Immaculate Conception = Predestination yes or no?

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The question came up a few times over various threads and now I am curious.

There are a number of ways predestination may be understood, does the IC dogma fall into the general idea of predestination?

Whatever your opinion, please feel free to elaborate.
 
Hesychios said:
The question came up a few times over various threads and now I am curious.

There are a number of ways predestination may be understood, does the IC dogma fall into the general idea of predestination?

Whatever your opinion, please feel free to elaborate.
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Not in the Catholic understanding. See CCC 491 and 600
 
Also from the catechism (bolding mine):
494 At the announcement that she would give birth to “the Son of the Most High” without knowing man, by the power of the Holy Spirit, Mary responded with the obedience of faith, certain that “with God nothing will be impossible”: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be [done] to me according to your word.” Thus, giving her consent to God’s word, Mary becomes the mother of Jesus. Espousing the divine will for salvation wholeheartedly, without a single sin to restrain her, she gave herself entirely to the person and to the work of her Son; she did so in order to serve the mystery of redemption with him and dependent on him, by God’s grace:
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As St. Irenaeus says, “Being obedient she became the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race.” Hence not a few of the early Fathers gladly assert. . .: “The knot of Eve’s disobedience was untied by Mary’s obedience: what the virgin Eve bound through her disbelief, Mary loosened by her faith.” Comparing her with Eve, they call Mary “the Mother of the living” and frequently claim: “Death through Eve, life through Mary.”
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Mary’s “fiat” was absolutely necessary for the grace to flow from on high. This was her conscious decision, made out of obedience. Wouldn’t this odd concept of “pre-destination” have made Gabriel’s visit unnecessary? If Mary was “pre-destined” to bear Christ, she would simply have been told that the conception had already taken place. Why offer her an opportunity to say “no”, if she was destined to say yes?
 
po18guy said:
Also from the catechism (bolding mine):

Mary’s “fiat” was absolutely necessary for the grace to flow from on high. This was her conscious decision, made out of obedience. Wouldn’t this odd concept of “pre-destination” have made Gabriel’s visit unnecessary? If Mary was “pre-destined” to bear Christ, she would simply have been told that the conception had already taken place. Why offer her an opportunity to say “no”, if she was destined to say yes?
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Actually, Mary’s consent was neither requested, nor required. Gabrielle simply told her that it will happen.
 
Hubriss said:
Actually, Mary’s consent was neither requested, nor required. Gabrielle simply told her that it will happen.
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if Mary rejected being the mother of Jesus, would you think God would have wanted His Son born of a rebellious woman?

Mary still had a choice. she could have said no, probably would have been cursed, and God would find another suitable human mother to share humanity with His Son.

its all speculation because it didn’t happen, but i cannot believe that God would let His Son be born of an uncooperative woman
 
Victorious said:
Do you mean predestination in the Calvinist sense?
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I meant any sense of predestination, one is free to explain in a post. I think the Calvinists follow Saint Augustine on the subject.

But since the IC is a Catholic dogma I think one could assume if the IC is a manifestation of predestination it is in concert with Catholic thought, whatever that is.

It seems to me (based upon past threads) that the Catholic church does teach a form of predestination, but not Augustine’s full theory. As far as possible I will let other Catholics and interested parties elaborate on that, it’s not something I am well versed in.

If one has an opinion on the subject explaining that in a post would be a good thing, I think. 🙂
 
Hubriss said:
Actually, Mary’s consent was neither requested, nor required. Gabrielle simply told her that it will happen.
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This would make Gabriel’s announcement to Mary not only redundant, but superfluous, would it not? Since Mary pondered all things in her heart, would she not also ponder why she was pregnant without “know(ing) man”?

Your response causes me to ponder whether or not anyone is predestined to be agnostic…
 
Hubriss said:
Actually, Mary’s consent was neither requested, nor required. Gabrielle simply told her that it will happen.
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Actually, the question relates to the conception of Mary, not the conception of Jesus, although I think I see your point.

Mary, of course, could not have known or been asked if she wanted to bear Jesus before she was actually conceived herself, and (unless I misunderstand) the decision by God to immaculately conceive her preceded her actual existence. It seems like the Providence of God.

