I Love that Woman! My Unworthy Reflections on The Immaculate Conception

Fighting Irish Thomas ^ | 12-8-06 | Tom O'Toole

[mlizzy]

...a doctrine revealed by God and therefore to be believed firmly and constantly by all the faithful that the Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instant of her conception, was, by a unique grace and privilege of Almighty God in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the human race, preserved exempt from all stain of original sin. –Ineffabilis Deus

Today's feast day is more than Pope Pius IX's 1854 infallible proclamation, as important as that Dogma was and is. Today's feast day, which issues not only from the Papal Bull Ineffabilis Deus but its echo at the Grotto in Lourdes four years later, demonstrates that the Virgin Mary, with all her wonderful titles, wants to be known by that name. And the reason is not so much that she was conceived without sin, but that through her humility before God she continued without sin until the day she was assumed into heaven. It is for this reason her prayer is so powerful, her intercession so necessary.

While salvation is assured to anyone who lives a Christ-like life and is baptized in the name of the Father and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, to reach sainthood two further questions must be asked. First, can "The Word" become "Flesh" without the Eucharist? And second, can we truly know (and then, follow) Christ if we don't love Mary?

As a Catholic, who has come to know Jesus "in the Breaking of the Bread" (Luke 24:35), I believe one's knowledge (and thus belief) in Christ can never be fully realized without the Eucharist, and without it one instead develops a sort of two-dimensional faith that allows errors to infiltrate the spaces in the soul that grace has not filled in. Similarly, one cannot have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ without Mary. A person can attempt to be friends with another without sharing in the lives of this person's close friends, but that relationship is always doomed to be flawed or incomplete. Plus, Christ chose Mary as THE friend of any Christian, when He gave her to John as His mother (John 19:26-27). And the reason Mary was named first among a Christian's friends is because she finished the Salvation Race first in humility. Being the first and only person who followed God completely, she is the only person God calls "Full of Grace" (Luke 1:28).

Of course, a charismatic Christian will correctly claim one can appeal for God's grace without the sacraments and go directly through the Holy Spirit. But without perfect humility, these appeals are always open to deception (i.e. the devil), which is obvious to anyone who observes two or more Christian leaders claiming the Holy Spirit's inspiration on a subject when their doctrines flatly contradict each other. And, of course, this need heads us directly back to Our Lady. One needs perfect humility to correctly invoke the Holy Spirit, and that is available only through the prayers of the perfectly humble one, Mary The Immaculate Conception. And Mary never fails to lead those who seek her Intercession back to her Son, especially in His humblest form, under the Appearance of Bread and Wine.

Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!

[topcat54]

Mary was not only free from actual sin, but she was also, by a special privilege, cleansed from original sin. She had, indeed, to be conceived with original sin, inasmuch as her conception resulted from the commingling of both sexes. For the privilege of conceiving without impairment of virginity was reserved exclusively to her who as a virgin conceived the Son of God. But the commingling of the sexes which, after the sin of our first parent, cannot take place without lust, transmits original sin to the offspring. Likewise, if Mary had been conceived without original sin, she would not have had to be redeemed by Christ, and so Christ would not be the universal redeemer of men, which detracts from His dignity. Accordingly we must hold that she was conceived with original sin, but was cleansed from it in some special way. (Thomas Aquinas)

Quoted here.

[vladimir998]

You wrote: "Dealt with here" No, it isn't. Look at what your author DID NOT DEAL WITH: "...after all, how do we know what greater degree of grace for a complete victory over sin was conferred on her who merited to conceive and bring forth Him who all admit was without sin..." What GREATER DEGREE OF GRACE. Augustine is not just saying he won't deal with it. He's saying Mary receieved a greater degree of grace, but he doesn't know how much.

[topcat54]

Oh, I don’t know. Martin Luther talked to the Devil. Was Luther a Mormon?

Non sequitur. Protestants have no theory of infallibility wrt human leadership. We have no problem pointing out when our own are inventing doctrines out of whole clothe.

