Johnny,

The Trinity is "extra-biblical", and is a widely held belief among many Christians.

And the doctrine of the Trinity is a perfect example of when people add novel concepts to the scriptures.  If Christianity were a science, the trinitarian doctrine would be a theory.  It is designed to describe and explain certain events, but it does a bit of hypothesizing.

-Acumen

Yes, tradition is important - but my point is that what you call tradition and what I would call tradition are not necessarily the same thing. Catholic (big C) authority doesn't enter in, quite frankly. WHO makes changes after the fact is irrelevant, regardless what claim they may have to some myth of authority or a line of succession.


Jesus? Are you suggesting that flawed men are solely responsible for the selection of the books that were included in the Bible? I don't particularly care what they called themselves - I believe that they could only have done the job if God was the project leader. MEN, no matter whether they used a capital C or a lower-case one, would have screwed it up.


See above. I don't care who they were. God can use anybody, even the apostate, if He so chooses.


Au contraire... there may not be anything new under the sun, but a "deeper" understanding is hardly the only remaining option. While I agree that no many knows everything, I'm not sure I agree that we really know any more today than we did in the Apostolic age, though, and we very well may know less. Oh, we THINK we know more... but do we really? As for preconceptions - bwahahahahahahaha!!! We can discuss this in another thread, if you really want to, in spite of the ad hominem nature of the statement. It doesn't have a place here, though.


Where? I must have missed it. I did catch something about preconceptions, though. Maybe I was blinded by the statement that seemed to be accusing me of missing what is "very evident" because I don't accept that the Catholic church (big C) has any special insider information about the nature of God.


And that's what I am saying, too! Hallelujah!


Well, no... not really.

So, anyway... the devotion to Mary...

Weren't we talking about Mary?

Johnny,

I can see that the core of the confusion about Mary does come from a real question posited above about the Authority of the Catholic Church to speak definitively on matters theological.

I agree.  And that's why we need to hammer out the authority issue a little better.

Let me add that EVERY dispute with a Marian Dogma ends in a Christological Heresy,

Right, but to a protestant, the term "heresy" is just another way of saying "the Catholic church disagrees."  It doesn't carry the same sort of stigma with us.

If Mary was born into sin, meaning she was not Immaculately Concieved, then Christ is something a little less than God Incarnate, because God could not exist WITHIN the veil of human flesh under the cloud of original sin.

That being said, I don't see the logical necessity of immaculate conception.  Presumably, Mary's mother was born into sin; so if Mary was immaculately conceived from a sinful mother, then why not Jesus?  Jesus still came from an ancestory of sin, that's part of what makes him human, and in essence the reason why he is the necessary consequence of our nature and free will.  If we pursue this issue much further, we will eventually get into the Catholic doctrine of original sin, which is not something I consider an evident doctrine.

That is, since baptism was not yet instituted, God would have had to grow up inside a womb subject to sin.  God indwelling within Sin. 

Then how exactly does God fill us with the Holy Spirit if He cannot indwell a sinful body?

-Acumen
 

Johnny,

Right, but to a protestant, the term "heresy" is just another way of saying "the Catholic church disagrees."  It doesn't carry the same sort of stigma with us.

Which is why there are so many sects in protestantism.  There is not even any unity regarding the actual divinity and humanity of Christ!  A little stigma and shame would go a long way toward bending
the will of the “sliding scale confession” christian into a deeper understanding of Who Christ really was, and what that means to being authentically human.

Let me make my point by the posts you have below....

I wrote:
“If Mary was born into sin, meaning she was not Immaculately Concieved, then Christ is something a little less than God Incarnate, because God could not exist WITHIN the veil of human flesh under the cloud of original sin.”

your response:
That being said, I don't see the logical necessity of immaculate conception.  Presumably, Mary's mother was born into sin; so if Mary was immaculately conceived from a sinful mother, then why not Jesus?

So you miss my point.  If you say Jesus was immaculately conceived, then you offer by presumption that his sinful humanity had to be “corrected” at conception, when in fact, he was Fully God and Fully Man from the moment of Conception.  That is something strikingly different than an immaculate conception.  He CAN NOT be sin, and HE cannot be God indwelling within Sin.  Since Mary was “only human”, she must - by the necessity of the Holiness of Her Son - be a pure and sinless human.

