Mary and Labor Pains

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It’s not canon, but there are apocryphal stories of midwives to the Virgin Mary who at least arrived soon after the birth, if not during.
 
jimsnew said:
These people were pretty rural. I grew up a farm kid, and I could deliver a baby if I had to, done it hundreds of times for animals. I’m pretty sure Joseph could have helped with a delivery
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Yes, and those time too there weren’t any hospitals. I’m sure that most families- both men and women, assisted at plenty of births and could take the role of a midwife if needed. Women probably were more in the know to assist, but I would bet there were more than one man in a group that had the knowledge to assist too. Birth is a part of life and probably much more a common occurrence than it is today. Today people only have one or two children then stop, in those days, you had as many as God would allow you to, and sadly in those days, not many children survived.
 
pianistclare said:
Faith. Please.
This DOES NOT MATTER.
Whether she delivered vaginally, or Jesus mystically and miraculously appeared in her arms.
We KNOW she carried Him in her womb.
She’s His mother.
She’s your mother.

Your OCD is acting up again.
Take a deep breath. Prayers offered for your peace.
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👍
 
Faith1960 said:
Ok, but did she give birth through the birth canal? Does the Church have an official teaching on this?
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There are levels of theological certainty. Some doctrines are formal dogmas and others are theological opinions, although generally accepted. Some doctrines taught by the Church are to be accepted even though they are not proper dogmas, which means they could be modified later to be more precise. In post # 2 you can read:

“In general the Fathers and the Schoolmen conceived it as non-injury to the hymen, and accordingly taught that Mary gave birth in miraculous fashion without opening of the womb and injury.”
 
Vico said:
There are levels of theological certainty. Some doctrines are formal dogmas and others are theological opinions, although generally accepted. Some doctrines taught by the Church are to be accepted even though they are not proper dogmas, which means they could be modified later to be more precise. In post # 2 you can read:

“In general the Fathers and the Schoolmen conceived it as non-injury to the hymen, and accordingly taught that Mary gave birth in miraculous fashion without opening of the womb and injury.”
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So, you’re saying He wasn’t born through the birth canal? If so, how WAS he born?
 
Faith1960 said:
So, you’re saying He wasn’t born through the birth canal? If so, how WAS he born?
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The same way he walk through the closed locked door of the apostles room, he is God and can do what he wants.

On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!”
John 20:19
 
Faith1960 said:
So, you’re saying He wasn’t born through the birth canal? If so, how WAS he born?
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One opinion, St. Thomas Aquinas:

Summa Theologiae, Part III
Question 28. The virginity of the Mother of God
Article 2. Whether Christ’s Mother was a virgin in His birth?

**Objection 3. **Further, as Gregory says in the Homily for the octave of Easter [xxvi in Evang., that by entering after His Resurrection where the disciples were gathered, the doors being shut, our Lord “showed that His body was the same in nature but differed in glory”: so that it seems that to go through a closed passage pertains to a glorified body. But Christ’s body was not glorified in its conception, but was passible, having “the likeness of sinful flesh,” as the Apostle says (Romans 8:3). Therefore He did not come forth through the closed womb of the Virgin.

…

Reply to Objection 3. Some have held that Christ, in His Birth, assumed the gift of “subtlety,” when He came forth from the closed womb of a virgin; and that He assumed the gift of “agility” when with dry feet He walked on the sea. But this is not consistent with what has been decided above (Article 14). For these gifts of a glorified body result from an overflow of the soul’s glory on to the body, as we shall explain further on, in treating of glorified bodies (Supplement:82): and it has been said above (III:13:3 ad 1; III:16:1 ad 2) that before His Passion Christ “allowed His flesh to do and to suffer what was proper to it” (Damascene, De Fide Orth. iii): nor was there such an overflow of glory from His soul on to His body.

We must therefore say that all these things took place miraculously by Divine power. Whence Augustine says (Sup. Joan. Tract. 121): “To the substance of a body in which was the Godhead closed doors were no obstacle. For truly He had power to enter in by doors not open, in Whose Birth His Mother’s virginity remained inviolate.” And Dionysius says in an epistle (Ad Caium iv) that “Christ excelled man in doing that which is proper to man: this is shown in His supernatural conception, of a virgin, and in the unstable waters bearing the weight of earthly feet.”

newadvent.org/summa/4028.htm#article2
 
Vico said:
One opinion, St. Thomas Aquinas:

Summa Theologiae, Part III
Question 28. The virginity of the Mother of God
Article 2. Whether Christ’s Mother was a virgin in His birth?

