A Layman's Reading Guide Through Munificentissimus Deus: Understanding the Case for the Assumption of Mary
Analyzing the Dogma of Mary's Assumption
Happy Solemnity of the Assumption! Today, I want to offer you a guided tour through the Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus which defined the Dogma of the Assumption.
The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary is a Divine and Catholic truth that has been believed from the earliest times. As it will be shown, this truth follows from the other divinely revealed doctrines of her Divine Motherhood, her Immaculate Conception, and her place as the New Eve, which was attested to by the Fathers as early as the 2nd century.
My hope is that by analyzing this magnificent Apostolic Constitution, you will be able to more fully understand the way in which this doctrine was defined by appealing to (7) “marks”(my own term) of proof that Pope Pius XII gives in his letter.1 This is a wonderful example of the Catholic understanding of Divine Revelation, particularly as it will be explored and explained in Dei Verbum which was written only 15 years after Munificentissimus Deus.
The 7 “marks” are as follows:
Almost all this bishops of the world unanimously petitioned Pope Pius XII to solemnly declare this Dogma.
The Universal Church has expressed this belief over centuries.
It is expounded and explained by the theologians of the Church (including the Fathers).
It is based upon the Sacred Writings.
It has been rooted in the minds of the faithful.
It has been a part of the ecclesiastical worship from the earliest times.
It is perfectly in harmony with the other revealed truths of the faith.
The Assumption is Closely Connected to the Immaculate Conception
The Immaculate Conception, the dogmatic belief that the Blessed Virgin Mary was conceived without Original Sin, was solemnly proclaimed by Pope Pius IX the Apostolic Constitution, Ineffabilis Deus, promulgated in 1854. Relying on that dogma, the Assumption takes on a clearer light and is in fact dependent on it. Pope Pius XII states that “these two privileges (the two dogmas) are most closely bound to one another.”2 The rationale is quite simple: Jesus overcame sin and death by His Cross and Resurrection. Through that gift of grace, the just share in the rewards won by Christ. However, as a general rule, even the bodies of the just, who are alive in Christ, still see corruption, and they must await the future resurrection of their bodies. However, by virtue of her Immaculate Conception—her freedom from Original Sin—God “has willed that the Blessed Virgin Mary should be exempt from this general rule,” and by the grace of her Immaculate Conception, “she was not subject to the law of remaining in the corruption of the grave, and she did not have to wait until the end of time for the redemption of her body.”3
Therefore, as Pope Pius XII states, once the dogma of the Immaculate Conception was solemnly declared in Ineffabilis Deus, “the minds of the faithful were filled with a stronger hope”4 that the solemn proclamation of Mary’s Assumption would shortly follow.
Desire for the Proclamation was Universally Requested by Bishops at the Time, as Well as from a Number of the Fathers of Vatican I
The call for this proclamation grew in number since the declaration of the Immaculate Conception. As Pope Pius XII states, it was not only the faithful themselves who desired this new dogma, but also bishops and even “a considerable number of the Fathers of the Vatican Council (Vatican I), urgently petitioned the Apostolic See”5 to request this proclamation.
Furthermore, theologians, committees, and Marian Congresses studied the belief of the Assumption of Mary and all determined that it “is contained in the deposit of Christian faith entrusted to the Church.”6 Again, after continuous and growing petitions from around the world, from laity to the College of Cardinals, Pope Pius XII requested the feedback of the world’s bishops. He issued the letter Deiparae Virginis Mariae on May 1, 1946, which was distributed to the world’s bishops and requested them to answer the question:
Do you, venerable brethren, in your outstanding wisdom and prudence, judge that the bodily Assumption of the Blessed Virgin can be proposed and defined as a dogma of faith? Do you, with your clergy and people, desire it?7
In response, there was “an almost unanimous affirmative response to these questions.”8 This unanimous assent, and all the subsequent study and requests, reveals that the Assumption of Mary:
shows the concordant teaching of the Church’s ordinary doctrinal authority and the concordant faith of the Christian people which the same doctrinal authority sustains and directs, thus by itself and in an entirely certain and infallible way, manifests this privilege as a truth revealed by God and contained in that divine deposit which Christ has delivered to his Spouse to be guarded faithfully and to be taught infallibly.9
This is proof from the ordinary magisterium of the Church’s teaching authority. This “new” dogma will simply be an infallible declaration so that all doubts may cease. The rest of the Constitution lays out the further proofs from Sacred Scripture, the teachings of the Fathers, doctors, Scholastics, theologians, and liturgical tradition of the Church.