[vladimir998]

Aquinas did not believe in the Immaculate Conception. He believed, however, that Mary was born immaculate. Most anti-Catholics are too stupid to know the difference or to see how Aquinas could believe what he did and still be perfectly in keeping with the Magisterium as it was understood in his day.

[topcat54]

He's saying Mary receieved a greater degree of grace, but he doesn't know how much.

True, but he is clearly not coming out an affirming the post-medieval RC doctrine of the IC. He asks, “how do we know?” Well, the point is, according to Augustine, we don’t. Certainly not to the point of making it dogma of the church.

[topcat54]

with the Magisterium as it was understood in his day.

I understand the difference. I also understand the shifting sands of the Roman magisterium.

[mlizzy]

Maybe this helps:

Evangelicals often use the fact that Aquinas (unlike others of his age) did not believe that Mary was entirely sanctified from the moment of her conception to imply that she committed actual, personal sin--as Protestants assert. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Even though Aquinas did not claim that Mary was sanctified from the moment of her conception, he did claim that she was sanctified before her birth, and so never committed personal sin (for unborn children commit no personal sin; cf. Rom. 9:11). --Link.

There is more here: http://www.cin.org/users/james/questions/q052.htm

I should also mention that Thomas Aquinas was a theologian in the Church. In The Catholic Way by Bishop Donald Wuerl he says, "Theologians and scholars teach the word and help the Church to penetrate its full meaning. They are not official teachers in the way that bishops, the successors of the apostles, are; theologians do not receive with the bishops that "sure gift of truth" (Dei Verbum 8) that apostolic witnesses to faith receive. But they are important companions of faith, for bishops look to scholars for appropriate assistance in understanding divine revelation."

Another important point to remember is that in Aquinas' time, the Immaculate Conception was a tradition of the Church but was not a required belief. It did not become doctrine (thus a required belief) until the 19th century.

Here's more: http://www.cin.org/jp960612.html

"Down the centuries, the conviction that Mary was preserved from every stain of sin from her conception, so that she is to be called all holy, gradually gained ground in the liturgy and theology. At the start of the 19th century, this development led to a petition drive for a dogmatic definition of the privilege of the Immaculate Conception."

Link.

[vladimir998]

You wrote:

“True, but he is clearly not coming out an affirming the post-medieval RC doctrine of the IC.”

It’s not post medievel.

“He asks, “how do we know?” Well, the point is, according to Augustine, we don’t. Certainly not to the point of making it dogma of the church.”

That’s not what he is saying.

[vladimir998]

You wrote:

“I understand the difference. I also understand the shifting sands of the Roman magisterium.”

You have yet to show any “shifting sands” at all concerning the Magisterium.

[topcat54]

Evangelicals often use the fact that Aquinas (unlike others of his age) did not believe that Mary

I’m not using Aquinas in this sense. It is simply to refute the notion that the IC is part of the apostolic or ancient church tradition.

[topcat54]

It’s not post medievel.

See How Many Popes Does it Take to Deny the Immaculate Conception?

That’s not what he is saying.

Clearly it is. Augustine would not teach a Pelagian doctrine like the IC.

Moreover, when expounding the Gospel according to Luke, he [i.e. Ambrose] says: "It was no cohabitation with a husband which opened the secrets of the Virgin's womb; rather was it the Holy Ghost which infused immaculate seed into her unviolated womb. For the Lord Jesus alone of those who are born of woman is holy, inasmuch as He experienced not the contact of earthly corruption, by reason of the novelty of His immaculate birth; nay, He repelled it by His heavenly majesty." (Augustine's Anti-Pelagian Works quoted here )

[topcat54]

Down the centuries, the conviction that Mary …

Conviction does not equal truth. Islamists and Mormons hold religiously to certain convictions of their theology.

[mlizzy]

I don't wish to "argue." I'm taking "refuge in silence."

[vladimir998]

You wrote:

“Clearly it is. Augustine would not teach a Pelagian doctrine like the IC.”

So you believe being cleansed by Christ’s is Pelagian? Unbelievable.

[vladimir998]

You wrote:

“See How Many Popes Does it Take to Deny the Immaculate Conception?”

Apparently you’re very ennamoured with Turretin, but he doesn’t seem very able.

