Protestant converts: How did you deal with the Church's Marian doctrines?

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Wait, you cannot separate God into “Jesus the Human” and "Jesus the God’. THERE’S your problem, hon. Mary did not give birth to “Human Jesus” but to Jesus True God and True Man.

Once you realize that, you will be on your way to a more accurate perception of the Blessed Mother, and thus a more accurate perception of Jesus.
 
Yes. Jesus demands our all…but in the same way that loving our own children don’t detract from our love of God, love of His mother who is also our spiritual mother, doesn’t detract from our love of God.

We should love our work too! And again, if our principal intention is to love God by doing our work well in service of Him and love of others, then it’s a good thing.

God is Our Father…he’s not a miserly mean jealous God. Think family love, the happiest, most generous and cheerful and bright love imaginable. This is the love that God wants us to take into the world…it’s why He put us in families so we would spread the family spirit (His spirit) into all of the world.

If we welcome our neighbor into our home cheerfully and generously…we don’t make God jealous. If we ask our neighbor to help us change out the water heater…God doesn’t get jealous.

Why would God get jealous if we ask Mary for a favor?

Take Mary’s example at the wedding feast in Cana…initially Jesus pushed back on Mary’s request about the need for wine. But then he agreed to help based on her intercession for the wedding couple.

Did Jesus get jealous because others didn’t come to him about the wine shortage problem? No, he responded because His mother pleaded with Him and because of her utter humble confidence that he would do it, and how He overacheived!
 
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setarcos said:
How you treat others IS how your treating God.
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So by that standard, applied to you, you are questioning God’s saying “my life” to his own Mother who cooperated to give Him his earthly body and life. Without Mary, there would be no birth of Jesus.
 
Have I told you yet that I appreciate your sharing your viewpoint with me? If not, I do.
I really understand what your trying to tell me. Do you understand and appreciate the viewpoint I’m trying to share with you? I understand what topic this thread is about. I hope you understand that what I say isn’t simply about you and your wife. If so I apologize, I have assumed too much and explained too little. Millions of people have come to an apparent misunderstanding of the status Mary holds within the Catholic religion. To thousands this alone is the stumbling block that prevents them from accepting Catholicism. The title of this thread alone should clue you in to that reality. I have nothing against loving Mary. Why would I ? I have nothing against someone adoring her or praying to her if that makes them feel good. To the extent that Catholicism has incorporated her adoration and status into its doctrines and statements of belief as if our salvation depends on it I think is a mistake. I could argue the reliability and truth of some of the Mythos which has built up around Mary but this is not the thread for that. I’m talking about being careful with what we say and what we do knowing that others will interpret its explicit appearance not your implicit feelings. As for the Saints, I think you have a mistaken view of them. Saints are not Saints because everything they did or said was perfect. Many quotes from saints are personal opinion and self expression not meant to be universally applied to everyone. A Saints life expressed on earth is not infallible.
 
I did not say that the love of one diminishes the love one can give to others. I believe love is a grace God instills in all his children and because of this cannot be diminished in expression. Your life however encompasses who you are and how you express your free will. Love is not unique to you. Its source is God and universally distributed. Your life however is unique to you and using it in an expression dictates how others may perceive your priorities in expressing yourself uniquely. To give your life to another doesn’t diminish your capacity to love others but it may diminish your expression of love towards others. I have given examples of wayward lovers whose love for one another has perverted their capacity to love others.
 
Lol, I understand what you think you mean. You seem to not be getting what I’m saying. It may seem to you I asked a question but in asking the question about a meaningless statement I’m making a statement. If you make a statement which at its core is meaningless it can be open to almost any interpretation. Again words are powerful and meaningless words dangerous. Think on this…some might believe your loving your wife too much if you think your loving her but in actuality are only succeeding in neglecting others who need your love as well. I sense your getting hostile towards me. I hope this is not the case. I mean you no disrespect by reasoning with you.
 
Ahhh, here is where it gets tricky. For me anyways. I didn’t say Jesus, I said God. You equated the presence of Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and the Father within the womb of Mary. What’s more unless you equivocate on what you mean by God you equate Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and the Father with being God. Where you find one you necessarily find the others, God be simple and undivided in his nature. Therefore where scripture says God is in everything, through everything, and sustains everything we necessarily must believe Jesus is within every woman’s womb. How is it that you would separate the presence of one person in the Godhead from the others and not divide God in his simplicity?
Of course we could delve into the theological verbiage and vague terminology of Christology etc. but I’ve presented the simple and straight forward conundrum that in my view hasn’t been answered…yet.
 
I don’t think you’ve answered Timothy, though.
In essence, God is found within all of us. . .even nonChristians. . .in a spiritual presence.

But God was physically present in the womb not of ‘all women’ but in only one woman. There is a difference.
 
