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.
Then He is never with you! Get to know what is sin. Did you so much as pick up a stick on the Sabbath? That, too, is sin as we learn in the OT with the man who was struck dead for doing so. God is so pure and holy - you couldn't live by God's standard of what is sin. So stop with the 'acting holy and religious' and all the 'infallible' nonsense and Mary being sinless at birth and 'works' is needed for salvation. EVERYONE needs a Savior - and their dirty works couldn't add one thing to their salvation. That's PRIDE! Like the RCC has lifted up Mary (WRONGLY), they lifted up their flock (WRONGLY) telling them they can add to their salvation. And that's why it is a gift because it cannot be earned - you are to receive it BY FAITH! Listen to GOD and not man!
I was talk to RNmom about the Physical presences in the stomach and intestines. I think she understood.
You were talking to the world while addressing your question to RNmom - surely, you know that. So you think God's Physical presence is in you and you have the ability to digest Him and you want to know how long that takes? Do you even stop and think? When will catholics admit Catholicism is teaching wrongly and it has nothing to do with God and His Ways?
Catholics do not know Jesus and they have no one to blame but themselves. It should be a sobering thought - enough for anyone to put down the pride and realize they've been duped.
As said, you have increasingly marginalized yourself by either your ignorance or reading into the facts, while binding Luther to Rome and her unScriptural priests versus elders and requirement of clerical celibacy has no more validity than requiring a different itinerant Preacher to submit to those who did likewise, and thus also rejected Him. (Mk. 7:2-16; 11:28-33)
They did not seek release from Rome because sex was not their desire, but doctrine, and it was 2 years later that Luther met and took his wife, after working to return the nuns to their parents.
Meanwhile, one man believes that even if wrong,
Over the pope as the expression of the binding claim of ecclesiastical authority there still stands one's own conscience, which must be obeyed before all else, if necessary even against the requirement of ecclesiastical authority. Conscience confronts [the individual] with a supreme and ultimate tribunal, and one which in the last resort is beyond the claim of external social groups, even of the official church" (Pope Benedict XVI [then Archbishop Joseph Ratzinger], Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II, ed. Vorgrimler, 1968, on Gaudium et spes, part 1,chapter 1.)
It, and the whole of the NT, also teaches us that all true believers are saints and part of the family of Christ, and treated as such, but not thought of above that which is written.
You have substantiated very little, and nothing objectively, while Luther clearly rejected faith as being saving without works. http://peacebyjesus.tripod.com/reformation_faith_works.html
And before you begin posting select quote from your comrades who are driven by hatred of Luther, do some checking here:http://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/2005/12/martin-luther-topical-master-index-for.html
Meanwhile, Luther himself is largely irrelevant and a red herring, as your predominate error is supposing we must follow him as an infallible pope, rather then being one of many who objected to Rome on Scriptural grounds, the supreme authority of that being the issue.
And some of which dissenters were murdered, but which you stand behind, and have expressed longing to see the Inquisition return, and your exclusion of torture (etc.) - the basis (for that of the CCC) you failed to substantiate - is highly questionable as a permanent injunction.
Council of Constance, Condemnation of Errors, against Wycliffe [ Condemned articles of John Wyclif]: 8. If a pope is foreknown as damned and is evil, and is therefore a limb of the devil, he does not have authority over the faithful given to him by anyone, except perhaps by the emperor. .
[Condemned articles of J. Hus]: 20. If the pope is wicked, and especially if he is foreknown to damnation, then he is a devil like Judas the apostle, a thief and a son of perdition and is not the head of the holy church militant since he is not even a member of it. Council of Constance, Condemnation of Errors, against Wycliffe
In your listing of Scriptural references, which by the way has been posted many, many times in this Religion Forum, Jesus is referring not to the Bible, but to the Tanakh. It was the Church which preserved the Tradition from which it produced the Bible some 350 years after the Resurrection.
Peace be with you.
St. Paul himself was a celibate Catholic priest.
Peace be with you
AMEN!!
We have to know JESUS to follow HIM. And His Word alone is The Way and His SPIRIT is The Teacher.
Worldly organizations found a better way - they will teach man made beliefs and will ‘say’ it’s from God. Anyone who falls for such deception has no interest in knowing God.
Catechism is the authority in a worldly organization set up by man and teach man made doctrine.
