Mary not just for Catholics anymore

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- As publications from Time magazine to Christianity Today have discovered recently, Mary, the mother of Jesus, is not just for Catholics anymore.

Features on Mary are perennial favorites for editors looking for a religion-themed story before Christmas, and in the last few years many of these articles have focused on the increasing popularity of Mary among Protestants.

Marianist Father Thomas Thompson, editor of the Marian Library Newsletter at the University of Dayton in Ohio, points out that the expanding Protestant acceptance of Mary is based upon a strictly scriptural view of her, rather than on any change in Protestant theology.

Some Catholic doctrines about Mary, such as the Immaculate Conception -- the belief that she was conceived without sin -- remain controversial among Protestants, Father Thompson said. But as anti-Catholicism has waned among Protestants, the barriers to Episcopalians, Baptists and evangelicals turning to Mary have faded as well.

"We're very happy to see others taking an interest in Mary," he said in a telephone interview with Catholic News Service.

Timothy George, dean of Beeson Divinity School at Samford University, a Baptist college in Birmingham, Ala., wrote recently that "it is time for evangelicals to recover a fully biblical appreciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary and her role in the history of salvation, and to do so precisely as evangelicals." George's comments appeared in the December 2003 issue of Christianity Today and in a 2004 collection of essays by various theologians, "Mary: Mother of God."

"We may not be able to recite the rosary or kneel down before statues of Mary, but we need not throw her overboard," George wrote.

In the magazine, he quoted an early 20th-century Southern Baptist New Testament scholar, A.T. Robertson, who said Mary "has not had fair treatment either from Protestants or Catholics." Robertson argued that while Catholics have "deified" Mary evangelicals have coldly neglected her.

"We have been afraid to praise and esteem Mary for her full worth," said George, citing Robertson, "lest we be accused of leanings and sympathy with Catholics."

George's article went on to explain historical, scriptural and theological reasons why Protestants should embrace Mary.

"We need not go through Mary in order to get to Jesus," George concluded, "but we can join with Mary in pointing others to him."

Another recent book, "Blessed One," is a collection of 11 essays about Mary by Protestant scholars.

In their introduction, editors Beverly Roberts Gaventa and Cynthia L. Rigby, professors at Princeton Theological Seminary in New Jersey and Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Texas, respectively, said their goal for the book was to help Protestants think in new ways about Mary, "blessing her and being blessed by her."

"She is a person of faith who does not always understand but who seeks to put her trust in God," they wrote.

John Alden Williams, professor emeritus in the humanities of religion at the College of William and Mary in Virginia, is a Catholic historian who has studied Islamic civilization and religion. He and fellow William and Mary professor James A. Bill published "Roman Catholics and Shi'i Muslims" in 2002.

It notes that two sections of the Quran, the sacred book of Islam, are devoted to Mary, known there as Maryam. She is recognized as the purified woman chosen to be the mother of the promised Messiah. Islam considers Jesus an important prophet, but not the incarnation of God.

Williams explained in a phone interview that, like Catholics, Shiite Muslims, who are a minority compared to the vastly more numerous Sunni Muslims, believe in intercessory prayer through saints and other holy people. That includes Mary, who is highly revered as a mediatrix between humans and God, or Allah. Sufis, another Islamic sect, also believe in intercession.

In Sunni Islam, "the whole idea of intercession is disputed," Williams said, "just as it is among Calvinist Protestants."

Among the differences the leaders of the Protestant Reformation had with the Catholic Church was the growth during the Middle Ages of devotion to Mary. Reformers argued that Jesus was the only mediator between God and mankind and that "exuberant Marian devotion seemed to them to threaten the clarity of the Gospel message of salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, through Christ alone," wrote Daniel L. Migliore, a theology professor at Princeton Theological Seminary, in his chapter in "Blessed One."

Muslims who seek Mary's intercession, on the other hand, see her in much the same way Catholics do, said Williams.

While living in the Middle East, he said he witnessed several striking examples of the reverence many Muslims have for Mary.

At the Convent of Our Lady, an Orthodox church in Sednaya, Syria, he watched devout Muslims roll out prayer rugs to join Christians in reverencing an icon of Mary that is reputed to have been painted by St. Luke the Evangelist and believed to have the power to cure illnesses.

