Was Mary Sinless???Why revere her?????

Question

I have heard first hand from a Catholic priest who said the Virgin Mary was without sin. Is this what other Catholics believe? And what Scriptural evidence is there for this? Also, why do Catholics revere her?She was just another christian like you or me. GOD alone deserves glory, it seems we should revere Him and Him alone.

Answer 1

Many Protestants do not know that both Luther and Calvin admitted the dogma of the divine maternity. Luther writes: There is no honor, no beatitude, capable of approaching an elevation which consists in being, of the whole human race, the sole person, superior to all others, unequaled in the prerogative of having one Son in common with the Heavenly Father" Calvin writes: "We cannot acknowledge the blessings brought us by Jesus without acknowledging at the same time how highly God honored and enriched Mary in choosing her for the Mother of God".


The Catholic Church has always paid special honor to the Blessed Virgin, because God honored her above all creatures by bestowing upon her the highest dignity He could confer the divine maternity. The Scriptures tell us that Jesus honored her by dwelling with her under the same roof at Nazareth for thirty years until He began His public ministry, and that He showed His love to her on the Cross, when He left her to the kindly care of His beloved disciple, St. John (John xix. 26). I could never understand how intelligent men hoped to extol the Son of God by making little of the Mother of God. We do not win the affections of our fellowmen by despising or making little of their mothers.

How can you call Mary an ordinary woman, and at the same time pretend that you have studied the Scriptures? Would God choose an ordinary woman to be the Mother of His only Son, when He had countless millions of women to choose from? The prophet Isaias spoke of her coming centuries before , and God sent from heaven a special ambassador to announce her supereminent dignity (Luke i. 26), and another to comfort St. Joseph in his doubting (Matt. i. 20). Both the angel and St. Elizabeth called her "blessed among women" (Luke i. 2&, 43), and her own prophecy that "henceforth all generations shall call me blessed" (Luke i. 48) is fulfilled to the letter every day by Catholics the world over.

Instead of detracting from the love of Christ, devotion to Mary increases our love for Him. The devout client of Mary is ever the strong defender of the divinity of Jesus Christ, her Son. The divine maternity, as the Council of Ephesus clearly recognized in 431, has ever been the standard of orthodox belief in the true doctrine of the Incarnation.



Love for Mary, the masterpiece of God's creation, by its very nature leads us to the love of Christ her Son. He cannot be jealous of the praise we give her, for every one of her privileges and prerogatives are His own free gift. Is the artist jealous of the praise you give his masterpiece? Is the author jealous of the praise you give his book?

Answer 2

Catholics Believe

Mary is the Immaculate Conception, having been conceived without the stain of original sin upon her soul.

Mary is the Second Eve, whose "soul did magnify the Lord," whereas the First Eve demagnified God through disobedience of His command.

Mary is the "virgin" Isaiah said would conceive the "Emmanuel, God with us" (7:14): That this prophesy included the virginal birth, as well as the virginal conception of Jesus the Messiah.

Mary, being the mother of Jesus, "the Son of the Most High" (St. Luke 1:32), is the mother of God: "How have I (Elizabeth) deserved that (Mary) the mother of my Lord should come to me?" (St. Luke 1:44).

Catholics Believe

Mary is the spiritual mother of mankind: "Behold thy mother" (St. John 19:27).

Mary is the mother who is ever ready to carry their petitions to her Divine Son.

Mary is the mother who knows the yearnings in the hearts of mankind, having been the ideal maiden, wife, mother and widow.

Mary is the Saint of Saints, our Mediatrix, whose intercessory influence with her Divine Son is first and foremost in heaven.


Catholics are proud to be of those "generations" that Mary said would "call" her "blessed" (St. Luke 1:48). Mary most pure; Mary inviolate: Virgin of Virgins; Queen of the Holy Rosary; "Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb" Jesus (St. Luke 1:42-43): Holy Mary, pray for us sinners, now, and at the hour of our death.

Answer 3

Mary was indeed sinless....as were Adam and /eve, by the way! At least, they were created sinless but chose to enter into sin.

If God the Most High lived for 9 months in a womb, do you think he would ever place his holy self into something unpure? Yes, Mary did need a redeemer....but God chose to bestow that upon her before her conception (hence the Immaculate Conception). He pre-gifted her with what he will one day gift to all of us for "nothing impure can see God")

As for the use of the word "all" as in "all have sinned"....Scripture also says that "all the Jews turned against Jesus". We know this to be false! After all, the apostles were Jews, so were Paul, Nicodemas, Joseph of Arimathea and countless others. They did not reject Jesus. Most Jews at the time of Jesus were still living in the place of exile in babylonia from the fall of the First Temple in 586 BC. When they were given permission to return to Israel, most opted to remain in Babylon -- therfore they had never heard of Jesus....so how can you reject what you have not heard of? In the time of Jesus, the word "all" actually meant "many".

