Jesus is the Life Preserver. Mary is the Rope He Chose To Reel Us In.

The Most Ancient Tradition | 06-16-2019 | Charles O'Connell

[CharlesOConnell]

In Captains Courageous, with Spencer Tracey, Freddy Batholomew is a blowhard millionaire's son who is socially, poorly adjusted. He uses his father's incredible wealth, to bully his classmates and even his teacher, but he's roundly disliked, and ostracized. While on an ocean liner, he unsuccessfully tries to impress some other boys by eating 5 ice cream sodas. When he has to throw up, to escape the mocking boys, he runs into a lifeboat area to evade their ridicule while purging his overindulgence, and manages to fall overboard into the ocean.

Instances of people falling overboard into the open ocean are rather commonly reported in the news. Usually they are lost, but if by chance their accidents are observed and a life-preserver is thrown to them, is that the end of the story, do we just say, "oh, well, you have a floatation device, you're okay now"?

No, we have to pull them in. The life-preserver, the lifesaver, is only part of the formula for saving their lives. There is also a rope, which must be attached to the life-preserver, and must be used to finally accomplish their salvation.

Jesus Christ is the one mediator between God and man. But on the man side of the equation, unlike the radical individuality most typified by J.J. Rousseau, we who life the life of Christians do so in communities. But even then, we do not abide as atomistic individualists. We live our Jesus-oriented life in relation to our fellows. "Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching." – Hebrews 10:25.

Jesus' first disciple was his mother, who gave us the total account of his early life and who "treasured these things up in her heart". "A sword will pierce your own soul too, so that the secret thoughts of many hearts might be revealed". On the cross, he gave his mother to John to take in his home, but when you take your master's mother, she takes care of you.

Then God's temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple; and there were flashes of lightning, voices, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail. And a great portent appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; she was with child and she cried out in her pangs of birth, in anguish for delivery.

And another portent appeared in heaven; behold, a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems upon his heads. His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven, and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to bear a child, that he might devour her child when she brought it forth; she brought forth a male child, one who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, but her child was caught up to God and to his throne, and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, in which to be nourished for one thousand two hundred and sixty days. …

And when the dragon saw that he had been thrown down to the earth, he pursued the woman who had borne the male child. But the woman was given the two wings of the great eagle that she might fly from the serpent into the wilderness, to the place where she is to be nourished for a time, and times, and half a time. The serpent poured water like a river out of his mouth after the woman, to sweep her away with the flood. But the earth came to the help of the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed the river which the dragon had poured from his mouth. Then the dragon was angry with the woman, and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus. - Rev 11:19 -- 12:17

She forms the body of Christ. She schools her son's disciples. Those who won't attend her school, remain ignorant.

We are in a time when any merely human institution would be washed away. Our churches are going under the shadow of a new Heresy of Ba'al of Peor, as when the Hebrew people were successfully attacked and overwhelmed through human sexuality. Our churches are now pro-gay and as soon as the civil authority authorizes child sex, they will be indistinguishable from the denizens of the town of Sodom: "Bring them out that we may know them".

Jesus' mother forms the few of the elect who will resist being fooled by the great apostasy. Those who will not avail themselves of the lifeline of Mary, will be lost.

[Zionist Conspirator]

[af_vet_1981]

I myself have argued against Paul being the author of Hebrews on the basis of the contrasting style and absence of his otherwise uniform statement of his authorship, yet 2 Peter 3:15 seems to refer to this epistle, and thus I postulate that it may have been originally a synagogue address (to Christians meeting therein) that was penned by someone else, as with the gospels and the teachings of Christ.

I doubt it; Jews who believed in Jesus were generally barred from the synagogues. The epistle was written to these:

• Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus;
  
  ...
  
  
• Know ye that our brother Timothy is set at liberty; with whom, if he come shortly, I will see you.
• Salute all them that have the rule over you, and all the saints. They of Italy salute you.

Hebrews, Catholic chapter three, Protestant verse one,
Hebrews, Catholic chapter thirteen, Protestant verses twenty three to twenty four,
as authorized, but not authored, by King James

But if you want to contend against the Pauline authorship of Hebrews than that is fine with me. However, then you need to thus attribute error to your own council of Trent:

It could have been the Apostle Paul. The part about a synagogue address makes no sense. Had it been to a Greek, Asian, or Roman synagogue, it would have been addressed to a church fathered by the Apostle. It could have been to the churches of Judea and Galilee, and it could have been Pauline, or someone closely associated with the Apostle.

The Pontifical Biblical Communion, in a decree issued on April 24, 1914, reaffirmed its canonicity. It answered the question, “Has the apostle Paul to be regarded as the author of this letter in the sense that not only must one hold that he conceived it and expressed it under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but that he gave it the form in which it has come down to us?” Its reply was, “No, not unless the Church decides so in the future.” This is probably why there is no direct reference to Paul as author of this letter in recent liturgical books. However, Paul can be regarded as the indirect author of Hebrews. Researchers are free to explore this matter.