If you believe Christ to be God, and the Holy Spirit to be God and the Father to be God; then Jesus made His own Mother, no?  He, as the Holy Spirit, breathed life into St. Anne’s womb, and saved Mary from sin at that moment.  Why?  Because as the perfection of man, He needed to be born fully human from the perfection of woman.  ALL of His humanity came from Mary.  Every cell, every hair, every wrinkle, even the DNA.  This had to be HIs plan from the dawn of time, wouldn’t it? 

Since Jesus Christ is the SOURCE of all salvation, and since Mary had be the highest form of human purity to be a worthy vessel for God Incarnate, then by His own logic, she had to be free of the stain of original sin.

To presume he would just “use” Mary is to deny the generosity and charity of His Love, and to have God USE His creatures like chattel.  And yet scripture reveals God letting humans be fully FREE - to the point of their own self destruction if they wish.  In addition, He asked her to be His Mother.  She had to give her permission.  Do you ask someone’s permission to “use” them?

No, I think if you look at the circumstances with CHRIST as pure God and Pure Man - then His Mother had to be the highest attainable human perfection.


Jesus still came from an ancestry of sin, that's part of what makes him human, and in essence the reason why he is the necessary consequence of our nature and free will.

Now I had to read that twice.... Jesus - God made Man - cannot have an “ancestry of sin”.  As an Israelite, he can claim membership in God’s chosen people, but to claim Christ “sin inclined” if you will, because of original sin, takes you logically into a denial of the Divinity of Christ.

If we pursue this issue much further, we will eventually get into the Catholic doctrine of original sin, which is not something I consider an evident doctrine.

Well, THAT certainly has another thread written all over it.  Let me offer a small observation.  If you deny Original Sin, you deny the veracity of Genesis, God’s first contact with humanity, and you deny the need for a Savior.  That again, is a Christological Heresy - Jesus as God is not divine.

I said:
“That is, since baptism was not yet instituted, God would have had to grow up inside a womb subject to sin.  God indwelling within Sin.”
You said:
Then how exactly does God fill us with the Holy Spirit if He cannot indwell a sinful body?

Via Baptism - adoption into the Family of God.

Ironically, you point out another quality of the Blessed Mother.  NO ONE else in the bible is declared, “Full of Grace”.  She was found suitable - without Baptism - to be a worthy vessel for the Holy Spirit to come into her and Divinely Impregnate her.  As she was immaculately conceived, she was a Daughter of the Father, as she was worthy of the Holy Spirit “Overshadowing” her, she was the Spouse of the Holy Spirit, and at the Holy Conception, she became the Mother of the Son.

That my friend, is One Holy Woman....

Johnny,

Which is why there are so many sects in protestantism.  There is not even any unity regarding the actual divinity and humanity of Christ!  A little stigma and shame would go a long way toward bending
the will of the “sliding scale confession” christian into a deeper understanding of Who Christ really was

Please don't pretend like the Catholic church has doctrinal unity.  I can't tell you how many Catholics I've run into who believe that the Holy Spirit is a dove or couldn't give one coherent statement of the holy trinity if their lives depended upon it.  And you want to talk about a deeper understanding?  Let's not sling mud.

So you miss my point.  If you say Jesus was immaculately conceived, then you offer by presumption that his sinful humanity had to be “corrected” at conception, when in fact, he was Fully God and Fully Man from the moment of Conception. 

I'm making no such presumption.  I find no reason to believe in original sin, and therefore believe there is no sin to transmit from the present to the next generation.  Essentially, there is nothing to correct.  I was merely humoring the notion of immaculate conception for the sake of argument. 

Given the presumption that sin is transmitted from generation to generation, immaculate conception isn't the only philosophical answer to the problem.  God has the power to regenerate the soul just as we are born again, wiped clean of our sins.  To me, it makes no difference if the soul was created without sin or purged from it, sinless in sinless.