Answer 4

If by "worship" you mean, as you no doubt do, that Catholics consider Mary to be a Goddess; that they imagine her to have powers of a Divine nature, and that therefore Catholics bestow upon her honors such as heathens bestow upon their female divinities, the answer is emphatically, NO. That would be a violation of the law of God.

If, by "worship" you mean honor, respect, reverence, such as is given when we address His Worship, the magistrate or others of rank and station, the answer is as emphatically, YES, though vener­ate is a less misleading term.

We worship other heroes; we bestow worshipful honors upon the mothers of presidents and kings, then what reasonable objection can be raised against worshipfully honoring the mother of the King of Kings? We venerate Mary as a heroine who gave us a Son whom we love more than we love all the sons of men. To her Son we give Divine worship, because He is our Lord and our God.

Catholics cannot help but question the consistency of Protestants giving praise of the highest to Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, Deborah, Ruth, and others, while virtually ignoring Mary. Surely she towers far above them. Is it because Catholics are profuse in their love and praise of Mary?

Answer 5

Luke writes that Mary is full of grace, highly favored. Lk1:37: "For with God nothing shall be impossible." She is the "woman" of Gen 3:15 whose enmity with Satan and sin is aboslute. Whe is the Ark of the Covenant (Ex 25:11-21) made to hold the living Word of God: a holy tabernacle nade not of the purest gold, but of the purest flesh. St. Paul is emphasizing the universal aspect of sin extending to Jews and Gentiles alike. Babies have not sinned; Adam and Eve before the fall had not sinned; Jesus never sinned. These are some exceptions that fall outside St. Paul's condemnation. Mary is another.
God honored her above all creatures by making her the mother of His Son. In honoring Mary, we are following the example of God Himself. Mary's special privileges were given to her by God, not man.

God bless,
Stanbo

Answer 6

Consider that if Mary was sinless she would not have needed to have a Son who takes away the sins of the world. Since she would be perfect she could have been the sacrifice for all sinners.

Christ was the only sinless person who ever lived. Mary was a sinner just like everyone who posts here and everyone in the world.

God alone does deserve the glory!

Answer 7

As God preserved Mary from acquiring original sin, so He preserved her by His grace from ever committing a sin during her life. This teaching essentially follows from the last.

How This Teaching Exalts Christ

As with the Immaculate Conception, this teaching shows that Jesus' holiness demanded that He be born of a holy woman, and that He can save to the uttermost.

Biblical Basis

Essentially the same as with the Immaculate Conception. Had Mary ever committed a sin during her life, she would not have been an enemy of the devil or a holy vessel; thus her Immaculate Conception would have been in vain! Her fullness of grace would have helped prevent her from committing sin.

Answer 8

The angel Gabriel said, "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you" (Luke 1:28). The phrase "full of grace" is a translation of the Greek word kecharitomene. It therefore expresses a characteristic quality of Mary.

The traditional translation, "full of grace," is better than the one found in many recent versions of the New Testament, which give something along the lines of "highly favored daughter." Mary was indeed a highly favored daughter of God, but the Greek implies more than that (and it never mentions the word for "daughter"). The grace given to Mary is at once permanent and of a unique kind. Kecharitomene is a perfect passive participle of charitoo, meaning "to fill or endow with grace." Since this term is in the perfect tense, it indicates that Mary was graced in the past but with continuing effects in the present. So, the grace Mary enjoyed was not a result of the angel’s visit. In fact, Catholics hold, it extended over the whole of her life, from conception onward. She was in a state of sanctifying grace from the first moment of her existence.

Cheers :-)

Answer 9

That is catholic teaching not Bible teaching. If you want to look at catholic beliefs you will find many beliefs that are not in the Bible and in fact many doctrines such as the Immaculate Concept (Mary being without sin) originated hundreds of years after Catholocism began in 325 AD.

Answer 10

Mary was not sinless, Romans 3:23 For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. How could Mary be declared sinless without the sacrifice of Christ Jesus her unborn son? God requires perfect justice, to have forgiveness of sin there had to be a perfect human sacrifice first so she could have foregiveness, if God declared her sinless, he would be going against his own justice which he cannot do. If Mary were sinless she never would have died, as the wages of sin is death, without sin there is no death, that is why Jesus Christ's ransom sacrifice gives foregiveness of sin, Jesus Christ never should have died and his life had redeeming value.