The Importance of Mary in Catholicism

[StTommyMore]

Of all of them only John Wesley used the word consent (yet it’s nowhere found in the Scriptural text itself). And that doesn’t surprise me. However:
(1) “assented” is not “consented”
(2) “acquiesced” is not “consented”
(3) “accepted” is not “consented”
(4) “cooperate” is not "consented"Do you think John Wesley found the word “consented” in the Biblical text? Did he show you in his commentary where Gabriel asked for Mary’s consent/permission? Assented, acquiesced, accepted and cooperated all relate to humble belief in what the angel told her. Consent does not. “Consent” is out of the realm of humble belief. That’s why you don’t find that word in the text, but rather that she “believed” that there would be a fulfillment of what had been spoken TO her (Lk. 1:45). Maybe it’s time you acquiesced and humbly believed the text. How bout it?

John Wesley had a very strong Marian devotion and prayed the Rosary daily. Will you follow his footsteps in honoring the Blessed Mother?

 

[moondweller]

kepha1:

Know Mary, know Jesus.

When Philip told Jesus to show them the Father, Jesus responded:"Have I been so long with you, and {yet} you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father;Are you making Mary part of the Godhead when you say “know Mary, know Jesus?” It’s remarks like yours that spawned the question: “Is there Catholicism without Mary?”

Does anyone who does the will of the Father have their free will removed?

Contrary to what Paul c has said about me, I’m one who considers belief to be a free will act. According to the text Mary “believed” what was told TO her and would be fulfilled THROUGH her. Her free will was not violated. She was free to believe it or not - and she did - and it was fulfilled.

 

[moondweller]

pablope:

So, what do you do in your realm that are not Catholic ways, that would indicate that you are considering/counting her as “blessed”? You cited catholic ways, but you did not account about what you do.

I’m not required to “do” anything. She was “blessed” and I count/consider her blessed because of what was spoken TO her and fulfilled THROUGH her. Biblically, that’s as far as we’re allowed to go with Mary: To count her blessed. And she was uniquely blessed amongst all women, but not above all women.

 

[moondweller]

paul c:

this is exactly the problem. Moondweller denies that man has free will.

You’re so wrong. I do not deny that man has free will.

You see, the reason he is so vehemently denying Mary’s consent is that he understands that if Mary actually had a choice, then free will is proven and his theology is in ashes.

So wrong again. I believe Mary had a free will. I deny the whole notion of “the consent of Mary” simply because it’s not there. Mary’s response was one of belief to what was spoken to her and would be fulfilled through her (Lk. 1:45). You deny what the Scriptures actually reveal because you must vehemently protect your Mariology. I don’t blame you, it’s vital to your religion. One might say, without it there is no Catholicism.

" May it be done to me according to thy word" clearly states consent to anyone who understand the English language.

It clearly states she believed what was spoken to her. Her response was a response of belief. Gabriel didn’t ask her anything. He stated it and explained it. She “believed” it and it was fulfilled through her. That’s as far as the text goes with her.

Once you believe as he does, then you need nothing else - no church, no sacraments, no good works, you really don’t even need the Bible. Its all about believing that Jesus will save you, no matter what if you just believe in his mercy.

So wrong again. Where does the Bible say, “Believe in Christ’s mercy and you will be saved?” That’s not the soteriology of my Bible. Mercy is God holding back what I deserve. Grace is God giving to me freely what I don’t deserve.

He will tell you that men were predestined for heaven or hell, but that’s really meaningless operatively, because its all about believing Jesus will save you if you believe that he will.

Salvation, according to God’s written Word, is not a future event (it is, however, in Catholicism). According to the Scriptures it’s a present reality through faith in a past finality: “For by grace you have been saved through faith…”.

The problem for Moondweller, ultimately is that he doesn’t balance God’s Mercy with Justice

God’s mercy is that He sent His Son to die for us while we were yet sinners. By that blood sacrifice God’s justice was met, perfectly. Which then opened the door for God’s GRACE (unmerited favor) unto eternal salvation to be exercised toward all the “ungodly” who would BELIEVE the Word (gospel, good news) concerning the Person and, once for all, sacrificial work of His beloved Son on our behalf. In like manner, Mary BELIEVED the words Gabriel spoke TO her (which was the Word of God) and it was fulfilled THROUGH her (Lk. 1:45).

 

[moondweller]

John Wesley had a very strong Marian devotion and prayed the Rosary daily. Will you follow his footsteps in honoring the Blessed Mother?