Since Jesus Christ is the SOURCE of all salvation, and since Mary had be the highest form of human purity to be a worthy vessel for God Incarnate, then by His own logic, she had to be free of the stain of original sin.

Why?  Why couldn't she have been wiped clean from sin prior to conception?  Also, in order for your philosophy to truly work, Mary would have to remain sinless up until the point of Jesus' conception, which isn't feasible when considered.  It's not feasible because if Mary could be sinless, then why not everyone else?  In fact, if Mary was sinless, then she wouldn't need the savior.  There are all sorts of problems with this sort of thinking.

To presume he would just “use” Mary is to deny the generosity and charity of His Love, and to have God USE His creatures like chattel.  And yet scripture reveals God letting humans be fully FREE - to the point of their own self destruction if they wish.  In addition, He asked her to be His Mother.  She had to give her permission.  Do you ask someone’s permission to “use” them?

I'm not sure what you're talking about here.

No, I think if you look at the circumstances with CHRIST as pure God and Pure Man - then His Mother had to be the highest attainable human perfection.

"Highest attainable human perfection?"  Are you saying that Mary was perfect, or just without sin?

Well, THAT certainly has another thread written all over it.  Let me offer a small observation.  If you deny Original Sin, you deny the veracity of Genesis, God’s first contact with humanity, and you deny the need for a Savior.  That again, is a Christological Heresy - Jesus as God is not divine.

First, I said that the doctrine of original sin is not evident.  This would mean that I don't see it explicitly in the bible, including the book of Genesis.  And second, denying original sin doesn't mean there is no sin in the world.  Our free will is perfectly capable of contracting sin without the logical need for it to be transmitted through birth.

Ironically, you point out another quality of the Blessed Mother.  NO ONE else in the bible is declared, “Full of Grace”. 

And Paul says that God can fill us with the fulness of the Godhead, does that make us God?

She was found suitable - without Baptism - to be a worthy vessel for the Holy Spirit to come into her and Divinely Impregnate her.  

Well, that's because baptism didn't have regenerational power prior to Christ's resurrection.  You can't put the cart before the horse.

As she was immaculately conceived, she was a Daughter of the Father, as she was worthy of the Holy Spirit “Overshadowing” her, she was the Spouse of the Holy Spirit, and at the Holy Conception, she became the Mother of the Son.

Let me tell you something -- we don't deserve to be filled with the Holy Ghost, and yet by God's grace, we are.  Maybe Mary was full of grace BECAUSE God chose her.  And she wasn't worthy of the Holy Spirit to overshadow her just like we're not worthy to be filled with the Holy Ghost.  But God chose her nontheless, and for that we are all greatful.

-Acumen

El,

Acumen:  And that doesn't matter one bit.  Disunity is only important as it refers to people.

El:  No, you will not find any contradictory official teachings in the Church of Rome.  It does not matter what people say, even if they claim to be Catholic.

How does this address my statement?

Acumen: You're kidding right?  Without members, all you have is a building.

El:  Unlike the protestant communities, the Catholic Church, headed by Christ Himself, is not dependent upon individual "members" especially dissenting ones.  That's why in the Mass we pray to God to not look on our sins but, on the faith of His Church.  The greek word kecharitoomenee literally means Full of Grace "Especially the divine influence upon the heart, and its reflection in the life; including gratitude"

To be "Full" of God's grace could mean nothing else but to be without sin. 

So now divine influence means sinlessness? 

Acumen:  How do you explain the temptation of Eve to sin in the garden?  Satan's words of enticement wouldn't have meant much if he couldn't appeal to Eve's sense of ego and sinful lust for power.  No original sin, and yet Eve had a craving for sin.

El:  Now who is adding words to the scriptures?  Where does it say that Eve had a "lust for power?"  Eve indeed fell into pride but it was not because of a sinful compulsion, it was a direct act of disobedience, which makes her crime worse an thus the reason the rest of mankind shares such a greivous consequence. 

