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Dear Friends in Christ,

In this morning's second reading, St. Paul says that God has chosen us in Christ, "to be holy and without blemish before him…(and) in accord with the favor of his will."

I believe that to be holy, and to live entirely in harmony with the will of God is truly what we all desire. But we also know, that none of us can achieve this state of spiritual perfection constantly. We do enjoy it at moments - especially when, fresh with the grace of forgiveness that comes from the Sacrament of Penance, we proceed directly to the reception of our Lord's Body and Blood in Holy Communion. Those are the ideal conditions, the perfect ingredients, and from them, we experience a depth of spiritual awareness that comes as close as we can, to knowing Heaven, to knowing the eternal love of God.

But try as we might to remain in that state, try as we might to retain that perfection of grace, it never really happens. Temptation and sin assail our peace, and even the slightest of sins - whether it is the surrender to our temper and impatience, or an insensitivity to the needs of our neighbor, or any one of the lesser or greater sins that we might commit in a day, we do commit those sins, and the directness of God's presence, for which, as St. Paul says, we were chosen - it parts from us, like oil from the water, for God's purity cannot be diluted by our weakness.

This is the fact of Original Sin, that fundamental flaw introduced into creation by the free and misguided will of our first parents, Adam and Eve, who disobeyed God's command, and knew shame - and who covered themselves before God, no longer without blemish, no longer able to live with Him in accord, or walk with Him in the Garden in peace.

The effects of their action have become ours to bear - it is our human inheritance. And only by the grace of Baptism, have we gained forgiveness for that sin, and the privilege, again and again, to seek forgiveness for what we do that is wrong - the privilege of gaining, if only momentarily, the state of perfect harmony with God, the foreknowledge of what awaits us, if we die in grace, and if God calls us to be with Him in Heaven.

Only once, in all the history of mankind, has God chosen to create a human being free from the stain of Original Sin - only once has He created a human being who enjoyed from the moment of her conception, and for all her days, that singular favor, of being truly holy and without blemish before Him. And that human was Mary.

He did this for two reasons:

first, so that the vessel which was to receive the creative force of His fatherly love, and from which the Divine-become-man was to be born - so that maternal vessel would be able to receive Him, with no weakness to dilute His perfection;

and second, to give us a sign of hope, a sign of what St. Paul says we can be, a sign for us to know that our struggles here below to be good and holy, will be realized in the other life, when we leave our human frailty behind, and if chosen, ascend to the throne of God.

These are the reasons why the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God had to be - not just for Christ, but for us as well. And her Glorious Assumption is the compliment - for just as her perfect love could not be left on earth, but had to be drawn back to the perfect love of the Father when her life was done, so too does her Assumption speak to us of our completion, and what Christ has promised: I am the resurrection and the life: whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live; and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.

The gifts of Mary's Immaculate Conception and Assumption came to her because, in the words of St. Paul, she was "destined in accord with the purpose of the One who accomplishes all things according to the intention of his will." And they were given in love, and by the grace God gave us when He gave us His beloved Son.

Dear friends, during this season of Advent, let us thank God for all these signs of hope, especially the signs He manifests in Mary, the Mother of Jesus Christ, and our Mother in faith. For through her, so much that we need, became and becomes accessible. And through her example, we are drawn irresistibly to those goals she embodied - to be perfect and without blemish before God, and to live in accord with His will.

May she obtain for us, through the power of her intercession, the grace to draw near God, to remain near Him, to turn aside from all sin, and dwell in goodness the rest of our lives.

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