Assumption of the Virgin Mary

Commemorating the death of the Blessed Virgin Mary and her bodily assumption into Heaven, the Feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary is celebrated every year on 15 August in Austria. In 2026, Assumption of the Virgin Mary falls on Saturday 15 August. The holiday will be on Sunday 15 August in 2027. In Austria colourful processions featuring fireworks is the favourite way to celebrate the Feast. Usually, a statue of Mary decorated with flowers is carried through a town to a statue of Christ. Once reunited, the statues are inclined to each other three times. The origin of this popular feast is actually uncertain and believed to be more the remnant of a church dedication than the actual date on which Mary’s body was taken up to heaven. Regardless of the answer now lost to history, the feast is recorded as originating during the time of the Council of Ephesus. In 377, Saint Epiphanius of Salamis stated that no one knew if Mary had died or not to denounce the popular texts circulating that all claimed to be the true story of Mary’s death. With the passage of time came a slowly altered idea of what, exactly, had happened to the Virgin Mother. In the 5th century, the Transitus Mariae described the apostles transcending to the clouds where Mary’s deathbed was, heavily hinting that her physical body was up in the sky. John of Damascus, who lived between 675 and 749, was the first church authority to advocate Mary’s assumption, and his followers spread the doctrine. By the 7th century, the story had changed even further. Initially, Mary had died in Jerusalem. Now, St. Thomas was purportedly on his way to pay homage to Mary’s body, but as the tomb was reopened, it revealed no body and a pile of empty clothes. Other versions had her tossing her girdle back to Earth as a sign she had ascended with her clothes. This version of the story was the one that carried it through popular teachings and, in the 8th Century, Pope Leo IV declared the feast to be official.