“As such, this does NOT require Mary remain a virgin AFTER the birth of Jesus.”
Nor does it REQUIRE her to lose her virginity.
My soul magnifies the Lord,
And my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.
For He has regarded the low estate of His handmaiden,
For behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
For He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is His name. And His mercy is on those who fear Him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with His arm:
He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He has put down the mighty from their thrones,
and exalted those of low degree.
He has filled the hungry with good things;
and the rich He has sent empty away.
He has helped His servant Israel, in remembrance of His mercy;
As He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to His posterity forever.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen
Magníficat ánima mea Dóminum,
et exsultávit spíritus meus
in Deo salvatóre meo,
quia respéxit humilitátem
ancíllæ suæ.
Ecce enim ex hoc beátam
me dicent omnes generatiónes,
quia fecit mihi magna,
qui potens est,
et sanctum nomen eius,
et misericórdia eius in progénies
et progénies timéntibus eum.
Fecit poténtiam in bráchio suo,
dispérsit supérbos mente cordis sui;
depósuit poténtes de sede
et exaltávit húmiles.
Esuriéntes implévit bonis
et dívites dimísit inánes.
Suscépit Ísrael púerum suum,
recordátus misericórdiæ,
sicut locútus est ad patres nostros,
Ábraham et sémini eius in sæcula.
Glória Patri et Fílio
et Spirítui Sancto.
Sicut erat in princípio,
et nunc et semper,
et in sæcula sæculórum.
Amen.
She became the Mother of God, in which work so many and such great good things are bestowed on her as pass man’s understanding. For on this there follows all honor, all blessedness, and her unique place in the whole of mankind, among which she has no equal, namely, that she had a child by the Father in heaven, and such a Child . . . Hence men have crowded all her glory into a single word, calling her the Mother of God . . . None can say of her nor announce to her greater things, even though he had as many tongues as the earth possesses flowers and blades of grass: the sky, stars; and the sea, grains of sand. It needs to be pondered in the heart what it means to be the Mother of God.
(Commentary on the Magnificat, 1521; in Luther’s Works, Pelikan et al, vol. 21, 326)
Also, in Hebrew culture, Joseph and Mary were considered “married” when they were betrothed and were allowed conjugal visits before they actually lived together as man and wife.
This is why Joseph considered “divorce” when he found out Mary was with child. Because Joseph knew he had not slept with Mary, God sent an angel to tell him of what had happened and to warn him to take the child to Egypt, as the Lord knew many were already looking for the coming Messiah.
This quirk of Hebrew law about couples sleeping together also was the reason no one questioned Mary's pregnancy as anything out of the ordinary (though her sister in law Elizabeth, who was pregnant with John the Baptist, obviously knew something was up when her baby leapt in her womb when Mary came near.)
Finally, Mary was in the upper room at Pentecost.
This showed that she knew
1. that she was a sinner just as the rest of us
and
2. She understood that the Old Covenant had passed away with the tearing of the Temple Curtain before the Holiest of Holies when her Son died on the Cross nearby at Calvary.. Mary understood her life and her Son were the sign of the coming Messianic Age of the New Covenant.
Mary knew that she needed to await the infilling of the Holy Spirit, as the Old Covenant was over, and so she awaited the fulfillment of the Old Covenant promises of Pentecost — as Peter quoted the Jewish Prophet Joel:
“And it shall come to pass afterward,
that I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh;
and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
your old men shall dream dreams,
your young men shall see visions:
For Peter to have full understanding of why Joel's prophecy was happening that day at Pentecost meant that Peter had overcome all of his troubling experiences with the Lord, when the Lord was on earth.
Right after Jesus commended Peter for saying He was the Christ (flesh and blood hath not revealed that to you, but the Father in Heaven) Jesus rebuked Peter strongly for being a mouthpiece of Satan.
This was because Peter was thinking it was not good for Jesus to go to the Cross, and Jesus rightly saw that Satan was making Peter think like a man in the flesh, not the way the Father would think.
At Pentecost, Peter understood it all, why Jesus rebuked him as he spoke for Satan (BTW, there goes the idea that Peter was the first “pope” as he was obviously not infallible!) and understood that the Cross was at the apex of all history. Peter as well as Mary understood that they had been part of the transitioning of Old Covenant to the New Covenant and looked forward to that Messianic Age when instead of men having to be outwardly conformed to the Law, “the Lord would write the Law on their hearts”.
Mary's presence in the upper room with the disciples signifies much more than we realize. It is so cool!
Just so you know, extra-biblical writings do not supersede scripture.
Neither does tradition overrule scripture.
From the scripture you cannot infer the perpetual virginity of Mary.
In fact, her marriage to Joseph then would be just a sham.