[fr_freak]

I'm not a Catholic, but I think you are confusing what Immaculate Conception means with the Virgin birth of Jesus.

You are correct. I was confusing the two. Now that I know that the two are separate things, I realize that I know even less about the whole Mary thing than I thought.

[xone]

I'm not a Catholic, but I think you are confusing what Immaculate Conception means with the Virgin birth of Jesus. You are correct. I was confusing the two. Now that I know that the two are separate things, I realize that I know even less about the whole Mary thing than I thought.

That's alright, it took me three posts to get where I am with that discussion, and I already knew they were different things. With that in mind, would you reconsider this statement of yours:

"It seems to me, that in the desperate rush to condemn the Catholic Church, many Protestants zoom in on the whole Mary thing and exaggerate and distort the teachings in order to confirm the entire basis for Protestantism, which is that the Catholic Church is false. For that reason, Protestants seem to need to believe in the most ridiculous exaggerations of Catholic teaching."

I think it is helpful if one can admit making a mistake with a broad over-generalization, it keeps the water of discussion/argument pure.