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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.

The gold-covered chest of acacia wood made at Sinai to hold the tablets of the law, the manna and Aaron's rod, over which the cloud of God's presence rested (Exodus 25; 40:34–35; Hebrews 9:4). David brought it up to Jerusalem with dancing and holy dread (2 Samuel 6); it was lost at the exile, hidden by Jeremiah according to 2 Maccabees 2, and is seen again in heaven in John's vision (Revelation 11:19). The New Testament presents Mary as its fulfilment: overshadowed by the same cloud, greeted with the same words, and carrying God himself.

The state of fallen human nature inherited from Adam, deprived of original holiness and justice. It is "contracted, not committed": a condition, not a personal act. The Immaculate Conception is Mary's preservation from it.

The traditional name, "first gospel", for Genesis 3:15: God's promise of enmity between the serpent and the woman, and between the serpent's offspring and hers, ending with the serpent's head crushed. The Church reads it as the first announcement of the Messiah and of his mother (Catechism §§410–411), and ancient Jewish readers already took the serpent to be Satan and the seed to be an individual. It is the founding text of the New Eve typology and of the Immaculate Conception.

The Hebrew title gebirah, "great lady", for the mother of the reigning king of Judah. Kings had many wives but only one mother, so it was she, not a wife, who held the office of queen. She wore a crown (Jeremiah 13:18), sat enthroned at the king's right hand, and acted as advocate for petitioners (1 Kings 2:19). The office could be lost, as when Asa deposed Maacah (1 Kings 15:13). The New Testament applies the pattern to Mary, mother of the Son of David.

The reading of Scripture in which persons, things and events of the Old Testament are patterns, "types", that God fulfils in Christ and the Church (Catechism §§128–130). Paul calls Adam "a type of the one who was to come" (Romans 5:14); the Fathers read Eve, the Ark, the queen mother and Rachel the same way for Mary. The working rule is that the fulfilment is never less than the type: whatever was true of the sign is true, more fully, of the reality.