"Whether Mary was a perpetual virgin or not is really a very minor point IMO. If I were to declare tomorrow that I thought Mary was a perpetual virgin it wouldn't change any of my other beliefs."
You know, during this thread I have wondered the same thing but of course presuming that I were to conclude that she wasn't "ever virgin". I have concluded that it wouldn't change what I feel about her at all, but I'm not sure that means much. I have grown up and lived in a religious culture which taught me about her from before I can remember. I have no recollection of not having her icons around. I have no recollection of not thinking of her as my mother. As I told another Freeper today, she has always been there for me in those "fox holes of life", ever since I was a very homesick 14 year old away from home at prep school to today when I saw her icon when I got up from bed and later sat at a desk in the office with her icon directly in front of me. I can be pretty grown up and educated about patristics and The Faith in most areas, but when it comes to her, well, I'm still that 14 year old homesick kid. I doubt I'll ever change.
Your last posts remind me of what I felt as a convert to Catholicism.
It seemed there was a vast richness and fullness, a depth and a fitting together of all things in Catholicism.
And it made me see my many years in Protestantism, in different Churches, as taking off on one aspect and expanding it - but lacking in the depth and richness of the whole.
To me, Protestant Churches seem varieties of Catholic Lite, and a driving motive in each a striving toward minimalism. "What is the least..."
I think the same is true of Mary in the differences shown here on this thread.
FWIW.
And this is precisely the problem my friend. When a angel appeared to John, and John fell on his face to worship, the angel told him to worship God alone. Our focus should be on Him; nothing else.