Removing Jesus

White Horse Inn ^ | June 1, 2014 | Timothy F. Kauffman

[RnMomof7]

Long before Jesus turned water into wine, He turned Mary’s amniotic fluid into meconium, and her breast milk into transitional stools. Anyone who has ever changed a child’s diaper knows that the resulting odor offends the nostrils greatly. As Jesus would later instruct us, “whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the belly” and ends up in the toilet (Matthew 15:17), or in His case as an infant, in the diaper. Thus did Jesus’ lower gastrointestinal tract operate as it must for all men, and thus did our Lord endure the gastrocolic reflex, as all we mortals do. We therefore have no doubt that Mary’s milk passed through Him according to the course of nature, and into His diapers in a common and necessary movement. And thus did Jesus come all the way down to earth to save us, “For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities” (Hebrews 4:15).

If that opening paragraph offends you, you do not know why Jesus came to earth, and you have not understood the Gospel. Jesus did not come to seek the whole, for the “whole need not a physician” (Matthew 9:12). He “came not to call the righteous” (Luke 5:32), for the righteous have no need of a Savior. He did not come to avoid sinners, but to find them. He touched lepers and whores (Mark 1:41, Luke 7:39), asked for a drink from an adulteress (John 4:7), asked for lodging from a tax collector (Luke 19:5), was adored by prostitutes (Luke 7:37-38), feted by sinners (Luke 5:29) and pursued by the ceremonially unclean, and He received them (Matthew 9:20, Luke 17:14).

In short, He is the sinners’ Savior, and He came to earth to pursue them, not to avoid them (1 Timothy 1:15). To find sinners, He became a man like us. Not a man like us in all ways but sweat and dirt. Not a man like us in all ways but meconium. He became a man like us—”touched with the feeling of our infirmities”—in all ways but sin (Hebrews 4:15). And as if it were not enough that His feet were soiled to walk among us, He stooped even further and soiled His hands as well (John 8:6). Thus Jesus truly condescended to be born into a sinful world to save sinners, and was like us in all ways but sin.

Except, say our Roman Catholic acquaintances, such condescension must have its limits. There is only so much stooping God can do without soiling Himself beyond what He can bear. Sure, He fixed his tabernacle among His people, but God ministers at the door of the Tabernacle (Exodus 33:9), and that tabernacle is Mary. And such a tabernacle would need to be sinless. But aside from having a sinless mother, Jesus condescended to be born into a sinful world to save sinners, and was like us in all ways but sin.

Except, of course, being sinless, the womb of Mary was a step up, not a step down, from Heaven. He actually did not, and could not, condescend all the way to our level, say the Roman Catholics:

“The womb of Mary—I will not call it womb, but temple; … the more secret tabernacle, … Yea verily above the heavens must Mary’s womb be accounted, since it sent back the Son of God to heaven more glorious than He had come down from heaven.” (St. Maximus, Homily V)

Thus, while it is true that Jesus “humbled” Himself to become man, He did not so humble Himself that He actually came down from heaven. No, by the testimony of Rome’s saints, He actually went up into Mary’s womb! So aside from having a sinless mother, and a first earthly home that was actually higher than the heavens that He had left behind, Jesus condescended to be born into a sinful world to save sinners, and was like us in all ways but sin.

Except, of course, for the fact that He was raised in a perfectly sinless home. Someone as holy as Jesus could not come this far and then live in a household contaminated by the sins He had come to take away. Therefore, Joseph must have been preserved from sin, too. The Apparition of Joseph in 1956 assured Sister Mary Ephrem that “immediately after my conception … because of my exceptional role of future Virgin-Father …  I was from that moment confirmed in grace and never had the slightest stain on my soul.” So, aside from having a sinless mother, and a first earthly home that was higher, not lower, than the heavens, and aside from having a sinless step-father, Jesus condescended to be born into a sinful world to save sinners, and was like us in all ways but sin.

Except, of course, for the fact that His cousin, John the Baptist, the herald of the King, also lived a life without sin. This “acceptable belief,” as you can read here, is freely accepted as true by Roman Catholics. As one member of the Catholic Answers forum explains, “It is crystal clear from Scripture that St. John the Baptist was baptized within his mother’s womb … [and] was free of all sin from that point on.”

