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Posted on 12/08/2021 2:19:08 PM PST by MurphsLaw
s it possible for a memorandum to be a masterpiece? A few paragraphs long, dashed off ex tempore, for a friend, not polished? Various columns in TCT have appreciated masterpieces – a poem, a painting, a musical work. But could a memorandum ever be accounted a “masterpiece”?
I have in mind Newman’s “Memorandum on the Immaculate Conception” – written off by the Cardinal,” his editor says, “for Mr. R. I. Wilberforce, formerly Archdeacon Wilberforce, to aid him in meeting the objections urged by some Protestant friends against the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception.”
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That’s it, “written off” – a memorandum is something written off, dashed off, tossed off.
Surely a master can “dash off” a masterpiece: witness the Gettysburg Address, a Shakespeare sonnet, a Scarlatti sonata. And so we look to Newman’s “Memorandum” without worries as truly a spiritual masterpiece.
Newman begins: “It is so difficult for me to enter into the feelings of a person who understands the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, and yet objects to it, that I am diffident about attempting to speak on the subject.” He adds, “I was accused of holding it, in one of the first books I wrote, twenty years ago. On the other hand, this very fact may be an argument against an objector – for why should it not have been difficult to me at that time, if there were a real difficulty in receiving it?”
Already, astonishing brilliance. He imagines someone raising difficulties, and his task would be to understand those difficulties and reply to them. But he can’t see any difficulties. Maybe he’s incompetent even to speak on the subject?
He turns this concern on its head. Many years ago, as a young Anglican minister, long before the pope’s definition, Newman had already come to hold that doctrine, naturally and easily. But he couldn’t have done if it had involved difficulties. So he has the requisite competence, which is to speak to the naturalness of the doctrine!
Here is that earlier passage, from the Parochial and Plain Sermons:
Who can estimate the holiness and perfection of her, who was chosen to be the Mother of Christ? If to him that hath, more is given, and holiness and divine favour go together (and this we are expressly told). . . .What must have been her gifts, who was chosen to be the only near earthly relative of the Son of God, the only one whom He was bound by nature to revere and look up to; the one appointed to train and educate Him, to instruct Him day by day, as He grew in wisdom and stature? This contemplation runs to a higher subject, did we dare to follow it; for what, think you, was the sanctified state of that human nature, of which God formed His sinless Son; knowing, as we do, that “that which is born of the flesh is flesh,” and that “none can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?”
Then come a series of devastating arguments as to why there are no difficulties in the doctrine. If there is no difficulty in saying that Eve was created without sin – if there is no risk of turning her into a deity – what is the great difficulty in saying that Mary was created without sin? If we hold that John the Baptist was cleansed of original sin in the womb, then why not Mary from an even earlier point in the womb? If there is no difficulty in saying that you and I are cleansed from original sin at some later point in our lives by baptism – if our saying so in no way detracts from the merits of the Lord – then wouldn’t Mary’s being cleansed even earlier in her life make her even more dependent on the Lord?
"We do not say that she did not owe her salvation to the death of her Son. Just the contrary, we say that she, of all mere children of Adam, is in the truest sense the fruit and the purchase of His Passion. He has done for her more than for anyone else. To others He gives grace and regeneration at a point in their earthly existence; to her, from the very beginning."
Newman then considers the antiquity of the doctrine. Why? Because “No one can add to revelation. That was given once for all; – but as time goes on, what was given once for all is understood more and more clearly.” You might wish to copy out these lines as proof of what Newman meant by “development of doctrine.” It did not allow for any new revelation. What it means, rather, is this: “The greatest Fathers and Saints in this sense have been in error, that, since the matter of which they spoke had not been sifted, and the Church had not spoken, they did not in their expressions do justice to their own real meaning.”
He focuses on the contrast between Mary and Eve in the earliest writings of the Fathers, and especially the proto-evangelion: “See the direct bearing of this upon the Immaculate Conception... There was war between the woman and the Serpent. This is most emphatically fulfilled if she had nothing to do with sin – for, so far as any one sins, he has an alliance with the Evil One.”