And in the late 1960s, many Muslims were among the millions who gathered in a Coptic Orthodox church in Egypt, hoping to catch a glimpse of reported Marian apparitions, he said.

For more than a year starting in 1968, apparitions of Mary were reported over the domes of the Church of the Virgin Mary in the Zeitoun area of Cairo.

Williams went to the church once during that time and was surprised to see Muslims among the crowd, he said.

"I asked some people, 'Isn't it a little funny for you to be coming here to a Christian church?'" Williams said. They said they considered it only proper that Mary would appear at a church dedicated to her, but explained that they believed she was speaking to all Egyptians, not just Christians.

"They all saw it as a great sign of consolation after the war with Israel (in 1967) that God had not forgotten the people of Egypt," he said.

“You see, you make the mistakes that those who debate from one standpoint make. You are absolutely right. Therefore any other pov is wrong.”

If we are both right, then we have nothing to debate. Debate exists because both sides think they are right, and they appeal to reason and facts to convince the other, if possible. If you didn’t believe my pov was wrong, you would have no reason to post.

“YOU gave me the source that pointed to the fact that St. Jerome translated ALL the original sources. Now that’s not convenient.”

No, Jerome didn’t HAVE all the original sources. I don’t have time to explain now, but will try to post later today on what I mean.

“You are lead by the Holy Spirit to believe that your translation is right, so you are right. However when I am lead by the Holy Spirit to believe that the Catholic translation is right, I am wrong.”

I doubt there are a lot of significant differences between us based on translation. My problem with the claim that Mary ascended into heaven is that I’ve seen no scripture to back it up. I haven’t read all of those books where Catholics and Protestants disagree about canon, so I grant that you may find it there.

“You can’t prove that there were no other texts that what you are looking at. None of us can. But because they don’t suit your argument, poof, gone.”

No. I would have nothing but loathing for any scholar who would toss out a bit of scripture because it wasn’t convenient for his beliefs. Indeed, it is the challenging scriptures that teach us the most, since we find them challenging because of our failures.

“Oh and as for the “understanding English” part, that’s a bit personal and against the rules of the Religion Forum.”

May or may not be against the rules, but it was rude and I apologize. Sorry.

No problem with the “understanding English” part. I’ve been in some Heated debates here and frustration can come out.

My only point is that one can be open to debate and consider all sides. Or can say, my point is absolute and disregard one POV absolutely.

I did my time in “Bible Churches” met some wonderfully intelligent people who totally disregarded anything the Catholic Church said, simply because it was from the Catholic Church. It made me look back at the RCC from a different pov. I could do that because I grew up Catholic.

When the RCC’s Bible was quoted, with any backup, I was thrown back to the “the Holy Spirit told me”. Well the Holy Spirit lead me back home. After my time in Bible Study Fellowship, who put those subtle digs in to Catholic teachings I now study in my parish. With open eyes to all POV.

I have a friend who was totally Anti-Catholic. A co-worker told him to look at the Bible from a pov that the Catholics were right. Suddenly, a whole new world opened up. He and his wife and now the VERY best apologists in our parish.

God works in mysterious ways.

If that were the only verse, I might be swayed. However, the entire thrust of scripture is that ALL have sinned, and ALL need a Savior.

As Paul rebuked Peter: “14 When I saw that they were not acting in line with the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter in front of them all, “You are a Jew, yet you live like a Gentile and not like a Jew. How is it, then, that you force Gentiles to follow Jewish customs?

15 “We who are Jews by birth and not ‘Gentile sinners’ 16 know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified. 19 For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”

If Mary could be without sin, and not need a Savior, then truly Christ died for nothing! If God could skip the sentence of Adam for her, and she could do right things and be justified before God, then Jesus died for no reason.

Look at the whole passage from Romans 3:

9 What shall we conclude then? Are we [Jews] any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. 10 As it is written:
“There is no one righteous, not even one;
11 there is no one who understands,
no one who seeks God.
12 All have turned away,
they have together become worthless;
there is no one who does good,
not even one.”
13 “Their throats are open graves;
their tongues practice deceit.”
“The poison of vipers is on their lips.”
14 “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”
15 “Their feet are swift to shed blood;
16 ruin and misery mark their ways,
17 and the way of peace they do not know.”
18 “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

19 Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. 20 Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.