So widespread is this “pious belief,” that even Pope John XXIII in 1960 taught the logical implications of it: namely that Joseph and John the Baptist must have been assumed bodily into heaven, just as Jesus and Mary had been. “So we may piously believe,” said John XXIII, that the grace of assumption into heaven, so recently and infallibly declared for Mary in 1950, was also granted both to John the Baptist and to Joseph (Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 52 (1960) 456). So, aside from having a sinless mother, and a first earthly home that was higher, not lower, than the heavens, and aside from having a sinless step-father, and a sinless cousin, Jesus condescended to be born into a sinful world to save sinners, and was like us in all ways but sin.

Except, of course, the fact that all of the apostles were sinless, too. That this is “acceptable belief” in Rome is evidenced from another writer at the Catholic Answers forum, who holds that not only the apostles, but many, many Roman Catholics led perfectly sinless lives after encountering Christ:

“What is being said is that they led sinless, blameless lives with the help of God’s grace. … Not only the Apostles, but many Saints, Martyrs, Fathers, desert fathers, Confessors and other members of the Church led sinless, blameless lives.”

So, aside from having a sinless mother, and a first earthly home that was higher, not lower, than the heavens, and aside from having a sinless step-father, a sinless cousin, and sinless apostles, disciples, saints, martyrs and other members of the church, Jesus condescended to be born into a sinful world to save sinners, and was like us in all ways but sin.

Except, of course, that His maternal grandparents must have been “profoundly pure” as well. Consider this pious tradition of the conception of Mary in the womb of St. Anne. If Mary was housed in her mother, Anne, and Mary was the tabernacle, then that would make Anne “the inner sanctuary in which was formed the living tabernacle which was to house the Son of God made Man.”

It is thus difficult for Roman Catholics to picture in their minds that Mary had been conceived through normal, biological, copulative processes, including the physical pleasure and all of the attendant physical intimacy between man and wife. So taught Christopher West in his lecture, Theology of the Body and Our Lady of Fatima:

“In the east, do you know how they depict the Immaculate ConceptIon? …  The icon is of a chaste embrace between Joachim and Anne, with the marriage bed behind them. How is it possible that their marital embrace led to the immaculate conception, if their hearts had not also in some way been made profoundly pure.”(59:30-1:00:40)

It is apparently inconceivable to Mr. West that Mary might have been conceived in an intimate sexual embrace, her parents lying down in bed, naked, enjoying the sheer physical pleasure that, as Paul wrote, was the “proper gift of God” to each of them (1 Corinthians 7:7). No, their hearts had to be “profoundly pure,” and that level of purity does not countenance the horizontality of unashamedly pleasurable marital sex.

So, aside from having a sinless mother, and a first earthly home that was higher, not lower, than the heavens, and aside from having a sinless step-father, a sinless cousin, sinless apostles, disciples, saints, martyrs and other members of the church, and “profoundly pure” maternal grandparents, Jesus was born into a sinful world to save sinners, and was like us in all ways but sin.

The point we are making is that Jesus was incarnated to save sinners, yet Rome has built up a religion that is intent on saving Jesus from the sinners He came to save! We see this in the march of Roman Catholic tradition that is constantly expanding the circle of sinlessness that surrounds this Man who, so we thought, had come to dine with sinners, touch lepers and be worshiped by prostitutes. Is it unfathomable that Jesus, Who freely and deliberately dined and lodged with sinners might have taken up His first residence in one, and received His first meal from one?  Is it unfathomable that Jesus, Who left Heaven to find sinners might have included among them a mother, a step-father, a cousin and two grandparents who were as eager to be cleansed of their sin as the harlots and lepers? To Roman Catholics, the answer is yes—it is unfathomable. So far removed is Jesus from sinners in the religion of Rome, that to approach Him to be cleansed, one must already be clean.

But this not the only way Rome separates Jesus from the sinners He came to save. We are all too familiar with Mary’s alleged role as “mediatress.” Yes, Roman Catholics tell us, there is one mediator between God and men, the Man Jesus Christ (1 Timothy 2:5), but despite His incarnation, Jesus’ divinity is still a hindrance, not a help, to His mediation. Read as Roman apologist William Most cleverly transitions from Jesus being “the answer,” to Mary being the much better answer, because her humanity makes her better qualified than Jesus to mediate on our behalf:

“How then can I understand God, how [to] know what He wills, how to deal with him? But In Jesus we have the answer. … Yes, but His heart is the heart of a Divine Person. However, her heart is purely, entirely human, … So her Immaculate Heart can and does assure us we have in heaven an Advocate whom we can understand, who understands us, who loves us to the extent that like the Father, she did not spare her only Son, but gave Him up for all of us” (Most, William G., Mary’s Cooperation in Our Redemption)

But even this cannot be sufficient for Rome, who ever strives by remarkable ingenuity to separate sinners further from their Savior. It is true, says Rome, that Mary is the Mediatress of all graces, and every grace that flows to us from Jesus comes through Mary. But every grace from Mary must necessarily flow through Joseph. In his book, True Devotion to St. Joseph and the Church, Fr. Domenico, makes the case:

“It seems fitting then that by his intercession St. Joseph should now obtain all the graces that Our Lady dispenses to the human race. …  these grace come through Mary first, and then through St. Joseph who obtains them only through her. …  all the other saints rely on St. Joseph in their intercessions, just as St. Joseph relies on the mediation of Our Lady.” (True Devotion to St. Joseph, 381, 383, 400).

One Mediator can never be enough, nor two, nor three, so far removed is Jesus from sinners in the religion of Rome.

But there is yet another way Rome separates Christ from sinners, and that is by reducing Jesus’ death on the cross to merely a symbolic gesture. It was hardly necessary to die and bleed, they say, but Jesus did it anyway—not to pay for sins, but to demonstrate the horror of sin. So taught Fr. William Most:

“Really an incarnation in a palace with no suffering or death would have been an infinite reparation. Yet to show the horror of sin, and the immensity of His love, the Father willed, and He agreed, to go so dreadfully far.” (Most, William, Eschatology).

That is completely contrary to the Scriptures (Hebrews 2:14-17, 9:22), for “it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren … to make reconciliation for the sins of the people,” for “without shedding of blood is no remission.” Yet as it turns out, in Rome, the real sacrifice of Jesus was not what He offered on the cross at all, but the bread He offered the night before in the Last Supper. That, we are told, was the real sacrifice:

“Those who crucified Christ did so at the sixth hour. But Jesus our High Priest immolated the lamb which He took towards the evening [the night before], when He celebrated the paschal banquet with His disciples and imparted to them the sacred mysteries.”

Indeed, Rome teaches that Jesus’ death on the cross was not an offering for sin. They do not hide this, but say it proudly and openly as the Catholic Legate demonstrates:

“The Last Supper was the real sacrificial offering of Christ for sin and it certainly was unbloody. Without the Last Supper I defy you to find any reference to the Body and Blood of Christ being offered as a sacrifice for sin in the entire of the Passion Narratives.”

Thus does the religion of Rome nullify the incarnation and “make the cross of Christ of none effect” (1 Corinthians 1:17)—as if Paul had not said we have access to the Father by the blood of the cross (Ephesians 2:13-19), and Peter had not said Jesus “bare our sins in his own body on the tree ” (1 Peter 2:24-3:18), and as if Hebrews did not instruct us that Jesus is “mediator of the new testament … by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions” (Hebrews 9:15). Rome would have Him mediate the new covenant, without blood, without death, without the cross and without suffering for our transgressions, for “an incarnation in a palace with no suffering or death” would have sufficed.

Couple this with the visions of Mary, and what we find is an utter and absolute denial of everything the incarnation was to accomplish. The visions of Mary teach Roman Catholics that it is Jesus Who is angry at them, and that Mary is holding back His wrath, and she is suffering for them—contrary to Romans 5:9 which assures us that “we shall be saved from wrath through him.”  The visions of Mary also teach that it is Jesus Who needs to be consoled by our sufferings—contrary to 2 Corinthians 1:5 which assures us that “as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ.” Compare these Scripture verses, above, with what the apparitions of Mary teach (Both of these visions and messages, La Salette and Akita, have the ecclesiastical approval of the Roman religion):

“If my people will not obey I shall be compelled to loose my Son’s arm. It is so heavy, so pressing that I can no longer restrain it. How long I have suffered for you! If my Son is not to cast you off, I am obliged to entreat Him without ceasing.” (Apparition of Mary in LaSalette, France to Maximin Giraud and Melanie Mathieu, 1846)

“Many men in this world afflict the Lord. I desire souls to console Him to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair by their suffering and their poverty for the sinners and ingrates.” (Apparition of Mary in Akita, Japan, to Sr. Agnes Sasagawa, 1973)

So far removed is Jesus from sinners in the religion of Rome, that we are told that Jesus is angry with us, and that we must suffer to console Him and save Him from His Father’s wrath! Is not the sum total of Rome’s doctrines a material denial of the incarnation?