Newman’s masterpiece concludes: “I say it distinctly – there may be many excuses at the last day, good and bad, for not being Catholics; one I cannot conceive: ‘O Lord, the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception was so derogatory to Thy grace, so inconsistent with Thy Passion, so at variance with Thy word in Genesis and the Apocalypse, so unlike the teaching of Thy first Saints and Martyrs, as to give me a right to reject it at all risks, and Thy Church for teaching it. It is a doctrine as to which my private judgment is fully justified in opposing the Church’s judgment. And this is my plea for living and dying a Protestant.’”
Here we go with the multiple, inane posts from Elsie again.
Keep ‘em coming!
Did you ever take simple math?
If A=B, B=A.
Comprende?
Perhaps you can explain what is wrong with the logic here:
Then if Mary is the mother of God, she’s also the mother of God the Father and the Holy Spirit as well.
The answer is in the first line of your post.
Welcome to the club of confusion.
Pfftt…
That’s the best you can come up with?
If Mary is mother of Jesus = Mary is mother of God, then if the Father is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, then Mary, being mother of God, is also mother of God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit.
If she is the mother of God, and she is either their mother as well, or they are not God.
BTW, still waiting for the Scripture references for the terms “mother of God” and “Blessed Mother”.
Thank you kindly. 👍 He finally made 1st Lieutenant, and has finally finished all his training. It took two years, of training, and it was a grind, but he stayed with it. Now, he can fly the aircraft with no supervision. 😀👍
You have just confirmed by belief that you cannot comprehend the Holy Trinity.
As I said, most protestants don’t or can’t.
You keep saying that but offer no reasonable explanation of what you think it is.
Simply saying”You’re wrong” is no argument at all.
All it tells anyone else is that you have nothing to support your contention or position.
Elizabeth’s salutation to Mary refers to Her as being both blessed and a mother.
Are you aware of the Visitation? Or have y’all exercised that from your “bibles” also?
Rather, you are denying Christ’s divinity by rejecting Her title as “Mother of God”.
You have nothing to support your contention or position in Scripture.
Show me the exact phrase.
Just like y’all demand to find the phrase sola Scriptura in the Bible and then declare victory when it isn’t in there, if that’s your criteria, then don’t be hypocritical and exempt yourselves from the same standard of proof when it’s asked of you.
And calling Mary blessed, which she was, is NOT the same as the title “Blessed Mother” that Catholicism has assigned to her.
Still waiting for the explanation of how the term “mother of God” doesn’t mean what it says. If she’s mother of God, that means GOD, including the Father and the Holy Spirit, not just part of Him.
If it means only mother of Jesus, the there’s no reason for the Catholic religion to have changed the God breathed, Holy Spirit inspired word of God, as if they think they could improve on what God Himself gave us.
Or was the Holy Spirit wrong in using the descriptor “mother of Jesus” when referring to that Mary? The Catholic religion must have thought the Holy Spirit did an inadequate job of inspiring Scripture if they had the chutzpah to think they could improve on it.
Mary’s title of “mother of Jesus”, is not about Jesus or His character. It’s not a statement of His identity, but of hers.
It’s about identifying which Mary in Scripture is being referred to.
Still waiting for you to better understand the Holy Trinity.
Get back to me when you do.
Scripture identifies Jesus as the “son of Mary” and also as the “Son of God”.
Does that confuse you even more?
Like I said, you need to learn more about the Holy Trinity.
I reject sola scriptura. So I’m not about to use sola scriptura as a defense.
Mary the Mother of Jesus is the most blessed among women. The Magnificat is beautiful in its revealing of Mary's submission to God's purpose. She died almost 2000 years ago but her forever alive spirit will be returning WITH JESUS when God does the Rapture of ALL believers who have been born again due to their belief in Whom God sent for our salvation.
Your religion of catholiciism commits blasphemy against The Blessed Mother of Jesus by making of her the later-day Semiramis goddess. But you are in lick because Jesus declared that even blasphemies against Him can be forgiven, BUT blasphemies against the Holy Spirit WILL NOT.
BTW, why don't you post the sources of your links on the thread. And thank you for not posting in an unreadable color. Some of us appreciate that.
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