Satan always has a counterfeit truth to the things of God and Catholicism isn’t the only one. There is Mormonism, Islam, Buddhism, Atheism, etc. ALL with their own ‘Book’ of beliefs.
God’s Holy Spirit Inspired Word is The Final Authority. IT always was and always will be. HE ALONE reigns!
They took vows according to man made beliefs and not what GOD says! GOD reigns and man does NOT!
If fact, God calls those who forbid anyone to marry hypocritical liars - so these liars who forbid marriage fornicated with satan, the master of lies/liars.
"Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron." 1 Tim 4:2
"They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which GOD CREATED to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the TRUTH." 1 Tim 4:3
God's Word is The Final Authority and anyone who doesn't believe that their consciences has been seared as they don't BELIEVE nor KNOW the TRUTH!
No it says Rome is a false teacher FORBIDDING its "priests" to marry
Paul was a Jew who lacked knowledge. He repented as he gain knowledge of JESUS and God used him to write 1/2 to 2/3 of the NT.
He was not affiliated with any worldly organization. God would not use a heathen for his heart was not submitted to GOD alone as God's Way and thoughts are higher than ours ways and thoughts.
1 Corinthians 7:28 "But if you do marry, you have not sinned; and if a virgin marries, she has not sinned. But those who marry will face many troubles in this life, and I want to spare you this."
1 Corinthians 7:36 "If anyone is worried that he might not be acting honorably toward the virgin he is engaged to, and if his passions are too strong[a] and he feels he ought to marry, he should do as he wants. He is not sinning. They should get married".
Paul wrote Corinthians. He was a man of God and not a man of an organization with man made beliefs that void God's Word.
Neglect not the grace that is in thee, which was given thee by prophesy, with imposition of the hands of the priesthood. (1 Timothy 4:14)
Let me guess..THAT IS A ROMAN TRANSLATION LOL
New International Version (©1984) Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you.
New Living Translation (©2007) Do not neglect the spiritual gift you received through the prophecy spoken over you when the elders of the church laid their hands on you.
English Standard Version (©2001) Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of elders laid their hands on you.
New American Standard Bible (©1995) Do not neglect the spiritual gift within you, which was bestowed on you through prophetic utterance with the laying on of hands by the presbytery.
Holman Christian Standard Bible (©2009) Do not neglect the gift that is in you; it was given to you through prophecy, with the laying on of hands by the council of elders.
International Standard Version (©2012) Do not neglect the gift that is in you, which was given to you through prophecy when the elders laid their hands on you.
\
Aramaic Bible in Plain English (©2010) Do not despise the gift that is in you, which is given to you by prophecy and by the laying on of the hands of the Eldership.
Young's Literal Translation be not careless of the gift in thee, that was given thee through prophecy, with laying on of the hands of the eldership;
There is NO PRIESTHOOD in the NT church ... Greek is very clear on that . There is a word for priest in greek and it is NEVER USED FOR THE NEW CHURCH. That word is "hiereus"
,The greek word for elder is presbyteros'''.
The greek word for elder is different than the greek words for priest.. archiereus which translates into "High Priest" and hiereus which translates one that OFFERS SACRIFICES.
The role of the priesthood in scripture was to offer sacrifices.. That is what a priest does in scripture.. God set aside one tribe to be priests, they were not granted any land as God was their inheritance .
The greek have a couple words for priest
hiereus
1) a priest, one who offers sacrifices and in general in busied with sacred rites
a) referring to priests of Gentiles or the Jews,
2) metaph. of Christians, because, purified by the blood of Christ and brought into close intercourse with God, they devote their life to him alone and to Christ
the greek word for elder is presbyteros''', IT never translates as PRIEST [/B] The defination for elder/ Presbyteros is
2) a term of rank or office
a) among the Jews
1) members of the great council or Sanhedrin (because in early times the rulers of the people, judges, etc., were selected from elderly men)
2) of those who in separate cities managed public affairs and administered justice
b) among the Christians, those who presided over the assemblies (or churches)
The NT uses the term bishop, elders, and presbyters interchangeably
c) the twenty four members of the heavenly Sanhedrin or court seated on thrones around the throne of God
Elders is a leadership role, not a role of sacrificer .
