Marian Apparitions

So what happens when millions around the world are "asking" Mary something? Is she now omnipresent (a trait only God has)? I know if 100 people asked me to pray for them at once I can only hear one at a time.

 

No, the mother is not God, but the Son is, so not a red herring: the Biblicist's post implied at least that he did not believe the Son to be God.

This

 

You replace Jesus Christ with Mary by your communications with Mary. There is ONE mediatory BETWEEN God and man and it is not Mary.

Find one example in Acts to Revelation where anyone communicated with Mary as you are describing???? Are you more spiritual than Paul or Peter or John or the congregations that walked with the apostles?

Your "Mary" is not the Mary of the Scriptures but the pagan Madonna, Queen of heaven of Babylon.

 

"All generations will call me blessed": "The Church's devotion to the Blessed Virgin is intrinsic to Christian worship."515 The Church rightly honors "the Blessed Virgin with special devotion. From the most ancient times the Blessed Virgin has been honored with the title of 'Mother of God,' to whose protection the faithful fly in all their dangers and needs. . . . This very special devotion . . . differs essentially from the adoration which is given to the incarnate Word and equally to the Father and the Holy Spirit, and greatly fosters this adoration."516 The liturgical feasts dedicated to the Mother of God and Marian prayer, such as the rosary, an "epitome of the whole Gospel," express this devotion to the Virgin Mary.517

 

God would have to relay the messages to her.

This might seem ridiculous, since it seems to defeat the purpose of asking her to pray for us if God has to tell her that we asked her to pray for us. The answer is that God wants his children to be one body, and He wants us to assist each other and pray for each other. Another way of looking at it is that in heaven we will be able to 'see God' which may include, if God permits it, an ability to see things that God sees, due to our connectedness with Him.

Certainly God doesn't require any assistance in running heaven, yet the bible says that the saints will 'reign with God' in heaven. Why? Because God wants to include us in his plans even thought it isn't strictly necessary.

 

But doesn't this argument also rule out communicating with our earthly brothers and sisters to ask them to pray for us? That's what I don't understand. Why is that kind of mediation/intercession acceptable to you but not the intercession of a saint in heaven?

I don't think the practice can be found in the bible. All I'm trying to do is show that the practice isn't against the bible.

 

Sorry, but this makes no sense and sounds suspiciously to me like Nestorianism, which we all know is heresy.

 

Actually it is your position that denies Jesus is God the Son. You believe that God had to be conceived rather than eternal.

My position is that God the Son TOOK UPON HIMSELF what the Holy Spirit conceived. My position is that the Father only PREPARED A BODY (Heb. 10:5-8) while God the Son INDWELT that prepared body WHEN it was conceived.

Mary is not the Mother of God because the term "mother" refers to what is "conceived" in her and what is born of flesh is flesh. Humanity cannot conceive divinity.

 

You don't see how silly this is? We pray to Mary...but since she is not omniscient or omnipresent God has to become her divine secretary and relay the messages to her...so she can turn right around and tell Him the prayers to her? How can anybody believe this stuff?

 

Then you deny the Godhead of Jesus, pure and simple.

[reply to the Biblicist]

 

Think it through! You are teaching that God the Son is not eternal but was conceived in time and space in the womb of Mary.

I am saying that God the Son is eternal and WHEN the Holy Spirit conceived "flesh" (human nature) in Mary that God the Son INDWELT what was conceived. I am saying when the Father PREPARED a body that God the Son TOOK UPON HIMSELF that body.

The "child is born" but the Son is "given"! If not, then the Son had no previous existence before birth. Think it through! What is born of flesh is flesh! Dieity cannot be conceived by humanity.

 

Yes I see that it's kind of silly and illogical. Which is why I don't bother much with devotions to saints. I don't really see why it is necessary. On the other hand I don't think its sinful, since I don't give them more respect than they are due, i.e. I don't worship them.

It's also illogical to ask our brothers and sisters to pray for us, isn't it, since we have Jesus Christ to mediate for us.

 

You are the one actually denying the Godhead! If you teach that God the Son - actual deity - was conceived by Mary then you are dying God the Son is eternal but had a specific origin in time and space.

I am using the biblical language which shows that what was conceived was human nature because what is born of flesh is only flesh. God the Son preexisted what was concived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of Mary and when the Holy Spirit conceived a child in Mary the Son of God indwelt that child, took upon himself that child and became 100% Man as well as 100% God. Prior to that conception God the Son WAS NOT MAN but was God. Upon that conception God the Son "BECAME" flesh and dwelt among us.

 

I'm glad you don't, but as the portion of the catechism I quoted, the religion as a whole does.

Not at all since believers are in Christ.

 

Which is very odd that you cannot see a clear distinction between the two.

 

Catholicism has a distinction between the devotion given to the saints and the adoration given to God. There is a distinction there for sure. But I suppose you see both of those types of devotion as worship. I guess that's the problem.

The main distinction, as I see it, is that we believe the saints are completely subject to the power of God. They would cease to exist if God stopped holding them in existence. They can do nothing apart from God. No 'false god' or god-claimant would ever accept that kind of limitation. It would be a great insult to a false god to be told that they are completely reliant on another God. It places them below God. It wouldn't be worship at all, but rather an insult to a false god.

I must be really dense or something, and I'm afraid to keep belaboring the point but.... aren't the saints in heaven 'in Christ' too? Wouldn't the same thing apply to them?

 

Hmm. When I talk to a saint in heaven I feel like I'm talking to another person like, say, my friend I know at church, except this person is far away so I just speak out loud and hope he hears me. It's a relationship between equals. It's not like when I talk to God, my maker, the creator of the universe.

 

and yet you just continue on.

 

Catholics focus on Mary so they "see" her alot.

Pentecostals focus on the supernatural and Satan so they see semons alot.

I am Baptist, and i focus on the next pot-luck dinner, so i see fried chicken alot.

But seriously, people see what they want to see.

John