Featured Today is the Feast Day of the Blessed Virgin Mary

I would be more comfortable with *earthly" mother of Christ, or *earthly* mother of the son.

 

>Mary was no different than any one of us. We all have a purpose to perform in this life. It is our duty to find out what that purpose is and do it to the best of our ability.

American egalitarianism at its worst.

 

:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

At the moment that the words "Hail Mary, full of grace"... are spoken, the idolatry has begun.

 

It is heretical to say that God has a mother.
It is heretical to pray for a feast for Mary, a dead person.

Your personal attacks are unwarranted. I am not "frothing at the mouth," but pointing out both truth and error. If you read the rules it appears to me that you fit the definition of a "troll" very well. Do you agree?

I will never show the mother of God respect for God has no mother. Maybe you serve another god. I don't know. Possible, perhaps.

The prayer, ostensibly to God, is a prayer that praises Mary. What kind of prayer is that? When the disciples came to Jesus they said: "Lord, teach us to pray." Then, Jesus said, "Pray after this manner:" Afterward follows what we know as "The Lord's Prayer." It certainly isn't a prayer about Mary. Jesus never taught that, and, in fact, reproved Mary at times. The second part of the prayer seems to assume the assumption of Mary. Doesn't it? "who have taken to yourself the blessed virgin Mary" Is that not a reference to the "Assumption" a heretical doctrine?

Mary deserves no more honor than any other believer, apostle, missionary, pastor, evangelist, or person working for the Lord. She was a vessel used of God at one point in history for one particular purpose.

 

Heretofore I have not opposed the term "Theotokos" in its original meaning, although I would not use it myself due to its susceptibility to misunderstanding and being taken to the extreme and turned into errors as the Catholics have done. I think there is nothing wrong with the term, rightly understood. However, as with so many other things that the extreme sacramentalists have done, it has been subjected to all kinds of superstition and traditions of men so that the original meaning is obscured. It simply means that Jesus was both God and man, inseparable in nature, and thus Mary bore Jesus the God-man in her womb.

Affirming this, though, is absolutely no excuse for exalting Mary to a position which she does not, should not, and cannot have.

Oh, and the "blessed Virgin Mary" was a blessed virgin only up to the time that she conceived the siblings of Jesus. Afterward, she was still blessed but no longer a virgin. Any Catholic attempts to wrest the scriptures here is a bunch of hooey.

 

The term "full of grace" in Greek is πλήρης χάριτος (pleres charitos). It is found once in the New Testament (twice if you count the Alexandrian variant of Acts 6:8) in John 1:14. The Greek word used in Luke 1:28 is κεχαριτωμένη
(kecharitomene) which comes from the verb χαριτόω (charito'o). According to Liddel's dictionary, χαριτόω means 'to show grace to any one' or in the passive 'to have grace shown one' or 'to be highly favoured'.

When the Greek New Testament was translated into Latin, κεχαριτωμένη was rendered "gratia plena" which means "full of grace". The Roman Catholic Douay-Rheims version of the Bible, which is a translation of the Latin Vulgate, translated the relevant portion of the verse as "Hail, full of grace". The Knox version, produced in the 20th century, renders it as "hail, thou who art full of grace". The reason that the Hail Mary prayer begins "Hail Mary, full of grace" is that it is a rendition of the Latin Vulgate, not the Greek text. To my knowledge, no Protestant version (nor the RC New Jerusalem Bible or New American Bible) renders the phrase as "full of grace".

Another attempt to reconcile the perpetual virginity of Mary to the siblings of Jesus is to state that the brothers and sisters of Jesus are the children of Joseph by a previous wife. The apocryphal Gospel of James (the consensus on which is that it was composed in the 2nd century AD) states that Joseph was old when he married Mary and already had children. This "Gospel" also mentions temple virgins in the Jerusalem Temple in a similar fashion to the Vestal Virgins in Rome.

 

"Hail Mary full of grace, the Lord is with thee;
Blessed are thou amoung women, and blessed is the fruit of thy wonb Jesus;
Holy Mary mother of God pray for us sinners now and forever;
Amen!"

WM

 

That was Nestorius' heresy which made Jesus an amalgamation of Humanity possed by the Holy Spirit rather than being fully God and fully human at the incarnation.

FYI. Mother of God does not mean Mary Created the creator. Mary is a creaton. It does however put into perspective who Jesus Christ is. And since Jesus is God and Homoosious with the Father she gave birth to God. She didn't create God. That is how that term "Mother of God" came to be. To put that into question; questions the very nature of Jesus Christ.

 

No it doesn't.

Did she give birth to God the Father and God the Spirit?

And absurd claim with no foundation.

 

More mental gymnastics!! Where does God's Word give her such a title? Answer? Nowhere! The title is MISLEADING and therefore deceptive and leads to idoltry which is self-evident in Roman Catholicism. It is MISLEADING because the technical truth is that God has no beginning and God preexisted the birth of Mary and so Mary cannot possibly be PROPERLY called "The Mother of God" without some mental gymnastics.

The "Mary" of Rome is the pagan "QUEEN OF HEAVEN" which is another title Rome gives her which comes from the same pagan cult that worshipped the "QUEEN OF HEAVEN" as the "Mother of God" or the mother of Baal!