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This Dogma Has Been Believed Over Centuries and is Expounded by the Fathers, Popes, Scholastics, and Theologians of the Church
Next, in what constitutes the bulk of the letter, Pope Pius XII lays out the historical argument and proof of the Assumption going back to the earliest time. First, as will be more clearly detailed below, the Assumption is learned through the witness of Sacred Scripture. It is then shown through the writings of the earliest periods throughout Church history.
Proofs of the ancient belief of the Assumption of Mary are shown in the “innumerable temples which have been dedicated to Mary assumed into heaven” as well as “those sacred images, exposed… for the veneration of the faithful”10 which show the Assumption of Mary. Other examples include the Assumption as a Mystery of the Rosary, Our Lady of the Assumption being the patronage of many “cities, dioceses, and individual regions”.11 These many examples put forth by the Pope are meant as a sketch to show that the Assumption is rooted in the praxis of the Church.
In paragraphs 17-36, Pope Pius gives numerous quotes and witnesses from the early Church through the 16th century as proof of the ancient belief in the Assumption. He quotes from Pope Adrian I, St. Sergius I, St. Leo IV, St. Nicholas I, St. John Damascene, St. Germanus of Constantinople, Amadeus, Bishop of Lausarme, St. Anthony of Padua, St. Albert the Great, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, St. Bernardine of Siena, St. Robert Bellarmine, St. Francis de Sales, St. Alphonsus Liguori, St. Peter Canisius, and Francisco Suarez. This extraordinary witness stretching almost every century of the Church and including many Doctors and saints shows that the doctrine of the Assumption has been believed and taught from the highest levels of the Church for centuries.
It is Rooted in the Liturgical Tradition of the Church
An important theological principle to remember is lex orandi, lex credendi: the law of prayer is the law of belief. This classic principle is integral in this doctrine, particularly as is related to “proving” the well-founded belief in the Assumption, even when one might expect more to be written in the early Church than we currently find.
This principle means that the way the Church prays reveals what she believes. In other words, the way the Church conducts its worship, the prayers she prays, the celebrations she enacts, all serve to reveal what she believes. In a rather enlightening paragraph, Pope Pius XII reveals this key point:
However, since the liturgy of the Church does not engender the Catholic faith, but rather springs from it, in such a way that the practices of the sacred worship proceed from the faith as the fruit comes from the tree, it follows that the holy Fathers and the great Doctors, in the homilies and sermons they gave the people on this feast day (the Assumption), did not draw their teaching from the feast itself as from a primary source, but rather they spoke of this doctrine as something already known and accepted by Christ's faithful.12
This passage is meant to show that the feast itself becoming a solemn celebration, the “litany, or the stational procession” for the Assumption, prescribed by Pope St. Sergius I, Pope St. Leo IV ordering a “vigil to be held on the day before it and prescribed prayers to be recited after it until the octave day”13, and a fast being observed for this celebration, reveals that these Liturgical events were the expression of the faith of the people and the Church. The Liturgical practice stemmed from the belief of the people, not the other way around.
The beliefs of the Church are not dictated by the Liturgy; the Liturgy comes forth from the believing Church. The ample historical testimony of the Liturgical celebration of the Assumption show that the Assumption has been a steadfast belief throughout the centuries.
The Assumption is Revealed in the Sacred Scriptures
Following from all of these proofs in history, and through the witness of the Fathers, it is no surprise that there are ample statements, sermons, and letters from the Fathers that reveal their biblical exegesis concerning the Assumption in Sacred Scripture.
One of the common concerns from non-Catholic Christians is that the Assumption is extra-biblical—that is not found in Scripture. With this as antecedent knowledge, Pope Pius XII rightly gives testimony from the Fathers regarding the grounding of the Assumption in the Sacred Scriptures and the fact that many of the Fathers and Doctors cite Scripture as witness and testimony to their belief.
Pope Pius XII mentions a few of the most commonly cited passages: “Arise, O Lord, into your resting place: you and the ark, which you have sanctified"14, as the Spouse in the Canticles “that goes up by the desert, as a pillar of smoke of aromatical spices, of myrrh and frankincense”.15 Furthermore, as Pope Pius XII states:
the scholastic Doctors have recognized the Assumption of the Virgin Mother of God as something signified, not only in various figures of the Old Testament, but also in that woman clothed with the sun whom John the Apostle contemplated on the Island of Patmos. Similarly they have given special attention to these words of the New Testament: "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you, blessed are you among women," since they saw, in the mystery of the Assumption, the fulfillment of that most perfect grace granted to the Blessed Virgin and the special blessing that countered the curse of Eve.16
Once you understand the reasons the early Church, the Fathers, Scholastics, and the entire Tradition of the Church held this doctrine as a matter of faith, the exegetical moves made by many of the theologians into the Sacred Scriptures become much clearer. As a further note of clarification and continuity with the Tradition, this patristic exegesis and the heritage of the Fathers in terms of their biblical writings is given greater clarity in the Second Vatican Council’s Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, Dei Verbum.
