Fr FRANCESCO PIAZZOLLA Visiting Scholar - Studium Biblicum Franciscanum We are in the church of Dormitio Marie, the Holy Sion, close to the cenacle, a place of rich tradition, both spiritually and also historically. For it was here that the first Christian community gathered and here - according to tradition - in this beautiful church of the Benedictine fathers of Boiron, Mary would have known transit to the Kingdom of Heaven, in body and soul. Fr FRANCESCO PIAZZOLLA Visiting Scholar - Studium Biblicum Franciscanum And it is in this very place, behind me you see a reproduction of the coffin of the Blessed Virgin Mary, that we want to reflect on Mary, the image of the church. Fr FRANCESCO PIAZZOLLA Visiting Scholar - Studium Biblicum Franciscanum This title was rediscovered thanks to the documents of the Second Vatican Council. The Council Fathers wanted in the 8th chapter of Lumen Gentium to reflect on Mary as the model of the Church. I want to pause and reflect with you on this. Mary as Virgin and Mother is the model of the Church, and the Church is called to imitate her virtues. Mary Virgin and Mother. It is the great prodigy of the Spirit that makes the mystery of the Incarnation possible, and Mary's womb remains a virgin even though she has conceived a child. The council reminds us that the Church is also Mother because she, through preaching and the sacraments by the power of the Holy Spirit generates sons and daughters of God. But she continues to remain in this sense a virgin, because she is totally given to the Lord and in some way grows in virtue precisely because of the fact that she consecrates herself, in faith, hope and charity to her God. In this Mary continues to remain a perpetual model for the Christian community on its way to the Kingdom of Heaven. Fr FRANCESCO PIAZZOLLA Visiting Scholar - Studium Biblicum Franciscanum The second aspect that the council highlights in speaking of Mary as the model of the Church is the fact that we are called to imitate Mary's virtues. Yes, we have not yet reached the fullness of glory. Mary is the first redeemed immaculate, and she is the perfect redeemed, the Assumption. We are on our way wrestling with the forces of flesh and blood that somehow want to draw us away from God. Mary teaches us by her virtues to be constantly turned toward God. On this journey we look up, we look at Mary, and we see her as a being far from our human perspective but constantly close to us. Close because she, like us, Saint Athanasius said, is our sister in flesh and blood has walked in faith, has known the tribulation of the human journey, pain, suffering, but has always remained faithful to the Lord. Fr FRANCESCO PIAZZOLLA Visiting Scholar - Studium Biblicum Franciscanum Being human like us, being our sister, she teaches us the way, the right path to take to overcome the forces of flesh and blood. Mary therefore remains a model for us to reach for but she is also our intercessor, the one who in the communion of saints prays that our destiny here on earth, will reach its fullness. We are on the way with Mary, brothers and sister, and together with her we can walk the path of our sanctification. Let us be guided by this mother and look to her as our model. Let us preserve virginity of heart as a faithful response to God, let us generate in faith the Christ in us through hearing the Word of God, and let us walk in victory over evil and sin and helped by Mary walk the path of fullness and holiness.