WHY? Nothing is impossible for God.... His Holy Spirit indwells believers today who are not sinless!
***The Immaculate Conception is clearly a belief which exalts Jesus!***
Jesus was/is fully exalted apart from this recent dogmatic assertion. It elevates Mary beyond the appropriate biblical honor due her.
Genesis 3 says
15and I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: he shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
The wider quote shows clearly that the enmity is between Satan and Jesus (Mary's seed).
Wrong. The belief that Mary was immaculate is an ancient belief. The only thing that could be said to be "recent" was the official explanation of how she was created that way. The Church waited until relatively recently to define her Immaculate Conception because it took so long to formulate theologically the means by which she was Immaculately conceived.
So, Mary's sinlessness was believed from the earliest Christians.
The manner in which God created Mary sinlessly was not fully or properly understood or formulated until recently.
You cannot argue that Mary's sinlessness is not an ancient belief based on the fact that the belief was not codeified until relatively recently. That is a false argument. The writings of the early Christians prove they believed Mary was sinless.
WARNING RnMomof7: Here follows one of Polycarp's dreaded cut and pastes!!! (I often wonder why you dislike my cut and paste, but deep down we both know its because they are irrefutable ;-)
Mary's Sinlessness Early Christian belief always associated Mary with Jesus in the divine plan. The Patristic writers referred to Mary as the "new Eve," who cooperated with Christ, the "new Adam." In the writings of Justin the Martyr (165 A.D.), Irenaeus (202 A.D.), Ephraem of Syria (403 A.D.), Cyril of Jerusalem (348 A.D.), Jerome (420 A.D.), Augustine (430 A.D.), Epiphanius of Salamis (403 A.D.), and John Chrysostom (407 A.D.), Mary is portrayed as bringing life (Christ) into the world, whereas Eve brought death, and Mary's humility and obedience is contrasted with Eve's pride and disobedience.
Mary's sinlessness in general was undisputed by early Christian writers. St. Ambrose (430 A.D.) wrote, ". . . Mary, a Virgin not only undefiled but a virgin whom grace has made inviolate, free of every stain." Concerning Our Blessed Lady, St. Augustine declared, "I wish to have absolutely no question when treating of sin." St. Ephraem, in a poem addressed to Christ, penned "Thou and thy mother are alone in this—you are wholly beautiful in every respect. There is in thee, Lord, no stain, nor any spot in thy Mother." In praise of Mary, he wrote, "My Lady most holy, all-pure, all-immaculate, all-stainless, all-undefiled, all-incorrupt, all-inviolate . . . spotless robe of Him who clothes himself with light as with a garment . . . flower unfading, purple woven by God, alone most immaculate!"
St. Proclus (446 A.D.), Patriarch of Constantinople, wrote, "Mary is the heavenly orb of a new creation, in whom the Sun of justice, ever shining, has vanished from her soul all the night of sin." St. John Damascene spoke of Mary as "preserved without stain." Although agreeing that Mary was sinless in her behavior, the Church Fathers were divided on the question of her inheritance of original sin. Even the great Thomas Aquinas (1274 A.D.) could not resolve the issue; it remained for John Duns Scotus (1308 A.D.) to propose a "preservative redemption" rather than a "restorative redemption" for Mary. The Church took the decisive step on December 8, 1854, when Peter's successor, the venerable Pope Pius IX, infallibly defined the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. It was by this title that, four years later, Mary identified herself to St. Bernadette at Lourdes. And, in 1954, the first Marian Year was occasioned by the 100th anniversary of the proclamation of this beautiful truth.