Maculata?

I asked my pastor if Lutherans held to the Immaculate Conception and he said that it was sort of a pious belief (which Luther held originally), and I was content in that, but after reading St. Bernard's immaculate(?) case against the Immaculate Conception... I'm not so sure

In any case, like St. Augustine, out of reverence for the Mother of God, I will make no speculation as to her sinfulness.

Some Passages from St. Bernard of Clairvaux & Thoughts

"And who need wonder when I say that the Word was united to human flesh through the faith of Mary, seeing that He received that same flesh from hers ? There is nothing in the foregoing explanation opposed to our regarding the faith of Mary as a type of the kingdom of heaven ; nor does it seem unfitting to compare her faith with the kingdom of heaven, since by that same faith its losses are repaired."

***

"O Lamb of God ! O truly meek Lamb ! do Thou open the book. Open out Thy pierced hands and feet, that the treasure of salvation and the plentiful redemption hidden
in them may come forth."

***

"If there be anyone stained with crime, and driven headlong by despair to the pit of destruction, let him call upon this life-giving name, and he will speedily be restored to hope and salvation. Is there anyone amongst you in hardness of heart, in sloth, or tepidity, in bitterness of mind, if he will but invoke the name of Jesus his heart will be softened, and tears of contrition will flow gently and abundantly. In dangers and distress, in fears and anxieties, let him call on this name of power, and his confidence will return, his peace of mind will be restored. Doubts and embarrassments will be dispelled and give place to certainty. There is no ill of life, no adversity or misfortune, in which this adorable name will not bring help and fortitude. It is a remedy whose virtue our dear Saviour invites us to test."

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I've always loved St. Bernard. I believe it was Calvin who cited him more than any other Christian author. He has such a lively faith, and a love for Jesus that just shines through the page. I wish I had someone like him to teach me the faith sometimes.

The pastor I've been meeting with has been great, and is very meek. Not at all argumentative or polemical, a quiet man. Of course as our Lord said, "they will all be taught by God" (Jn 6:45) so I suppose I have nothing to complain about. Just like the Blessed Virgin, and the Patriarchs, and St. Bernard (and Calvin?), all I can do is trust in the promises of God, and call upon the name of Jesus, for he - not me or anyone else - is my Saviour.

"they said to him, "What must we do, to be doing the works of God?" Jesus answered them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent."" - John 6:28-29

Jesus I trust in You

Scott Hahn, 'Fleshing Out' the Holy Spirit

Scott Hahn has written a great piece on the connections between the Holy Spirit and the Blessed Virgin Mary. I didn't read all of it but it really helped me to understand the maternal aspects of the Spirit - though obviously the Holy Spirit is not feminine as Hahn makes clear, but in the same way that God the Father is not male, we can use analogies to understand God.

Anyway he writes about how the Spirit conceived in Mary brought forth the birth of Christ and how the Spirit's work in baptism gives birth to Christians etc. He quotes N.T. Wright which will only confirm the widespread allegations that Wright is a secret Jesuit (though I think the man is very anti-Catholic)

Anyway, here is the book:

http://www.salvationhistory.com/documents/scripture/First_Comes_Love_appendix.pdf

Courage and the Feast of the Assumption

Today I had a very awkward (I don't think I spelled that right) breakfast with my parents. I was telling them about where I wanted to go to school for graduate studies. I suggested St. Regis College (Jesuit) attached to UofT and Boston College (Catholic & Reformed) but as soon as the word 'saint' came out of my mouth he began to talk about how I was adamant on unbiblical 'denominationalism' by wanting to attend a Catholic school, and suggested Dallas Theological Seminary or 'some other good evangelical school'.

Anyway, he said that true theology is based on "the Word" alone and that denominations which I allegedly insist on (If Catholicism is a denomination, then all the Church fathers were "denominationalists") were a sin. I just had the courage to tell him that I wanted to study "false theology" based on the traditions of men and Aquinas and Augustine and Church History. After that there was a long silence, an we spoke no more on it.

Today is the feast of the Assumption of our Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mother. This is arguably the most offensive feast day to Protestants as it is not explicitly in the bible and because the dogma was only declared in the last 70 years as official. But there was a certain courage it took for the Pope to declare it as a feast day and a certain courage for Catholics to celebrate it. It is the affirmation that God's tradition lives on in our Church, that the bible is not the only source of God's word, and that the Holy Spirit is still guiding our pilgrim Church. May I find courage to face these obstacles in drawing from the courage of my Church and the power of the Holy Spirit.

