Posted on 12/08/2012 2:24:39 PM PST by NYer
Do Catholics worship Mary? This question is as old as the Protestant Reformation itself, and it rests, like other disputed doctrinal points, on a false premise that has been turned into a wedge: the veneration of Mary detracts from the worship of Christ.
This seeming opposition between Mary and Christ is symptomatic of the Protestant tendency, begun by Luther, to view the entirety of Christian life through a dialectical lens – a lens of conflict and division. With the Reformation the integrity of Christianity is broken and its formerly coherent elements are now set in opposition. The Gospel versus the Law. Faith versus Works. Scripture versus Tradition. Authority versus Individuality. Faith versus Reason. Christ versus Mary.
The Catholic tradition rightly sees the mutual complementarity of these elements of the faith, as they all contribute to our ultimate end – living with God now and in eternity. To choose any one of these is to choose them all.
By contrast, to assert that Catholics worship Mary along with or in place of Christ, or that praying to Mary somehow impedes Christ’s role as “the one mediator between God and men” (1 Tim 2:5) is to create a false dichotomy between the Word made flesh and the woman who gave the Word his flesh. No such opposition exists. The one Mediator entrusted his mediation to the will and womb of Mary. She does not impede his mediation – she helps to make it possible.
Within this context we see the ancillary role that the ancilla Domini plays in her divine Son’s mission. Mary’s is not a surrogate womb rented and then forgotten in God’s plan. She is physically connected to Christ and his life, and because of this she is even more deeply connected to him in the order of grace. She is, in fact, “full of grace,” as only one who is redeemed by Christ could be.
The feast of Mary’s Immaculate Conception celebrates the very first act of salvation by Christ in the world. Redemption is made possible for all by his precious blood shed on the cross. Yet Mary’s role in the Savior’s life and mission is so critical and so unique that God saw it necessary to wash her in the blood of the Lamb in advance, at the first moment of her conception.
This reality could not be more Biblical: the angel greets Mary as “full of grace” (Luke 1:28), which is literally rendered as “already graced” (kecharitōmenē). Following Mary, the Church has “pondered what sort of greeting this might be” for centuries. The dogma of the Immaculate Conception, ultimately defined in 1854, is nothing other than a rational expression of the angel’s greeting contained in Scripture: Mary is “already graced” with Christ’s redemption at the very moment of her creation.
Because God called Mary to the unique vocation of serving as the Mother of God, it is not just her soul that is graced, as is the case for us when we receive the sacraments. Mary’s entire being, body and soul, is full of grace so that she may be a worthy ark for the New Covenant. And just as the ark of the old covenant was adorned with gold to be a worthy house for God’s word, Mary is conceived without original sin to be the living and holy house for God’s Word.
Thus Mary is not only conceived immaculately, that is, without stain of sin. She also is the Immaculate Conception. Her entire being was specifically created by God with unique privilege so that she could fulfill her role in God’s plan of salvation. “Free from sin,” both original and personal, is the necessary consequence of being “full of grace.”
Protestants claim that veneration of Mary as it is practiced by Catholics is not biblical. St. Paul encouraged the Corinthians to “be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (1 Cor 11:1). Paul is not holding himself up as the end goal, but as a means to Christ, the true end. And if a person is imitated, he is simultaneously venerated.
If we should imitate Paul, how much more should we imitate Mary, who fulfilled God’s will to the greatest degree a human being could. Throughout her life she humbled herself so that God could be exalted, and because of this, Christ has fulfilled his promise by exalting his lowly mother to the seat closest to him in God’s kingdom.
Mary is the model of humility, charity, and openness to the will of God. She allows a sword to pierce her heart for the sake of the world’s salvation. She shows us the greatness to which we are called: a life free from sin and filled with God’s grace that leads to union with God in Heaven. She is the model disciple, and therefore worthy of imitation and veneration, not as an end in herself, but as the means to the very purpose of her – and our – existence: Christ himself.
God’s lowly handmaiden would not want it any other way.
Observe first that verse 27 already establishes that certain work does not perish but endures onto salvation.
I'm sure that METMOM and NATURAL LAW will want to jump in here and talk about things being changed.
Pearls. Swine. When speaking truth to those blinded in spirit recall that they cannot hear, cannot read and cannot see.
You seem to have a stuttering problem; or a VERY limited vocabulary.
So before the Bible and before printing, no one was saved?
Keep workin' it!
No WONDER that ex-Catholics make good MORMONs!
Keep posting’ Brother.
It’s time for cereal again...
In fact this poster claims ALL organized religions are wrong and that even venerating a simple Cross is pagan. Given that this is the point of view from which he views the world, why should anyone pay attention to his odd, often incomplete and often misread cut-n-pastes?
More potty language. Again and again.
Nephi taught us clearly what we ought to do. He said, “For we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do” (2 Nephi 25:23).
Pearls. Swine. When speaking truth to those blinded in spirit recall that they cannot hear, cannot read and cannot see.
So you’re proving that Luther erred. He was raised as a Catholic after all. Spent his life as a Monk and Priest. I would imagine that to throw off all that indoctrination wasn’t going to be totally complete. One more reason we can see why Paul warned about following man rather than Christ.
