**Give my church CREDIT, because it gave to the word the Bible as we know it.**
It is said that to be the case. I recall reading a history on the Inquisition, prepared by a Catholic bishop (or professor, can’t remember), in an old edition (approx. 1960)of the Americana Encyclopedia. He quoted the words of a missionary from around 1100A.D. that had ventured into some region of what is now Germany. This missionary was amazed to find the unwarlike and unlearned hereitics to be surprisingly well versed in scripture, “..able to quote the entire gospel of John....”.
By trying to claim and/or maintain all scripture, the RCC could also claim to be the authority on any interpretation, as is represented in your following words:
**All that CHANGED when at the foot of the cross, Jesus gave his mother to the beloved apostle John as his mother and his mother Mary was given John, meaning that she who was Jesus’s FIRST disciple, would become the spiritual mother of ALL Christian believers.**
Keys words signifying your (and your church’s) interpretation: “..meaning that..”
Consider that there are no birthdates for anyone in the Word, and only one deathdate, that being the Christ’s. When Jesus was baptized, Joseph could quite possibly been closing in on 50 yrs of age. Since there is no mention of him, in an active sense, after the ‘temple alone’ incident where Jesus was only 12 yrs of age, we are left in the dark somewhat. In John 6:42, the doubters of Jesus’ claim of coming down from heaven, were quick to say they knew he had earthly parents. Joseph could have been deceased by the time of the crucifiction. The Word is very silent on the life of Joseph, and holds Mary’s biography to a minimum, in order to keep the carnally minded from focusing on matters of little importance, imo.
But, since we are left to interpretting, allow me to give an interpretation to the passage in John 6:26,27:
Jesus is telling his mother (addressing her as “woman”) to regard John as her son in his stead. He then tells John to regard Mary as his mother. So what does John do? He “took her unto his own home”. Do you suppose that Joseph and Mary were to live separate from that point on? (I believe Joseph to be deceased by this time. And he is not mentioned as being among the 120 in the upper room at Pentecost). So from this incident we are to believe that Mary is be regarded as mother of us all? That is just a private interpretation, imo, as I believe the “Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all” (Paul writing to believers in Gal. 4:26)
Your interpitations.