Saturday Evening Thoughts

Today yet another Calvinist tried to convert me on facebook (a really amateur one, who didn't even understand the orthodox Protestant theology, but was basically just a disciple of R.C. Sproul) and I felt the same normal annoyance. Yesterday night our family was out for dinner and I was told I wasn't allowed to mention religion as i would 'ruin' the evening. I mentioned politics and came close enough to doing so anyway.

People really hate me, alot. Almost every Calvinist I know, every arch-conservative/American Republican (I'm a conservative in Canada, which makes me a centrist in the states), and every optimist.

I have an incredibly easy life, and I have suffered little in it, but I was just getting annoyed with life today. I just want to live in Quebec or Rome or something, just somewhere where I can be Catholic without having to constantly listen to hellfire condemnations from Prots and just live happily.

The Anglicans and the Lutherans can be so sophisticated when dealing with us Romans, why can't the Reformed (Excluding Jared and Matt) grow up like them?

Philip Yancey wrote something I found interesting the other day. The verb "to Oppress" in English (according to Yancey - I couldn't find this onlin) comes from an English practice where Catholics were placed under a board and then heavy rocks were placed on top of the board, squishing them gradually until they died or recanted. I guess I have it pretty easy compared to my Anglo-Saxon Catholic ancestors in the faith.

I've been thinking about what Pelikan says about the B.V.M. being Mediatrix in medieval Catholic theology and how disgusted he 'sounds' when he writes. But then I realized, 'hey that's the default, that's what the church universally agreed upon, why should I feel bad for believing the consensus of the church?'

Once again I'm reading Tolkien, and a bit of Chesterton, and planning where I'll go to mass tomorrow.

And I don't care about fighting with anyone, I just want everyone to leave the reprobate Catholic alone, and for God to send me some Roman brothers in the faith...but I'm he most likely won't and I'll be writing similar blog posts for annoyed Protestant friends in a year from now.

st. mary star of the sea, pray for me, I entrust myself to your maternal care this evening, may your holiness be an example to me, and may I be reminded of the sufficiency of God's grace.

The Joys of Catholicism (2) - Marian Devotion

I'm very hesitant to post this, because it's so full of Popery. It's the most Romish I think I've dared to go here, and so I'm warning everyone.

I started this post with the warning because I feel like if I talk about the personal spiritual joys I've experienced as a Catholic, Protestants will dismiss it as meaningless emotion. I know they'll do it, because that's what I would do if I were them. So please don't dismiss it outright. I announce my joys in Catholicism only after and sometimes in the midst of my difficulties with it.

Mary Mother of Christians?
When I "signed on" to Catholicism, one of the remaining "cons" was the Blessed Virgin. I think Baptists are instilled with a special hatred for Our Lady - or at least I was, because the only thing I remember being taught about her in church was that she was a sinner and that she didn't follow Jesus, just like the Roman Catholics who worshipped her. I was given 3 rosaries after my confirmation and despite my remaining struggles with the Virgin Mother, I am starting to lighten up about it. I was reading in Pelikan today about how Christology is linked to Mariology and how Christ who had won superabundant grace on the cross, chose to mediate it through his Mother. This made me almost physically sick. I wanted to scream and burn the book (Yes the Baptist force is still strong with me). I could not imagine how such doctrines of Mary could ever point people to Jesus, to the God who claims his own name as "Jealous". None of it made sense, but again I was reminded, this is the original doctrine which people criticized. This is the liturgical tradition of the church and the sum of her prayers, IT is to be accepted, and the burden of proof rests on those against St. Mary theotokos.

(Mis)Translating with St. Jerome!
I've been finding titles for Mary that I feel comfortable with, St. Mary Theotokos, Our Lady, Mother of the Church, Mother of God, and a new favourite I picked up in Pelikan today he is describing titles for her that had to do with "tricks of language".