**Objection 3. **Further, as Gregory says in the Homily for the octave of Easter [xxvi in Evang., that by entering after His Resurrection where the disciples were gathered, the doors being shut, our Lord “showed that His body was the same in nature but differed in glory”: so that it seems that to go through a closed passage pertains to a glorified body. But Christ’s body was not glorified in its conception, but was passible, having “the likeness of sinful flesh,” as the Apostle says (Romans 8:3). Therefore He did not come forth through the closed womb of the Virgin.

…

Reply to Objection 3. Some have held that Christ, in His Birth, assumed the gift of “subtlety,” when He came forth from the closed womb of a virgin; and that He assumed the gift of “agility” when with dry feet He walked on the sea. But this is not consistent with what has been decided above (Article 14). For these gifts of a glorified body result from an overflow of the soul’s glory on to the body, as we shall explain further on, in treating of glorified bodies (Supplement:82): and it has been said above (III:13:3 ad 1; III:16:1 ad 2) that before His Passion Christ “allowed His flesh to do and to suffer what was proper to it” (Damascene, De Fide Orth. iii): nor was there such an overflow of glory from His soul on to His body.

We must therefore say that all these things took place miraculously by Divine power. Whence Augustine says (Sup. Joan. Tract. 121): “To the substance of a body in which was the Godhead closed doors were no obstacle. For truly He had power to enter in by doors not open, in Whose Birth His Mother’s virginity remained inviolate.” And Dionysius says in an epistle (Ad Caium iv) that “Christ excelled man in doing that which is proper to man: this is shown in His supernatural conception, of a virgin, and in the unstable waters bearing the weight of earthly feet.”

newadvent.org/summa/4028.htm#article2
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This is over my head. Can you put it in plain language?
 
Faith1960 said:
This is over my head. Can you put it in plain language?
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Maybe. Jesus was not born in his glorified body that had extraordinary powers, such as passing through walls, etc., so it has to be a miracle that the Blessed Virgin Mary gave birth without any damage to her female organs.
 
Vico said:
Maybe. Jesus was not born in his glorified body that had extraordinary powers, such as passing through walls, etc., so it has to be a miracle that the Blessed Virgin Mary gave birth without any damage to her female organs.
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But did He come down Marys birth canal and have a vaginal birth, while miraculously not doing any damage?
 
Faith1960 said:
But did He come down Mary’s birth canal and have a vaginal birth, while miraculously not doing any damage?
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I imagine so, and there would be an afterbirth also, to be a normal human birth. But that there is no damage could certainly be a miracle.
 
Vico said:
Maybe. Jesus was not born in his glorified body that had extraordinary powers, such as passing through walls, etc., so it has to be a miracle that the Blessed Virgin Mary gave birth without any damage to her female organs.
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While perineal ruptures are common, only about half of all women experience them while giving birth, so a birth without any damage could hardly be considered a miracolous event. I still don’t see why the gospels would fail to mention miracles at Jesus’ birth, given that both Matthew and Luke tell us about his conception.
 
tuffsmurf said:
While perineal ruptures are common, only about half of all women experience them while giving birth, so a birth without any damage could hardly be considered a miracolous event. I still don’t see why the gospels would fail to mention miracles at Jesus’ birth, given that both Matthew and Luke tell us about his conception.
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Hymen intact, assuming one was present intact to start, would be a miracle.
 
Vico said:
Hymen intact, assuming one was present intact to start, would be a miracle.
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As stated before, the hymen is a ring of tissue that all women have, virgins and non-virgins alike. The hymen does not break and there is no physical difference between a woman that is a virgin and a woman that is not (there are rare cases of girls that are born with a membrane that covers the opening, but that is an abnormality and is dangerous and she would need a surgery before she starts to menstruate).
 
tuffsmurf said:
As stated before, the hymen is a ring of tissue that all women have, virgins and non-virgins alike. The hymen does not break and there is no physical difference between a woman that is a virgin and a woman that is not (there are rare cases of girls that are born with a membrane that covers the opening, but that is an abnormality and is dangerous and she would need a surgery before she starts to menstruate).
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I am not saying what was present, but giving an example of damage that could occur, which would if hymen imperforatus was possessed.
 
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