My soul magnifies the Lord,
And my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For He has regarded the low estate of His handmaiden,
For behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
For He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name. And His mercy is on those who fear Him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with His arm:
He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted those of low degree.
He has filled the hungry with good things;
and the rich He has sent empty away.
He has helped His servant Israel, in remembrance of His mercy;
As He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to His posterity forever.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen
Magníficat ánima mea Dóminum,
et exsultávit spíritus meus
in Deo salvatóre meo,
quia respéxit humilitátem
ancíllæ suæ.
Ecce enim ex hoc beátam
me dicent omnes generatiónes,
quia fecit mihi magna,
qui potens est,
et sanctum nomen eius,
et misericórdia eius in progénies
et progénies timéntibus eum.
Fecit poténtiam in bráchio suo,
dispérsit supérbos mente cordis sui;
depósuit poténtes de sede
et exaltávit húmiles.
Esuriéntes implévit bonis
et dívites dimísit inánes.
Suscépit Ísrael púerum suum,
recordátus misericórdiæ,
sicut locútus est ad patres nostros,
Ábraham et sémini eius in sæcula.
Glória Patri et Fílio
et Spirítui Sancto.
Sicut erat in princípio,
et nunc et semper,
et in sæcula sæculórum.
Amen.
She became the Mother of God, in which work so many and such great good things are bestowed on her as pass man’s understanding. For on this there follows all honor, all blessedness, and her unique place in the whole of mankind, among which she has no equal, namely, that she had a child by the Father in heaven, and such a Child . . . Hence men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her the Mother of God . . . None can say of her nor announce to her greater things, even though he had as many tongues as the earth possesses flowers and blades of grass: the sky, stars; and the sea, grains of sand. It needs to be pondered in the heart what it means to be the Mother of God.
(Commentary on the Magnificat, 1521; in Luther’s Works, Pelikan et al, vol. 21, 326)
Oh I’d say go there! Let’s prove why Paul warned about following men. Like Luther, Paul, Peter, the Pope, or any other fallible human. So go ahead. Let’s show folks why Paul rebuked the people for doing that.
O Immaculate Virgin Mary,
Mother of God and Our Mother:
Queen of Heaven and Earth,
Mediatrix of every grace!
Thou through whom dost shine the whole splendor
and magnificence of the Trinity!
O Fount of Light!
O Light of all lights!
O shining Brightness of the Eternal Light!
O spotless Mirror of the Divine Majesty!
O Window upon the Divine Nature!
O Portal opening unto Eternity!
O blessed Gate of Heaven!
O Doorway thru which has shone the Light of men!
O Door of the Most High King!
O Horizon out of which is arisen the Sun of Justice!
O Promontory above the Ocean of Divinity!
O Watchtower before the blazing Majesty of God!
O Star of the Sea!
O Star of Heaven, who alone has crushed all the Stars
fallen from Heaven!
O Morning Star, who has merited to usurp the name of the first fallen Star!
Thou who dost now gaze upon the wondrous abundance of the Divine Vision,
as the One closer to the Face of God than all creatures!
Rejoice O Thou, who has borne the Clarity of the Eternal Light!
Rejoice, O glorious and mystical City of God!
Rejoice, O Thou, who art more glorious than the Sun,
more beautiful than the Moon,
who dost shine more golden than the dawn,
more brightly than the stars.
Rejoice O Mother of the Lamb, the Light of the City of
God, who has made Thee shine forever with His own incomparable Light!
Rejoice, O Immaculate Virgin,
who dost hold the Light of God in the palms of Thy hands,
who dost behold the Child Jesus,
the Eternal Light,
in wondrous glory for all eternity!
Rejoice O Most Blessed Virgin,
for it is through Thee that all the Angels of Heaven
and all the Choirs of the Elect
art enlightened and filled with the Incomparable Radiance!
O Immaculate Mother,
lead us to Heaven,
inflame us with the Divine Love,
let shine upon us that same light of glory
which Thou dost behold forever!
Let us see What Thou dost see and gaze upon Him in Trinity,
that we may share the fullness of Thy Heart’s joy forever!
Let it be!
Let it be!
Amen.
Because they didn’t have the knowledge of stuff that we do. They were working a lot on superstition and didn’t know it.
Women not able to keep themselves pure? Men smarter than women because of their build? Spoken only in the ignorance of the day.
It has nothing to do with his spiritual state.
There’s a huge tendency, and error, in judging the actions, thoughts, and words of people from hundreds of years ago in different cultures based on what we know here and now in our own culture and condemning them for not knowing any better when they couldn’t have known any better.
Hindsight is always 20/20.
James 2:14-26
New King James Version (NKJV)
Faith Without Works Is Dead
14 What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 17 Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.
18 But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your[a] works, and I will show you my faith by my[b] works. 19 You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe—and tremble! 20 But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead?[c] 21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar? 22 Do you see that faith was working together with his works, and by works faith was made perfect? 23 And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.”[d] And he was called the friend of God. 24 You see then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only.
25 Likewise, was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out another way?
26 For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.
Salvation also ends with faith.
Faith is all that’s needed for salvation.
“Because they didn’t have the knowledge of stuff that we do. They were working a lot on superstition and didn’t know it.”
ROTFLMAO!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.