Mary not important?

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Paladin4God

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Hello,
I’ve been having a discussion with several Protestants lately, and they have been saying that Mary was never crucial to our Redemption, that she never had a choice whether to accept to be the mother of God. They don’t see how Mary could have had any impact on the Redmption, and even if she could have declined, that God could have “picked” someone else? Could you help me out? Also, we’ve been discussing salvation and Purgatory, and how our sins are permanently washed away by the blood of Jesus and I quoted one of the articles from catholic.com. Here’s a response they gave me.
I have a real problem with people who feel that God chooses who is saved and that we play no part in accepting him as our savior. To anyone who feels that God chooses who is saved and we don’t have a choice in the matter, answer me this, 2 Peter 3:9 says “The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance”. So, if God wants all people to come to repentance, and it is he that chooses who is saved and we can’t refuse salvation, then why isn’t everyone saved since he is “not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance”?
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Thank you
 
well well well, the old Mary argument, ask your friends this:

Did Jesus sin??? answer: no
Did Jesus have to obey all 10 comandments??? answer: yes
and in the commandment “HONOR THY FATHER AND THY MOTHER” Did Jesus honor mary???, did He being God the son obey her at the wedding at canna??? (first miracle), EVEN THERE SHE WAS A MEDIATOR.
ASK THEM ALSO THIS, HOW DID JESUS FEEL IF YOU SAID TO HIM “OH JESUS I LOVE THE WITH ALL MY HEART, BUT I WILL NOT EVEN MENTION YOUR MOTHER, I DONT CARE LESS ABOUT HER”
 
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Paladin4God:
Hello,
I’ve been having a discussion with several Protestants lately, and they have been saying that Mary was never crucial to our Redemption, that she never had a choice whether to accept to be the mother of God. They don’t see how Mary could have had any impact on the Redmption, and even if she could have declined, that God could have “picked” someone else? Could you help me out? Also, we’ve been discussing salvation and Purgatory, and how our sins are permanently washed away by the blood of Jesus and I quoted one of the articles from catholic.com. Here’s a response they gave me.

Thank you
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A quickie here as I need some shut-eye. If Mary had no choice, then she wasn’t human. If Mary chose no, then who??? Do you know which Bible verse is being quoted at the end??? And I am confused by this quote "I have a real problem with people who feel that God chooses who is saved and that we play no part in accepting him as our savior. " How did the individual get that Catholics don’t believe that the individual has any role in their Salvation???Or who said the Church teaches that we can’t refuse Salvation??? The Church says that Christ Redeemed us, but that we must cooperate with Grace living out the Faith in order to be saved. Thanks and God Bless.
 
I have no idea which verse is being quoted, I should probably ask that. As for what he said, I was confused by that, and didn’t really know what he meant, so that’s why I posted to see if anyone could figure that out. Thanks for responding.
 
Hello,
I’ve been having a discussion with several Protestants lately, and they have been saying that Mary was never crucial to our Redemption, that she never had a choice whether to accept to be the mother of God. They don’t see how Mary could have had any impact on the Redmption, and even if she could have declined, that God could have “picked” someone else? Could you help me out? Also, we’ve been discussing salvation and Purgatory, and how our sins are permanently washed away by the blood of Jesus and I quoted one of the articles from catholic.com. Here’s a response they gave me.
I have a real problem with people who feel that God chooses who is saved and that we play no part in accepting him as our savior. To anyone who feels that God chooses who is saved and we don’t have a choice in the matter, answer me this, 2 Peter 3:9 says “The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance”. So, if God wants all people to come to repentance, and it is he that chooses who is saved and we can’t refuse salvation, then why isn’t everyone saved since he is “not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance”?
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Thank you

In the first place, I find it terribly ironic that these people should be saying that Mary had no choice in being the Mother of the Redeemer, but that the rest of us have a choice in our salvation. Believing as they do that we can say yes or no to God, their whole theory about Mary not being able to do so falls flat. You might want to point out the inconsistency in their own thinking here.

Also, God often chose certain people for specific missions, such as: Abraham, David, Samuel, Sarah, Ruth, Paul, John the Baptist, etc. In like manner he chose Mary. You might want to point that out to them, as well.