You see the scriptural division in passages like this
Mark 15;1And straightway in the morning the chief priests held a consultation with the elders and scribes and the whole council, and bound Jesus, and carried him away, and delivered him to Pilate. Young's Literal Translation
;Acts 4:5 And it came to pass upon the morrow, there were gathered together of them the rulers, and elders, and scribes, to Jerusalem,
Even the Douay-Rheims Bible does not translate that as priests.. Acts 4:5 And it came to pass on the morrow, that their princes, and ancients, and scribes, were gathered together in Jerusalem; A poor translation from the greek, but non the less even they did not translate it as priest.
the administrators of the sacraments were called clerks
No it does not READ IT
It says this is a DOCTRINE OF FALSE TEACHERS AND DEMONS
4:1 The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron.
3 They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth.
4 For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving,
5 because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.
That my friend ARE THE DOCTRINES OF ROME
Thank you for you r thoughtful theological response
Not just of Rome ~ for example there were the SHAKERS!
the greek word for elder is different than the greek words for priest.. archiereus which translates into "High Priest" and hiereus which translates one that OFFERS SACRIFICES.
The role of the priesthood in scripture was to offer sacrifices.. That is what a priest does in scripture.. God set aside one tribe to be priests, they were not granted any land as God was their inheritance .
The greek have a couple words for priest
hiereus
1) a priest, one who offers sacrifices and in general in busied with sacred rites
a) referring to priests of Gentiles or the Jews,
2) metaph. of Christians, because, purified by the blood of Christ and brought into close intercourse with God, they devote their life to him alone and to Christ
and archiereus
Outline of Biblical Usage
1) chief priest, high priest
2) the high priests, these comprise in addition to one holding the high priestly office, both those who had previously discharged it and although disposed, continued to have great power in the State, as well as the members of the families from which high priest were created, provided that they had much influence in public affairs.
3) Used of Christ because by undergoing a bloody death he offered himself as an expiatory sacrifice to God, and has entered into the heavenly sanctuary where he continually intercedes on our behalf.
Neither role is given in scripture for the new church ..
the priesthood of Israel was a TYPE of Christ who would offer the FINAL sacrifice for sin... by offering Himself as the sinless lamb Christ fulfilled the role of Priest on the cross.. there is no more sacrifice for sin He is now our High Priest..
Page Options Share on facebook Share on twitter Share on email << < = = > >> Show resourcesAdd parallel Hebrews 10 New International Version (NIV) Christ’s Sacrifice Once for All
10 The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship.
2 Otherwise, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins.
3 But those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins
. 4 It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
5 Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said: “Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me;
6 with burnt offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased.
7 Then I said, ‘Here I am—it is written about me in the scroll— I have come to do your will, my God.’”
8 First he said, “Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not desire, nor were you pleased with them”—though they were offered in accordance with the law.
9 Then he said, “Here I am, I have come to do your will.” He sets aside the first to establish the second.
10 And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
The word for elder is presbyteros here is the GREEK definition
1) elder, of age,
a) the elder of two people
b) advanced in life, an elder, a senior
1) forefathers
2) a term of rank or office
a) among the Jews
1) members of the great council or Sanhedrin (because in early times the rulers of the people, judges, etc., were selected from elderly men)
2) of those who in separate cities managed public affairs and administered justice
b) among the Christians, those who presided over the assemblies (or churches) The NT uses the term bishop, elders, and presbyters interchangeably
c) the twenty four members of the heavenly Sanhedrin or court seated on thrones around the throne of God
Now the Holy Spirit knows the difference in the greek words.. there is no priesthood provided for in the NT church.
There was no priests in the new church.it was about 300 AD before the first priesthood appeared..
No; as exception we know of Mary and Noah. It is also possible that St. John the Baptist lived without sin, since Christ gave him the Holy Spirit while both were not yet born. Of course, in each case it is Christ alone who renders people sinless.
LOL, was Noah REALLY SINLESS? Read your bible PLEASE
I know that Catholics do not understand that a sinless Mary is blasphemy.
You make her a demi god.
The only one that had a sinless life, the only one that could live a sinless life is Jesus Christ, God made man.