I follow the Word of God, not the footsteps of men.

 

[Miguel_Sastre]

The point is you don’t consider her blessed because your actions do not follow through with your professed belief. How you act is how you believe. Everyone who has faith in the Scriptures demonstrate their faith through action. You say that you call her blessed, but your actions say otherwise. If you truly gave the Blessed Mother the respect she deserves, then you would have no problems with the dogmas. The truth is you do not respect her at all.

Hello,

When I read this, I thought, "is there any chance this guy would grant the possibility that a Christian could agree with Elizabeth (“blessed are you among women”) without agreeing with, say, that Mary was immaculately conceived or assumed into heaven? Until 1854, no Catholic was required to believe the former, nor the latter until 1950. And yet lots of people, Catholics included, still called her “blessed” even though they may have denied those dogmas.

I’m always taken back when Catholics interpret criticism of their ideas (such as the Catholic Marian dogmas) as criticism of Mary herself. I do hope you understand that no one is directing his/her criticism at the one of whom scripture says, “all generations will call blessed.”

Our criticism is directed at the church that has elevated its traditions to the level of scripture and then threatens anathema to anyone who would deny those traditions. But more specifically, we’re directing our criticism toward the arguments used to justify those traditions since they seldom have any basis in what we do know to be true–inspired scripture–and sometimes seem to even contradict scripture.

For example, claiming Mary is sinless seems to contradict the universality of sin stated in “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 6:23). The “all” doesn’t seem to admit of a special exception for Mary. Perhaps Paul doesn’t envision some categories of humans in the “all”–say, perhaps, children too young to be accountable for their sin or severely retarded people lacking the faculties to understand what is sin, etc. But since the context of Romans concerns two categories of people, Jews and Gentiles, and since Mary was a Jew, then Paul almost certainly would have included Mary in the category of sinner. So pending an explicit exception clause in scripture, Mary belongs to the category of sinner, just like everyone else. That, biblically speaking, is the clear truth we have to obey. When a tradition comes along that contradicts scripture, we’re supposed to reject that tradition, not elevate it to a dogma.

 

[GreggAlvarez]

Moondweller,

You did not understand a word I said. You may say that you did but I can assure you that you did not. I told you that Gabriel himself honored Mary by saying, “Hail, full of grace.” The ONLY other person this was ever said to was Jesus. I can understand why you conveniently ignored my response though. No biggie.

And I did not admit anything by asking you to provide an acceptable response (which you failed to do). Upon replying, you actually DELETED my answer from the quote! Asking a question, deleting the answer and responding to the rest by saying I cannot answer is a terrible form of argument. And completely useless. You talk about logic quite a bit and most of your logic is good. You should know that what you did is not logical. I showed you where we are to honor Mary. If Gabriel did it, so should we. You may know more Bible verses than me but I know Mary better than you do. You are probably going to throw that previous sentence way out of proportion but that is fine.

I in turn asked you to show me where Scriptures say we are NOT supposed to honor Mary. Hypothetically, if you do find it, that would mean Gabriel went against scripture. By getting on the offensive you have undeniably proven that you cannot find that passage or anything remotely similar.

Your problem is that you are asking us to give exacts in the Scripture. Does it say “honor Mary”? Nope. Does honoring Mary happen in Scriptures? Yup. Does it say “Incarnation”? Nope. Does an Incarnation happen? Yup. So and so forth.

And nice way to change my words to where I look like an idiot. Although, that is not too hard but still! No Catholic on this planet thinks Mary is blessed because we call her blessed. She is blessed because of God and nobody else. Let me get this straight though. You consider Mary blessed, right? You count Mary blessed, right? But you will not call her blessed Mary, right? What on God’s green earth does that even mean? She is blessed but how dare we say, “Blessed Mary”? “Blessed are thou among women”. You “consider” or “count” her blessed but you will not “SAY” she is blessed? If you consider the Trinity holy, will you not say Holy Trinity? Come on… You are better than this Moondweller. You always speak of logic but this is what you are telling us!

Show us where it says in scripture that we should not venerate or honor Mary. Be careful though. Gabriel did it before anybody else.

 

[GreggAlvarez]

Miguel,
That is not Romans 6:23 by the way. I have no clue where it is but I know it is somewhere in Romans because I have seen it. It does say “all have sinned”. Where does that leave Jesus? He is man. According to your idea, He sinned also. What about in Psalm 14:3 when it mentions “not one does what is right”? Yet, the very next psalm (15) talks about doing what is right.

