As a Christian, do you consider the Blessed Virgin Mary as your Mother?

[Angelos]

Also, requiring or assuming that Mary should pre-exist God in order to be His mother gives the false impression that mothers create their children - but they don’t.

Mothers bear and nuture their children (as Mary did with Jesus), but God alone creates them.

Mary’s motherhood of God is no different than any other mother’s relationship with her children.

Amen! Mary is the mother of Jesus, who has only one personality. That personality is DIVINE. Therefore, Mary is the mother of Jesus, who’s true God and true man. Virgin Mary gave human body to the eternal and uncreated Word of God. If we once comprehend that Jesus of Nazareth is **the same person **as the second person of the Holy Trinity, we can easily refer to Mary with the title “Mother of GOD”. Centuries ago, Nestorious claimed and taught that the Logos was a distinct person from **the human Jesus **Mary gave birth to. Accordingly, he denied that the child born of the Virgin was not identical with the Son of God. Since Nestorius distinguished Mary’s earthly son Jesus from the celestial Son of God, he naturally believed that Mary was not Theotokos (God-bearer), but Christ-bearer. Thanks to the Spirit of the Truth, the Holy Church came together in Ephesus in 431 A.D. to condemn this heresy and confirm that Mary is truly the Mother of GOD since the personality of human Jesus is identical with the personality of Logos. If you do not call Mary “the mother of GOD”, you do not believe that Jesus has had one and the same personality before and after the Incarnation!

Peace to all

 

[VociMike]

Also, requiring or assuming that Mary should pre-exist God in order to be His mother gives the false impression that mothers create their children - but they don’t.

Mothers bear and nuture their children (as Mary did with Jesus), but God alone creates them.

Mary’s motherhood of God is no different than any other mother’s relationship with her children.

Exactly. Mothers do not create their children.

And to those who say Mary is not the mother of God, I must ask, who then is she the mother of?

 

[E.E.N.S]

No biblical evidence that she’s to be considered the mother of all Christians.

John 19:26 - Jesus makes Mary the Mother of us all as He dies on the Cross by saying “behold your mother.” Jesus did not say “John, behold your mother” because he gave Mary to all of us, his beloved disciples. All the words that Jesus spoke on Cross had a divine purpose. Jesus was not just telling John to take care of his mother.

Rev. 12:17 - this verse proves the meaning of John 19:26. The “woman’s” (Mary’s) offspring are those who follow Jesus. She is our Mother and we are her offspring in Jesus Christ. The master plan of God’s covenant love for us is family. But we cannot be a complete family with the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Christ without the Motherhood of Mary.

And in Gen 3:20 - Eve is called the mother of all the living (bodily), this forshadows Mary being the mother of all the living (spiritually). Mary gives birth to the fullness of the Body of Christ, no just the Head, but its members as well - through the order of grace. Here we are not speaking of a bodily birth, but a spiritual birth into the Mystical Body of Christ.

 

[Sixtus]

she is not the Mother of God.

Then pray tell me who bore the Second Person of the Trinity in His Humanity of flesh Jesus Christ!!!

If Christ IS God and I believe He is, then by definition, Mary can be none other than ‘the Mother of God’.

If you want further proof, Jesus said that ‘to see Him is to see the Father’. So if the Father is in HIm, we may assume He always was. Therefore, in that sense, even though God had no beginning, He was ‘created’ in His Humanity by His Mother and also His Father

 

[exoflare]

To the OP:

I voted for option #1, but just out of curiousity how would option #3 be different or incorrect?

 

[Mannyfit75]

To the OP:

I voted for option #1, but just out of curiousity how would option #3 be different or incorrect?

It is the same I was going to delete it but before I could people already voted.

 

[Zooey]

Amen! Mary is the mother of Jesus, who has only one personality. That personality is DIVINE. Therefore, Mary is the mother of Jesus, who’s true God and true man. Virgin Mary gave human body to the eternal and uncreated Word of God. If we once comprehend that Jesus of Nazareth is **the same person **as the second person of the Holy Trinity, we can easily refer to Mary with the title “Mother of GOD”. Centuries ago, Nestorious claimed and taught that the Logos was a distinct person from **the human Jesus **Mary gave birth to. Accordingly, he denied that the child born of the Virgin was not identical with the Son of God. Since Nestorius distinguished Mary’s earthly son Jesus from the celestial Son of God, he naturally believed that Mary was not Theotokos (God-bearer), but Christ-bearer. Thanks to the Spirit of the Truth, the Holy Church came together in Ephesus in 431 A.D. to condemn this heresy and confirm that Mary is truly the Mother of GOD since the personality of human Jesus is identical with the personality of Logos. If you do not call Mary “the mother of GOD”, you do not believe that Jesus has had one and the same personality before and after the Incarnation!

