Help...debating Immaculate Conception

[StColette]

Okay I found this and had to post it, its from ewtn about the Immaculate Conception, History of the Doctrine

The Immaculate Conception of Mary
by Dr. Robert Schihl

The constant faith (tradition: paradosis) of the Church attests to the belief in the special preparation of the holiness of the person of Mary to bear in her body the most holy person of the Son of God.

Church Fathers:

implicitly found in the Fathers of the Church in the parallelism between Eve and Mary (Irenaeus, Lyons, 140? - 202?);

Found in the more general terms about Mary: "holy", "innocent", "most pure", "intact", "immaculate" (Irenaeus, Lyons, 140?-202?; Ephraem, Syria, 306-373; Ambrose, Milan, 373-397);

Explicit language: Mary - free from original sin (Augustine, Hippo, 395-430 to Anselm, Normandy, 1033-1109);
Eastern Church:

celebrated a Feast of the Conception of Mary in the 8th to the 9th Century;
Western Church:

celebrated a Feast of the Conception of Mary in the 12th Century;
A record of the feast in the 11th Century in Great Britain; in the 12th Century in
Normandy;

Record in many churches of a Feast of the Conception of Mary in France, Germany, Italy and Spain in the 12th Century (Bernard, Clairvaux, 1090-1153);
14th Century:

was noted for the opposition to the Immaculate Conception from some of the great doctors of scholasticism. The celebration of the feast was not denied though. The difficulty arose from the meaning of the universal redemption through Christ.
15th Century:

Franciscan theologians solved the difficulty--Christ, the most perfect mediator, preserved Mary from original sin by an equally perfect act of healing. Duns Scotus (Scotland, 1266-1308) explained that the Immaculate Conception came through God's application of the grace of Christ beforehand.
From 15th Century:

the Feast was universally celebrated; and christian piety introduced an oath to defend the belief in the Immaculate Conception to be taken not only by Religious, but also by non-Religious and at the Universities (e.g., Paris, 1497; Cologne, 1499; Vienna, 1501, etc.)
1854, Pope Pius IX, infallibly defined, ex cathedra:

"The Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instant of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of Almighty God, and in view of the foreseen merits of Jesus Christ, the savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin."

[url="http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/maryc3a.htm"]http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/maryc3a.htm[/url]

[phatcatholic]

P3chrmd,

please go [url="http://phorum.phatmass.com/index.php?showtopic=13537&hl=all+have+sinned"][b]here[/b][/url] and scroll down to my 3-part defense of the sinlessness of Mary. you should find w/in it some answers to ur questions

pax christi,
phatcatholic

[Cure of Ars]

For some reason your link would not load on my computer so I don't know if this will help but I check this out.

[url="http://phorum.phatmass.com/index.php?showtopic=15034&st=0"]http://phorum.phatmass.com/index.php?showtopic=15034&st=0[/url]

[daugher-of-Mary]

Was I wrong to apply Genesis 3:15 to Mary?

[phatcatholic]

[quote name='daugher-of-Mary' date='Aug 14 2004, 11:44 AM'] Was I wrong to apply Genesis 3:15 to Mary? [/quote]
that verse is applicable, but every time i use it the debate gets shifted to this one verse and i have to spend the next week defending what it really means. so, i try not to use it if i can help it. but, that's just me.

[daugher-of-Mary]

[quote]that verse is applicable, but every time i use it the debate gets shifted to this one verse and i have to spend the next week defending what it really means. so, i try not to use it if i can help it. but, that's just me. [/quote]

That is what I have discovered. lol.

[StColette]

[quote name='phatcatholic' date='Aug 14 2004, 04:50 AM'] P3chrmd,

please go [url="http://phorum.phatmass.com/index.php?showtopic=13537&hl=all+have+sinned"][b]here[/b][/url] and scroll down to my 3-part defense of the sinlessness of Mary. you should find w/in it some answers to ur questions

pax christi,
phatcatholic [/quote]
Wow !!

[StColette]

hmm to refute part of Dr. Worm's post saying that you said

[quote] Haven't you said that all infants are without sin? [/quote]

Babies are born with original sin, except those given the grace from God to be born sinless from their very conception, ie Mary. There is a difference between babies being born with original sin and babies commiting sin. Since babies are too young to comprehend the meaning of sin, they are therefore innocent from committing sin.

[quote] Rom. 3:23 - "all have sinned" also refers only to those able to commit sin. This is not everyone. For example, infants, the retarded, and the senile cannot sin. [/quote]

[quote] Romans 6:1 shows us that grace increases with our sin (though also says that this is not a reason to justify sin). You seem to have it backwards. If we do not sin, we do not need grace. [/quote]

Roms 6:1

What then shall we say? Shall we persist in sin that grace may abound? Of course not!

God's display of generosity or grace is not evoked by sin bt, as stated in Romans 6:5, 6:8 is the expression of God's love, and this love pledges eternal life to all believers ( from footnotes of NAB )

Edited August 14, 2004 by StColette

[goldenchild17]

Hey P3. Just wanted to let ya know that I'm still there. Doing what I can, not very knowledgeable but tryin. I'll be working on his Romans argument.

[StColette]

Okay how about an update on how things are going there ?

[Guest JeffCR07]

thats some pretty solid work, also, phat, you've got a ton of great stuff there.

