'Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh;'
{Hebrews 10:19-20)

Love,
.A.

Note to Catholics: I don't have animosity towards you as a person (non-Catholics included) please please understand that. I understand we are all trying to get to the same place.

You will burn for that one!

Nah, God does not listen to me anyway.

I cannot say for Western Catholicism but Eastern Orthodox teach that they pray to Mary because she was the mother of Jesus and can tell him what to do. I find this quite appalling.

I personally had never heard of that!  Mary telling God what to do!  Learn something new....

But as to praying to Jesus, yes, all christians do.  For one of the basic tenets of Christianity is that Jesus is God, so in praying to Jesus, you are praying to God. The differences between the different Christian sects is in how they explain, understand the Trinity and its different manifestations as God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit (Ghost).

My Eastern Ortho. friend was telling me it is because in the miracle of turning water into wine at a wedding it was Mary who told Jesus to do it. So based upon that they get this ideology.

obviously they have never ran up against a Jewish MOTHER!!!

there in lies my problem with Christians in GENERAL, we are all trying to get to the same place, but no one has the ONLY WAY TO GET THERE!!!

Now we all can see why I have been on such Jihad!!
I am done with religious articles for awhile.
I only want all folks to understand, we are all G-Ds children, we can all wind-up in the same place, but we just take different paths to get there.

Nah, You just needed a good vech session .

No argument from me. I am christian, but beleive the same thing.

Well I can speak for Western Catholicism and I, too, would be appalled if the Chruch taught that the Blessed Mother of Christ "can tell Him what to do".

However, it's not this connatation that you describe here.


The wedding feast is the first miracle of Christ just as He begins His public ministry. The timing of the miracle of changing the water into wine had to be God's will...Christ knew that, while His mother didn't.

They are at a wedding feast and the Blessed Mother is made aware that the bride and groom have run out of wine...she intercedes for them by telling Christ about the problem.

She gives them (and us) very excellent advice. She tells them "to do what He asks".

Jythier posts:

Catholics adore God alone, Father, Son and Holy Ghost. They love and reverence (venerate) the BLessed Mother becasue God honored her above all other creatures by bestowing the highest dignity He could confer--choosing her to be the Mother of His only begotten Son.

I can't understand how one can have Christ as their personal Savior and hope to extol the Savior by making as little as possible of His mother. We don't win the affections of our fellow men on earth by making little of their mothers, do we?

The prophet Isaias spoke of her coming centuries before 7:14, and God sent from Heaven His angel to announce her supereminent dignity. Both the angel and St. Elizabeth called her "blessed among women", and her own prophecy that "henceforth all generations shall call me blessed" is fulfilled to the letter every day by Catholics the world over.

I think that Almighty God is well pleased with the love that Catholics show for the Blessed Mother Mary. Instead of detracting from the love of Christ, devotion increases our love for Him for love for her by its very nature leads to love of her Son. He cannot mind, for she is the masterpiece of God's creation and everyone of her privileges are His own free gift. Is the artist bothered by the praise one gives his masterpiece? or the author of the praise one gives his book?

AD POSTS: #19

AD,

Your note is well taken AD. But I can't let this nonsense pass without a comment or two. Let's take a closer look at what this is inferring about the Blessed Mother of Our Lord Jesus Christ.


Holding heathen myths up to Catholicism.....well, all I can do is grin and chuckle...the parallel is altogether deficient, against all the facts.

What these various myths try to show is that the early Christians imported the life of Christ and the Blessed Mother Mary from pagan myths...in this one that the god of Mithra was virgin born.

Mithra has no human mother at all, but was invariably regarded as 'rock-born' imaged by a conical stone which represented the sky vault in which the light-god first appeared. Adonis or Tammuz was a demi-god representing the light of the sun. Various myths make him the son of Cinyras, or Phoenix, and of King Theias of Assyria and his daughter Myrra. The ancient pagan myths are taken from nature, representing the succession of day and night, or of the seasons, and the mystery of life and its transmission from one creature to another. They are undated, and unlocated, and generally belong to a vaguely imagined period before the coming of man.



A further study would show that a critical and comparitive examination, such as Catholic doctrine has had to undergo, leaves these mythological claims devoid of reality while the Christian facts, although attacked from every angle, have emerged and remained unscathed for 2,000 years.

Pagan mythologies and literature are characterized chiefly by the complete absence of a historical element.

Anyway, what separates Christ from all the rest is that He said not only that He was the Son of God, but that He is God. The historical account of our Lord's birth has the form, not of myth, but of history: place, date and contemporary persons and events are specified, and it is interwoven not only with texture of general history, but also with the events of our Lord's life in such a way as to be inseparable from the Gospel accounts of them. He performed miracles and no one can explain the empty tomb that was sealed and heavily guarded with both Roman soldiers and those whom the Pharisetic Jews had sent.

Religious similarities? Not even close AD. Pipe dreams of the naysayers of the world...and you gotta watch out for them folks.

Lula,

That is why I found this quite appalling. You and I are in agreement this story doesn't have a leg to stand on in regards to the spiritual realm.

Lula,

Of course I understand your desire and need to comment.

Lula posts:

AD POSTS:

AD,

Ahhh, no. Please don't turn my words around and infer something which I said to mean something I didn't mean.

To reiterate: What I agreed with you was that would be appalling is to think that the Blessed Mother could tell Christ what to do once He went into His public ministry.

Here's what I wrote per reply 34:





Rightly understood, it does have great weight in regards to understanding Christ and His mission of Redemption of all mankind.

Lula, I think we are in agreement just saying it differently.

