St. Ignatius and the Virgin Mary (exchange of letters)

The Epistle of Ignatius to the Virgin Mary

Her friend Ignatius, to the Christ-bearing Mary.

Thou oughtest to have comforted and consoled me who am a neophyte, and a disciple of thy [beloved] John. For I have heard things wonderful to tell respecting thy [son] Jesus, and I am astonished by such a report. But I desire with my whole heart to obtain information concerning the things which I have heard from thee, who wast always intimate and allied with Him, and who wast acquainted with [all] His secrets. I have also written to thee at another time, and have asked thee concerning the same things. Fare thou well; and let the neophytes who are with me be comforted of thee, and by thee, and in thee. Amen.

Reply of the Blessed Virgin to This Letter.

The lowly handmaid of Christ Jesus to Ignatius, her beloved fellow-disciple.

The things which thou hast heard and learned from John concerning Jesus are true. Believe them, cling to them, and hold fast the profession of that Christianity which thou hast embraced, and conform thy habits and life to thy profession. Now I will come in company with John to visit thee, and those that are with thee. Stand fast [in the faith], and show thyself a man; nor let the fierceness of persecution move thee, but let thy spirit be strong and rejoice in God thy Saviour. Amen.

In the absence of any supporting material? Well, good luck to you. I happen to own a bridge in Brooklyn I'd like to sell you ... ;-)

Where is your supporting material to PROVE that the document in question is authentic. You accuse me of “straw men” but you have failed to offer ANY proof. If you have it, there should be no problem in showing it.

No one has argued for canonicity, so any conclusion based on the counter-argument is moot.

Clearly, the Church has rejected this letter (and most of the other ancient writings) as part of the Canon of scripture. Once again, I ask you, on what do you base your conclusion that this is an authentic document? Can you show conclusively that the Catholic Church believes that this document is authentic even though it has been rejected as suitable to be included in the canon of scripture? The burden of proof is on you. If you can’t prove it, it remains a letter that is “alleged” to have been written by Mary as Br. Anthony first said.

Would you be happy if the Church said (or thought or assumed or considered) it was genuine?

As a matter of fact, like Augustine who accepted the authenticity of the scriptures based on the authority of the Catholic Church, so do I. Evidently, you don’t feel the same way. Evidently, you feel that you can pick and choose what ought and ought not be regarded as authentic. Are you Protestant? ;-)

The mere fact that it's included in The Writings of the Ante-Nicene Fathers is greater (positive) proof than Bro. Anthony's unsupported (negative) assertion.

Tell me, do you believe in the authenticity of all the apocryphal writings simply because they are anti Nicene? Do you believe in the authenticity of the “Gospel of Thomas” and the “History of Joseph the Carpenter” and The “Gospel of Marcion” and the “Gospel of Philip” and on and on and on?

By your logic, virtually all writings of the early Church can't be proven authentic, are therefore of questionable authority, and can safely be ignored.

By your logic, all the apocrapha is authentic. But, what you are attempting to do is to change my argument. I never said they are to be ignored; I said they are interesting and I will also say that in combination with other writings they have an augmented value for all Christians and, in this case, especially regarding the ancient practice of prayer for the dead and veneration of Mary. However, you are the one who insists that this letter is authentic. Fine, now why don’t you prove it?

Bro. Anthony's statement may or may not be biased. My point is that in the absence of supporting material or authority, the statement can safely be ignored.

Actually, the burden of proof is on you. Bro. Anthony correctly inferred that the authenticity of this letter could not be proved. I accept his statement. Why don’t you prove both Bro. Anthony and me to be incorrect? I will be waiting but not holding my breath.

No doubt Bro. Anthony is more often right than wrong, but again, your making a straw man argument.

I made no straw man argument. I gave you a more recent example of an entire book [The Imitation of Christ] that employs the same literary device as this alleged writing of Mary.

- His negative characterizations were unsupported

It is you who has no proof to support your "positive" contentions. If you do, show it.

- He doesn't have the education to qualify as an authority

Neither do I, but I know for a fact that you have offered NO PROOF to support your belief.

He doesn't have the experience to qualify as an authority

Let’s have your proof. If you have the experience and the education that Bro. Anthony does not, this should present no difficulty for you.

- his religious training has a demonstrable bias in the area under discussion.