This verse certainly says that God wishes to save everyone and so invites us to come to repentance. But, that doesn’t prove we have a choice in the matter. Still, you might not want to confuse them by pointing that out. Instead, I recommend that you simply tell them that Catholics do not believe that we have no part in our own salvation. That we believe all that this verse says and more. They seem to have gotten some wrong idea about what Catholics believe about this, which you can easily correct.
 
I have to admit that the conent of the discussion seems more geared towards the concept of predestination than it does to Mary…

Nevertheless…

The problem with the generally accepted western concepts of predestination and free will is that both rely on human logic and rationalisim to come to the conclusions they hold.

I am increasingly disgusted, day by day, with the fact that there is so much rationalisim in our theological patrimony in the west, and not enough genuine mystery.

Scripture clearly teaches that God chose before the foundation of the world who would be found in the book of life, and equally clearly teaches that he wills for all to come to repentance and salvation. The two seem at odds… thus, when we try to reconcile these with human logic we are left with either predstination or free will to the exclusion of the other… whereas I think if we just admitted that we don’t know and moved on, we could have avoided a lot of problems in history (oh, say, like the Reformation).

I am a man of simple faith, and while I won’t say that a lot of eastern theology is simple… I get the feeling that the doctrines concerning redemption are a bit easier to explain… and can be summed up by saying, “It’s a mystery!” and left at that.

As to Mary, well, Mary is definately important, she is the best completely human example of constancy and faith that we have, and we can follow her example of fidelity and love with an aboslute conviction that it is a mirror of the love of her Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Rob+
 
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FrRobSST:
I have to admit that the conent of the discussion seems more geared towards the concept of predestination than it does to Mary…

Nevertheless…

The problem with the generally accepted western concepts of predestination and free will is that both rely on human logic and rationalisim to come to the conclusions they hold.

I am increasingly disgusted, day by day, with the fact that there is so much rationalisim in our theological patrimony in the west, and not enough genuine mystery.

Scripture clearly teaches that God chose before the foundation of the world who would be found in the book of life, and equally clearly teaches that he wills for all to come to repentance and salvation. The two seem at odds… thus, when we try to reconcile these with human logic we are left with either predstination or free will to the exclusion of the other… whereas I think if we just admitted that we don’t know and moved on, we could have avoided a lot of problems in history (oh, say, like the Reformation).

I am a man of simple faith, and while I won’t say that a lot of eastern theology is simple… I get the feeling that the doctrines concerning redemption are a bit easier to explain… and can be summed up by saying, “It’s a mystery!” and left at that.

As to Mary, well, Mary is definately important, she is the best completely human example of constancy and faith that we have, and we can follow her example of fidelity and love with an aboslute conviction that it is a mirror of the love of her Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Rob+
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I hear you, Father. I too believe that the things of God are mysteries too grand for us to fully understand. Like G. K. Chesterton asserted, they are divine paradoxes, but not to him!

The sort of folks Paladin is dialogging with do not have a Catholic worldview. Nor do they understand that faith doesn’t need to be an either/or thing, such as we either believe this or we believe that when it comes to such paradoxes as predestination and free will. That is why they get tangled into theological knots over it, poor things.
 
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Paladin4God:
Hello,
I’ve been having a discussion with several Protestants lately, and they have been saying that Mary was never crucial to our Redemption, that she never had a choice whether to accept to be the mother of God. They don’t see how Mary could have had any impact on the Redmption, and even if she could have declined, that God could have “picked” someone else?
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This is all nonsense. When God picked Adam and Eve, and they failed to obey Him, did He pick someone else, and start again?

Mary is the new Eve, in that she was faced with the same choice as Eve - to obey and believe God, or to disbelieve and disobey. I find it strange that some Protestants are quite able to accept and emphasise Eve’s negative role in salvation history, but hate to accept Mary’s positive one.
 
I’ve been having a discussion with several Protestants lately, and they have been saying that Mary was never crucial to our Redemption, that she never had a choice whether to accept to be the mother of God.
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If Mary had no choice in the matter, then what in the world is the answer from her doing in the bible “…may it be done to me according to thy word”. If there isn’t free will involved then why make this statement at all? It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever to say something like this if she had no choice. Rather she should’ve just said something like “Oh I see”.