Exaggerations, hyberboles… They are in the Bible too.

 

[Matorin]

In my case he keeps up very well, because he simply leaves 99% of my questions unanswered.

Isn’t leaving a lot of questions unanswered kinda the definition of not keeping up?

We can get philosophical if you wish, but it is not necessary. It goes like this:

1. By being one with Jesus, and because we share in all the aspects of his humanity, we likewise share in his relationship with Mary, which is that of mother and Son.

Could you explain what you mean by being one with Jesus? I think there is another difference between what you are saying and what many evangelicals believe. While we certainly share in physicality with Jesus, we do not share a) a sinful nature or b) sinful actions with him. He is rather exempt from those things, right? Although I think we’re meaning the same thing here.

A thought I had is, if we share in one relationship with Jesus, why not all of them? Is Joseph our father? Are the original 12 our Apostles? Did Judas betray us? Were we crucified on the tree? (I’d love to talk about Galations 2, it’s my favorite chapter in Galations, so much good stuff in there ) The way Jesus is the Son is so completely different than the way you or I are a son, I just am finding it hard to get the picture I think.

What things could the average hmmm lets say Reformed and beyond (i.e. not Lutheran or Anglican) do to honor Mary within the context of their denomination, seeing as they, in general, do not believe in prayer to the dead?

 

[EricFilmer]

(1) “assented” is not “consented”
(2) “acquiesced” is not “consented”
(3) “accepted” is not “consented”
(4) “cooperate” is not “consented”

In terms of the underlined words that I used in Post #133 (from which you drew this list), you left out…
“Submits” (Matthew Henry Commentary)
“Willing submission” (Dr. Buchner)
“Expressed desire” (Dr. Utley)

Are you saying that their usage of these other terms constitute statements of belief rather than consent? If so then clearly explain why. I’ll get to what the other above terms mean and don’t mean in my next post.

Of all of them only John Wesley used the word consent (yet it’s nowhere found in the Scriptural text itself)… Do you think John Wesley found the word “consented” in the Biblical text? Did he show you in his commentary where Gabriel asked for Mary’s consent/permission?

I showed where John Wesley clearly stated that Mary “consented”. As you, yourself, recognized, he used the same word that we have been using. It doesn’t matter what words were actually in his Bible. The point is that a prominent Protestant theologian, who inspired the fashioning of the entire Methodist denomination, interpreted this part of the Gospel of Luke the exact same way we have in this forum. So obviously it is not strictly a Catholic-oriented interpretation, and your own interpretation is in opposition with prominent Protestant theologians.

(Continued in my next post)

 

[EricFilmer]

(Continued)

Assented, acquiesced, accepted and cooperated all relate to humble belief in what the angel told her. Consent does not. “Consent” is out of the realm of humble belief. That’s why you don’t find that word in the text, but rather that she “believed” that there would be a fulfillment of what had been spoken TO her (Lk. 1:45).

All the following definitions are from Dictionary.com
dictionary.reference.com

I’m adding the underlines for emphasis.

Consent:

1. to permit, approve, or agree; comply or yield (often fol. by to or an infinitive): He consented to the proposal. We asked her permission, and she consented.

Assent:

1. to agree or concur; subscribe to (often fol. by to ): to assent to a statement.
2. to give in; yield; concede: Assenting to his demands, I did as I was told.

(Notice that the definitions for consent and assent both include “to agree” and “yield”)

Acquiesced:
to assent tacitly; submit or comply silently or without protest; agree; consent

(Notice that the definitions for consent and acquiesced both include “to comply”)

Accepted:

1. to take or receive (something offered); receive with approval or favor: to accept a present; to accept a proposal.
2. to agree or consent to; accede to: to accept a treaty; to accept an apology.

In each of these cases, they are all pretty much saying the same thing. The specific differences are too slight to make a distinction between them and the act of consenting (in terms of what the Protestant theologians and Catholics are saying about Mary’s reaction to Gabriel’s message).

Cooperate:

1. to work or act together or jointly for a common purpose or benefit.
2. to work or act with another or other persons willingly and agreeably.
3. to practice economic cooperation.

Consider what you said in the above quote:
“Assented, acquiesced, accepted and cooperated all relate to humble belief in what the angel told her.”

Please clearly explain to me how the verb “cooperate”, as defined above, can mean “a humble belief.” And if you have another credible definition of cooperate you want to use, then cite it (and the source) and use it as well.