Consider Rome’s teachings in light of John’s instruction in his first epistle. 1 John is an exquisite magnification of the incarnation, “which we have heard, … seen with our eyes, … looked upon, and our hands have handled,” (1 John 1:1). If we have sinned, there is a Mediator for us, for “we have an advocate with the Father” (1 John 2:1).  “God … sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins” and “your sins are forgiven you for his name’s sake.” (1 John 2:12, 4:10). “He was manifested to take away our sins” (1 John 3:1). All these speak of an incarnation that provided us with one Mediator, provided us with one propitiation for our sins, and let us boldly approach Him (1 John 4:17) not because we are without sins (1 John 1:8-10), but because He Himself has made propitiation for them. “This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son” (1 John 5:11). But Rome denies this record. The Serpent attempted to prevent the incarnation from occurring (Revelation 12:4), and failing that, now every effort is made by Rome to undo all of the benefits to be gained from it.

Did Jesus come in the flesh to seek and save sinners? Rome responds by surrounding Him with as many sinless people as possible to make Him distant an inaccessible to those who need Him.

Did Jesus come in the flesh to make a propitiation to the Father? Rome responds by relegating His sacrifice to the background—merely a profound gesture that was not strictly necessary—and making the real sacrifice an unbloody one the night before the crucifixion, when He “offered” bread for sins of the world.

Did Jesus come in the flesh to die, making peace through the blood of His cross? Rome responds by teaching that every sin Jesus pays for just makes the Father and Jesus angrier and angrier, and it is we who must, by our sufferings, make reparation for sin and thus save Jesus from His Father’s wrath.

Did Jesus become a man to be a Mediator between God and His people? Rome responds by adding as many mediators as possible between Jesus and sinners, as if His incarnation had failed, and left Him incapacitated, unfit and unable to serve.

Was Jesus “made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death” (Hebrews 2:9)? Rome responds by saying He was made higher than the heavens, so high is Mary’s womb above the children of men. The leisure of a palace, they say, instead of the humiliation of the cross, would have sufficed as a reparation.

Like the disciples, Rome would send away the unclean (Matthew 15:23), keep the simple from approaching Him (Luke 18:16), and rebuke Jesus for dying on the cross (Matthew 16:22)—for Rome has “taken away the key of knowledge,” not entering themselves, and hindering those who would (Luke 11:52).

When John wrote, “every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God” (1 John 4:3), he did not write this as an isolated formulaic incantation. He did not write this as if the mere recitation of the Nicæan Creed was sufficient as a substitute for faith in what had really been accomplished in the incarnation. John wrote this in the context of an incarnation that guaranteed to us a propitiation for sins and the favorable disposition of our heavenly Father, that provided us an Advocate who took on flesh to represent us and intercede before Him, that comforted us with an assurance of pardon for our sin through an accessible Savior Who hears us when we call upon Him. All these things are in practice denied by Rome, and we are offered no peace, no security, an angry Father, an angry Son, an endless line of mediators and a Savior unable to sympathize with our weakness, unapproachable and inaccessible except by those who are already “whole” and already “righteous.”

We hold therefore that when John wrote, “he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son.” (1 John 5:10), it is proof that the religion of Rome, at its core, is a rejection of the incarnation, for Rome has done all in its power to nullify it and make God a liar. Does Rome recite the Nicæan Creed? Well did Isaiah speak of her:

“Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men:” (Isaiah 29:13).

The priests of Rome honor the incarnation with their lips, but by removing Jesus from sinners, they have denied the incarnation, and have removed their hearts from God.

“For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” (Hebrews 4:15)

[ealgeone]

I’ve read a lot of the CCC. From comments I’ve seen on FR I’ve read more than a lot of rccs.

[ealgeone]

It's promulgated by the RCC itself. This nonsense that Mary and Joseph didn't have kids of their own is what drives it in part.

The Word, as has been explained too many times, clearly shows Joseph and Mary had other kids of their own. There are too many passages that show they did have children when read in context. And please....none of this the word brethren can mean cousin, other believers, when we read the passages indicating they had children.