Peace to all

:clapping:

 

[rbarcia]

Then pray tell me who bore the Second Person of the Trinity in His Humanity of flesh Jesus Christ!!!

If Christ IS God and I believe He is, then by definition, Mary can be none other than ‘the Mother of God’.

If you want further proof, Jesus said that ‘to see Him is to see the Father’. So if the Father is in HIm, we may assume He always was. Therefore, in that sense, even though God had no beginning, He was ‘created’ in His Humanity by His Mother [and also His Father

Hmm? Following this logic further, you get

Mary is mother of Jesus, Jesus is God, God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or God is Trinity, therefore, Mary is Mother of Trinity. Therefore, Mary is mother of Father and Holy Spirit as well?

But we know Mary is not the mother of the Father, nor the mother of the Holy Spirit, therefore, therefore this logic is faulty.

I believe in One God, in three persons. Weather one things Mary is the mother of God, or just Jesus can do no harm to the Trinity. Your belief in her relationship to God has nothing to do with some heresy or dividing Christ.

Christ is both fully God and fully Man. The Catholic Church believes this. Therefore, Mary is only mother to the flesh, and not the spirit.

**
Romans 1

1 Paul, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated to the gospel of God 2 which He promised before through His prophets in the Holy Scriptures, 3 concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who was born of the seed of David according to the flesh**, 4 and declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.

People should focus on their own relationship to Christ, not someone else’s.

**

Luke 11

27And it came to pass, as he spake these things, a certain woman of the company lifted up her voice, and said unto him, Blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked.

28But he said, Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it.

Matthew 12

46 While He was still talking to the multitudes, behold, His mother and brothers stood outside, seeking to speak with Him. 47 Then one said to Him, “Look, Your mother and Your brothers are standing outside, seeking to speak with You.”
48 But He answered and said to the one who told Him, “Who is My mother and who are My brothers?” 49 And He stretched out His hand toward His disciples and said, “Here are My mother and My brothers! 50 For whoever does the will of My Father in heaven is My brother and sister and mother.”

Matthew 13

53 Now it came to pass, when Jesus had finished these parables, that He departed from there. 54 When He had come to His own country, He taught them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished and said, “Where did this Man get this wisdom and these mighty works? 55 Is this not the carpenter’s son? Is not His mother called Mary? And His brothers James, Joses, Simon, and Judas? 56 And His sisters, are they not all with us? Where then did this Man get all these things?”

**

Mary is blessed among women, she is a model of faith, but all worship and veneration should go to God.
[/quote]

 

[jmcrae]

Hmm? Following this logic further, you get

Mary is mother of Jesus, Jesus is God, God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or God is Trinity, therefore, Mary is Mother of Trinity. Therefore, Mary is mother of Father and Holy Spirit as well?

But we know Mary is not the mother of the Father, nor the mother of the Holy Spirit, therefore, therefore this logic is faulty.

Patty Bonds gives a really good talk on those "we know"s - you should listen to it one of these days, since I can’t do it justice here.

But never assume that “we know” anything that we haven’t actually read for ourselves in Scripture or heard from the Holy Tradition.

I believe in One God, in three persons. Weather one things Mary is the mother of God, or just Jesus can do no harm to the Trinity. Your belief in her relationship to God has nothing to do with some heresy or dividing Christ.

If Mary is not the mother of Christ’s divine person, then Christ was already divided in the womb. But the first chapter of John’s Gospel tells us that it was God in Mary’s womb. Not dead flesh awaiting a spirit to come to it later on.

Christ is both fully God and fully Man. The Catholic Church believes this.

So far, so good.

Therefore, Mary is only mother to the flesh, and not the spirit.