(Continued in my next post)

 

[EricFilmer]

(Continued…)

I want to spend a little bit more time on Matthew Henry’s use of the word “acquiescence.” He, himself, elaborates on what he means by the term. As you can see in Post #133, he states that it means to “submit”, and the context is that Mary “humbly desires that it may be so.” Obviously Henry does not see this as a simple statement of belief. Is belief something that she is submitting? No. Does she humbly desire that her “belief” may be so? No.

So your objections do not hold out. In each of those seven cases I listed in Post #133, Protestant theologians were interpreting the Gospel of Luke in terms of Mary giving her consent. Even if they did not use the exact word, they embraced the same meaning.

This consent of Mary was given within the framework of what I presented in Post #144 (i.e., the second example therein).

Maybe it’s time you acquiesced and humbly believed the text. How bout it?

Maybe it’s time that you acquiesced to my challenge for you to name ONE credible Scripture scholar or theologian who backs up your claim that Mary did not give her consent. After all, this is now the fourth time that I have make this request.

Whatever your notion is concerning what happened between Gabriel and Mary, I believe it is on the far fringe of Christian biblical interpretation (modern and historic) until you can demonstrate otherwise. And yet you seem to present your view as the obvious conclusion. So far, the only obvious thing about your conclusion is that you can’t find a single scholar to back you up on it.

And how about all my other questions from Post #90?

 

[pablope]

I’m not required to “do” anything. She was “blessed” and I count/consider her blessed because of what was spoken TO her and fulfilled THROUGH her. Biblically, that’s as far as we’re allowed to go with Mary: To count her blessed. And she was uniquely blessed amongst all women, but not above all women.

Well…there is a saying that action speak louder than words…so, if you are not required to do anything…is there anything that you would voluntarily do that would show how you are treating Mary as blessed among all women?

It is also said that treat others as you would like them to treat you…so if what you are stating about Mary, how you are treating her…would you not expect Jesus to treat you the same you are treating her Mother? What I mean is, would you not expect your words to come back to you at the time of your judgement?

 

[GreggAlvarez]

Moondweller,
We also follow the Word of God. I know it feels better for you to think and say that we do not do that. But we do.

Nice childish jab at the Church by saying Catholicism would falter without Mariology. Considering Mariology is Christological, that is absolutely TRUE! Yay for Moondweller. EXCEPT that you misunderstand that Mariology does NOT leave out Christ anymore than instruments leave out music or a words leave out a story. Other than that, you are absolutely right. Christianity without Mariology (in the Church’s sense of the word) would not exist.

“May it be done to me…” is consent! There is zero way around this. This should not even be debate. She believed AND she consented that she would bear Emmanuel. She had to consent. Otherwise, she would not have bore God. Yes, she believed the words said to her. Yes, she believed it was to be fulfilled through her. BUT she also had to consent that it be done to her according to God’s word it was not small task. She consented though. I am not sure why, if she consented, you would have a problem with this. She believed and consented. No way around it unless you take away free will. She believed by free will and consented by free will. Note: I am not saying you do not believe free will. I am saying that you must overlook it to say she did not consent to bearing God.

About the salvation as a past event… Here some of Jesus’ words, “…whoever endures to the end will be saved.” Lucky for me, the Church has answers to a past saving event and a future saving event! But you are at odds with Jesus in the statement. And you forgot to put that people must believe and do good works for eternal salvation. And according to the addendum you made (or should have made) while reading the last paragraph Mary believed the words spoken to her, CONSENTED and it was fulfilled through her. It would be ridiculous to say she believed and then it was fulfilled. She had to consent. You cannot deny it. Do not be stubborn. It really has nothing to do with any Marian dogma we have. So agreeing to this will not automatically make you believe Immaculate Conception, Mother of God, etc… It just help be in line with the rest of Christianity.

 

[kepha1]

When Philip told Jesus to show them the Father, Jesus responded:
"Have I been so long with you, and {yet} you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father;

This quote is irrelevant to “No Mary, no Jesus…” What Jesus says to Philip has nothing to do with how Jesus came to become fully human. Jesus got his humanity from his mother. Without Mary, there would be no Jesus. Philip did not give birth to Jesus. Philip could not see that the Father and Him were one and you cannot see the BIBLICAL portrait of Mary.

The second part, “…know Mary, know Jesus.” Needs a little more unpacking.

Are you making Mary part of the Godhead when you say “know Mary, know Jesus?” It’s remarks like yours that spawned the question: "Is there Catholicism without Mary?"Contrary to what Paul c has said about me, I’m one who considers belief to be a free will act.