That catholics continue to perpetuate this ever virgin myth of Mary is just totally contrary to the Word.

Roman catholics have built up Mary to something that is not recognizable when viewed through the lense of Scripture.

It's why Christians reject roman catholic tradition on this issue and a host of others.

[metmom]

Here, a couple of links with references to some of the ECF’s who espoused that view, found with a google search.

http://www.godrules.net/articles/earlychurch-on-sex.htm

http://whychurchfatherswerenegativeaboutsex.blogspot.com/

There are other indicators as well. For one thing, the way celibacy is held up as the ideal, especially for the priesthood.

Not to mention that married couples who give up sex have been lauded. There was at least one thread that I recall recently about a married couple who agreed to be celibate and it drew mixed reactions, but there were those who supported it.

And the reactions of Catholics when it’s even suggested that Mary had sex with Joseph. Catholics are just aghast at the thought.

I’ve heard people state that Mary couldn’t have had sex with Joseph because she was sinless, or rather that she couldn’t have been sinless if she had had sex with Joseph.

[metmom]

Why do Catholics get someone banned as a hate site so Prots can’t reference him and yet at every turn throw same said banned person/site back in the faces of Prots as if he is representative of Protestantism?

Why do Catholics feel free to appeal to someone they don’t want anyone else to use?

The hypocrisy is staggering.

They are continually breaking the RF guidelines they demanded to be put in place.

Rules for thee but not for me, eh?

[WVKayaker]

They get really upset when a spade is called a spade.

It is interesting to hear the squeals of the wounded all the way over here in the Philippines. It seems most of the Roman Catholic cultists prefer to remain in their state of denial. They have been properly indoctrinated, and have no response except to complain.

There is no Salvation outside of Jesus Christ. There is no remission of sins outside Jesus Christ. There is no other intercessor under Heaven, only Jesus Christ.

The idea that the roman catholic mary was sinless, and all those others that have been proclaimed sinless by that cult, deny the very purpose for Jesus to come, to live, to be killed, and to be resurrected. This writer is square over the target.

They like their fables and fairy tales of apparitions and alleged "miracles". They prefer the smells and bells of their false religion, and miss the most important part of Scripture.

John 3: 3 Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. 2 He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”

3 Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

4 “How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

5 Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. 7 You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

9 “How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.

10 “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? 11 Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. 12 I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? 13 No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. 14 Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”

16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. 19 This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God. ...

[MarineBrat]

Wasn’t interested in wasting any time arguing. Just expressing an opinion.

[Resettozero]

Anyone who has ever changed a breast-fed child's diaper, knows that breast-fed baby poop does not stink. It's sweet-ish.

Perhaps YOUR breast-fed child's poop didn't stink...and had a nice sweet aromatic scent.

(Just, wow.)

Does the Mister agree with you on this?

[daniel1212]

It's staggering how I ....have never met one single, solitary Catholic who thought sex between a husband and wife is dirty and sinful.

Perhaps not, but while modern RCs have become more enlightened on the subject, RCs often assert one must go to the "fathers," and there we see no less than Jerome, Augustine and Tertullian imputing uncleanness to marriage or its relations.

this too we must observe, at least if we would faithfully follow the Hebrew, that while Scripture on the first, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth days relates that, having finished the works of each, “God saw that it was good,” on the second day it omitted this altogether, leaving us to understand that two is not a good number because it destroys unity, and prefigures the marriage compact. Hence it was that all the animals which Noah took into the ark by pairs were unclean. Odd numbers denote cleanness. St. Jerome, Against Jovinianus Book 1 http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf206.vi.vi.I.html

So much for 2 x 2 evangelism! And behold how the scholar resorts to this false dilemma, as on First Corinthians 7 he reasons:

It is good, he says, for a man not to touch a woman. If it is good not to touch a woman, it is bad to touch one: for there is no opposite to goodness but badness. But if it be bad and the evil is pardoned, the reason for the concession is to prevent worse evil. (Against Jovinianus (Book I, v. 7)

He furthermore stated,

It is not disparaging wedlock to prefer virginity. No one can make a comparison between two things if one is good and the other evil....Let them marry and be given in marriage who eat their bread in the sweat of their brow, whose land brings forth thorns and thistles, and whose crops are choked with brambles. My seed produces fruit a hundredfold.(''Letter'' 22; http://epistolae.ccnmtl.columbia.edu/letter/447.html).