This does not follow at all. If Christ is both fully God and fully Man, then (therefore) the person to whom Mary gave birth (which was Christ) was both fully God and fully human. She gave birth (she didn’t create Him; she gave birth to him) to God, Incarnate.

And yes, the Father and the Holy Spirit were with Him, since they three also cannot be separated, any more than Christ’s divine nature and human nature can anymore be separated: they are one God in three divine Persons, and Christ is one Person with two natures: a human nature and a divine nature.

 

[Victorious]

Christ is both fully God and fully Man. The Catholic Church believes this. Therefore, Mary is only mother to the flesh, and not the spirit.

This is the old Nestorian heresy that was put to bed at the Council of Ephesus in 431.

When you deny that Mary is the Mother of God, you deny the hypostatic union. You can’t arrive at the truth about Jesus without understanding the truth about Mary, no matter how much Scripture you cut and paste.

 

[tequilamac]

I would rather honor Mary that does not go against any Scriptural teaching. I do as she ask and obey Christ. I believe this would please her more than honoring her, besides this always boils down to Bible vs Bible plus your Tradition which has no merit. Not much is said about Mary after Christ Death and resurrection. It seems more would have been said if it was such an important part of our faith.

Huh? Mary wants you to please Christ. You cannot please Christ by honoring him and dishonoring your neighbor. In the same way, you cannot please Christ by honoring him refusing to honor his mother thereby opening oneself up to the charge of hypocrisy by Christ. I can see it now:
“Why do you honor me while dishonoring my mother? You hypocrite, out of my sight.” We have so much testimony to that one thing from Christ himself.

 

[Angelos]

Hmm? Following this logic further, you get

Mary is mother of Jesus, Jesus is God, God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or God is Trinity, therefore, Mary is Mother of Trinity. Therefore, Mary is mother of Father and Holy Spirit as well?

But we know Mary is not the mother of the Father, nor the mother of the Holy Spirit, therefore, therefore this logic is faulty.

I believe in One God, in three persons. Weather one things Mary is the mother of God, or just Jesus can do no harm to the Trinity. Your belief in her relationship to God has nothing to do with some heresy or dividing Christ.

Christ is both fully God and fully Man. The Catholic Church believes this. Therefore, Mary is only mother to the flesh, and not the spirit

You do not believe that Lord Jesus had a human Spirit? Saying that Mary was only the mother of Jesus’ flesh is equal to dividing Him into two entities during His miraculous birth.

We know that Mary is the mother of neither the Father nor the Holy Spirit. Yet She is the mother of the Son of God. The title “Mother of God” does not mean that Mary is the mother of the divine essence or God-head. She’s truly the mother of the SECOND PERSON of the Trinity. Who Mary miraculously bore is GOD in the sense that God **took flesh **from Mary. Since we know that only the second person of the Trinity became man, it is not necessary to distinguish the persons of the Trinity while repeating our faith in the INCARNATION by calling Mary “Mother of God” (God-bearer actually). Besides, Thomas called Jesus “Lord and God” in John’s Gospel, but He definitely did not mean that Jesus was the same person as the Father and the Holy Spirit.

Mary is blessed among women, she is a model of faith, but all worship and veneration should go to God.

I agree with you that all worship should go to God, but also think and believe that veneration should also go to the holiest woman full of grace. Read how God in the Old Testament presents Abraham as a holy person that will be venerated:

12:2-3 "Then I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will make your name great, so that you will exemplify divine blessing.I will bless those who bless you, but the one who treats you lightly I must curse, and all the families of the earth will bless one another by your name.”

Peace & blessings to you

 

[VociMike]

Hmm? Following this logic further, you get

Mary is mother of Jesus, Jesus is God, God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, or God is Trinity, therefore, Mary is Mother of Trinity. Therefore, Mary is mother of Father and Holy Spirit as well?

Your logic fails because the nature of the Father and the Holy Spirit simply do not allow for mothers. The nature of Christ does.

 

[Victorious]

I would rather honor Mary that does not go against any Scriptural teaching. I do as she ask and obey Christ. I believe this would please her more than honoring her, besides this always boils down to Bible vs Bible plus your Tradition which has no merit. Not much is said about Mary after Christ Death and resurrection. It seems more would have been said if it was such an important part of our faith.