No, actually it was a lust for power just like I said.  Satan told eve if she ate of the fruit, she would become like God, knowing good from evil.  He appealed to her craving for more power.  It's not like she made her choice on the flip of a coin, El.  The devil knew her weakness, and he exploited it.  God put Adam and Eve in a garden with parameters and rules.  There were limitations, and Eve had a desire to extend the boundaries of those limitations.  That, my dear cousin, is a lust for power.

-Acumen

I'm sorry, this debate is extremely frustrating, because the catholics debating
(Johnny and El) keep claiming as fact their catholic doctrines.  We have
Scripture to say Jesus was sinless.  El's full of grace Scripture still does
NOT say Mary was sinless.

It's hard to read EVERY word of the catholics' debate, because there are
so many false assumptions and theories passed on as fact, and then they
build a whole/looooong argument on it - that is frustrating and hard to read
when I decided right at the start it was unfounded.  PLEEEEEASE GIVE SOME
SCRIPTURE for Mary's sinless/emmaculate conception, and it would be much
easier to keep your audience - and maybe even convince some of us to
believe your dogma.  I still have heard nothing of Scripture (except El's
stretch of full of grace) to establish this dogma - that is supposedly infallible.
THIS IS WHY I AM TURNED OFF BY CATHOLIC DOCTRINE - where is the
Scripture ("Where's the beef?" )

I don't much care about the doctrines found in Rome, when catholic leaders
in America are debating over what happens in their own parishes.  That
sounds like division to me, El.  Who cares if you have one leader who thinks
his doctrine is infallible and united, when his churches are not following and
yes doing their own thing.  The "church" of God is absolutely a body of believers -
there are plenty of Scriptures to go to for this doctrine.  Again, I think it's a
convenient dogma to believe the Catholic church is the church regardless of
it's people.  I, too, agree you have an empty building.  Jesus didn't come to
fill temples made with hands!  Too many convenient doctrines.  I promise
I'm not trying to be mean in this - I just don't see how people can believe
teaching that don't have Scripture to build on.

I'm not trying to be sarcastic, but the last post from Johnny was the worst
yet.  So WHERE did you get the story of Adam allowing Eve to be tempted.
Since when is temptation allowed by another person.  The Scripture says
"every man" (individually) is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust
and enticed.  Eve didn't blame Adam for her sin, on the contrary Adam did
try to blame her.  The last I read the Genesis account, Eve sinned at her
own volition and then passed the fruit on to Adam.  Again, I'm not trying
to be mean, but if you're going to quote from some encyclopedia - skip it.
Give me Scripture/Truth!

Ac, please down load some Bible program on your laptop.   

El,

No, being "full" of God's grace does.

Again, show me why "full of grace" is supposed to mean sinless, when believers are filled with the Holy Spirt, and yet aren't sinless?

I see no where in the account where it states that the serpent appealed to her "craving for more power."  Where does it state that?

The passage says that Eve had a desire for more wisdom.  The desire was there, the passage says it.  Logically, there would be no reason for her to risk her life unless she thought there would be some payout for her disobedience.  She chose herself over God at the risk of her own life.  There would be no reason to do this if she weren't selfish.

And exactly where does it say that he "knew her weakness?

The passage says that the serpent was more crafty than the other creatures.  What is the purpose of mentioning this point, if it didn't play a role in tricking Eve?  In order to trick someone, you must know at least one weakness, namely lack of knowledge.

Where exactly does it say that Eve had a "desire to extend the boundaries of those limitations?"

Hmmm . . . perhaps when she ate the fruit, thus extending her boundaries of good an evil?  I think that Catholics should spend more time reading the bible, rather than asking questions to those who read it.

-Acumen

Point taken... it's true that some 1800 years after Christ it was determined that Mary was immaculately conceived - although in my defense I had assumed you were talking about immaculate conception in the way Jesus was immaculately conceived - without a human father.

My bad on the assumption, although the dogma is hardly anything approaching a supportable claim. The Catholic Encyclopedia even acknowledges that it's not scripturally defensible, and that many of the Church "fathers" were "WRONG" on the matter.

That, I must admit, was a very interesting statement to read. It was also interesting to read the statement, also in the Catholic Encyclopedia, that Tradition is an "ongoing process."