St Ambrose notes this of Christ,
"He was man in the flesh, according to His human nature, that He might be recognized, but in power was above man, that He might not be recognized, so He has our flesh, but has not the failings of this flesh. For He was not begotten, as is every man, by intercourse between male and female, but born of the Holy Spirit and of the Virgin; He received a stainless body, which not only no sins polluted, but which neither the generation nor the conception had been stained by any admixture of defilement. For we men are all born under sin, and our very origin is in evil, as we read in the words of David: 'For lo, I was conceived in wickedness, and in sin did my mother bring me forth.'" (On Repentance, 1:3:12-13)
No exception for Mary there.
Augustine quotes Ambrose here
"For the Lord Jesus alone of those who are born of womanis 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." (cited in Augustine, On the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin, 2:47)
No immaculate conception there.
Augustine himself did not hold to a "sinless" Mary
"And now that we are about to bring this book to a conclusion, we think it proper to do on this subject of Original Sin what we did before in our treatise On Grace, --adduce in evidence against the injurious talk of these persons that servant of God, the Archbishop Ambrose, whose faith is proclaimed by Pelagius to be the most perfect among the writers of the Latin Church; for grace is more especially honoured in doing away with original sin. In the work which the saintly Ambrose wrote, Concerning the Resurrection, he says: 'I fell in Adam, in Adam was I expelled from Paradise, in Adam I died; and He does not recall me unless He has found me in Adam,--so as that, as I am obnoxious to the guilt of sin in him, and subject to death, I may be also justified in Christ.' Then, again, writing against the Novatians, he says: 'We men are all of us born in sin; our very origin is in sin; as you may read when David says, 'Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.' Hence it is that Paul's flesh is 'a body of death;' even as he says himself, 'Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?' Christ's flesh, however, has condemned sin, which He experienced not by being born, and which by dying He crucified, that in our flesh there might be justification through grace, where previously there was impurity through sin.' The same holy man also, in his Exposition Isaiah, speaking of Christ, says: 'Therefore as man He was tried in all things, and in the likeness of men He endured all things; but as born of the Spirit, He was free from sin. For every man is a liar, and no one but God alone is without sin. It is therefore an observed and settled fact,that no man born of a man and a woman, that is, by means of their bodily union, is seen to be free from sin. Whosoever, indeed, is free from sin, is free also from a conception and birth of this kind.' Moreover, when expounding the Gospel according to Luke, he 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.' These words, however, of the man of God are contradicted by Pelagius, notwithstanding all his commendation of his author, when he himself declares that 'we are procreated, as without virtue, so without vice.' What remains, then, but that Pelagius should condemn and renounce this error of his; or else be sorry that he has quoted Ambrose in the way he has? Inasmuch, however, as the blessed Ambrose, catholic bishop as he is, has expressed himself in the above-quoted passages in accordance with the catholic faith, it follows that Pelagius, along with his disciple Coelestius, was justly condemned by the authority of the catholic Church for having turned aside from the true way of faith, since he repented not for having bestowed commendation on Ambrose, and for having at the same time entertained opinions in opposition to him." (On the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin, 2:47-48)
"The Augustinian view long continued to prevail; but at last Pelagius won the victory on this point in the Roman church." - Philip Schaff (http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/history/3_ch07.htm, section 81)
"Now, O you, my children, our Instructor is like His Father God, whose son He is, sinless, blameless, and with a soul devoid of passion; God in the form of man, stainless, the minister of His Father's will, the Word who is God, who is in the Father, who is at the Father's right hand, and with the form of God is God. He is to us a spotless image; to Him we are to try with all our might to assimilate our souls. He is wholly free from human passions; wherefore also He alone is judge, because He alone is sinless. As far, however, as we can, let us try to sin as little as possible. For nothing is so urgent in the first place as deliverance from passions and disorders, and then the checking of our liability to fall into sins that have become habitual. It is best, therefore, not to sin at all in any way, which we assert to be the prerogative of God alone...But He welcomes the repentance of the sinner-loving repentance-which follows sins. For this Word of whom we speak alone is sinless. For to sin is natural and common to all." (Clement of Alexandria /The Instructor, 1:2, 3:12)
You attribute to Mary the very nature of God, yet you all wince when Protestants say you worship her. By this doctrine Mary would have been a fit substitutionary sacrifice on the cross for the sins of man .
That is blasphemy !
Amen ...Christ IN YOU the hope of Glory
LOL Yea and they have a priesthood too
Another cult
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