Welcome to the Weekend Roundup! – News & Views – 8/17/19

• What’s the Feast of the Assumption of Mary, anyway?
• Pope Francis on Feast of the Assumption: Mary is the “Gate of Heaven”

This past Thursday, Roman Catholics celebrated the Feast of the Assumption, the dogma that Mary was assumed bodily up into Heaven either at the moment of her death or immediately prior to her impending death. This belief was defined as an infallible dogma by pope Pius XII in 1950, meaning any Catholic who refuses to believe the teaching commits a soul-damning mortal sin. The feast or “solemnity” is a holy day of obligation (HDO), meaning all Catholics were required to attend mass last Thursday under threat of mortal sin. How many actually did attend mass on Thursday? RCC statistics reveal that only 12% of Catholics attend all HDOs as required.

There is nothing in the Bible to support the notion of Mary being assumed into Heaven and there is…