The "Mary" of Rome is a pagan mistress, a harlot who requires the same kind of worship IN FORM that belongs only to God.

 

All you are doing is making assertions without any historical evidence or knowledge of the matter. You think you are making a relation to something but you are revealing your historical ignorance. You are making a case against Jesus Christ himself and against Christianity. Do you think Jesus is the first God who is believed to be raised from the dead? Long before Jesus there was Horis the Egyptian God who was killed and raised from the dead. Long before Jesus there was Mythras who was also raised from the dead. Are you too a pagan because it can be said bagans worshiped a God who raised from the dead?

That is the same logic and ridiculous reasoning you are applying to Mary being called the Mother of God. Actually study some history!

a protestant source btw. Here is another Non Catholic Source

And that is the real underlying truth and issue. And don't go around calling Nestorius baptist because he held to Catholic teaching in every other area. But it show how the term came to be used and is to be understood and thus your rant has no premise or the same premise as any other athiest might hold of all of Christianity to include you.

 

This deserves a re-post,
G. K. Chesterton wrote:

"If the Christian God made the human race, would not the human race tend to rumors and perversions of the Christian God? If the center of our life is a certain fact, would not people far from the center have a muddled version of that fact? If we are so made that a Son of God must deliver us, is it odd that Patagonians should dream of the sudden God? When learned skeptics come to me and say 'are you aware the Kaffirs have a sort of incarnation?' Speaking as an unlearned person, I don't know. But speaking as a Christian, I should be very much astonished if they hadn't."

 

I try not to get into Catholic bashing here, as I know how it feels to be the brunt of attacks, and the Catholics here have treated me better than some. I have strong disagreements with the RCC, and I believe they have serious errors, but, as I said, I feel the same about Calvin and his "system".

However, what I bolded is an absurdity and another example of contortions aimed at finding a basis for a doctrine that has no scriptural support whatsoever.

 

Just a note for your parousal. Not really making a defense here because the Protoevangelium of James is Psuedopigraphical. However, among the Essenes (from what was discovered at Qumran) that; that community did practice celebacy and it seems that early Christian thought and culture was somewhat influenced by that group. And some supect that John the baptist may have been raised by that community as his parents may have died when he was relatively young. Given the location he preached at. - Dr. David Flusser was a professor of Early Christianity and Judaism of the Second Temple Period at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

 

These are unsubstantiated MYTHS! The resurrection of Christ is a historically documented fact with documented eyewitnesses. No comparison. However, your "Mary" is as mythical and as pagan as Horis and Mythras.

Of course we understand that ANY historian that takes a negative view of Rome is "unqualified" and "ignorant" of history. That is precisely how the ignorance and the cult of Romanism defends its paganism intellectually.

What I said stands! God has no beginning and therefore it is not only MISLEADING but deceptive as well as UNBIBLICAL to give Mary the title "Mother of God." However, it is completely Biblical to identify and give the name "Queen of Heaven" to your cultic Mary because that is precisely who she is.

 

Rome represents the pagan version not the Christian version. Find "Cardinals" or a "college of Cardinals" in the Bible??? Find a "pope" in the Bible?? Find the office of "preists" in the New Testament???? Find the "Queen of heaven" in the New Testament? Find a sinless Mary in the New Testament? Find the title "Mother of God" in the New Testament? Find sacraments in the New Testament??? Nowhere to be found except in the mental gymnastics of the minds of heretics.

 

I'm not sure what you mean by that. Do you mean that the religions of these deities are myths or that what I've shown you they believe are Myth. If you mean the religions are Myths then I agree whole hartedly with you but then that is my point. Using the same logic of Atheist against Christians you invalidate you whole faith because by saying Mary is a Catholic Deity because the Babylonians worshipped Ishtar is no different than saying Jesus is a myth because Horis and Mythras are myths and they all have similarities with each other.

Historically documented by what? Christian Scripture? The same can be said of Mythras and Horis. Ie they are historical fact because the book of the dead speaks to the resurrection of Horis and the Babylionian Mythras Scripture text document the fact that Mythras rose from the dead. What unbias doucment states that Jesus rose from the dead? None. Now I agree Jesus rose from the dead and that is a fact and the Gospels are based on fact rather than Myth but I am a biased observer in that I believe in Jesus and his resurrection. This is not a document that an athiest would appeal to. So certainly there is comparison. Your argument suggesting Mary is a pagan deity is as baseless as an atheist suggestion that Jesus is a pagan deity.

No only those historians that are revionist in their motivation. Historians that deal with actual facts are acceptable.

No. Its just the truth. Your accusations are baseless and not historically accurate. You live in a make believe world where history is pliable and can be formed to meet your preferrence. Kind of like the White supremisist and Neo-Nazis, and Iranian Muslim leaders who say the Holocaust never occured.

Nothing of your accusation stands as I have shown. It remains just that baseless accusation that reveals your lack of historical education.

No Catholic or anyone on this site aruges against that point we support it!

No it speaks to the nature of Jesus Christ that he was fully God as he is fully man.

The bible attest that Mary gave birth to Jesus who is God! Therefore Mary is the Mother of God. not his creator but the mother of Jesus who (Jesus that is) is God and man. She gave birth to her creator.

The bible give "queenly imagry to mary in the book of Revelation

Again Mary is no more Ishtar than is Jesus Horis or Mythras.