Posted on 07/19/2009 2:17:43 PM PDT by NYer
Such a statement, dear friend, requires support. From which "Scripture" did the Catholic Church wander? What is the source of your statement?
The angels in heaven indeed are sinless. Yet we are not to worship them.
Agreed 100%. But, when the Psalms command the Angels or beseech their assistance, are the Angels being worshiped?
They are not described as omniscient, to my knowledge, so I assume they aren’t.
The Psalmist pleads for their assistance though, doesn't he? And as you've said, Angels are in Heaven, serving God. So, that means either (1) Angels are in fact omniscient, and thus that is another trait not applicable solely to God, or (2) the relationship between Heaven and Earth is one that those is Heaven can "see" all of Earth simultaneously. Thus, if (2) is correct and Mary is in Heaven, is she not able to do the same as the Angels?
Excellent point! Salvation made a similar comment with regards to Mary.
I've never encountered "sinlessness" mentioned as a Divine attribute -- God is "All-Good," of course, which would necessarily include sinlessness, but would be so minor a part of it and so overshadowed by the Divine reality as not to be worth mentioning. Put another way, "All-Good" necessarily excludes sin (sort of tautological, or something, since sin is almost by definition that which is opposed to God!), but sinlessness doesn't come anywhere near implying "All-Good"!
No one that I've ever heard of has ever attributed omniscience to a creature -- to any creature. OTH, it's not at all hard to picture someone who knows far more than we do and who is nonetheless unimaginably far from omniscient.
A big difference between the words of those around Stephen in ACTS and the Archangel Gabriel in LUKE.
I don’t follow... Was Stephen filled with grace? Did he need to be sinless to be filled with grace? If Stephen was filled with grace and was not sinless, then being filled with grace does not imply a sinless life.
The point is that traditions should not contradict Scripture. If one must choose between trusting scripture, and trusting the Pope, then one either trusts Scripture (Protestant) or the Pope (Catholic).
When Scripture says (and, BTW, these are quotes from the OT),
“There is no one righteous, not even one;
there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God.
All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.”
then one can believe it, or believe the Pope’s footnote “No one EXCEPT Mary”.
If you place tradition above Scripture, that is your choice. But one shouldn’t pretend it doesn’t exist as a choice.
I’m not disputing that Mary wasn’t filled with grace; that is clearly expressed in the Bible. That is not in question.
What I am disputing that being filled with grace implies that one is sinless. We have the example of Stephen being filled with grace, but he was not without sin.
As a Catholic, I thank you for your thoughtful responses. You have made your position very clear.
I ask you to consider for a moment that perhaps all your study and inquiry is based on the belief that only Scripture matters. If you have viewed Church history though that prism, you have viewed it with a bias.
I ask you to remember that Christ promised to guide His Church forever. It also states in scripture that the writers of the Gospels couldn’t write down all the wondrous things Christ did and all his teachings. Scripture only records a small percentage of what He did and taught. Christ didn’t tell the Apostles to sit down and write out their teachings and evangelize by having everyone study it. He told them to go and verbally teach His word. He set up a system to do that with a hierarchy. He sent them the Spirit to guide their thinking. This is all Scripture based fact.
If you can imagine studying Scripture from that perspective, from the basis of Christ’s intentions and actions for His Church, I think you would begin to see where Catholics are coming from. We believe in the system Christ set up before He died. He passed on insight, understanding, and knowledge verbally. He didn’t write it down for the Apostles. He sent them to verbally teach others. He began traditions, like the breaking of the bread in Mass, and asked them to continue His traditions. He followed Jewish customs and traditions. He believed in them as the fulfillment of God’s promises to man.
Christ wanted His Church to continue oral teaching and tradition. He wanted us to remember what He taught us and set up a living, breathing body to do that. His message, and His Church, is more than Scripture.
I also ask you to consider that He chastised the Jews who clung to the letter of the Law/Scripture and didn’t want to learn from the living, breathing, acting Man in front of them. They had no respect for Christ’s oral tradition and teaching.
No matter how you slice it, breaking away from a Church after 15 centuries because of disagreements/concerns is still breaking away from an existing Church. It is separating yourself from the original. Only one Church can really trace its roots, leadership, teaching, oral tradition, and written record back to Christ. Various Protestant faiths filtered the Gospels to fit their beliefs.