In addition, Augustine held marital relations must involve sinful lust:

...the very embrace which is lawful and honourable cannot be effected without the ardour of lust, so as to be able to accomplish that which appertains to the use of reason and not of lust....This is the carnal concupiscence, which, while it is no longer accounted sin in the regenerate, yet in no case happens to nature except from sin. — On Marriage and Concupiscence (Book I, cp. 27); http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/15071.htm

Then we have Tertullian, who argued that second marriage, having been freed from the first by death, "will have to be termed no other than a species of fornication,'' partly based on the reasoning that such involves desiring to marry a women out of sexual ardor. ''An Exhortation to Chastity,'' Chapter IX.—Second Marriage a Species of Adultery, Marriage Itself Impugned, as Akin to Adultery, ANF, v. 4, p. 84.]

[metmom]

That last quote of Augustine’s was the one I remembered.

And again, the typical Catholic’s reaction at the thought of Mary having sex with her lawful husband reveals what people really think about sex within marriage.

While there is no doubt that sex outside of marriage is wrong, the way celibacy and virginity are held up as standards to attain over marriage, strips off the fluff and shows what Catholic teaching really is stating.

[MHGinTN]

In the ruins of Pompeii were discovered water drained toilets. That did not use traps as modern toilets do, but they had running water under the ‘stools’ to drain away the effluent. The Romans has sewers and pipes, albeit their pipes were made of lead, with the resulting lead poinsoning which accompanies ingesting lead.

[Mark17]

Wasn’t interested in wasting any time arguing. Just expressing an opinion.

It's kind of understood, that if you post something on FR, others might respond to you, whether you like it or not. What a novel concept, but hey, wasn't interested in wasting any time arguing. Just expressing an opinion. 😎

[RnMomof7]

It's staggering how I could be 63 years old, have known or personally corresponded with many hundreds of Catholics, have read Himalayan stacks of Catholic books and periodicals, have visit Catholic websites, English and Spanish language, from far-right-to-far-left,the ones I consider doctrinally sound and even the ones I, personally, think are like Kellogg's, full of flakes and nuts --- and have never met one single, solitary Catholic who thought sex between a husband and wife is dirty and sinful.

But Mary never had sex with her husband Joseph... When priests were married they were not to have sex with their wived the day prior to saying mass ....and on this site I have read posters say that sex without the intent of getting pregnant (using birth control ) is "mutual masterbation"

[MHGinTN]

It makes no difference in the case of many sacrilkege apologist, for they can’t even see when someone agrees with them they are so blind to anything except the dogma of mother church.

[Mrs. Don-o]

The links you provided manifest a certain ignorance about the way the Church regards the early Church fathers. They are not regarded as infallible teachers nor as sources of doctrine per se. They are most authoritative when what they say shows a broad a consensus, which is evidence of the "mind of the Church" at that time.

The authors at "godrules" are so ignorant as to refer to "Saint Tertullian". It may seem like a mere detail, but it's a telling error which shows a real unfamiliarity with the subject, like a sportscaster who persists in talking about home-runs in football. Tertullian write a huge amount of valuable stuff, for instance refuting the Gnostics, and also he originated the term "Trinity" --- that's a biggie! --- but he was never honored as a saint because a number of his later writings directly contradicted the teachings of the Church.

Even St. Augustine, who IS a canonized saint, and a very great one, is not accepted uncritically or in toto. For instance, some of his writings can be interpreted as denying free will as well as asserting total depravity: this the Catholic and Orthodox churches reject.

People who try to conflate "early Church Fathers" totally with Catholic doctrine, as if they were one and the same, never quote St. John Chrysostom, who wrote in a beautiful and positive way about the embrace of marital love. They also manage to miss the entirety of Catholic Sacramental theology, which holds Holy Matrimony to be a sacred sign, a "Mysterium Tremendum" imaging the union of Christ and the Church, and sexual intercourse to be a constitutive element of that Sacrament.

So it is not only not considered a sinful, dirty or depraved act, it is considered an outward sign of the inward life of grace.

Catholics know this.

Propagandists who comb the ECF's for obsolete "gotcha" texts do not.

Please be wary of such distorted misuses of early Christian writers.

As for Mary, what do you think --- that God just used her as a Hagar, a reproductive concubine, and then passed her off to Joseph: "Here, I got what I wanted, now you can have her"?