But it is you that keeps arguing that belief doesn’t require consent because the word “consent” is not in Luke 1. We agree that belief is a free will act, yet you say Mary gave no consent. And you give quotes about how she “believed”. This is not logical. On your grounds, Jesus never gave consent to the Father because he never used the word.

According to the text Mary “believed” what was told TO her and would be fulfilled THROUGH her. Her free will was not violated. She was free to believe it or not - and she did - and it was fulfilled.

Glad to see we are getting somewhere.

 

[kepha1]

Originally Posted by moondweller http://forums.catholic-questions.org/images/buttons_khaki/viewpost.gif
Are you making Mary part of the Godhead when you say “know Mary, know Jesus?” It’s remarks like yours that spawned the question: "Is there Catholicism without Mary?"Contrary to what Paul c has said about me, I’m one who considers belief to be a free will act.

The clearest line of separation between Fundamentalism and historic Christianity, when it comes to devotion to Mary, is the differing perspectives on the dictum “to Jesus through Mary.” Historic Christianity has never seen Mary in isolation from Jesus and has viewed Marian doctrine and devotion as the safest, surest and swiftest path to a true and lasting commitment to Christ. Fundamentalists claim that they “do not need Mary” to go to Jesus and that they prefer to go directly to Jesus.

This response is a misunderstanding of the traditional teaching. All Christians can and should pray directly to Jesus. But no one actually “goes” to Jesus “alone”. We all carry with us some mediating group or individual when we go to Jesus. Fundamentalists approach him with a Calvinist picture of a god who has predestined the majority of mankind to damnation or with a Dispensationalist picture of a god who operates through various covenants and dispensations established with Israel and the church. Faith movement Charismatics have their own health-and-wealth conception of god. Nobody goes to Jesus “alone”. We go with various pictures of God and salvation. If we go to Jesus through Mary we go with the right picture, the historic picture, the God-given picture.

**
When we talk about going “to Jesus through Mary” we are not suggesting that Mary’s function is to “introduce” us to Jesus. We are talking about growing deeper in our life in Jesus with and through Mary’s assistance. With Mary as our model, teacher and guide we become the kind of Christian God wants us to be. With and through Mary we become more and more like Jesus. Thus “through Mary” does not mean that she functions as a door-opening “go-between”. In actuality, it means that she is acting as our Mother trying to make us more like her divine Son. We are simply doing what Jesus commanded in John 19 and what the book of Revelation teaches when it says that those who “keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ” are “her seed.” (Revelation 12:17).
mariology.com/book-mainmenu-28/9-10-marian-devotion

 

[moondweller]

So far, the only obvious thing about your conclusion is that you can’t find a single scholar to back you up on it.

So far you still haven’t been able to show me IN THE TEXT where Gabriel asked for Mary’s consent. You have to go OUT of the Scriptures (and not all that successfully).

And how about all my other questions from Post #90?

You think they’re going to change anything? How about sticking to the TEXT and showing me where Gabriel asked for Mary’s consent? How bout it, Eric?

 

[moondweller]

Originally Posted by moondweller
According to the text Mary “believed” what was told TO her and would be fulfilled THROUGH her. Her free will was not violated. She was free to believe it or not - and she did - and it was fulfilled.

To the contrary, if you agree with my statement then it is you who is getting somewhere.

 

[moondweller]

“May it be done to me…” is consent! There is zero way around this. This should not even be debate. She believed AND she consented that she would bear Emmanuel. She had to consent.

You can keep saying it but it doesn’t change anything. Show me where Gabriel asks her consent. Show me where Gabriel asks “Will you…”

 

[Matorin]

If I grow closer to God through Jesus, and closer to Jesus through Mary, is there someone I can go through to get closer to Mary? Some way to grow deeper in our life in Mary?

It’s interesting, If you replace the word Jesus with the Father, and Mary with Jesus, you get something that I think Moondweller would agree with.

"With Mary as our model, teacher and guide we become the kind of Christian God wants us to be. With and through Mary we become more and more like Jesus. "

Also, please stop saying “Without Mary there is no Jesus” because it is a foolish, endless (cyclical) argument. There is no point in speculating because we cannot know God’s mind and we cannot know alternative universes or however you want to look at it. It’s really frustrating to moondweller (as well as most Protestants I would imagine) so, with 1 Cor 8:13 in mind, could you stop?