No Immaculate Conception, No Immutable God

[MarysLurker]

No, He could have just used a different plan. Not because because He was choosing based on what worked, but because He both chose a plan and saw it worked through all eternity.

You are making a leap of logic I don’t understand.

Right, but He didn’t. I think I’ve said several times that since He knows everything from all eternity, He would not have chosen the plan that He actually did if the success rate was less than 100%.

 

[Wesrock]

tafan2:

No, He could have just used a different plan. Not because because He was choosing based on what worked, but because He both chose a plan and saw it worked through all eternity.

You are making a leap of logic I don’t understand.

if the success rate was less than 100%.

This is the part that’s throwing me. God knows what the outcome would be. Success rate in our terms could be one in a trillion, if that’s the chance that will come up God knows it absolutely will with 100% certainty. There’s no chance it would go wrong for him.

 

[MarysLurker]

There’s no chance it would go wrong for him.

… because He wouldn’t choose a scenario that could go wrong. He chose this scenario. Does E have to equal mc^2? No, but in this Universe it does. In a different hypothetical universe, could E equal something else? Sure. But He didn’t make that Universe, He made this one, and if He had changed that formula, we wouldn’t be sitting here to think about it.

So I don’t think it’s a valid objection to the theory that the IC goes along with the plan of salvation. In a different plan, sure, but there is no different plan.

 

[TMC]

I’m sorry, but this argument makes no sense to me at all. It seems to rely on a lot of internal bootstrapping, beginning with the assumption that God had to do some things and could not do others. I do not find any argument that begins with that premise to be convincing in the least.

 

[Wesrock]

Wesrock:

There’s no chance it would go wrong for him.

… because He wouldn’t choose a scenario that could go wrong. He chose this scenario. Does E have to equal mc^2? No, but in this Universe it does. In a different hypothetical universe, could E equal something else? Sure. But He didn’t make that Universe, He made this one, and if He had changed that formula, we wouldn’t be sitting here to think about it.

So I don’t think it’s a valid objection to the theory that the IC goes along with the plan of salvation. In a different plan, sure, but there is no different plan.

Yes, but he choose the scenario for everything, not just the plan of salvation. There is no possible scenario in which it doesn’t go 100% according to how he knows it will go. “Success rate less than 100%” makes no sense.

 

[MarysLurker]

assumption that God had to do some things and could not do others.

He is omnipotent, but He cannot violate His own nature. It’s not loving or good to allow the Fall if it isn’t for the purpose of leading to a state for humanity than was better than Adam and Eve had. It’s also not loving or good to create people and chuck them into hell without giving them a chance at salvation. That’s why He does have to save us somehow (and why Calvinism is false).

P.S. You might want to look at this Marian prayer that Pope Francis composed…

We thank you, O Mother, because in showing yourself to us
You free us of all stain of sin;
You remind us that what comes first is the grace of God,
The love of Jesus Christ who gave his life for us,
The strength of the Holy Spirit which renews all things.

He certainly doesn’t think Mary forgives our sins… but maybe he realizes Mary’s Fiat is part and parcel of our salvation on the Cross?

 

[MarysLurker]

There is no possible scenario in which it doesn’t go 100% according to how he knows it will go.

Just turn it around: a success rate of less than 100% is not possible. So if the plan of salvation requires the Incarnation, all conditions must be set so that Mary will say yes of Her own free will. That includes gracing Her to be able to do it. (That last part is clearly in the Catechism.)

 

[porthos11]

It all again goes back to the question of man’s free will vs. God’s sovereignty. As with the question of predestination, how does the Church reconcile this?

The answer is, she doesn’t. She allows multiple opinions within certain boundaries, but otherwise, this is fair game.

So in short, the answer is: Are you a Thomist or a Molinist?

Depending on THAT answer, you can come up with multiple different, but acceptable theories.

 

[TMC]

He is omnipotent, but He cannot violate His own nature. It’s not loving or good to allow the Fall if it isn’t for the purpose of leading to a state for humanity than was better than Adam and Eve had. It’s also not loving or good to create people and chuck them into hell without giving them a chance at salvation. That’s why He does have to save us somehow (and why Calvinism is false).

Just this paragraph contains limitations on the nature and abilities of God and assumptions about God - such as what the feels or would allow, and so forth. If your hypothesis is helpful to your faith you are certainly welcome to it. I do not find it convincing or helpful. No offense meant, just giving my honest opinion.

 

[Wesrock]

Wesrock:

There is no possible scenario in which it doesn’t go 100% according to how he knows it will go.

