Salt and water and the Virgin Mary

Didymus · **Posted:** Mon May 09, 2005 5:42 am

I'm not so sure the Virgin really cares that much to be seen anyway. As Pope Pius once put it, "The Mother is not pleased when she is exalted above her Son."

ramrod · **Posted:** Mon May 09, 2005 4:10 pm

Didymus wrote:

I'm not so sure the Virgin really cares that much to be seen anyway. As Pope Pius once put it, "The Mother is not pleased when she is exalted above her Son."

That's why some non-Catholic Christian broke away rom the Vatican, because they beleived that we were worshipping The Mother too much, as almost another God.

StrongCanada · **Posted:** Mon May 09, 2005 9:31 pm

Mary on an overpass????

Gag me with a big wooden spoon! :sb:

Choc-o-Lardiac Arrest · **Posted:** Mon May 09, 2005 10:33 pm

ya know, what does that mean?

Beyond the Grave · **Posted:** Tue May 10, 2005 4:10 am

MHGuy wrote:

ya know, what does that mean?

What does what mean?

The reason that the Virgin Mary is held in such high regard in the Catholic Church is because she is one of two people in history to have never been born with sin or commit a sin. She was the Immaculate Conception.(Take a guess at the other one, ain't that hard)

Didymus · **Posted:** Tue May 10, 2005 4:56 am

Quote:

The reason that the Virgin Mary is held in such high regard in the Catholic Church is because she is one of two people in history to have never been born with sin or commit a sin.

Except that we do not know whether this is true. The Scriptures testify only that Christ was born without sin, and that because of the conception by the Holy Spirit.

But whether she was immaculately conceived or not, she is not a Person of the Holy Trinity, and therefore is not equal to the Son.

Black Knight · **Posted:** Tue May 10, 2005 2:53 pm

I saw the Virgin Mary once, and she had a Halo, and there was something in the background about Regret. Then I realized I had fallen to sleep playing Halo 2. I think it had something to do with the puddle of drool under my chin, but I'm not sure. Stupid puddles of Drool.

Upsilon · **Posted:** Tue May 10, 2005 4:40 pm

That article wrote:

But the authorities say the image is likely to be a stain caused by salt.

Well, with geniuses like that in charge...

That toast image reminds me of the The Cheat Bread.

Beyond the Grave · **Posted:** Wed May 11, 2005 3:26 am

Didymus wrote:

Quote:

The reason that the Virgin Mary is held in such high regard in the Catholic Church is because she is one of two people in history to have never been born with sin or commit a sin.

Except that we do not know whether this is true. The Scriptures testify only that Christ was born without sin, and that because of the conception by the Holy Spirit.

But whether she was immaculately conceived or not, she is not a Person of the Holy Trinity, and therefore is not equal to the Son.

What do you think the Feast of the Immaculate Conception celebrates. Its not Jesus' date. Why do you think God chose Mary to carry his child. She was a being free from the stain of Original Sin and had never sinned. God wasn't going to pick anybody. He wanted the person to be perfect. So he made Mary free of sin.

Didymus · **Posted:** Wed May 11, 2005 5:42 am

Quote:

What do you think the Feast of the Immaculate Conception celebrates. Its not Jesus' date.

Who says the Feast of the Immaculate Conception is biblical. Actually, only a few of the feast days celebrated by Christians can be verified, and most of those are related to the Passion, Resurrection, Ascension, and Pentecost. But if you can point to me in Scripture where it says that Mary was immaculately conceived, I'll believe it. Until then, I remain a skeptic on this one.

Quote:

Why do you think God chose Mary to carry his child.

The same reason God chose Moses, or David, or Isaiah. Or Jacob (remember him? Father of the Hebrew people? Also a thief and a lying cheat?). It's a thing known as GRACE. That means that God choosed people, not because of their goodness, but because of His.

Quote:

She was a being free from the stain of Original Sin and had never sinned. God wasn't going to pick anybody. He wanted the person to be perfect. So he made Mary free of sin.

In which case, the only person worthy to be her mother would likewise have to be perfectly sinless, as her mother's mother would be, ad infinitum. Where does it end? Plus, I would counter that it is not necessary for Jesus' mother to be sinless. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit and thus of divine origin. It is necessary only that the Son be sinless, not the mother.

Furthermore, none of the ancient Creeds of the Faith attribute Mary with sinlessness. All the debates of Christ's origins in the early Church centered around his humanity and divinity, not the sinlessness of his mother. I contend that, at least for the early Christians, this was not a primary issue.

