Posted on 11/30/2020 6:25:03 AM PST by CharlesOConnell
During the first 1,500 years of Christianity, Mary was regarded as the peer of Enoch, Elijah and, according to a Jewish targum (a biblical commentary), Moses, by God taking her bodily up into heaven. (Orthodox and Catholics allow that she may have just newly died during the Assumption, calling her death “falling asleep”.) In two-thirds of the Christian tradition, across the Orthodox and Catholic world, Mary is regarded as having been specially privileged, called Theotokos, God-bearer. In order that the birth of Jesus would be in a fitting vessel, Catholics believe Mary was also the peer of Eve prior to her eating the forbidden fruit, in that she was preserved from sin during her conception, so that “macula non est in te” (“there is no stain in you”, Song of Songs, verse 4:7). There is no sin in her. Most Christians are saved by the death of Christ after their sins; Mary was saved before sinning. This is called The Immaculate Conception.
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http://www.celebrationarts.net/images/_alpha/O-Purest-Of-Creatures-Sweet-Star-Of-The-Sea.mp3
Fr. Frederick William Faber, (1814-1863) | St. Denio |
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1. O purest of creatures, sweet Mother! sweet Maid! The one spotless womb wherein Jesus was laid! Dark night hath come down on us, Mother! And we, Look out for thy shining, sweet Star of the Sea! | 2. Deep night has come down on this rough-spoken world, &-the banners of darkness are boldly unfurled; &-the tempest tossed Church— all her eyes are on thee, They look to thy shining, sweet Star of the Sea! |
3. He gazed on thy soul; it was spotless and fair; For-the empire of sin—it had never been there; None had ever owned thee, dear Mother! But He, And-He blessed thy clear shining, sweet Star of the Sea! | 4. Earth gave Him one lodging; ‘twas deep in thy breast, And God found a home where the sinner finds rest; His home and His hiding place both were in thee, He-was won by thy shining, sweet Star of the Sea. |
5. O blissful and calm was the wonderful rest, That-thou gavest thy God in thy virginal breast; For-the heaven He left, He found heaven in thee, And-He shone in thy shining, sweet Star of the Sea! | 6. To sinners what comfort, to angels what mirth, That God found one creature un- fallen on earth, One spot where His Spirit, un- troubled could be, The depth of thy shining, sweet Star of the Sea! |
7. O shine on us brighter than even, then shine, For-the highest of honours, dear Mother! Is thine; “Conceived without sin,” thy chaste title e’re be, Clear light from thy birth-spring, sweet Star of the Sea! | 8. So worship we God in these rude latter days; So worship we Jesus our Love, when we praise, His wonderful grace in the gifts He gave thee, The gift of clear shining, sweet Star of the Sea! |
9. Deep night hath come down on us, Mother! Deep night, And-we need more than ever the guide of thy light; For-the darker the night is the brighter should be, Thy beautiful shining, sweet Star of the Sea! | Amen. |
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http://www.celebrationarts.net/images/_alpha/ImmaculateMary.mp3
No one is saying that Mary is the source of Jesus’s divine nature. What Christians believe is that the divine and human natures united in Jesus from the moment of his conception. There was never a time when Jesus was not the Second Person of the Trinity. Jesus is a divine person with a human nature — and Mary is the mother of that person.
To say that Mary is not the Theotokos (a name Christians have given her since 250) is to say that there was a time that the divine and human natures of Jesus were not united. You are dabbling in the heresy called Nestorianism. You are in way over your head.
“God sent his SON, born of a woman.”
Those are the words, and they’re not going away.
Also, you spelled “Galatians” wrong.
Why would you suppose anything so lumpishly pagan? Christianity isn't some Greek myth with Gods and Goddesses spawning everywhere.
The Holy Trinity is eternal and uncreated. It is the central fact of reality.
Christ - who has existed and will exist forever - has entered into full hypostatic union with mankind. He became Man.
That union is forever. Christ will never cease to be both God and Man. That is the Incarnation: an eternal change to The Holy Trinity.
The Holy Trinity chose Mary as the representative of the human race whose acceptance of God's plan would change reality for ever. She is the Mother of God.
Who is the woman mentioned in Galatians 4:4?
Who was born of that woman?
Born of a woman no one disputes. where do you see sinless in there?
