The Catechism of the Catholic Church, Section 966, quoted below, did not say that the Blessed Virgin Mary had died [2] [Emphasis added.]:
"Finally the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all stain of original sin, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory, and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things, so that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of lords and conqueror of sin and death." The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin is a singular participation in her Son's Resurrection and an anticipation of the resurrection of other Christians:
In giving birth you kept your virginity; in your Dormition you did not leave the world, O Mother of God, but were joined to the source of Life. You conceived the living God and, by your prayers, will deliver our souls from death.509 [Emphasis added.]
(509 Byzantine Liturgy, Troparion, Feast of the Dormition, August 15th.)
Quoting in part from Catholic Straight Answers [3]:
Since Mary was free of Original Sin and its effects (one of which is corruption of the body at death), since she shared intimately in the life of the Lord and in His passion, death, and resurrection, and since she was present at Pentecost, this model disciple appropriately shared in the bodily resurrection and glorification of the Lord at the end of her life.
Given this understanding, Pope Pius XII solemnly defined in Munificentissimus Deus on November 1, 1950 that “the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever-virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.” [Paragraph 44, quoted further below] Note that the solemn definition does not specify whether Mary physically died before being assumed or just was assumed; it simply states, “Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life….”
So did Mary die first before being assumed? Did she fall “asleep”? Was she buried? The Church does not bind us to a particular answer because the tradition is not clear.
In contrast to Catholic Straight Answers, Catholic Online insisted with certainty, leaving no room for doubt, that the Blessed Virgin Mary did die in an article authored by Shirley Aaron dated 21 February 2018. [4] She included a quote from Pope John Paul II without a citation. How reliable is that? Even if those words were his, he cited no convincing authority to support them, referring only to a "common tradition." Quoted below is what Shirley Aaron claimed that Pope John Paul II had "pointed out", copied and pasted without her italics and her emphasis in bold [4]:
Some theologians have in fact maintained that the Blessed Virgin did not die and and [sic] was immediately raised from earthly life to heavenly glory. However, this opinion was unknown until the 17th century, whereas a common tradition actually exists which sees Mary’s death as her entry into heavenly glory.
Shirley Aaron also cited Pope Pius XII’s encyclical Munificentissimus Deus, as did Catholic Straight Answers (quoted earlier), to support her claim that the Blessed Virgin Mary did die prior Her Assumption by focusing on interesting background information that relied on "sacramentary" and liturgical sources that did not appear to have been unsubstantiated by facts in Paragraphs 17 and 18, as opposed to the encyclical's official pronouncement.
Shirley Aaron's uncompromising insistence that the Blessed Virgin Mary did die seemed to have made her miss the operative words of Catholic dogma pronounced in Paragraph 44 of Pope Pius XII's encyclical Munificentissimus Deus, quoted below are Paragraphs 17, 18 (without references) and 44 from Vatican.va [5] [Emphasis added]:
17. In the liturgical books which deal with the feast either of the dormition or of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin there are expressions that agree in testifying that, when the Virgin Mother of God passed from this earthly exile to heaven, what happened to her sacred body was, by the decree of divine Providence, in keeping with the dignity of the Mother of the Word Incarnate, and with the other privileges she had been accorded. Thus, to cite an illustrious example, this is set forth in that sacramentary which Adrian I, our predecessor of immortal memory, sent to the Emperor Charlemagne. These words are found in this volume: "Venerable to us, O Lord, is the festivity of this day on which the holy Mother of God suffered temporal death, but still could not be kept down by the bonds of death, who has begotten your Son our Lord incarnate from herself."
18. What is here indicated in that sobriety characteristic of the Roman liturgy is presented more clearly and completely in other ancient liturgical books. To take one as an example, the Gallican sacramentary designates this privilege of Mary's as "an ineffable mystery all the more worthy of praise as the Virgin's Assumption is something unique among men." And, in the Byzantine liturgy, not only is the Virgin Mary's bodily Assumption connected time and time again with the dignity of the Mother of God, but also with the other privileges, and in particular with the virginal motherhood granted her by a singular decree of God's Providence. "God, the King of the universe, has granted you favors that surpass nature. As he kept you a virgin in childbirth, thus he has kept your body incorrupt in the tomb and has glorified it by his divine act of transferring it from the tomb."