I hope this clarifies what many Catholics feel for you. We believe that if you go back and research the earliest versions of Scripture, in the original languages, you will find ample reasons for Catholic dogma. I invite you to consider that you are studying Christianity through the prism of what you want to find- that only Scripture matters. Look to the original Scripture with an open mind and heart and you will find that the Catholic Church is the most scripturally accurate Church, from Christ’s time to today.
Thank you for your patience with my long post. I thank you for what you cited that we have in common.
The Sacred Scriptures have revealed the proper names of only three Angels, all of whom belong to the Choir of the Archangels. The names are well known to all, namely: Michael, Gabriel, Raphael. Ancient apocryphal literature of the Old Testament contains several other names of Archangels in addition to the three just mentioned. Like the sources themselves, these other names are spurious. Names like Uriel, Raguel, Sariel, and Jeremiel are not found in the canonical books of Sacred Scripture, but in the apocryphal book of Enoch, fourth book of Esdras,[1] and in rabbinical literature. The Church does not permit proper names of Angels that are not found in the canonical books of the Bible. All such names that were taken from apocryphal writings were rejected under Pope Zachary, in 745. There must have been danger of serious abuses in this regard during that century, because a similar step was taken in a synod held at Aix-la-Chapelle in 789.
The Catholic Church has set apart September 29 as a feast day to honor the archangels. We also acknowledge that each person who walks this earth has a guardian angel. We have prayers, in praise of these illustrious beings.
Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel
Saint Michael, Archangel, defend us in battle.
Be our protection against the wickedness
and snares of the Devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray;
And do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host,
by the power of God, thrust into hell Satan and all the other evil spirits who prowl about the world
seeking the ruin of souls. Amen.
Guardian Angel Prayer
Angel of God, my guardian dear,
To whom His love commits me here,
Ever this day be at my side,
To light and guard, to rule and guide. Amen
You might also read this:
http://www.ichthys.com/mail-Mary-full-of-grace.html
A taste:
” The idea that one can read into this word meaning “object of grace/favor” any degree of sinlessness or perfection on the basis of a “perfect” verb form indicates a complete misunderstanding of what “perfect” means in grammatical terms. In verbs, it only means “completed action”; not sinlessness! To go back to the discussion in point 4 above, if the present is a line with an arrow and the aorist is an “x”, then the perfect would be a line with an “x” at the end, that is, action begun in the past and now complete. The action doesn’t have to have begun in eternity nor does the completion of the action impart perfection of any sort on the object. In our case all it would mean is that Mary had received favor from God in the past and was still in His good-graces.”
Also, the perfect past participle is used, I believe, in the preceding verse in Luke (1.27): “...to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph...”
So apparently, if one reads perfect past participles the way Catholics do in verse 28, then in verse 27, Mary perfectly pledged to stay pledged forever to be married, but not to marry. Kind of like always winter, never Christmas.
You know, I'm sure that when anyone touched the "old" Ark of the Covenant mentioned in the Old Testament that they died instantly.
That is one reason that Catholics believe that Mary is "The Ark of the New Covenant and that no one, not even her most chast spouse, St. Joseph, touched her in procreating children.
One does not take lightly the Words from the Creed: We believe.....(soon to be "I believe/Credo"....by the power of the Holy Spirit he was born of the Virgin Mary, and became man.
Catholics bow their heads during that phrase of the Creed during Mass because it is so important; bet you didn't know that, huh?
Thank you, most enlightening!
I have yet to find anywhere in the Bible where a precondition of being filled with grace or the Holy Spirit requires one to have always been sinless. Perhaps one of our Catholic friends can educate us?
Because she carried the new Promise of God. Seems simple enough to me.
You know, I'm sure that when anyone touched the "old" Ark of the Covenant mentioned in the Old Testament that they died instantly.
I agree. Yet we have plenty of examples of Mary touching others without them bursting into flames. Clearly she was not the same type of Ark as that which carried the ten commandments, the jar of manna, and Aaron's staff.
That is one reason that Catholics believe that Mary is "The Ark of the New Covenant and that no one, not even her most chast spouse, St. Joseph, touched her in procreating children.
Yes, Catechism 499. But this leaves you with a conundrum: either there were more men and women born of virgin birth, or the Bible is lying - multiple times - when it talks of the brothers and sisters of Jesus (see Matt 12:46, Matt 13:55-56, Mark 3:31, Luke 8:19, John 7:1-10, Acts 1:14 - all four Gospels and the book of Acts).