I am not saying that you are absolutely wrong about thid, BTG. Nor am I claiming that the Mother of Christ should not be honored as one of the great saints of history. But without support from Scripture, the claim that Mary was sinless cannot be substantiated or argued.

But back to my original point: Mary is not equal to Jesus because she is not God. Only Jesus can make that claim. As stated above, even one of your own popes said as much.

DanBo · **Posted:** Wed May 11, 2005 5:52 am

Didymus, you are king of the R&P forum. Your extensive knowlegde of the famed 2000 year old book astounds me. I only wish I could do that with engineering. Alas, we make equations, not theology, and I suck at math. Good job, ol' spice (That's a Futurama reference)

Didymus · **Posted:** Wed May 11, 2005 6:45 am

Right back at you, Forest Rush!

Beyond the Grave · **Posted:** Wed May 11, 2005 12:50 pm

Didymus wrote:

I am not saying that you are absolutely wrong about thid, BTG. Nor am I claiming that the Mother of Christ should not be honored as one of the great saints of history. But without support from Scripture, the claim that Mary was sinless cannot be substantiated or argued.

You wanted Scriptural proof you got it:

Genesis 3:15 wrote:

No direct or categorical and stringent proof of the dogma can be brought forward from Scripture. But the first scriptural passage which contains the promise of the redemption, mentions also the Mother of the Redeemer. The sentence against the first parents was accompanied by the Earliest Gospel (Proto-evangelium), which put enmity between the serpent and the woman: "and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and her seed; she (he) shall crush thy head and thou shalt lie in wait for her (his) heel" (Genesis 3:15).The translation "she" of the Vulgate is interpretative; it originated after the fourth century, and cannot be defended critically. The conqueror from the seed of the woman, who should crush the serpent's head, is Christ; the woman at enmity with the serpent is Mary. God puts enmity between her and Satan in the same manner and measure, as there is enmity between Christ and the seed of the serpent. Mary was ever to be in that exalted state of soul which the serpent had destroyed in man, i.e. in sanctifying grace. Only the continual union of Mary with grace explains sufficiently the enmity between her and Satan. The Proto-evangelium, therefore, in the original text contains a direct promise of the Redeemer, and in conjunction therewith the manifestation of the masterpiece of His Redemption, the perfect preservation of His virginal Mother from original sin.

Wait there is more

Luke 1:28-31 wrote:

And he came to her and said, "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you!" But Mary was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be. And the Angel said to her, "Do not be afraid Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you shall name him Jesus.

I hope this helps. I am not a bible expert.

Didymus · **Posted:** Wed May 11, 2005 5:53 pm

You are right in assessing the Genesis passage as a prophecy of Christ. However, you presume much in reading "sinlessness of Mary" into it. Nowhere does the passage say that the woman herself would be sinless, only that her seed would crush the serpent.

The Luke text says that Mary has found Favor. It does not say that she did so on account of sinlessness. Again, this is what we theologians call GRACE, i.e., unmerited favor. Look, God chose a thief and a liar (Jacob) to become the father of the whole Hebrew race. The greatest of Jesus' ancestors (King David) was an adulterer and a murderer. Yet these men found favor with God as well. Therefore, as I have stated before, it is not necessary to be sinless to find favor with God. And if you pay attention to the Magnificat, you'll see that Mary gives thanks that God chose her on account of her lowliness (most likely meaning poverty or unimportance), not sinlessness.

So once again, I make the same three points:
(1) it is not necessary for Mary to be sinless; only Christ himself.
(2) the Bible does not attribute sinlessness to Mary, only God's grace.
(3) the Mother is still not greater than the Son, on account of the Son being God.

bobjones · **Joined:** Thu May 05, 2005 3:18 pm **Posts:** 35

People interested in the position of Mary in the church may be interested in a publication just released by the Anglican - Roman Catholic International Commission called "Mary: Grace and Hope in Christ".

Basically, I believe, it's a reconcilliation attempt between the Anglicans and Catholics. It agrees that Mary was Jesus's foremost disciple and a model Christian but not a saviour. You'll find plenty about it on Google.

Hope this helps!

Didymus · **Posted:** Wed May 18, 2005 6:33 am

That's basically what we Lutherans believe too. We believe that she is to be esteemed, but not worshipped as savior.

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