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.
Did you say:
“God doesn’t smile down on people who celebrate Easter.”
Did you say:
“God doesn’t smile down on people who celebrate Easter.”
You still haven’t shown where I have said any of those things are pagan.
Well, yes I have. And again, I quote you:
“All of the Lent and Easter abomination is pagan and God clearly condemned it in scripture.”
“God doesn’t smile down on people who celebrate Easter.”
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.
You still haven’t shown where I have said any of those things are pagan.
Well, yes I have. And again, I quote you:
“All of the Lent and Easter abomination is pagan and God clearly condemned it in scripture.”
“God doesn’t smile down on people who celebrate Easter.”
Except, well, I posted his exact words. And I was right. So now where are you?
No one here other than Catholics have denied the church founded by Christ. The church I belong to is much older than the RCC.
Really? And in your church you teach things like:
“All of the Lent and Easter abomination is pagan and God clearly condemned it in scripture.”
“God doesn’t smile down on people who celebrate Easter.”
How odd. And how many folks do you think agree with your odd views?
Psst, are you still here? I answered you, fully and with links. Where did you go?
CynicalBear wrote:
“The church I belong to is much older than the RCC.”
Really? And in your church you teach things like:
“All of the Lent and Easter abomination is pagan and God clearly condemned it in scripture.”
“God doesn’t smile down on people who celebrate Easter.”
How odd. And how many folks do you think agree with your odd views?
lasttrumpetministries.org is not a banned website.
No, the reason they are forgotten is because Rome believes a lie, in which, besides the forgeries and falsely claiming unanimous consent of the fathers, and other things, she fosters a false hope of salvation, no matter how nominal, because of infant baptism on proxy faith and confidence in the power of the church by her self-promotion, so that few see their desperate need for conversion by faith as damned sinners who are destitute of any merit whereby they may escape their just eternal punishment and gain eternal life, who can only be saved on Christ's expense and merit, by a faith which will follows Him.
Jaroslav Pelikan stated that before Trent, between extremes “were many combinations; and though certain views predominated in late nominalism, it is not possible even there to speak of a single doctrine of justification.” In reaction to the Reformation,”the Council of Trent selected and elevated to official status the notion of justification by faith plus works, which was only one of the doctrines of justification in the medieval theologians and ancient fathers. When the reformers attacked this notion in the name of the doctrine of justification by faith alone—a doctrine also attested to by some medieval theologians and ancient fathers—Rome reacted by canonizing one trend in preference to all the others. What had previously been permitted (justification by faith and works), now became required. What had previously been permitted also (justification by faith alone), now became forbidden. In condemning the Protestant Reformation, the Council of Trent condemned part of its own catholic tradition." — Jaroslav Pelikan, The Riddle of Roman Catholicism (New York: Abingdon Press, 1959), pp. 51-52. http://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/2006/02/luther-added-word-alone-to-romans-328.html
What, you do not hold to Sola Fide any more?
Rather, i provide the documentation that it refers to the kind of faith which effects works, In that sense , "Thus, it is just as impossible to separate faith and works as it is to separate heat and light from fire!" [http://www.iclnet.org/pub/resources/text/wittenberg/luther/luther-faith.txt]
Or is it that when it is time to deflect criticism you all of a sudden get interested in things literal and historical?
It is you whom i see deflecting criticism, while you seem to have a short memory. On your very own home page you will find links to your posts on a very extensive thread (part here) in which i explain sola fide and also provide historical aspects. Of which thread you courteously wrote,
"This is another marathon thread, where Daniel and I exchanged many lengthy posts. We mostly argued the role of good works in salvation, where Daniel took a detailed classical-Protestant position. His thoughtful and well-argumented posts can be seen from my responses to them:"
Little more should need to be added.
And yet that website repeats Jack Chick weirdness like CB linked to.
Do not bring Chick up on this form at all. Argue the issues independently.
CynicalBear wrote:
“The church I belong to is much older than the RCC.”
Really? And in your church you teach things like:
“All of the Lent and Easter abomination is pagan and God clearly condemned it in scripture.”
“God doesn’t smile down on people who celebrate Easter.”
How odd. And how many folks do you think agree with your odd views?
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