So did Mary have additional immaculate conceptions? Or did she consummate her marriage to Joseph after the birth of Jesus, as Matthew 1:25 alludes to, meaning she was no longer a virgin?
Sinners need a savior. If Mary was not a sinner, she wouldn't need a savior. Yet in Luke 1 we find she includes herself among those in need of a savior:
"And Mary said: 'My soul exalts the Lord, And my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior.'" (Luke 1:46-47 NASV)
If she was perfect, Mary would not have acknowledged anyone as her savior. The reason Mary acknowledged her need for a savior is because, "as it is written, 'there is none righteous, not even one.'" (Romans 3:10)
Additionally, we know the wages of sin is death, so if Mary had no sin, she should would be alive today or there would be some record of her being the third person (after Enoch and Elijah) taken to heaven without dying. But you know as well as I do, there is no such account recorded anywhere in church history.
Finally, Mary's Magnificat shows the Catholic idea of Mary as co-redemptrix is flawed. How could a perfect, co-savior possibly need a savior? If Mary is a co-redemptrix, it would mean sinners are redeemed and come to the Father not just through Jesus, but also through his mother Mary. And if that were true, it would prove Jesus a liar when he said in John 14, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me." (John 14:6) And Peter would have been lying when, filled with the Holy Spirit and referring to Jesus, he proclaimed in Acts 4, "And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved." (Acts 4:12) "Salvation in no one else" -- you'll have to agree, I think, that the term "no one else" pretty much excludes you, me and Mary. Peace, A
Mary did need a savior and had a savior. She admitted this - My spirit rejoices in God my Savior. She never sinned; that is true. But that is not to say that she did not need a savior. How could she be sinless without a savior? God exists outside of time. See my post #13.
This is a good article overall, NYer. Its a shame it was spoiled by this:
“The Catholic Church has always believed in the immaculate conception of Mary.”
That’s simply untrue. That notion was never held in The Church in the East and isn’t to this day. Many in the West rejected it, +Thomas Aquinas for example. The IC is made necessary by the the West’s conception of both the reality and effects of the Sin of Adam, a conception rejected by all the Fathers save Blessed Augustine. As a matter of dogma in the Latin Church it is less than 200 years old and was proclaimed by no council but by an asserted infallible declaration of Pius IX. There are those among the Orthodox who state that this doctrine, far from being true dogma, is in fact a type of Christological heresy which effectively denies Christ’s human nature as per the Council of Chalcedon.
The Catholic understanding of Grace is that it displaces sin, not merely covers it up. This is why one described as filled with grace no longer has sin.
Further, the Catholic Church does not teach that Mary and Jesus alone were without sin, and that all the rest have committed sins at least once. It is entirely compatible with Catholicism to think that John the Baptist was also without sin. In the case of Noah, for example, the Scripture tells us that he was “perfect in every way”, so even based on the Scripture alone you are required to believe that Noah was without sin.
So, you are setting up a straw man. You presume that we teach that St. Stephen was not in fact without sin as he was martyred. But we don’t teach that. In fact, we teach that everyone who validly received the Holy Communion is likewise free from sin from that moment on till he either dies or commits a sin. Baptism, ditto, frees one from sin. You probably disagree with all or with some of these doctrines, but you cannot say that juxtaposing St. Stephen being “pleres charis” and Our Lady being “kecharitomene” (the underlying Greek is in fact different) you are pointing to some contradiction in Catholic teaching.
Having said that, let us examine the contexts. Our Lady is proclaimed by Archangel Gabriel already filled with grace. This is why the grammatical prefect tense is important: here is a young girl and she is said to be filled with grace already. This the scriptural basis not merely of her sinlessness but also of her immaculate conception: since she had been filled with grace prior to Archangel Gabriel talking to her, it is reasonable to think that she had been that way since the beginning of the life, since Sts Joachim and Anna concieved her.
No similar inference exists with St. Stephen. He is undergoing martyrdom, and martyrdom is like baptism. He is filled with grace at that moment, but nothing can be inferred about his condition prior to that from that verse in Acts.
“all your study and inquiry is based on the belief that only Scripture matters. If you have viewed Church history though that prism, you have viewed it with a bias.”
I admit to that, pretty much. It’s not so much that only Scripture MATTERS, as much as it is the supreme authority on doctrinal issues, for me.
I do agree that Christ promised to guide His Church forever. Perhaps we differ as to how. I do believe the Bible, the Holy Spirit making it clear to us, and God’s providence are the primary methods.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.