Ahhh…confusing definitions in order to support a supposition. If by birth you mean Mary was the vessel from which Jesus was delivered to the world then ok, I can deal with that. If by birth you mean that Jesus’s divinity was somehow brought into existence through Maries agency then that is arguably false. Jesus’s divinity wasn’t created by Mary, it wasn’t immature when Mary birthed Jesus, it wasn’t nurtured to maturity as a babe goes through stages of growth. It would have been fully there in all its being from the beginning lest we fall into absurdity and meaninglessness. You cannot equate the creation of a unique individual by two humans to the birth that Mary delivered. In my opinion calling Mary the Mother of God is a human psychological device misapplied to the realities of what it means to be God. Here’s one for you…how is it that Jesus the Man lived, died, and was resurrected and ascended to heaven, having his existence (as a man, with a mans nature) yet we say Man and necessarily the nature of being a man is a creature created by God? Either the nature of being a man existed as part of the nature of God timelessly, before creation, or we must separate the humanity of the son from his divinity at some point.
 
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Mary is the Mother of Jesus, Jesus has two natures, human and divine. Mary is not God nor did she create Jesus. It’s pretty clear.

Now before going further, are you Catholic?
 
The Hypostatic Union is a mystery. You know, if you think about it, would you really expect to be able to thoroughly understand God? And explain everything about Him?

Christ’s death and resurrection are miraculous. You don’t have a problem with Christ dying and rising, so why is it a problem for Him to be born of a woman as both true God and true man?

Here’s another question for you that is probably related to your conceptions. . .Now that Christ has died and risen from the dead, do you think that He has ‘discarded’ His humanity like an unnecessary garment, or do you think that He remains God and Man?
 
I’m sorry, you must elaborate for me on where God said this to Mary? I haven’t been able to locate the source.
 
Thank you for your contribution. I believe however that scripture itself separates actions taken by “Jesus the man” and by “Jesus the God”. For instance when Jesus displays ignorance of an event, or when he displays a separate will from Gods, or when he relates to us that the Father is greater than he. At most I would concede that Mary by being human contributed her humanity to Jesus, she could not have contributed her divinity since she herself is not divine. You must agree Jesus’s birth is unique in all of history. Why do you insist on judging Maries birthing by normal human standards? The birth was an explicit fulfillment of prophecy. Mary has no implicit contribution to Jesus existence other than this. This is why Jesus never calls her mother. He even explicitly goes so far as to tell us who his mother actually is and his statement does not place Mary in this unique status. Jesus could just as well have walked out of the wilderness and began his mission as God becoming man to redeem us. He didn’t in order to fulfill prophecy and all righteousness. The same reason he told John that even though it seemed not necessary he must baptize him in order to fulfill all righteousness. A sinless man needs no baptism.
 
anon65111186 said:
How you treat others IS how your treating God.

So by that standard, applied to you, you are questioning God’s saying “my life” to his own Mother who cooperated to give Him his earthly body and life. Without Mary, there would be no birth of Jesus.
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If whatever you do to me is what you do to God.
You are questioning me about whether it is good to say “our life” or “my life” to Mary.
Therefore, you are questioning also God about saying “my life” to Mary.

That is your logic, am I wrong?
 
Scripture clearly states God is a spirit. What was physically present in Mary’s womb was Jesus’s humanity. In this manner his physical uniqueness would simply be confined to who he is as a human no different than the uniqueness any human baby has as a person. Physically speaking that is.
 
Your trying to paint me into a logical corner. My statement concerns our conduct with each other as God has dictated to us to treat each other. We are surrogates for Gods desires. There are rules. One of them states that we should dedicate our lives to God alone. Another states we should love one another. You appear to be trying to make my statement equate you to God because I’ve stated my treatment of you is how I’m treating God and therefore my statement must be wrong. This is a literal fallacy and this is not what scriptures intent is. Reread Psalm 51 verse 4. David committed adultery with Bathsheba and basically murdered her husband. Yet his sins were against God alone. We are merely surrogates for Gods desires. This is the ancient understanding. Whatever you do to the kings representative you do to the king. Not literally but figuratively. I thought I was clear that I am not a Catholic. Perhaps that was another thread. I would consider myself at this juncture non denominational. I am open to change that though.
 
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I agree, God is a mystery. I also believe that what is a mystery should not be used to dictate belief. You cannot understand God. You can only understand what God gives you to understand. I accept Christ died and was resurrected in order to redeem our transgressions. What I do have a problem with is calling Mary the Mother of God instead of The Mother of Jesus. The statement “Mother of God” is dangerously close to and obviously a remnant of the early Pagan beliefs in the Goddess Mothers of old. Its demonstrably linear in development. Its like taking a cow and a goat, the cow being useful and the goat trouble, and saying ok, were going to call our cow a goat now. We know its a cow and we’d never confuse it with being a goat but we’ll call it a goat now and explain to people that its not actually a goat its a cow and in this way maybe we can get the goat herders to be more comfortable with being cow herders instead.
As for your last question. I would ask you this, do you believe that his humanity is part of the Godhead now?
 
Theology 101

There is only ONE person, not TWO in Jesus. The Divine Son of God took on a human nature in addition to His divine nature.
 
That is not Christian understanding. You cannot separate God into “Part A human, part B God”. The two ‘parts’ are in a complete union, inseparable.
 
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