I think you've got it. I would add that all (small "o") "orthodox" Christians who accept the conciliar creedal formulations can trace their establishment as "orthodoxy" to Constantine. Before then, there was no "orthodoxy", but rather competing ideas/denominations/religions.
I hope your holidays went well.
I am somewhat surprised at your attitude here. The truths you do speak are about to be lapped up by some who do not realize what is being said.
As you say, different ideas were in competition. But to say there was no "orthodoxy" is not quite right. Orthodoxy existed for sure, but was not accepted as such. And there was no mechanism for "punishing" heterodoxy.
The bottom line, which I think you would agree with, is that if one wants to say that there was no "orthodoxy" before 325, and use this to disprove the existence of a Catholic church, that one needs to similarly point to 325 as the year that Jesus became God.
Before this same council, there was competition in ideas about who Jesus was. There was no consensus among the individual churches.
So let us be careful what we draw from this event. Do deny that any "orthodoxy" existed is, for many here, to cut off their own support.
SD
Not Mary's egg? Puh-leeze. I'm still waiting for someone from the non-Catholic side to take that one on. There is no biblical evidence to support such a claim.
I could give you all kinds of A/P data on why this wouldn't work but with God anything is possible.
Huh? What is A/P? And which view "wouldn't work?"
I guess if he figured we needed to know how he did it, he would have told us. Why is this so important? Either way is fine with me It's the results that count, right?
What is "the result?" As I have striven to show over the past week, the orthodox Christian position is that Jesus is truly the Son of Mary. Truly her Son, not just one who used her womb.
Why does this matter?
Well, for one, if something like Jesus not being related to Mary at all is believed, it goes a long way towards explaing the standoffishness many Protestants have towards Mary. If she was just a womb-for-hire and a nanny, there is no need for her to be anything special.
But the real point is that we believe that God, in his effort to rehabilitate man took on humanity. That He took on the exact same humanity that all of us share as desecndents of Adam and Eve. He took this fallen line of humanity and united it to Himself so that we could all be likewise lifted up and united to God.
If God instead took a new, totally unrelated to Adam, strain of humanity on as His form when He became Incarnate, that is nice. But it does not provide an avenue for the present humans to become lifted up.
In short, as I have said many times, if our humanity is not assuemd by God, then our humanity is not redeemed by God.
We believe God takes our humanity, our failed experiment, and glorifies it. We don't believe he considers the race of Adam to be a dead end, requiring an entirely new batch of humanity.
SD
You can't be saying that Mary never sinned? I have to be misunderstanding here .
Yes, Mary never sinned. She was born free of the consequences of Original Sin and she also avoided any personal sin during her life.
(These are not the same thing, note that Adam and Eve had no Original Sin, yet they managed to sin.)
This ability to avoid sin is not of Mary's own power, but rather because God chose her for her role. She was saved from sin by the power of Jesus Christ, from the very moment of her conception.
SD
Allow me to clarify. Beliefs that were later termed "orthodox" did exist prior to Constantine. They were one thread of many Christianities. Only in retrospect can these beliefs -- as they existed pre-Nicea -- be called "orthodox".
that one needs to similarly point to 325 as the year that Jesus became God.
Which is precisely the assertion -- somewhat tongue in cheek -- I made last week. Before 325, some Christians believed that Jesus was God, but many did not. It was Nicea that established this belief as orthodox doctrine.