How would you even know what’s in the Bible if it wasn’t for “our” Tradition? How would you know there aren’t other writings floating around that aren’t in the Bible but ought to be if it wasn’t for “our” Tradition?

1 Corinthians 11:2:

I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I have delivered them to you.

2 Thessalonians 2:15:

So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter.

John 21:25:

But there are also many other things which Jesus did; were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

2 Peter 1:20-21:

First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by the impulse of man, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.

2 Peter 3:15-17:

So also our beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, speaking of this as he does in all his letters. There are some things in them hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other scriptures. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, beware lest you be carried away with the error of lawless men and lose your own stability.

1 Timothy 3:14-15:

I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these instructions to you so that, if I am delayed, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and bulwark of the truth.

[SIGN]Proverbs 30:11: There are those who curse their fathers and do not bless their mothers.[/SIGN]

 

[VociMike]

Christ is both fully God and fully Man. The Catholic Church believes this. Therefore, Mary is only mother to the flesh, and not the spirit.

Fleshes do not have mothers. Natures do not have mothers. Only persons have mothers. Mary is the mother of the Person of Jesus Christ, who is true God and true man.

 

[julebenn]

John 19:26 - Jesus makes Mary the Mother of us all as He dies on the Cross by saying “behold your mother.” Jesus did not say “John, behold your mother” because he gave Mary to all of us, his beloved disciples. All the words that Jesus spoke on Cross had a divine purpose. Jesus was not just telling John to take care of his mother.

Rev. 12:17 - this verse proves the meaning of John 19:26. The “woman’s” (Mary’s) offspring are those who follow Jesus. She is our Mother and we are her offspring in Jesus Christ. The master plan of God’s covenant love for us is family. But we cannot be a complete family with the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Christ without the Motherhood of Mary.

And in Gen 3:20 - Eve is called the mother of all the living (bodily), this forshadows Mary being the mother of all the living (spiritually). Mary gives birth to the fullness of the Body of Christ, no just the Head, but its members as well - through the order of grace. Here we are not speaking of a bodily birth, but a spiritual birth into the Mystical Body of Christ.

 

[Victorious]

NO! She is someone who was obedient and blessed. Very Blessed!, but she is **not **the Mother of God.

This is the Nestorian heresy, refuted and discredited 1600 years ago, long before Luther came along. That old Nestorius can still claim adherents just goes to prove that when you detach yourself from the moorings of Sacred Tradition, you don’t free yourself, except to pile up on the same rocks of error over and over and over again.

Proverbs 26:11:

Like a dog that returns to his vomit is a fool that repeats his folly.

 

[julebenn]

Rev. 12:17 - this verse proves the meaning of John 19:26. The “woman’s” (Mary’s) offspring are those who follow Jesus. She is our Mother and we are her offspring in Jesus Christ. The master plan of God’s covenant love for us is family. But we cannot be a complete family with the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Christ without the Motherhood of Mary.

This should be for another thread, but This verse refers to the NationIsrael, not Mary, if you read on…

The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the desert, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time, out of the serpent’s reach.

15Then from his mouth the serpent spewed water like a river, to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. 16But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth.

 

[rbarcia]

Patty Bonds gives a really good talk on those "we know"s - you should listen to it one of these days, since I can’t do it justice here.

But never assume that “we know” anything that we haven’t actually read for ourselves in Scripture or heard from the Holy Tradition.

If Mary is not the mother of Christ’s divine person, then Christ was already divided in the womb. But the first chapter of John’s Gospel tells us that it was God in Mary’s womb. Not dead flesh awaiting a spirit to come to it later on.

So far, so good.

This does not follow at all. If Christ is both fully God and fully Man, then (therefore) the person to whom Mary gave birth (which was Christ) was both fully God and fully human. She gave birth (she didn’t create Him; she gave birth to him) to God, Incarnate.

And yes, the Father and the Holy Spirit were with Him, since they three also cannot be separated, any more than Christ’s divine nature and human nature can anymore be separated: they are one God in three divine Persons, and Christ is one Person with two natures: a human nature and a divine nature.

So you believe then that Mary is the mother of the Father and the Holy Spirit?

 

[jmcrae]

So you believe then that Mary is the mother of the Father and the Holy Spirit?

I believe that Mary is the Mother of God Incarnate. Whatever that may mean - it’s a mystery that I do not fully understand.