[Popman]

You must have a different version of. Luke 1 because their is no early account of Jesus life in there except for a passing reference...

[metmom]

That’s the image of God I was raised with as a Catholic.

[daniel1212]

Ott acknowledges for the first three centuries, the “veneration” of Mary was connected with the veneration of Christ. It is in the fourth century, and especially after Ephesus (431), that the formal veneration of Mary is found. “For the first three centuries, the “veneration” of Mary was intimately connected with the veneration of Christ. From the 4th c onwards we find a formal veneration of Mary herself.”

Ephesus? That are also had a tradition:

So that not only this our craft is in danger to be set at nought; but also that the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised, and her magnificence should be destroyed, whom all Asia and the world worshippeth. And when they heard these sayings, they were full of wrath, and cried out, saying, Great is Diana of the Ephesians. (Acts 19:27-28)

Mary’s unparalleled stature as a figure to whom the faithful sought recourse grew through the slow accumulation of a complex matrix..An ever-growing stock of inventive literary images and elaborate phraseology embellished the liturgy.

Pelikan observes “…there is no altogether incontestable evidence that it was used before the fourth century, despite Newman’s categorical claim that “the title Theotocos, or Mother of God, was familiar to Christians from primitive times.”

Carroll contends “…there is little evidence or no evidence that anything like the Mary cult existed during the first four centuries of the Christian Church.”

Par for the Catholic course, but tradition is and means what they say, based on tradition.

Thanks. Is your whole paper online?

[aMorePerfectUnion]

.

[Mark17]

Islam does teach the Muslim’s salvation is however Allah weighs the scales....unless you die in jihad.

Speaking of jihad, my catholic dad told me, that if a man dies, fighting for his country, he would go to Heaven. Have you ever heard of anything so ridiculous in your life? It just goes to show you some of the weird beliefs that some Catholics have.

[ealgeone]

Urban II promised forgiveness of sins for those who died in battle during the first Crusade IIRCC.

Roman Catholicism's version of jihad.

[Mark17]

I was wondering where it came from. I couldn’t believe my dad made it up out of thin air.

[2nd amendment mama]

placemark

[Religion Moderator]

“You have no idea.”

Discuss the issues all you want, but do not make it personal.

Mind reading is making it personal.

[Mark17]

Salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, not in anyway by works placemaker.

[2nd amendment mama]

??? I’m very aware of that. Not sure who your post was for.

[Luircin]

It’s just a self-set reminder to come back to the thread later and see what’s happening on it.

[daniel1212]

Much of Roman Catholic theology is based on the discounted Infancy Gospel of James.

Some official theology is influenced by it, while RC apologists argue for such desired beliefs as Mary being a type of vestal virgin (yet extrapolating from othwer sources for it).

For the Roman Catholic, who seemingly elevates "tradition" to a position equal to, and in many cases, superior to Scripture, to continue to rely upon this discredited and rejected writing is telling.

Rome presumes to be as God.

“It was the charge of the Reformers that the Catholic doctrines were not primitive, and their pretension was to revert to antiquity. But the appeal to antiquity is both a treason and a heresy. It is a treason because it rejects the Divine voice of the Church at this hour, and a heresy because it denies that voice to be Divine. ” "I may say in strict truth that the Church has no antiquity. It rests upon its own supernatural and perpetual consciousness. Its past is present with it, for both are one to a mind which is immutable. Primitive and modern are predicates, not of truth, but of ourselves.... The only Divine evidence to us of what was primitive is the witness and voice of the Church at this hour." — Dr. Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, Lord Archbishop of Westminster, “The Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost: Or Reason and Revelation,” (New York: J.P. Kenedy & Sons, originally written 1865, reprinted with no date), pp. 227-228.

[Mark17]

It’s just a self-set reminder to come back to the thread later and see what’s happening on it.

[MHGinTN]

The conflation of the Catholic Org with the actual One True Church of Jesus The Christ made up of ALL believers across time and not an institution has deep roots. Deception at it’s most refined! We confront it almost daily right here in Freerepublic ... and I am certain the posters know they are conflating for empowerment of their Org (rhymes with Borg).

[Elsie]

Would/could you do this?

The forthcoming "why not" should prove interesting.

[Elsie]

The "great sign" not only has both an individual and collective reference, it also has both a present and future reference,...

You Catholics appear prepped for looking for SIGNS in the sky.

Good luck with the next one.

---

Matthew 24:24-25

For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. 25 See, I have told you ahead of time.

[Elsie]

... just as the rays of the sun penetrate without breaking or injuring in the least the solid substance of glass,
so after a like but more exalted manner did Jesus Christ come forth from His mother's womb without injury to her maternal virginity..

WHAT??

Are we having a contest to find the most crazy non sequitar ever published??