Just turn it around: a success rate of less than 100% is not possible. So if the plan of salvation requires the Incarnation, all conditions must be set so that Mary will say yes of Her own free will. That includes gracing Her to be able to do it. (That last part is clearly in the Catechism.)

Yes. But we need to be careful how we write this. Implying God’s knowledge in principle could be proven wrong or uncertain is clearly faulty.

 

[MarysLurker]

Are you a Thomist or a Molinist?

Those are both theories of predestination, that deal with exactly how God knows future events will unfold. It is assumed that God knows what Mary will do under any circumstance. There is no claim or argument that God doesn’t know what will happen. Her consent has to be free and totally borne by grace no matter who is right about predestination.

 

[MarysLurker]

Just this paragraph contains limitations on the nature and abilities of God and assumptions about God - such as what the feels or would allow, and so forth.

Those aren’t my ideas.

God is the highest good, as has been shown. But the highest good cannot bear any mingling with evil, as neither can the highest hot thing bear any mingling with the cold. The divine will, therefore, cannot be turned to evil ( Summa Contra Gentiles , I:95).

 

[tafan2]

If you cannot phrase the argument without referring to things such as success rates, you need to consider there may be a flaw in your logic.
I will respond again tomorrow at some point. But I still do not understand the argument " without the immaculate conception, God would not be immutable". We agree the immaculate conception was necessary for God’s plan of salvation (thank you for that CCC reference, btw). You have not gotten from there to immutable.

 

[MarysLurker]

without the immaculate conception, God would not be immutable".

It’s actually given that God ties our redemption to the Incarnation of Christ, the Incarnation doesn’t happen without Mary’s Fiat (note the Pope’s prayer above). Thus, Mary has to be totally borne by grace to say yes. Otherwise, God would be forced to change and that’s not possible.

 

[mcq72]

Why would God want people to be at emnity with each other? Genesis 3:15 is talking about Jesus and Mary vs. the devil and his cohort, not factions of humans versus each other.

Well you are making me double check myself…but yes, i have understood passage on several levels, but that the seed of Satan are "children of darkness, that is people…i mean Satan has no “offspring” per say, and certainly not all of Eve’s offspring were children of the light…and certainly we have martyrs for a reason …we have people killing people at emnity with one another, having spiritual reasonings.

Satan’s seed helped put Jesus on the cross…Jesus called told some folks. “You father the devil”.

 

[MarysLurker]

certainly not all of Eve’s offspring were children of the light…

Right, and neither was Eve herself, yet Genesis 3:15 refers to a Woman who will be out at the same emnity with satan and the demons as Jesus Himself—who had no sin. This is why Gabriel tells Mary She is “full of grace.”

 

[Gorgias]

By removing concupisence from Mary, He did stack the deck without removing Her freedom.

I look at it a different way. God didn’t stack the deck; He made it possible for Mary to be truly free in making her decision. That didn’t enhance her; it unencumbered her from the things that would make it impossible for her to truly give a complete, free “yes” to Him.

 

[MarysLurker]

God didn’t stack the deck; He made it possible for Mary to be truly free in making her decision. That didn’t enhance her; it unencumbered her from the things that would make it impossible for her to truly give a complete, free “yes” to Him.

Exactly, that’s why I said the “deck stacking” consisted of increasing Her freedom.

 

[mcq72]

Right, and neither was Eve herself,

Correct, but she was restored, covered by the blood, and was faithful to the carrying of the promise of a Promise, was faithful in beginning such lineage, enough to say her salvation was in childbearing.

Eve was a child of the light and began the emnity with Satan.

Do not you have to be perfect to be at emnity with Satan.

yet Genesis 3:15 refers to a Woman who will be out at the same emnity with satan and the demons as Jesus Himself—who had no sin.

Well, as you well know there is no evidence of apostolic teaching on this, as there is on the new Adam…only much later tradition. Most translations do not infer a “she” but “he”, as has been discussed.

This is why Gabriel tells Mary She is “full of grace.”

Again no apostolic teaching of this, and certainly only a much later tradition have it at birth and not there after. I mean Job was perfect (in a sense), and Enoch was taken up to heaven, and Elijah…were they immaculately conceived?

 

[tafan2]

And that proves God’s immutability how? Sorry, we must be at an impasse. I wholeheartedly believe in the Immaculate Conception. Your argument does nothing to reinforce my belief. You have not is presented any logical path from the necessity of the IC to an immutable God. Both are true.

God’s plan for salvation took cooperation by others also. If Moses would have said no when God first told him to go back to Egypt, that would have thrown a link in the plan. Yet we do not believe God is mutable because Moses was not conceived immaculatly.