On the Assumption of Our Blessed Virgin Mary

Today in the Tridentine Calendar we celebrate the Assumption of Mary with the Blessing of the Herbs and Fruits:

Deus, qui virgam Jesse, Genetricem Filii tui Domini nostri Jesu Christi, hodierna die ad cælorum fastigia ideo evexisti, ut per ejus suffragia et patrocinia fructum ventris illius, eundem Filium tuum, mortalitati nostræ communicares: te supplices exoramus; ut ejusdem Filii tui virtute, ejusque Genetricis glorioso patrocinio, istorum terræ fructuum præsidiis per temporalem ad æternam salutem disponamur. Per eundem Dominum nostrum.

O God, who on this day didst raise up to the heights of heaven the rod of Jesse, the mother of Thy Son our Lord Jesus Christ, that through her prayers and patronage Thou mightest commu-nicate to our mortality the Fruit of her womb, Thy Son: we humbly pray that by the power of Thy Son and the glorious patronage of His Mother, we may be so affected by the aid of these fruits of the land as to proceed from temporal to eternal welfare. Through the same Jesus Christ.

Prune ye lavenders and rosemaries, indeed.

Part, in fact, most, of my love for Catholic Liturgy can be traced to a veneration of Mary, to whom, at the end of most services I have attended, we extend prayers of thanks for her intercession - the Angelus, the Hail Holy Queen, the Salve Regina, all of these, where we ask 'pour forth, we beseech thee O Lord, thy grace into our hearts', in the way that we're given to understand that Mary pronounced her fiat, 'Thy will be done'.

The five dogmas - the Virgin, the Immaculate Conception, the Mother of God, the Assumption into Heaven and the Mother of the Church, all these mantles, and the Co-redemptrix, and Mediatrix, still to look forward to. A crown of stars, standing on the moon, adorned with the sun.

Ave maria, gratia plena, dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui Jesus. Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.