21 But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25 God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— 26 he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.

27 Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On that of observing the law? No, but on that of faith. 28 For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law. 29 Is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles too? Yes, of Gentiles too, 30 since there is only one God, who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through that same faith.

I mean no offense to you, but I fail to see how it is possible to read that passage, and respond that it means all sorts of folks have sinned, but some have not.

I’ve read that when Paul quotes the Old Testament as saying “There is no one righteous, not even one;”, he used the Greek translation, which added the words ‘not even one’ to the translation from the Hebrew. That additional emphasis would seem to rule out interpreting this passage as ‘most have sinned, but Mary has not’.

Indeed, I cannot think of a single passage anywhere that indicates anyone was sinless, except Jesus.

Mary herself knew she needed saving, for in Luke we read, “46 And Mary said: “My soul glorifies the Lord 47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior...”

Nor did Jesus indicate Mary was in any way sinless.

In Matthew 12 we find,

“46 While Jesus was still talking to the crowd, his mother and brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. 47 Someone told him, “Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.”

48 He replied to him, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” 49 Pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers. 50 For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.”

And in Luke 11 we read, “27 As Jesus was saying these things, a woman in the crowd called out, “Blessed is the mother who gave you birth and nursed you.”

28 He replied, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.”

The Good News of Jesus is that, while ALL have sinned, ALL can be saved by grace through faith. I have no doubt but that Mary has indeed been saved, by grace, through faith, and her sins have been forgiven. By the sacrifice Jesus offered, “he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy” - including Mary.

But there is no reading of scripture that would lead one to believe Mary was sinless. That tradition is in flagrant contradiction to virtually ever passage in the entire New Testament.

If what you say is true, then the line of argumentation you make would extend as well to Christ, who also would have to be within sin. Yet Scripture tells us that He was without sin. To the extent that Christ can be without sin, so can Mary be without sin, by God's special grace.

Why is Mary special? Well, obviously she is playing a key role in salvation history, giving birth to the Savior. As the Early Church Fathers taught us, in the early centuries of the Church, the special role of Mary is prophecied in Genesis 3:15 -- the Protoevangelium. This is the scene in Genesis in which God curses the serpent for causing mankind's fall into original sin. And God says:

"And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall crush your head, and you shall strike at His heel."

The Church Fathers unequivocably understood this to be a prophecy of the coming Christ and the defeat of Satan. On that I am sure we can agree. But ALSO the Church Fathers unequivocably understood the WOMAN in this passage to be the Virgin Mary, the "New Eve."

For example, around the A.D. 155, St. Justin Martyr wrote in his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew that the Holy Scriptures teach us concerning Christ,

"'that He became Man by the Virgin so that the course which was taken by disobedience in the beginning through the agency of the serpent, might be also the very course by which it would be put down. For Eve, a virgin and undefiled, conceived the word of the serpent, and bore disobedience and death. But the Virgin Mary received faith and joy when the angel Gabriel announced to her the glad tidings that the Spirit of the Lord would come upon her and the powers of the Most High would overshadow her, for which reason the Holy One being born of her would be called the Son of God. And she replied: 'Be it done unto me according to thy word.'" BR> St. Justin Martyr therefore parallels the Virgin Mary with the Virgin Eve. Just as the word of the serpent bore fruit through the Virgin Eve, so the word of God came into the world through the Virgin Mary. Eve believed the word of an evil angel and death was brought into the world, while Mary believed the word of a good angel and Life Himself was brought into the world.

Also, around the A.D. 190, St. Ireneus, in his masterwork, Against Heresies, writes,

"Consequently, then, Mary the Virgin is found to be obedient, saying: "Behold, O Lord, your handmaid; be it done to me according to your word." Eve, however, was disobedient; and when yet a virgin, she did not obey.... having become disobedient, was made the cause of death for herself and for the whole human race; so also Mary, betrothed to a man but nevertheless still a virgin, being obedient, was made the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race.... Thus, the knot of Eve's disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary. What the virgin Eve had bound in unbelief, the Virgin Mary loosed through faith."

So again we see the second century fathers contrasting Mary and Eve, saying that the evil done through Eve was undone through Mary.

