Mack wants me to leave this subject alone but I can't yet. I wanna know why if, I'm ok with calling Mary the mother of God, and I believe Jesus is the Word that was with God before the foundation of the world, that I have to believe Mary was sinless. Ok now Mack I'm gonna read your big long post.
The catholic church denies that Mary had a sin nature or that she ever committed wrong doing. Following are quotes from Catholic Publications:
The Immaculate Conception-or the fact that Mary was conceived without the stain of original sin-is a doctrine of the faith contained implicitly in Holy Scripture. The Holy Ghost did not express it in so many words; but he deposited it in the bibllical statements from which, like a seed, it grew up in the living Church of Christ until it reached its full size demension. Could the mother of the Saviour, shairng in her Son's victory, be, even for a moment , under the power of Satan? She had to be free from original sin. Finall, in 1854 Pope pius IX declared it a revealed doctrine- one of theose that have to be believed by all who share the faith of the church.
The Immaculate Virgin was preserved free from all stain of original sin" (Vatican II documents, "Dogmatic Constitution of the Church").
See it was revealed later and you have to believe it:)
Could someone explain the "sharing in her Son's victory," part for me.
Becky
You don't have to. If I can't convince you of the truth, then you can remain skeptical. While it has been declared a dogma, which must be believed by all, Catholics still have a hierarchy of truths, some of which are more basic and more important than the others. Certainly I would give you a passing grade based upon what you have already confessed.
SD
I'm short on time today, and still giddy from the Patriots win, so I'll take the easy - but honest, I think - way out. You don't have to believe it. No one should force you to believe anything. Its not specifically in Scripture, its not in the Nicene Creed. You can be a good Christian, even a good Orthodox, and not believe it.
But I'd say, at the same time, its what the Church teaches. And there's always going to be a struggle towards understanding, a dialogue, between the individual believer and the Church, between the individual believer and God. In one of the first classes I sat in on, an inquirer asked, "can I be Orthodox and still have doubts about the ever-virginity of Mary?" The priest leading the class replied, IMO with complete accuracy, "You can be Orthodox and still have doubts about everything."