Clarification Needed Re: Christ's Birth

[Lil Red]

+J.M.J.+
[quote name='Raphael' date='09 December 2009 - 08:11 AM' timestamp='1260367862' post='2016559']
Only one point for clarification: Mary did not experience pain in her childbirth, not because she was exempt from it (pain in childbirth is one of the temporal punishments associated with original sin), but because she did not deliver Christ vaginally. According to the Sacred Tradition, Christ was born "like light passing through glass." The Blessed Virgin remained a virgin before, during, and after the Birth of Christ. We use the classical definition of [i]virgin[/i]: her womb was never opened.
[/quote]

so, how did Mary give birth?

[Thy Geekdom Come]

C-Section.

How it did happen isn't really defined, except that everything I've ever been taught about it indicates that it was not vaginal. From the Catholic Encyclopedia:

"...that the supernatural influence of the Holy Ghost extended to the birth of Jesus Christ, not merely preserving Mary's integrity, but also causing Christ's birth or external generation to reflect his eternal birth from the Father in this, that "the Light from Light" proceeded from his mother's womb as a light shed on the world; that the "power of the Most High" passed through the barriers of nature without injuring them; that "the body of the Word" formed by the Holy Ghost penetrated another body after the manner of spirits."

http://newadvent.org/cathen/15448a.htm

We may be able to say that He was born vaginally, but it would seem from the description given that it would be more similar to the way in which He passed through doors in His glorified state, in "the manner of spirits" and "as a light...[passing] through the barriers of nature without injuring them." I would argue that we couldn't really call that a "vaginal birth" and mean what we typically do by the term.

I admit I have never done a study of the original source documents in question, but it seems to be a little known teaching that has not been emphasized in recent Church history (on the objective level, it doesn't seem to me to be anywhere near the status of a central teaching of the Church, but it is related to the Virgin Birth, which is very integral to the faith).

God bless,

Micah