooded quarry and that the quarry was where Karol Wojtyła (the future Pope John Paul II) was forced to work for a chemical company during the Second World War.
Andrew, Becky and I prepared a picnic lunch: sandwiches made of fresh rolls, fresh ham, cheese, cucumbers, lettuce (so delicious!), some fruit and bottles of beer. (The Poles aren't so puritan about public drinking and the vast majority of people behave themselves.) Then we caught up with Tom later at the lake.
After lugging around so much heavy baggage while moving from base to base during my Air Force days, I had only packed one medium suitcase to take to Poland. Luckily I had included a pair of swimming trunks in that suitcase. The day at the lake was fantastic. The weather was sunny and warm, the water lovely and cool, the food and beer very satisfying and the time spent with my friends I'll never forget.
Andrew and Becky were cooking enthusiasts and they taught me to make tomato spaghetti sauce and creamy alfredo sauce during our time in Cracow. After we finished our course they both got jobs at a school in Wrocław and I got a job in Łódź. They came up once to visit me and I went there twice - my second visit to them over Christmas and New Year's included a week in Cologne, Germany.
Andrew and Becky split up the following February, Becky going back to Canada. Andrew and a friend of his stayed with me for a few days the following summer when I was teaching summer school in Cracow. Then Andrew went back to Canada and we lost touch.
It was a brief and admittedly not a deep friendship, but they both did touch my life and I'll never forget them. I thank God for them and I ask Him to guide and protect them wherever they are now.
Cracow (Kraków) - St Mary's Church, main square
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