I'm saying that he didn't coerce her. You're the one who seems to trying to remove or downplay Mary's acceptance - her enthusiastic acceptance - of God's plan.
First things first. Do you accept that Mary is the Mother of God?
Mary is the mother of Jesus and the bearer of God.
What doe you mean by “bearer”? As in being pregnant with and giving birth to?
i can support both statements (mother of Jesus and bearer of God) with scripture. Nowhere in scripture can you fond Mary as sinless, assumed bodily into heaven, given more titles than Jesus as worthy to be prayed fo as catholic mythology demands.
As carrying in her womb the God who already existed long before Mary and who in fact created her
But she apparently has an ‘in’ with the big guy... being her baby-daddy and all.
So if you pray to Mary, not God, she will ‘intercede’ for you.
Please confirm: do you say that Mary carried God in her womb?
Sure. As Christians our privilege is to approach the Throne of God directly. He has won that for us praise His name forever.
Absolutely. That does not mean she is the mother of the uncreated deity. Christ was not conceived He was incarnated. she is the mother of His human side only. Christ existed long before Mary and created her. Calling her mother of God attempts to elevate Mary above God and diminish Gods eternal nature. I will do neither
He gave Mary the title "Full of Grace".
Chaire, Kecharitomene
Here is clear scripture with a clear meaning. Mary was Full of Grace. No sin at all.
Lest anyone believe that this some late modern interpretaton: it's meaning was certainly obvious to the early Greek Fathers , who were greeks of a culture basically identical to that of St Luke's.
They certainly understood the same by Chaire, Kecharitomene as we do today.
For instance Gregory Thaumaturgus (205-270 AD): wrote the following exposition on the meaning of Luke's gospel and Chaire, Kecharitomene.
Mary's sinless nature was obvious to greeks in 250 AD. They hadn't fallen into our modern unease with the concept of holiness.
It is the Logos, the uncreated Eternal Word who became incarnate.
Jesus, being man, has a beginning. There was a time when Jesus did not exist, namely, before the Incarnation. There was never a time when the Eternal Son of the Father did not exist.
Jesus is therefore a divine person with a human nature. In Jesus the divine and human natures:
"We confess, therefore, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten Son of God, perfect God, and perfect Man of a reasonable soul and flesh consisting; begotten before the ages of the Father according to his Divinity, and in the last days, for us and for our salvation, of Mary the Virgin according to his humanity, of the same substance with his Father according to his Divinity, and of the same substance with us according to his humanity; for there became a union of two natures. Wherefore we confess one Christ, one Son, one Lord. According to this understanding of this unmixed union, we confess the holy Virgin to be Mother of God; because God the Word was incarnate and became Man, and from this conception he united the temple taken from her with himself."
No one has ever suggested that Mary is the source of the divine nature in Jesus. What the Church has always believed is that because there was never a time that the Holy One conceived in the womb of the Virgin was not God, and since in that Holy One the human and divine natures are inextricably united without confusion or annihilation, there is no way that Mary could have carried and given birth to one who was not always the Son of God -- as Galatians 4:4 testifies.
To say that Mary is not the Mother of God is to say that in Jesus the divine and human natures are not truly united. To say that Mary is not the Mother of God is to say that God did not suffer and die on the Cross. It makes a hoax of the entire atonement.
When you say that Mary gave birth to the Second person of the Trinity you are.
Jesus is a divine person with a human nature — and Mary is the mother of that person.
She is NOT the mother of divinity.
She is the mother of the Incarnation of that Divinity, Jesus physical body.
The title, *mother of Jesus* is NOT a statement in Scripture about the nature of Jesus. That issue is clearly and plainly settled throughout the Bible.
The title is to identify which of the many Mary's in Scripture the Holy spirit was referring to.
There were other Mary's mentioned who were identified by other phrases.
*Mother of Jesus* is only about which Mary the Holy spirit was referring to.
Why is *mother of Jesus* as the Holy spirit saw fit to identify Mary as, not good enough for you?
Mary is not the mother of GOD. GOD has no mother.
For you to say otherwise, is to say that God is a created being and Mary is greater than He because she preexisted Him.
Clearly the Catholic god is not the God of Scripture who has no mother.
Jesus was born of a woman.
GOD was not born of a woman.
If you think He was then that means that Catholicism teaches that Mary is also the mother of God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit.
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