The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Description:
In the East and West, this holiday has different names. The Greeks called it "koimesis" - "immersion in sleep" (church-Slav. - succession). In the West, the Latin name “assumptio” – “taking”, “acceptance” – was fixed, so among Russian Catholics of the Latin rite, the name “Taking the Blessed Virgin Mary into heavenly glory” is used along with the established in the Russian tradition “Dormition”.
Early Christian monuments contain various and often contradictory information about where and how long the Mother of God lived after the end of Christ’s earthly life.
There is no evidence of the death and burial of the Mother of God. Most texts mention the following plot: after the ascension of Jesus Christ to heaven, the Virgin Mary lived in Jerusalem under the tutelage and care of John the Theologian, praying in anticipation of meeting with the Son. Three days before the death of the Virgin Mary, the archangel Gabriel appeared to her and announced the imminent transition to blessed succession. She called on all the apostles to say goodbye.
According to the will of the Mother of God, her body was buried in Gethsemane near Jerusalem, between the graves of her parents and Joseph the Betrothed.
Three days later, the Apostle Thomas came to the tomb, who was absent from Jerusalem on the day of her death, but instead of the body of the Virgin Mary, roses were in the tomb.
The bodily taking of the Virgin into heaven, as well as her freedom from original sin, is a dogma of the Catholic faith. And although people believed in its success for centuries, this dogma was officially formalized only in 1950.