I read through the quotes from Leo I, for instance, and none of them deny the Immaculate Conception.

The same goes for Gelasius I - he never once mentioned Mary for instance.

Gregory I - none of the quotes mention Mary.

John IV - no mention of Mary.

Innocent III - “He had before come into her, when, in her mother’s womb, He cleansed her soul from original sin; but now too He came upon her to cleanse her flesh from the ‘fomes’ of sin, that she might be altogether without spot or wrinkle.” So Innocent believed she was in fact immaculate.

“7. John XXII (or Benedict XII)”

Uh, if you can’t tell me who EXACTLY said it, then I don’t see why I should take the quote at face value to begin with.

And when you follow the link you discover no real source is listed. I just love it when bigots cite bigots who cited bigots.

[topcat54]

So you believe being cleansed by Christ’s is Pelagian? Unbelievable.

No, I believe the IC is a Pelagian heresy. Among the ancient church, the only ones teaching a form of sinlessness were the Pelagians. None of the church fathers taught that Mary was immaculately conceived. So the claim of Ineffabilis Deus regarding the nature of this teaching in church history is basically a false one.

[TASMANIANRED]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5GUdUYUF8A

[topcat54]

people who openly and unblushingly say the most shocking things, difficult to put up with, we should take refuge in silence,

Have you ever considered that many of the things taught by the RC regarding Mary such as the theory of the IC are "the most shocking things, difficult to put up with?" The knife cuts both ways.

The irony here is that Ambrose would be spinning in his grave if a pope told him that he must accept the dogma of the IC.

[vladimir998]

You wrote:

“No, I believe the IC is a Pelagian heresy.”

Which makes absolutely no sense. In a miracle at conception no human works are even possible.

“Among the ancient church, the only ones teaching a form of sinlessness were the Pelagians.”

That again makes no sense. You’re claiming that a doctrine held only by orthodox Christians is related to a doctrine held only by heretics. That in itself seems like an impossibility. Also, this was a singular grace of God in Mary’s case and that is NOT what the Pelagians believed in. Your views are incoherent.

“None of the church fathers taught that Mary was immaculately conceived.”

I think you should look into that claim. How about Proclus of Constantinople:

As He formed her without any stain of her own, so He proceeded from her contracting no stain (Homily 1[ante A.D. 446]).

Jacob of Sarug:

[T]he very fact that God has elected her proves that none was ever holier than Mary, if any stain had disfigured her soul, if any other virgin had been purer and holier, God would have selected her and rejected Mary[ante A.D. 521].

Romanos the Melodist:

Then the tribes of Israel heard that Anna had conceived the immaculate one. So everyone took part in the rejoicing. Joachim gave a banquet, and great was the merriment in the garden. He invited the priests and Levites to prayer; then he called Mary into the center of the crowd, that she might be magnified (On the Birth of Mary 1 [d. ca A.D. 560]).

Some Fathers clearly taught she was sinless in their writings. So, when do you think they believed she became immaculate?

Ambrose of Milan

Come, then, and search out your sheep, not through your servants or hired men, but do it yourself. Lift me up bodily and in the flesh, which is fallen in Adam. Lift me up not from Sarah but from Mary, a Virgin not only undefiled but a Virgin whom grace had made inviolate, free of every stain of sin (Commentary on Psalm 118:22-30 [A.D. 387]).

“So the claim of Ineffabilis Deus regarding the nature of this teaching in church history is basically a false one.”

No. Only your understanding is false. Anti-Catholics rarely understand orthodox Christianity since it is foreign to them.

[vladimir998]

you wrote:

“The irony here is that Ambrose would be spinning in his grave if a pope told him that he must accept the dogma of the IC.”

I’m not so sure of that.

Ambrose of Milan:

Come, then, and search out your sheep, not through your servants or hired men, but do it yourself. Lift me up bodily and in the flesh, which is fallen in Adam. Lift me up not from Sarah but from Mary, a Virgin not only undefiled but a Virgin whom grace had made inviolate, free of every stain of sin (Commentary on Psalm 118:22-30 [A.D. 387]).