Fr Jarek Kurek OSB
Over the last few years, as a curious non-native English-speaking foreigner, I explored the beginnings of the English language and wondered who the first authors might be. Strangely, the answer is not easily found. Some say Shakespeare, others point to Chaucer. But in fact, it was the Poems written in Old English in the 9th century.
Now, what has the origins of the English language got to do with the feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary to heaven? I will tell you in a second, before that an important point.
Today we contemplate Mary following her Son on her own journey to heaven. But there is another theme closely intertwined with it.
The perennial battle between good and evil: the woman and the dragon, glory and abyss, heaven and hell. The battle we all fight. On earth, we witness the almost unending clashing between God and Devil, between good and evil. I said ‘almost unending’, as this struggle is supposed to be over at the end of times, with the monks here often pronouncing the words of the Father spoken to Jesus: Sede a dextris meis, donac ponam inimicos tuos scabellum pedum tuorum; ‘Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool’, a reference to which we also had in the second reading, and yesterday’s reading at vigils.
Returning to the ‘linguistic’ introduction, those who were first to use the English language were acutely aware of this conflict, and so we are left with a beautiful piece of writing called ‘Christ and Satan’. It was monks of the 9th century who explored the theme, monks of whom some followed the Rule of St Benedict also. Anyhow, the Christian monks were the ones who with their poems were at the start of what is today a lingua franca of the world.
Those monks may be good teachers for us today in terms of what to do and what not to do so that we may reach, with Mary, the celestial heights.
Mary is for us an example of obedience, whereas the words the monks put in the mouth of Satan show the opposite of this desirable attitude and its consequences: ‘I’ve learned a hard lesson: Whoever refuses to listen to the Lord, the King of heaven, will discover the darkness of love’s loss and be dispossessed of eternal delight’.
To avoid it and instead share the lot of Mary, the monks guide us that we constantly ‘aspire to achieve a homeland in heaven with the King of Kings, who is called Christ’.
What do we do? The monks insist we ‘live in this earthly realm with our mind on God’. In doing so, ‘our souls will shine when we seek God’s and our home where saints and angels stand by the throne of the living Lord’, the Son of Mary and the Son of God.