Also how do the protestants know that God didn’t ask someone else. Do they have infallible knowledge about this, that we don’t?

Calvin
 
To me, the great glory of Mary’s fiat is that, standing in the line of the flesh, she said YES to God. I have to say that if it was simply a matter that God pushed her button, manuvered her string, and she said yes, we wouldn’t be calling her blessed.

There is a divine dichotimy between the concepts of predestination and free will that embracing radically either side alone without the benefit of another misses out on.

Of course, that’s just my rambling opinion.

Rob+
 
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Paladin4God:
Hello,
I’ve been having a discussion with several Protestants lately, and they have been saying that Mary was never crucial to our Redemption, that she never had a choice whether to accept to be the mother of God. They don’t see how Mary could have had any impact on the Redmption, and even if she could have declined, that God could have “picked” someone else? Could you help me out? Also, we’ve been discussing salvation and Purgatory, and how our sins are permanently washed away by the blood of Jesus and I quoted one of the articles from catholic.com. Here’s a response they gave me.
Thank you
Click to expand...
I, too, have a problem with Protestants saying that Mary played no significant role in our salvation - that she didn’t have a choice in the matter. In Genesis 3: 15, God tells us that there would be a woman who would participate with Jesus in our salvation - Mary. That’s because He knew she would say “Yes”. God did not make her say yes - He knew beforehand what her decision would be - big difference. Mary had free will just as every human being has free will. Mary is the new Eve. Eve used her free will to disobey God and essentially said “No” thereby ushering in the fall of man. Mary, on the other hand, said, “Yes” to God, thereby ushering in the salvation of man through Jesus, her Son. She cooperated with God’s grace, just as we are supposed to do in our own salvation. Jesus shed His precious Blood for the forgivness of our sins - BUT - we have to accept that gift - we have to cooperate with Jesus.

That’s why we can lose our salvation - if we do not cooperate with His grace in our salvation and turn away from Him to commit sin - mortal sin which separtes us from God until we confess and receive His grace to help us persevere against sin. God knows who will persevere, He doesn’t make us persevere. If we choose not to be with Him, then He lets us have our choice. That’s why names are written in the Book of Life - He knows who will choose Him - He gave us all free will - even Jesus. Remember Jesus’ prayer in the Garden? Jesus chose to do God’s will - He chose His Father! (Okay, He had a head start!) But you see the point?
 
Wow, thanks everyone for posting. All this is taking place on a message board for a Christian Card Game(of all things:) ) in the off-topic area, and I have been discussing and defending(mostly defending) things with about 5 or so Protestants(all of whom are older than me) They’ve now said that Catholics worship Mary:confused: , but I denied that of course, and now we’re discussing praying to the “dead” saints. I’ll let you know if I need any more help.
 
Ok, here’s a response I got, could you give me some help please? The following is what he said.

Here is a prayer I found (and I know this is used by Catholics, because my Grandmother uses it all the time), which details a request to Saint Anthony, patron saint of lost items:

Quote: Dear St. Anthony, you are the Patron of the poor and the helper of all who seek lost articles. Help me to find what I have lost,
(here name what you have lost)
so that I will be able to make better use of the time that I will gain for God’s greater honor and glory. Grant your gracious aid to all people who seek what they have lost – especially those who seek to regain God’s grace. Amen.

Notice a number of things. One, the user does not request prayer from St. Anthony, but rather requests his personal aid, to the point of requesting that he could help those who seek to regain God’s grace. Objectively, I’d say that this is borderline between requesting prayer from the saints in all times (which is in the cannon of a lot of denominations) and Medianship, communicating or requesting service from the Dead (1 Sam. 28 .

While there is nothing wrong with requesting prayer from others, I believe there is something wrong in calling for assistance from the Dead. As the Ghost of Samuel (or a demon impersonating Samuel) clearly illistrates, God has the final say, and no ammount of cajoling the dead will effect anything. Is there some sort of “Catholic erata” which states that all prayers to Saints are offered with the intent you mentioned, even if they are worded as prayers to men and not to God (See the death of Harod, Acts 23)? Or is this prayer simple a poor example, and not refelective of saint-prayers as a whole?
 
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