44. For which reason, after we have poured forth prayers of supplication again and again to God, and have invoked the light of the Spirit of Truth, for the glory of Almighty God who has lavished his special affection upon the Virgin Mary, for the honor of her Son, the immortal King of the Ages and the Victor over sin and death, for the increase of the glory of that same august Mother, and for the joy and exultation of the entire Church; by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.
The words Pope Pius XII chose to use for the pronouncement in his encyclical Munificentissimus Deus after "pour[ing] forth prayers of supplication again and again to God" appear to leave open the possibility that the Blessed Virgin Mary might not have died prior to Her Assumption, one that Shirley Aaron decided to ignore.
Shirley Aaron's own conclusion that the Blessed Virgin Mary had died before being assumed into Heaven seemed quite convincing initially, by emphasizing the Blessed Mother's humility. Shirley Aaron's words are quoted in part below [6]:
It was the same sort of humility practiced by her Son throughout His earthly life ... and supremely in His voluntarily Death. How fitting, therefore, that the Virgin Mary’s death should echo that of her Son!
However, after reading it again and thinking more about it, her conclusion no longer looked convincing. It is precisely because of the Blessed Virgin Mary's humility that it would not be "fitting" "that the [Blessed] Virgin Mary’s death should echo that of her Son!"
Assuming that Shirley Aaron was correct that the Blessed Virgin Mary did die, in what ways did the Blessed Virgin Mary "echo" the death of Her Son? Was She crucified? Was She wrapped in a burial shroud? If She had been wrapped in a burial shroud, who wrapped it and why did Her shroud not "echo" Her Son's shroud, leaving it in Her tomb with an image of Her as in the Shroud of Turin? Where is Her burial shroud being displayed today? Did Her death and Her Assumption change the course of history by "echoing" that of Her Son?
The Blessed Virgin Mary, in a apparition said "I am the Immaculate Conception" to Bernadette Soubirous (now a saint) on 25 March 1858 [7]. The Blessed Virgin Mary was conceived without the stain of Original Sin; therefore, these words of God spoken in the Garden of Eden ought to apply to Her, the new Eve Who would have obeyed God and would not have been tempted by the Serpent to touch and eat the forbidden fruit, quoted in part without references [8]:
... but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”
According to these words of God, the Blessed Virgin Mary, immaculately conceived, might not have died before Her Assumption into Heaven.
A thoughtful conclusion, quoted in part below, on whether the Blessed Virgin Mary died or merely slept prior to Her Assumption came as an answer given by William J. Byron, S.J., to the questions asked: "... my second question relates to the [Blessed] Virgin Mary. Did [S]he die? Since death is a punishment for sin and [S]he was never tainted by sin, why would [S]he have died?" [9]:
... centuries of speculation touch upon your question. Answer it for yourself and ask why you wanted the answer to be the one you prefer. Th en [sic] ask what your answer tells you about yourself, as well as about the [Blessed Virgin] Mary you want [H]er to be.
[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=Dormition&oq=Dormition&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8, click on down arrow.
[2] http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p123a9p6.htm, quoted without references except for footnote 509.
[3] https://catholicstraightanswers.com/what-do-we-mean-by-the-sleep-of-mary-or-the-dormition-of-mary/
[4] http://francismary.org/did-the-blessed-virgin-mary-die/
[5] http://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/apost_constitutions/documents/hf_p-xii_apc_19501101_munificentissimus-deus.html
[6] http://francismary.org/did-the-blessed-virgin-mary-die/
[7] http://www.catholicpilgrims.com/lourdes/bg_lourdes_conception.htm
[8] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+3%3A1-3&version=NIV
[9] http://www.catholicdigest.com/from-the-magazine/ask-father/200801-01did-the-virgin-mary-die/
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