Catholic teaching, with every link in the chain visible.

Mary, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory. Pius XII defined it in Munificentissimus Deus (1950; Catechism §966). The teaching follows from what Mary is. The Ark of the covenant was made of incorruptible wood and went up to God's resting place (Psalm 132:8); the Ark that was lost at the exile is seen again in heaven in John's vision, and in the next verse John sees a Woman clothed with the sun (Revelation 11:19–12:1). What was true of the sign is true of the one it pointed to.

Mary, from the first moment of her conception, was preserved free from all stain of original sin by a singular grace of God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ. Pius IX defined it in Ineffabilis Deus (1854). The doctrine rests on Mary as the New Eve: as the first woman began without sin, so the Woman whose seed crushes the serpent begins in grace.

Mary was a virgin in conceiving Jesus, in giving birth to him, and for the rest of her life. The Church confesses her as Aeiparthenos, "ever-virgin": the Second Council of Constantinople (553) uses the title, the Lateran Synod of 649 spells out "before, during and after" the birth, and the Catechism gathers the teaching at §§499–507. The "brothers of the Lord" named in the Gospels are close kin, not sons of Mary, and Mary's question to Gabriel, "How can this be, since I do not know man?", makes sense only if she did not intend to have children.

Mary is truly the Mother of God, because the one she conceived and bore is the eternal Son of God made man. The Council of Ephesus (431) affirmed the title Theotokos against Nestorius. The point is Christological: to deny it is to divide Christ.

Mary prays for the Church and for each of its members, and the faithful may ask her to, as they ask one another (Lumen Gentium 62; Catechism §§969, 2673–2679). The Old Testament root is the queen mother who brings petitions to the king and is not refused (1 Kings 2:19–20) and Rachel, whose weeping for her children is heard (Jeremiah 31:15–17). At Cana Mary's request is the first Marian intercession. The oldest known prayer to Mary, Sub tuum praesidium, dates from about the third century. Asking her prayers is honour, not worship: sacrifice is offered to God alone.

From the cross Jesus gave his mother to the beloved disciple and the disciple to his mother, and in that disciple to everyone who follows him. Mary is the mother of all who are born of the Church's labour, as Rachel is mother of Israel and weeps for her children. Paul VI proclaimed the title Mater Ecclesiae at the close of the third session of Vatican II (1964); Lumen Gentium 53 and 61–63 and Catechism §§963–970 set out the teaching, and John Paul II developed it in Redemptoris Mater.

Mary reigns with her Son as Queen. In the kingdom of David the queen was not one of the king's wives but his mother, the gebirah, who wore a crown, sat at the king's right hand and carried the people's petitions to him (1 Kings 2:19). If Jesus is the Davidic king, his mother holds that office; Elizabeth already greets her as "the mother of my Lord". Pius XII set out the teaching in Ad Caeli Reginam (1954); see also Lumen Gentium 59 and Catechism §966.