We know from Scripture that God the Most High chose May as his dwelling, a marvel foreshadowed by the Ark of the Covenant.

The Ark carried manna; Mary carried Jesus, the Divine Bread of Life. The Ark carried the Tablets of the Law; Mary carried the Divine Giver of the Law. The Ark carried the staff of Aaron, which symbolized God's life-giving power; Mary, in a way far excelling this, carried the Living God Himself. Thus Mary is untouchable and inviolate for even stronger reasons than the Ark of the Covenant or the Holy of Holies would be untouchable.

If only the High Priest could enter the Holy of Holies, certainly no man could enter Mary: the idea here is inviolability.

In the NT, Mary herself bears witness to her commitment to virginity. When the Archangel Gabriel tells Mary she will conceive and bear a son, she seems astonished --- revealing that she was not only a virgin, but committed to virginity.

Imagine this: You are at a bridal shower for a friend and somebody remarks to the bride, “You are going to have such adorable kids!” Everybody laughs, but the bride draws back in astonishment and says, “But...but...how shall this be? I know not man.” **Huh?** For a woman who is engaged to be married, there are only two possible explanations for such a reaction: either she has no idea where babies come from—--or she has every intention of remaining a virgin after marriage.

Why else would Mary be astonished? She’s a woman betrothed to Joseph, she knows about the birds and the bees. Yet she reacts with amazement at the news that she, a woman betrothed, will bear a son.

Notice that the angel does not say “You are pregnant.” He says “You will conceive in your womb and bear a son” (Luke 1:31). This is a promise that has been made to other women in Jewish history such as Sarah and Hannah. All of them understand the promise to mean, “You and your husband will conceive a child.” So why should the same promise astonish Mary, a young woman who also plans to marry—--unless she had already decided to remain a virgin throughout her life?

Lastly, the “ever-virgin” argument boils down to, “The Church believes this because the Church has always believed this.” All the ancient churches –Coptic, Chaldean, Assyrian, Arabic-speaking, Greek-speaking, as well as Latin --- which existed from Apostolic times --- refer to Christ’s mother as "Our most holy, pure, blessed, and glorious Lady, the Theotokos and Ever Virgin Mary," Aeiparthenos in Greek, or the equivalent in Syrian or Coptic or whatever. Our martyrs who were killed by Nero and Diocletian believed this. You can find an inscription in the Catacomb of Priscilla in Rome: “Beata Maria Semper Virgine”, "Blessed Mary Ever Virgin.”

This same truth was firmly held by Luther, Zwingli, and other Christians until well into the Reformation --- even Calvin rejected arguments against Mary's perpetual virginity based on the mention in Scripture of “brothers of Jesus,” whom Calvin understood to be other close kin, e.g. half-brothers and cousins. The Anglicans in the 16th, 17th, even the 18th century, (John Wesley) hailed Mary as ever-virgin.

This idea that Mary was NOT ever-virgin, is a Renaissance-era innovation. So you can either think that the ancient churches and the devout and learned Christians for 15 centuries were right; or you can think they were all wrong. I, myself, would think it rash to presume that most Christians in most places have been wrong about most things, most of the time, but that a handful of breakaway Renaissance-era Europeans all-of-a-sudden and for the first time grasped the meaning of the ancient texts.

[ifinnegan]

“How is this much different than “If you ain’t Catholic, you ain’t Christian” threads out there.”

Exactly.

[MarineBrat]

>>It’s kind of understood, that if you post something on FR, others might respond to you, whether you like it or not.

Agreed. And when I opened the thread and saw that its intent was to put a stick in the eye of (ostensibly fellow) Christians, and to foment argument, I responded and moved along. No argument here.

Yadda yadda Catholics! Yadda yadda Protestants. It just doesn’t interest me.

[Tennessee Nana]

and breastfed babies don’t poop as much..

:)

[WVKayaker]

What a perverted view that roman catholics display about things that are clear in Scripture. Evidently, black is white and green is red in the understanding of that cult's followers. The view of God's Word and the inspired history they claim to have authored, is opposed in their teaching from their traditions.

i have no doubts about their sincerity, but I do wonder at the adherence to the indoctrination! They seem to blindly follow and accept the lies the cult displays. This mary thing is born from a need for tangible feelings, and not giving over to the Spirit calling us out! Cults need blind followers, but every now and then, God can speak through an ass. That seems to be the impression from the roman cult toward non-rccers...