That’s why the question is so interesting to me.
 
po18guy said:
Hubriss;6795494:
Actually, Mary’s consent was neither requested, nor required. Gabrielle simply told her that it will happen.
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This would make Gabriel’s announcement to Mary not only redundant, but superfluous, would it not? Since Mary pondered all things in her heart, would she not also ponder why she was pregnant without “know(ing) man”?
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Actually, the question relates to the conception of Mary, not the conception of Jesus.

Mary, of course, could not have known or been asked if she wanted to bear Jesus before she was actually conceived herself, and (unless I misunderstand) the decision by God to immaculately conceive her preceded her actual existence. It seems like the Providence of God.

That’s why the question is so interesting to me.
 
In my view, because time as we conceive of it is not the same as the manner in which God conceives of it, it only appears to be predestination because of our strictly linear view. God knew that she would submit her will when told that she had been chosen to carry the son of God, so he went ahead and gave her the fullness of grace in vitro to prepare her womb for His only son.

To help explain, let me use the example of confession and sin.

You have sinned. God knows the future and knows that you are going to go to confession, so you already know that you are going to receive the absolution. So do you still have free will in this instance, or were you predestined to go to confession and therefore by extension were predestined to sin? The answer to all of this is “no.”

God knows you are going to confession, but you still have to make the conscious effort to go. You are still granted this choice. In the eyes of the Lord, before you’ve even sinned, you have already gone to confession and received absolution. But in the world in which we live and the manner through which we perceive time, the sin must precede the confession must precede the absolution. Therefore, we are answerable to our sequential understanding of time because we cannot fathom time as God perceives it. Quid pro quo, we must therefore still go to confession and we must make the decision to do it.

The same applies to the Immaculate Conception. Before Mary was ever born, God knew she would submit her will. But in the same manner that time is perceived differently, Mary was still given the choice to submit or the choice to deny. Only with this understanding of how time works differently for God and for man can one understand that the Immaculate Conception was not predestination, it was in fact in answer to Mary’s submission to God’s will.
 
IHeartAquinas said:
In my view, because time as we conceive of it is not the same as the manner in which God conceives of it, it only appears to be predestination because of our strictly linear view. God knew that she would submit her will when told that she had been chosen to carry the son of God, so he went ahead and gave her the fullness of grace in vitro to prepare her womb for His only son.

To help explain, let me use the example of confession and sin.

You have sinned. God knows the future and knows that you are going to go to confession, so you already know that you are going to receive the absolution. So do you still have free will in this instance, or were you predestined to go to confession and therefore by extension were predestined to sin? The answer to all of this is “no.”

God knows you are going to confession, but you still have to make the conscious effort to go. You are still granted this choice. In the eyes of the Lord, before you’ve even sinned, you have already gone to confession and received absolution. But in the world in which we live and the manner through which we perceive time, the sin must precede the confession must precede the absolution. Therefore, we are answerable to our sequential understanding of time because we cannot fathom time as God perceives it. Quid pro quo, we must therefore still go to confession and we must make the decision to do it.

The same applies to the Immaculate Conception. Before Mary was ever born, God knew she would submit her will. But in the same manner that time is perceived differently, Mary was still given the choice to submit or the choice to deny. Only with this understanding of how time works differently for God and for man can one understand that the Immaculate Conception was not predestination, it was in fact in answer to Mary’s submission to God’s will.
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Well said. I was thinking that God, Creator of all that exists, knew Mary’s heart before He accomplished the physical act of creating it. Thus, when /He sent His messenger to her, He was assured of her assent, even though she retained free will. Both Adam and Eve were immaculately conceived (in the Divine mind), but retained free will, which they then improperly exercised in the garden. The difference with Mary is that she properly exercised free will at the annunciation.

Much the same as a person choosing to ask a favor of another. The other’s love is known beforehand, and so the other is pre-disposed, rather than pre-destined to grant the favor.
 
So can we say that all types of predestination just look that way to us, because we see things in linear time?
 
Hesychios said:
So can we say that all types of predestination just look that way to us, because we see things in linear time?
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We are confined to linear time, and linear thinking is its product. God has no such restrictions and is present in all places and during all times simultaneously. Just as Jesus’ sacrifice redeemed those past, present and future, just so is God present and in like manner, all things past, present and future are before Him simultaneously.
 
