Posted on 06/18/2009 4:02:05 PM PDT by bronxville
Mary was a mortal human being, a sinner like all of us.
Bingo.
Speak directly to The Man.
No need to go through subordinates.
Martin Luther, Founder of the Reform, Speaks on Mary
In his sermon of August 15, 1522, the last time Martin Luther preached on the Feast of the Assumption, he stated:
There can be no doubt that the Virgin Mary is in heaven. How it happened we do not know. And since the Holy Spirit has told us nothing about it, we can make of it no article of faith . . . It is enough to know that she lives in Christ.
The veneration of Mary is inscribed in the very depths of the human heart. (Sermon, September 1, 1522).
[She is the] highest woman and the noblest gem in Christianity after Christ . . . She is nobility, wisdom, and holiness personified. We can never honor her enough. Still honor and praise must be given to her in such a way as to injure neither Christ nor the Scriptures. (Sermon, Christmas, 1531).
No woman is like you. You are more than Eve or Sarah, blessed above all nobility, wisdom, and sanctity. (Sermon, Feast of the Visitation, 1537).
One should honor Mary as she herself wished and as she expressed it in the Magnificat. She praised God for his deeds. How then can we praise her? The true honor of Mary is the honor of God, the praise of God’s grace . . . Mary is nothing for the sake of herself, but for the sake of Christ . . . Mary does not wish that we come to her, but through her to God. (Explanation of the Magnificat, 1521).
Luther gives the Blessed Virgin the exalted position of “Spiritual Mother” for Christians:
It is the consolation and the superabundant goodness of God, that man is able to exult in such a treasure. Mary is his true Mother .. (Sermon, Christmas, 1522)
Mary is the Mother of Jesus and the Mother of all of us even though it was Christ alone who reposed on her knees . . . If he is ours, we ought to be in his situation; there where he is, we ought also to be and all that he has ought to be ours, and his mother is also our mother. (Sermon, Christmas, 1529).
Martin Luther had the belief of Mary’s Immaculate Conception, Luther’s words follow:
It is a sweet and pious belief that the infusion of Mary’s soul was effected without original sin; so that in the very infusion of her soul she was also purified from original sin and adorned with God’s gifts, receiving a pure soul infused by God; thus from the first moment she began to live she was free from all sin” (Sermon: “On the Day of the Conception of the Mother of God,” 1527).
She is full of grace, proclaimed to be entirely without sin- something exceedingly great. For God’s grace fills her with everything good and makes her devoid of all evil. (Personal {”Little”} Prayer Book, 1522).”
That’s what Martin Luther had to say about the Blessed Mother. So even the reformers/rebels revered and honored Holy Mary. What happened to the Protestant Tradition?
Mary was a human mother born in sin. That’s all nothing more. The one qualifying factor that she had that Jesus needed was the unbroken, unblemished line from David through his son Nathan. Whereas Joseph’s bloodline which was broken but his line carried the title of King through David.
Free of sin so that she could bear Christ in her womb.
You are getting erroneous information from you Catholic bashing churches.
Free of sin?
We are all born sinners, so where does a person who is free of sin come from? Was she the daughter of God and Jesus is really the Grandchild of God?
Christians go through Christ, everyone else is just a dead human
"Never apologize for the Blessed Virgin Mary!"
~~Mother Angelica
You are not familiar with the Catholic dogma of the Immaculate Conception. Please educate yourself.
Christians worship God through Christ Jesus. That is all.
There sure are a lot of Catholic-bashers aka protestants on this site - they’re here to ensure you know in no uncertain terms what their opinion is of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
I don’t know whether Mary was sinless or not, and I’m comfortable with not knowing. All I know is that God found her special, and so do I.
I wouldn't apologize for her, I just don't consider her terribly relevant.
See, I worship Christ, not His mom or His second cousin or His lawyer.
I am privileged with direct communication to Him.
I have no need of intermediaries.
Tradition ... Topal .....men can speak of anything but there’s nothing about venerating Mary in the Bible ... great theologians can speak on whatever they want but it doesn’t make it Biblical ... Mary was just the means whereby Jesus entered the world ... nothing more.
Heinrich Bullinger
Bullinger (d. 1575) . . . defends Mary’s perpetual virginity . . . and inveighs against the false Christians who defraud her of her rightful praise: ‘In Mary everything is extraordinary and all the more glorious as it has sprung from pure faith and burning love of God.’ She is ‘the most unique and the noblest member’ of the Christian community . . .
‘The Virgin Mary . . . completely sanctified by the grace and blood of her only Son and abundantly endowed by the gift of the Holy Spirit and preferred to all . . . now lives happily with Christ in heaven and is called and remains ever-Virgin and Mother of God.’
{In Hilda Graef, Mary: A history of Doctrine and Devotion, combined ed. of vols. 1 & 2, London: Sheed & Ward, 1965, vol.2, pp.14-5}
That’s the problem they’re not educated in the doctrine. I mean if they were they’d know what their protestant reformers had to say about her. Heinrich Bullinger wrote the above on the Holy Mother. What happened one might wonder.
"Do whatever he tells you" she said (John 2:5). Mary calls us to obedience, and Our Lord has made her the vehicle to bring warring factions together in peace to Him. She did so in Mexico (as Our Lady of Guadalupe).
Throughout history, she has always pointed the way to her Son through obedience to Him.
I have been here long enough to know, you ain’t gonna change each others minds. To my fellow Catholics, I offer you this sage advice;
Stop casting pearls before swine.
“Tradition ... Topal .....men can speak of anything but there’s nothing about venerating Mary in the Bible ... great theologians can speak on whatever they want but it doesn’t make it Biblical ... Mary was just the means whereby Jesus entered the world ... nothing more.”
But who says that...? I mean your founding protestant reformers continued to honor and rever her. What happened? Do you all follow your own ideology? You’re your own little mini-gods? Mary is Biblical as your founding reformers knew... How come you strayed so far off the path?
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