Here is what I am saying:

Mary suggested to Jesus to turn water into wine (John 2:1-11)
This is no basis that Mary has authority OVER Jesus in the spiritual realm.

Do you agree?

Close, but no cigar.

The Blessed Mother NEVER suggested to Jesus to turn water into wine. Let's be very careful about this...and what you are insinuating. She merely told Him the wedding party was out of wine...she DIDN'T tell Him what to do about it...

Here's St.John 2:1-5

"And the third day, there was a marraige in Cana of Galilee; and the mother of Jesus was there. 2 And Jesus also was invited, and His disciples, to the marriage. 3 And the wine failing, the mother of Jesus said to Him, "They have no wine." 4 And Jesus said to her, "Woman, what is that to Me and to thee?" My hour has not yet come." 5 His mother said to the servants. "Do whatever He tells you."

Lula, Why else would his mom tell him this if she wasn't insinuating him to DO SOMETHING?

Here let me add what I see as a Jewish mother visual.

DISCLAIMER: This is my visual and only mine and is NOT meant to be taken as the ACTUAL account described in the Bible.

Jesus is kicking back enjoying the party in the fine straw weaved chair.
Mom comes up to where Jesus is sitting and stops putting her hands on her hips and toe begins to tap. She tilts her head and in a veching tone she says, "They have no wine," pausing afterwards and increasing the tone of tapping to emphasize the guilt trip.

Jesus smirks back disrespectfully, "Woman, what is that to me and to thee, my hour has not yet come?"

Mom gives the LOOK (oh yeah we guys know what I'm talking about here)!

"Oy Vey!" Jesus thinks to himself!

Jesus sensing that the Mother's wrath is about to bring thunder and lightening to the party, jumps up out of his chair scrambling to the door where the pots of water are.

Being content with the successful veching she smugly tells the servants, "Do whatever He tells you."

MM, does this sound like a Jewish mom to you?

A.D. I know that look,its the look of wrath fixing to come upon you because you are not moving fast enough for mom..
Pastor Terry

AD,

From what I can tell thusfar by reading your comments defending your position, you think the actual words of the Torah, the Five Books of Moses, actually mean something. If I were to take those passages about God out of context, twist them around and insinuate something else totally, you might not be amused and certainly wouldn't buy it.

What you fail to understand is that all the Books of Sacred Scripture say what they say and mean what they mean.

St.John 2:1-5 is a very simple couple of passages to read and understand.

No sense to be going on and on about how other Jewish moms might or might not be....no one of them can or will ever compare to the Blessed Mother of Christ, Lord God and Savior of all mankind. End of story.

Then why did all the Apostles teach out of the Torah and the Prophets?

35 The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand.

36 He that believeth on the Son hath eternal life; but he that obeyeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of Elohim abideth on him.

You either obey or die,period,endgame,the Word spoke from the beginning,the Lamb slain at the foundation of the World all the same as in the first as will in the last.
Pastor Terry

I may not buy it because I could maybe get a better price down the street?

I put a disclaimer on it even and still....

Not sure how I took it out of context either.

The only reason Joseph still married her was an angel appeared to him and gave him the scoop. He was going to send her away.

Loca, the problem here is the inconsistency of these two points. Assuming(and i emphasize that assumption)that Jesus is as they say above, then the Blessed Mary is NOT the mother of God, She is the mother of Jesus who as the second statement show is NOT God. The first statement would be ok if it had said "Mother of Jesus" or "Mother of Son of God".

Anyone can write as many essays as they want explaining, actually rationalizing that, still they won't wash the inconsistency away no matter how long or how convoluted the essays are.

Unfortunately, this won't change anything. it's been there for too long and it is too entrenched to change.

The problem with your statements is you are looking for a physical explanation to a matter of faith and spirit. Christians believe (note the word) that Jesus IS God, and since Mary bore him and birthed him, she is the mother of God. Jesus is God Made man.

That is a belief, and a core tenet with Christian faith. It is not something to be proved in a laboratory for the whole world to see. It is either accepted on faith, or not. That is what faith is all about. You can no more prove that it is not true, than a Christian can prove it is true.

I can understand that. The problem still exists , however. IS Jesus God or IS Jesus Son of God as Loca's second statement indicate?

Comon Doc, if you (not you personally Doc) are going to start talking about the Physical nature of God, then it must be physically logical. I always said let's not go into what God's nature is, we humans can never understand it. HE is at a higher level than we can possibly attain as far as understanding the REAL nature of things.

No one argues against the simple fact that Jesus was speaking for God. If jesus Is God then he is speaking for himself, but he still speaking for God. we all agree on that. To go any further and start disecting what God is starts the problem of being logical so humans can understand and live with it. Just leave it at the point that Jesus was speaking for God. Period. No more disecting. and no need to. the point is utterly meaningless for our lives.

We all will know the Reality of it all sooner or later. Leave it at that. we all will be well off that way. The God you speaking of in all this IS the God of Abraham, isn't HE? leave it at that and all Jews, Christians and Muslims will be in total agreement. the disagreement starts to show its ugly head when we start disecting PHYSICALLY what GOD's nature is. isn't it better to leave that out of discussion?it serves no purpose. actually it creats more harm than good.

Visualize God in your mind as you wish, just dont verbalize it. because we humans cant and shouldn't since we are not qualified to do so. What is wrong with verbalizing that? It leads to using His name in vain, that is why. We all dont know the REAL nature of God, we shouldn't even approach it. as you noticed, some jewish people are even careful not to use the word God which is generic,it is not HIS real name but still they respect the fact they shouldnt even approach HIS nature that way. may be they are overcautious, but it is better to be overcautious than careless with HIM. we all should be careful like that when it comes to HIS nature and using His name.