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THank you for your kind words, Dutchboy88. I value your good will. Now: let's keep thinking this through together. "Did they or did they not receive the Holy Spirit as embryos and fetuses?"... They did not."

What an extraordinary denial--- are you saying that the texts do not show the Holy Spirit preparing them prenatally for their role? Or are you saying they rejected the Hoily Spirit and did not receive Him?

(Jeremiah) "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations."
(Isaiah) "The Lord called me before I was born, while I was in my mother's womb he named me."

And this next one is wonderful, a regular cascade of the Holy Spirit in Luke 1!!

(John the Baptist) When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting,
the baby leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.
In a loud voice she exclaimed:
“Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear!
But why am I so favored,
that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears,
the baby in my womb leaped for joy.
Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her!”

Look at what's happening here! Mary is carrying Christ the Lord God, Elizabeth calls her "mother of my Lord" (SHE knew Mary was the mother, and she knew Jesus was God!) John the Fetus does his first prophetic work, dancing before the Lord --- the Holy Spirit is caroming through this whole scene -- and eventually even Zechariah's overwhelmed:

" His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied..."
And the child grew and became strong in Spirit; and he lived in the wilderness until he appeared publicly to Israel.

It's absolutely wonderful. The first chapter of Luke is like a mini-Gospel of the Holy Spirit in itself. Just exquisite.

And later Paul explains (Romans 8:30)

"And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified."

That applies to all these wonderful gift of grace, but pre-eminently to Mary, since her SOUL magnifies the Lord.

Who does this setting apart of human beings and appointing them prophets? Is it not the Holy Spirit?

I nowhere said that they ALL remained free from sin. You say, "Isaiah was man of unclean lips living among a people of unclean lips (Is. 6). Sinless because he was a prophet selected before birth? What happened along the way?"

Well, yes he was a man of unclean lips. What happened to him was, he chose to commit personal sin. The same thing that happened when Adam and Eve, though at first sinless, chose to commit sin. Just because a person is without sin ab initio, (like Adam and Eve) does not in itself mean they remained sinless forever. Isaiah was a sinner because he sinned.

You say,

"Jesus put Mary in a very utilitarian perspective, noting that the crowd to which He spoke was more His mother than Mary, at that moment. Actually, according to Jesus, anyone who did His will was his mother (Matt. 12:46ff)."

That is a wonderful passage from Matthew, but it is the furthest thing from "utilitarian" that it could possibly be. It's the exact opposite. He says that His mother is whoever will hear with word of God and keep it. And Mary was the first to do that: a spiritual act, even before the physical conception. (Didn't the Angel call her by that revealed, unique name, Kecharitomene, before she even conceived her Divine Son?) SHE heard the word of God. SHE kept it. She got pregnant!

Mary was the first disciple, because she was the first to accept Jesus Christ as her personal Savior (Luke 1:47.)

Good enough for me.

"What an extraordinary denial--- are you saying that the texts do not show the Holy Spirit preparing them prenatally for their role?"

Forgive my obsession with the text, but that is what we are considering here. And, the denial is not at all "extraordinary" if one sticks to the text. Jeremiah, was set apart and appointed. That is not "filled with the Spirit." Isaiah was called and named. That is not "filled with the Spirit." Elizabeth was "filled with the Spirit", not John her fetus. Perhaps words are elastic to Rome, but words mean something to biblicists.

And, I am a bit surprised that you quote the "golden chain" passage from Romans 8 regarding predestination and then claim Isaiah sinned based on "free will". Ordinary reading would recognize those are incompatible concepts. In the same way, your claim that Adam and Eve were created sinless and "chose" to sin (ostensibly based upon the concept of "free will") is simply not supported in the text. Please describe the passage that says they were created sinless. Then, tell us where it explains that they had "free will".

Finally, Mary...there is no possible way to view the remarks to Mary and the brothers as complimentary or honoring. Jesus is depreciating them, my FRiend, not praising them. He is saying, "Look, I am busy here with people who are actually listening to me...they are MORE my mother than my own mother who may wish to talk to me, but as I said, I am busy." If you find His words complimentary, you have a very different hermeneutic than mine. And, there is absolutely no textual evidence that she was sinless, born sinless, immaculately conceived (holy mackerel on that one!!!), or to be recognized above any other human. Paul never even mentions her and no early believers (1st century) elevated her. As John the Baptist said, "He must increase, I must decrease."