Show the proof and I will believe you. After I see your proof, I promise you that, although I don’t know the man, I will email Bro Anthony with your PROOF and I expect that he will believe you also and retract his online statement. Now, there are at least two of us that are waiting for you and possibly many others who read his online Q & A column.

p.s., Have we beaten this issue to death yet? ;-)

This is fun, but, I agree, we have beaten it to death. What’s next? ;-)

God bless

Where is your supporting material to PROVE that the document in question is authentic.

Ha ha! Now you're changing the subject, another form of straw man argument. Boy, you really like straw men!

You accuse me of “straw men”

Not at all, just pointing out the obvious ;-)

Clearly, the Church has rejected this letter (and most of the other ancient writings) as part of the Canon of scripture.

"Clearly" you like arguing against straw men.

No one has argued for "canonicity" so your many arguments against the position are moot (i.e., lack relevance or significance).

As yet another aside, you don't appear to understand the criteria the Church used for determining Scripture. Nor do you understand the meaning of "rejection" when applied to canonicity. As I indicated in an earlier post, there's more to canonicity than just "genuineness". (If you ever come across a post discussing canon criteria, please let me know. Development of the principles must have been very interesting.)

...like Augustine who accepted the authenticity of the scriptures based on the authority of the Catholic Church, so do I. Evidently, you don’t feel the same way.

Now you're just being plain silly. I'm responding, not because your point is off topic (which it is), nor because you've rebutted my argument (which you haven't), but because you're seriously misrepresenting what I said. If you want people to play with you, then you ought to play fair.

do you believe in the authenticity of all the apocryphal writings simply because they are anti Nicene?

First you'll have to define "apocryphal" because it has many meanings. And if your argument rests on the definition of apocrypha as "of dubious authenticity" then you're making more logical errors, this time combining a petitio principii error with a prejudicial language fallacy. Your loaded term is begging the question. (But on the plus side, your repertoire of logical fallacies is expanding! ;-)

However, you are the one who insists that this letter is authentic.

Fallacy Alert!!! Fallacy Alert!!!
Mischaracterization Sighted!!!

Actually, the burden of proof is on you.

And I've proven my assertion to the limit of the evidence available, without a single point being directly countered or refuted.

Bro. Anthony correctly inferred that the authenticity of this letter could not be proved.

Perhaps you don't understand the meaning of 'inference'. In the point at hand, Bro. Anthony simply made an unsubstantiated claim. No inference, correct or otherwise, was involved. (Now you on the other hand ... ;-)

I know for a fact that you have offered NO PROOF to support your belief.

All my proofs are directly from the web sites that either you or I referenced. Since the LSM and CSAP material is hosted by them, I have to assume it is true (for the sake of this argument). However, I am beginning to doubt that you can even identify my (repeatedly posted) assertion. If you can't, I'm spinning my wheels here.

So in summary,
- you've repeatedly misrepresented what I said
- you've repeatedly mischaracterized my arguments
- you've repeatedly raised off-topic arguments
- you've repeatedly made moot points
- you've repeatedly asserted logical fallacies as arguments

Thanks for playing! Better luck next time.

Now you're just being plain silly

I'm responding, not because your point is off topic (which it is), nor because you've rebutted my argument (which you haven't), but because you're seriously misrepresenting what I said.

If you want people to play with you, then you ought to play fair.

Fallacy Alert!!! Fallacy Alert!!!

Thanks for playing! Better luck next time.

I must admit, from your bio page, I expected more from you:

polemikos: from the Greek polemik(ós) meaning 'of or for war' or 'warlike'. Origin of 'polemic,' the art of disputation, an aggressive attack on the opinions of another.

Bwaaaahahahahaha!

You’re a prideful little child who has just been checkmated. Read the following material from the Catholic Encyclopedia and weep, Oh Great One!

I have no doubt that you will call into question the nefarious plot of the Catholic Encyclopedia regarding this subject or perhaps the author or even the evil Jesuit who transcribed this piece, but nevertheless, I’ve wasted too much time with you already. We are done.

"Also there are three letters extant only in Latin. Two of the three purport to be from Ignatius to St. John the Apostle, and one to the Blessed Virgin, with her reply to the same. These are probably of Western origin, dating no further back than the twelfth century."

Click here, Little Man

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