[phatcatholic]

[quote name='JeffCR07' date='Aug 16 2004, 09:45 AM'] thats some pretty solid work, also, phat, you've got a ton of great stuff there. [/quote]
thanks bro. that three-part defense i wrote is the product of at least a couple months i spent defeding mary over at the FCFC board.

whew!

colette, u know what i'm talkin about!

[StColette]

lol yep phat I know what you're talking about I have the Mary - Ever Virgin refute completely memorized after going to FCFC lol

[goldenchild17]

Well, I don't understand why the "woman" in Revelations has to be Eve?

As for Gen. 3:15, it cannot be Mary. This is very easily shown with the very next verse. Context is absolutely vital in understanding the Bible.

Gen 3:15 And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
Gen 3:16 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire [shall be] to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

Now, you have claimed that Mary did not experience pain in child birth. Yet here, we see that the very same woman that He is talking about in 3:15 ("the woman") is the one He tells will have painful childbirth.

So I do not believe that this could be Mary or that it represents Mary. The seed represents the descendents of Eve and has nothing to do with Mary except that she should be the descendent of Eve who bears the seed that is to bruise the serpent's head.

Is this explanation sufficient enough for you to see that the woman cannot be Mary? That it is in fact Eve and all women after her? Just as Adam is the one mentioned in the following chapters. You see, God did not refer to Eve as Eve in that verse because Eve had not been named yet. Adam named her even in verse 20.

Gen 3:20 And Adam called his wife's name Eve; because she was the mother of all living.

This seems like it should be more than enough to convince you. I hope it is so.

[goldenchild17]

I’m having a really difficult time establishing the typology of Mary. Here are some of the things I need some answers to. In the first one he is replying to me saying that the written word was in the Ark and the Living Word was in the new Ark.
[quote]No, the written word was never placed in the Ark. It is the ark of the covenant, but that does not mean that the word of God was placed there. If even the Torah had been placed in there, I would have agreed. But the ten commandments were never conisdered to be the covenant. It was the ark of the covenant because God was residing there, on the throne, among His people who were His by His covenant with them. The things on the inside are from God's physical interaction with His people. At the time, the Torah was the word of God. As time progressed in Israel, the Nevuiim and the Kethuviim were added to the Torah to make up the full Old Covenant word of God. The TANAK (acronym for the Torah (Laws), Nevuiim (prophets), and Kethuviim (writings)) is the word of God as we know it today, minus the New Testament of course. Though we have switched the Nevuiim with the Kethuviim so our version of the TANAK is really the TAKAN to make things more obvious that they do lead to Christ.

Now, it is understandable that the Nevuiim and the Kethuviim were never placed in the ark since they were created even after the time of King David. However, the Torah was written in the wilderness by Moses (or his scribes if you will). So even then, that was the word of God and if the Ark of the covenant was meant to contain the word of God then the Torah is what should have been placed in there. But for you to claim that the Ten commandments are the Old covenant is ridiculous. To say that they are at least part of it is correct. The covenant includes what happened and the agreement. If you just handed me some rules that you wanted me to follow I'd laugh at you. But hand me the rules and a document explaining that my forefathers made a covenant with you then I will listen. Again, rules cannot be the covenant, they are conditions.[/quote]


In this next one he's saying that if Mary was a fulfillment of the Ark, then she still couldn't be sinless.
[quote]Not to mention that no matter how many times they refined the gold, it would never be perfect. So it could be very close to perfect but still have things in it. So I would say, yes, Mary was probably a very righteous, upright, young lady of God. Perhaps even the most righteous and upright at the time. But that wouldn't make her perfect. Just well refined so to speak. So even using your arguement, it doesn't follow that the ark was sinless or that Mary was sinless. The ark was still man made. God didn't make the ark, He told them how to do it. So it wasn't perfect. Did man make Mary into what she was? By your arguement that would have to be true. That man was responsible for how righteous she was.[/quote]


This one regards Mary as the fulfillment of the "woman" in Gen. 3:15. This one has really got me good. Regarding Gen. 3:16 was Mary's desire for Joseph? And did he rule over her?
[quote]Well, I don't understand why the "woman" in Revelations has to be Eve?

As for Gen. 3:15, it cannot be Mary. This is very easily shown with the very next verse. Context is absolutely vital in understanding the Bible.

Gen 3:15 And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
Gen 3:16 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire [shall be] to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

Now, you have claimed that Mary did not experience pain in child birth. Yet here, we see that the very same woman that He is talking about in 3:15 ("the woman") is the one He tells will have painful childbirth.

So I do not believe that this could be Mary or that it represents Mary. The seed represents the descendents of Eve and has nothing to do with Mary except that she should be the descendent of Eve who bears the seed that is to bruise the serpent's head.

Is this explanation sufficient enough for you to see that the woman cannot be Mary? That it is in fact Eve and all women after her? Just as Adam is the one mentioned in the following chapters. You see, God did not refer to Eve as Eve in that verse because Eve had not been named yet. Adam named her even in verse 20.

Gen 3:20 And Adam called his wife's name Eve; because she was the mother of all living.

This seems like it should be more than enough to convince you. I hope it is so.[/quote]

Well, some of this is really got me, so I need someone to help me go through it. Appreciate it.