Around the A.D. 210, the Catholic Tertullian wrote in his treatise, On The Flesh of Christ, that

"...it was while Eve was still a virgin that the word of the devil crept in to erect an edifice of death. Likewise, though a Virgin, the Word of God was introduced to set up a structure of life. Thus, what had been laid waste in ruin by this sex, was by the same sex re-established in salvation. Eve had believed the serpent; Mary believed Gabriel. That which the one destroyed by believing, the other, by believing, set straight." As a result, we see three of the most important fathers of the second and third century bearing witness to the implication of the Genesis 3:15 prophecy, that after the woman of Genesis 3 there will come a second woman, a second Eve, who will give birth to Christ while still a virgin. Thus Mary helps rectify what Eve brought about. Eve brought sin and death into the world by her relationship with the first Adam, from whom we inherit Original Sin, while Mary brought helped bring holiness and life into the world by her relationship to the Second Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ. Notice that in both cases it is the Adams who do the actual work. It was the first Adam who was responsible for us inheriting Original Sin. St. Paul indicates that it is our unity with the First Adam which produces sin and death in us, while it is our unity with the Second Adam that produces righteousness and life in us. The Adams are the key players, the ones who do all the work, but their work happens to be brought about through the agency of the two Eves, the first one who believed an evil angel and the second one who believed a good angel.

This distinction is reflected in the saying of the Church fathers: "Death through Eve, life through Mary." Even though Eve and Mary were not the ultimate causes of death and life, it was through their actions that death and new life entered the world.

Put within this Biblical context, both the New Adam, Christ, and now His Mother, the New Eve, are without sin just as the original Adam and Eve, because the Lord has placed them within salvation history to redeem Mankind as a whole.

This week I am reading Han Urs Von Balthasar and Pope Benedict's Mary, The Church at the Source, so perhaps that will give me more insight into the Church's teachings on these matters. I'm not exactly a Doctor of the Church. Far from it -- but I try to take and learn from the best of them, as much as I can.

God bless.

“This distinction is reflected in the saying of the Church fathers: “Death through Eve, life through Mary.” Even though Eve and Mary were not the ultimate causes of death and life, it was through their actions that death and new life entered the world.”

Romans 5:

“15 But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! 16 Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man’s sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. 17 For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.”

If I held the teachings of the Church Fathers in the early centuries to be equal to Holy Scripture, I might feel compelled to interpret scripture in a way that satisfied them, no matter how unnatural the interpretation seemed. However, I do not, and the plain teaching of Scripture is that while Mary sinned, Jesus did not.

I came across this article on translating Genesis 3:15...it seemed pretty balanced to me:

http://faculty.gordon.edu/hu/bi/Ted_Hildebrandt/OTeSources/01-Genesis/Text/Articles-Books/Woudstra_Gen3_15_CTJ.pdf

I spent my life as an electronic warfare officer in the US Air Force, so I cannot argue knowledgeably either way.

However, if God could cause us to be born free from sin without the sacrifice of Jesus, then why not? If we can be justified by our deeds - which is what being sinless would do for Mary - then there was no reason for Jesus to die. Paul’s rebuke of Peter stands.

“If what you say is true, then the line of argumentation you make would extend as well to Christ, who also would have to be within sin.”

Not so. Scripture clearly teaches that Jesus was without sin. I think we can both agree that Jesus’s birth was unusual to an extent Mary’s was not.

And if Mary HAD been sinless, I’d expect those passages about Jesus to include reference to it - at least ONCE!

Remember the passage in Luke 11?

“27 As Jesus was saying these things, a woman in the crowd called out, “Blessed is the mother who gave you birth and nursed you.”

28 He replied, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.”

Jesus could have replied, “Yes! Blessed indeed, and without sin as well!” Or he could have said, “What the virgin Eve had bound in unbelief, the Virgin Mary loosed through faith!”

Instead, he redirected the woman from focusing on Mary, and had her focus on living for God instead.

I do not believe any of us will receive a theology exam when we stand before God. Someone who believe Mary was sinless does so, at a bare minimum, with scant scriptural support - but that is not on what our judgment depends.

John 3 “18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.”

That said, I thank you for your posts and the chance to discuss this with you. I appreciate your courtesy and desire for the truth - and you’ve led me to reading and thinking a great deal. A spur to study what God would have us do is always welcome! May God bless your studies.

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