In paragraph 12 of Dei Verbum, the Council Fathers speak directly about Catholic biblical interpretation. One of the principles involved in any authentic interpretation is the unity of Scripture as a whole and the unity of all the contents of the faith. Dei Verbum states that
since Holy Scripture must be read and interpreted in the sacred spirit in which it was written, no less serious attention must be given to the content and unity of the whole of Scripture if the meaning of the sacred texts is to be correctly worked out. The living tradition of the whole Church must be taken into account along with the harmony which exists between elements of the faith. It is the task of exegetes to work according to these rules toward a better understanding and explanation of the meaning of Sacred Scripture, so that through preparatory study the judgment of the Church may mature.17
This important paragraph reveals the heart of Catholic exegesis—namely Scripture—cannot be interpreted alone and in isolation. It must be read and understood in harmony with the whole of Revelation, which consists in both Scripture and Tradition. In this light, the Assumption of Mary in Scripture becomes quite clear. When the Fathers of the Church, looking in Scripture, having with them as an antecedent belief—clearly derived from the Tradition—that Mary was assumed body and soul into Heaven, they found ample evidence in both the Old Testament and the New. Yes, Mary is the New Eve, so the references to the woman in Revelation can be seen as speaking of Mary; yes, the New Ark is Mary; so in Psalm 131, it is also speaking about Mary. That is the beauty of Catholic biblical exegesis, and that is the harmony of all the elements of Revelation which Christ has entrusted to His Church.
Finally, the Assumption is Not New
Throughout this whole document, as you have seen from this article, the historical, biblical, and ecclesiastical evidence for the Assumption is strong. It is not a recent invention of the Scholastics or of Pope Pius XII. It is firmly rooted in the early Church and gained tremendous steam through the witness of the liturgical tradition of the Church, the writings of countless Fathers, Doctors, and saints.
Even before Pope Pius XII issued his solemn proclamation in 1950, St. Peter Canisius, writing in the 16th century stated, in regards to the teaching of the Assumption, that
[it] has already been accepted for some centuries, it has been held as certain in the minds of the pious people, and it has been taught to the entire Church in such as way that those who deny that Mary’s body has been assumed into heaven are not to be listened to patiently but are everywhere to be denounced as over-contentious or rash men, and as imbued with a spirit that is heretical rather than Catholic.18
Based upon this witness, the Assumption has been believed, almost universally among the faithful for centuries before its formal definition by Pope Pius XII.
The Definition
Lastly, the Apostolic Constitution closes with this infallible declaration:
For which reason, after we have poured forth prayers of supplication again and again to God, and have invoked the light of the Spirit of Truth, for the glory of Almighty God who has lavished his special affection upon the Virgin Mary, for the honor of her Son, the immortal King of the Ages and the Victor over sin and death, for the increase of the glory of that same august Mother, and for the joy and exultation of the entire Church; by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.19
What was once simply in the minds of the faithful, the Liturgy, the Fathers, Doctors, and Saints is now definitively defined as a divinely revealed Dogma of the Catholic Church that our Blessed Mother was assumed body and soul into Heaven.
What a gift this Solemnity is to the Church! I hope this break-down of the document has both helped you more fully understand the historical basis for the Dogma as well as given you a greater appreciation for the gift of Our Blessed Mother and the grace bestowed upon her by her Son.
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The letter itself does not list them in this way, however, by closely reading the letter, you can see these 7 “marks” of proof. In paragraph 41, Pope Pius XII names these 7.
Pope Pius XII, Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus, 1 November 1950. 4. https://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/apost_constitutions/documents/hf_p-xii_apc_19501101_munificentissimus-deus.html. (Hereinafter MD).
Munificentissimus Deus. 4-5.
MD 6.
MD 7.
MD 8.
MD 11.
MD 12.
MD 12.
MD 15.
MD 15.
MD 20.
MD 19.
Ps 131:8. MS 26.
Song 3:6; cf. also 4:8; 6:9. MS 26.
MS 27.
Second Vatican Council, "Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, Dei Verbum.” 18 November, 1965, in “The Word on Fire Vatican II Collection: Constitutions,” ed. by Matthew Levering (Park Ridge, IL: Word on Fire Institute, 2021), 28, §12.(hereafter cited as DV). Emphasis is my own.
MD 36. Quoting: St. Peter Canisius, De Maria Virgine.
MD 44.