I am the one who voted that the IC is a form of Predestination in the survey.
God predestines all to grace without prejudice to their elective choices even though He of course knows who will reject Him. In this manner all souls who become reprobate will be forced to admit that they were damned by their own choice and God did not force damnation on anyone but rather permitted it in accord with their will and actions.

That said God DOES also predestine SOME to GLORY as well as Grace - these are the elect and that predestiny is always in accord with human freewill as part of that predestiny. Mary was of course such a soul and she had a free choice in her role in all of this Divine Providence. But God foresaw that her will and choices would conform to His in the most perfect way any human soul ever could or would. Thus she was favored in her unique role and exempted from original sin. God essentially started a new branch of humanity with Mary - a new Eve who’s spiritual children would be elevated in their human estate to become Christ-like (partakers in the Divine nature - but not divine) after the prototype new Son of Man (new Adam) like her only divine-human child - Jesus.

It was all consistent with freewill but God did something special in preparing for the Incarnation of His Son. Freewill was a necessity in all of this but this is the part that is hard for many to grasp - that God is so benevolent that He permits us to participate in our Destiny by taking into account all our foreseen choices into his Divine Providence/Plan.

I am not sure this helps you or not. Catholic teaching on predestiny is very open to private insights within a general teaching framework. The essential things that must be present under Catholic teaching in this area are:
  1. Free will; that is, God allows people to choose him, and allows them to reject them. People always have the option. Thus election, if you believe it, must be an act of persuasion and not compulsion.
  2. Co-operation; it is necessary for salvation for a man to cooperate with God’s grace. Man must continuously allow God’s grace to work in him. If at any point a man prevents this, he falls from grace.
  3. Jesus died for all men, and his sacrifice has the potential of saving all, but his act did not automatically save anyone, only those who choose to accept him.
  4. Man is born in a state of sin, and must be called by God in order to accept Him and thus receive the merits of Christ’s sacrifice.
  5. God predestines no one to Hell. i.e. you can only believe in negative reprobation, not positive.
It was absolutely essential for Mary to consent to the Incarnation. But it was not necessary for God to exempt her from the stain of original sin by any active choice of hers since it is God’s prerogative to show compassion on whom He shall show compassion. We know that Mary’s parents (St. Joachim and St. Anne) were very devout and holy. We can project with some certainty from their context that Mary was a blessing & good fruit of that good marriage and family. In essence they too were blessed by God to have such a special and holy child that God would grant the special favor in her Immaculate Conception. In a sense this privilege was a fruit of Jochaim’s and Anne’s life long cooperative choices for God as well.

BF
 
I thought that this quote was interesting, and may have applications to the question of this thread:

“Will any man dare to say that God did not foreknow those to whom He would give to believe, or whom He would give to His Son, that of them He should lose none? And certainly, if He foreknew these things, He as certainly foreknew His own kindnesses, wherewith He condescends to deliver us. This is the predestination of the saints,–nothing else; to wit, the foreknowledge and the preparation of God’s kindnesses, whereby they are most certainly delivered, whoever they are that are delivered”
On the Gift of Perseverance - Saint Augustine of Hippo
 
I thought that this quote was interesting, and may have applications to the question of this thread:

“Will any man dare to say that God did not foreknow those to whom He would give to believe, or whom He would give to His Son, that of them He should lose none? And certainly, if He foreknew these things, He as certainly foreknew His own kindnesses, wherewith He condescends to deliver us. This is the predestination of the saints,–nothing else; to wit, the foreknowledge and the preparation of God’s kindnesses, whereby they are most certainly delivered, whoever they are that are delivered”
On the Gift of Perseverance - Saint Augustine of Hippo
 
Hesychios said:
I thought that this quote was interesting, and may have applications to the question of this thread:

“Will any man dare to say that God did not foreknow those to whom He would give to believe, or whom He would give to His Son, that of them He should lose none? And certainly, if He foreknew these things, He as certainly foreknew His own kindnesses, wherewith He condescends to deliver us. This is the predestination of the saints,–nothing else; to wit, the foreknowledge and the preparation of God’s kindnesses, whereby they are most certainly delivered, whoever they are that are delivered”
On the Gift of Perseverance - Saint Augustine of Hippo
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What we reject is Calvin’s concept of predestination. Also, where do you find an Orthodox mass in China?
 
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