"One was the identification of the Virgin as "Mary, star of the sea [Maria maris stella]," a name that was said to have been given her from on high. The name was thought to have been prophesied in the oracle "a star shall come forth out of Jacob" (Num 24:17)...its origins seem to lie in Jerome's etymology for the name "Mary" as "a drop of water from the sea [stilla maris]," which he preferred to other explanations. This etymology was taken over by Isidore of Seville, but in the process "drop [stilla]" had become "star [stella]."" - Jaroslav Pelikan "The Christian Tradition" Vol. 3, p. 162 (Mary as Mediatrix). - yes, another Marian title based on a mistranslation, there are many.

Anyway, I was about to go to bed and then decided I would pray first. So I took a rosary and lay on my back on the balcony of our house, looking at the stars and prayed it. The bright stars mixed with "Star of the Sea" made it an interesting time of prayer. It was very good.

I really thought about "gratia plena" (full of grace - my use of the Ave Maria in latin, might be a subconscious method of pretending I'm not praying to Mary). Anyway the 'gratia plena' reminded me of a verse I liked from bible study the other day: "From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace." Jn 1:16. I think this verse is one of my new favourites, not only is it a great prooftext for a scholastic/thomistic/catholic understanding of grace (lol), it's also beautiful, about grace, and about Jesus.

My Big Fat Greek Marian Dogmas
As I find out that the Greek Catholics/Orthodox also 'worship' Mary, it helps put me at ease to know that even without the Vulgate include Mariology in the "catholic faith" (including her title as mediatrix).

And so St. Mary, Star/Drop of the Sea, is becoming daily less of an issue, I feel no trouble of conscience in praying the Rosary (just occasional boredom). I also find that much of my "hatred" for Mary comes from the Misogeny I naturally have. I've said before that if there were a rosary to St. Thomas More, I'd have no problem at all, part of it seems to be what I was taught about Mary in sunday school, and part of it is the fact that I've never before had a woman held up as a good Christian. Another problem seems to be my latent racism which makes me cringe at the thought of attributing beauty to a wrinkled old Jewish woman from the 1st century. Give me classical greek sculptures or blonde-haired, blue-eyed Western European statues, but not the real thing. May God change my sinful heart.

St. Alphonsus Liguori I've been told is good to read on Mariology, but his "glories of Mary" still sounds a bit scary to my newly Roman ears. I need to ease into this.

A Hillariously Stupid Quote From Philip Schaff

"The development of the orthodox Mariology and Mariolatry originated as early as the second century in an allegorical interpretation of the history of the fall, and in the assumption of an antithetic relation of Eve and Mary, according to which the mother of Christ occupies the same position in the history of redemption as the wife of Adam in the history of sin and death [Rom 5:12 ff., 1 Cor 15:22] . . . Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian, are the first who present Mary as the counterpart of Eve, as a "mother of all living" in the higher, spiritual sense, and teach that she became through her obedience the mediate or instrumental cause of the blessings of redemption to the human race, as Eve by her disobedience was the fountain of sin and death.[Footnote: "Even St. Augustine carries this parallel between the first and second Eve as far as any of the fathers . . . "]" - Philip Schaff (History of the Christian Church, Vol. III: Nicene and Post-Nicene Christianity: A.D. 311-600)

Now Philip Schaff is one of the most reverenced Ecclesiastical Historians around (in the Protestant Tradition) but I have to say that I laughed out loud when reading this on Dave Armstrong's blog.

I mean if the early church (2nd century = REALLY early Church) fell into the 'heresy' of 'mariolatry' then just give up. Burn your bibles, throw out your crosses, sell your churches, because if God in all his sovereignty couldn't preserve the church before the new testament was even assembled, then he's the weakest god in history, or the strangest God. I could never tell a Mormon he wasn't a Christian if I agreed with Schaff, both agree (the mormon, and in this statement Schaff) to the ridiculous idea of 'the great apostasy'.

Chesterton writes on the early church that, it's strange how those who were motivated only by love for him (Jesus) would rush off and immediately do all those things he hated.

I know it's just one statement, and that Schaff is pretty solid, and I'm not trying to rub salt in the wound, but even the Anabaptists give the church till Constantine sanction, and let it not be said now or ever that the Lutherans stray further from the Christian history than the Anabaptists.

There you have it the "heresy" of Mariolatry taught by such degenerates as Justin Martyr, St. Irenaeus, Tertullian, St. Augustine and the other so-called "Early Church Fathers".