The Virgin Mary

Coming up next on Renewing Your Mind... To our careful study this week of Roman Catholic theology, an issue that has generated perhaps the most controversy, and it revolves around this question, how should we view Mary, the mother of Jesus? Catholics revere her, they pray to her, and some even maintain that she plays a role in our redemption.

Dr. R.C. Sproul examines how the Catholic Church came to that view and whether it's supported by Scripture. In this session I will be dealing with the Roman Catholic view of Mary, which of course has been the subject of much controversy and debate, not only between Protestants and Roman Catholics, but also there is an ongoing debate, which we shall see shortly, within the Roman Catholic Church concerning the role and the nature of Mary. So we'll do that after we open with prayer.

Let's pray. Our Father and our God, again we come with praise and thanksgiving before your throne, asking that our investigation into these matters that divide us may be honorable to Thee, that we may deal with these questions with integrity. We pray now that you will grant us understanding of the historical developments of the doctrine of Mary, for we ask these things in the name of Christ.

Amen. So many of the issues that are of debate and those issues that serve to divide Protestant communities from the Roman Catholic Church in this day and age are issues that did not receive the formal sanction and formal expressed definition by the church until after the Reformation. We've seen that as the case in the Roman Catholics' declaration of their canons on justification that took place as part of the Counter-Reformation, the notion of papal infallibility, which took place only in the latter part of the 19th century. And now we come to that area of controversy that deals with Maryology, that is the dimension of theology of Mary, which articles have not been defined except since also the 19th century, the most important definitions coming in 1854 and then most recently in 1950.

And we will consider some of those encyclicals in a few moments. Even though the formal definition of the role of Mary in the Roman Catholic Church is of relatively recent origin, concern and indeed preoccupation with the person and work of Mary is something that is of great age and lengthy tradition within the Roman Catholic Church. Just to get a flavor of this, let's look for a few moments at the popular manifestations of this Mary cultus within the Roman Catholic Church. The first and most obvious manifestation of the church's veneration of Mary can be seen in art history, in the central domination of the figure of Mary, particularly in medieval art and even later in some degree in Renaissance art. But most especially in the medieval church, the Church of the Middle Ages, we see the portrayal of the Madonna, and quite often the Madonna with child or the Madonna assisting in the descent of Christ from the cross, etc.

We would go to the Vatican and we would see a very outstanding fresco there that features the Madonna high and exalted on the wall with Christ and the Father seated on either side of the Madonna. We see the celebration of Mary in the music of the church historically and several hymns that are devoted to her, the most famous of which of course is the Ave Maria, with which I'm sure you're all familiar. Even in popular music, Mary has been celebrated. I can remember back, I believe it was the early fifties, when the song Our Lady of Fatima became a hit song.

In fact, in those days you didn't talk about the top of the charts, you talked about the hit parade, and songs were listed according to their ranking on the hit parade. And Our Lady of Fatima rose very high on the hit parade of popular music in America. That song, of course, celebrated Mary. And it's not, of course, by accident that we saw that revival of interest in Mary in the United States at that time in light of the recent papal encyclicals that dealt with Mary. In the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church, at the heart of the liturgy is the Ave Maria or the so-called Hail Mary, and in the celebration of the joyful mysteries and the prayers of the people of God in the Roman Catholic Church, the Hail Mary is a very important part of the liturgy of the church.

You're familiar with the Hail Mary, aren't you? It has two dimensions, Hail Mary, full of grace, blessed art thou among women, blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. And then what follows is Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and the hour of our death.

Amen. Now let's look at those two statements which have become prayers in the Roman Catholic liturgy and see which dimensions of those are part of the controversy between Protestantism and the Roman Catholic Church. Where does Rome get this statement, Hail Mary, full of grace, blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus? Yes, well, it comes from the Scriptures themselves. This is simply a quotation from the New Testament so that the words themselves could never be seen as being repugnant to a Protestant who held to the authority of Scripture. The use of the words, however, transforming this greeting, Hail Mary, which is simply a greeting given to Mary, full of grace, which we acknowledge that Mary was indeed filled with grace, blessed art thou among women, and the Bible says that all future generations will indeed call her blessed. There's no dispute there. And certainly blessed is the fruit of her womb, Jesus. We have no dispute about that. But that it should be used as a form of a prayer does raise questions for us.

But the content of the statement in and of itself, there is no point of controversy. How about the second part, Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and in the hour of our death. Amen. Do we have any objections to saying of Mary that she is holy?

Yes. Alright, do we have any objections to calling Christians saints? Could I also not address Mrs. Hillman as Holy Dora, Mother of pebble and Howard? We don't use that kind of language commonly in the Protestant church, but to call her holy does not necessarily indicate that you are worshipping somebody. Mary was holy. If she was a Christian, she was holy. If I'm a Christian, I'm holy in the restricted sense in which the New Testament uses it. How about the phrase Mother of God?

Where does that come from? It comes from the Council of Ephesus, the fifth century, which was ratified at the Council of Chalcedon, the one ecumenical council that's totally endorsed by virtually every church in the World Council of Churches, including the phrase Theotokos. But of course, that was understood at that time to mean Theotokos – that Mary was the Mother of God, not in the sense that Jesus Christ received in any way His divine nature from Mary. There's no sense in this phrase historically that would indicate that Mary generates the divine nature of Christ. All of that statement means historically at the Council of Chalcedon over against the heretics who were denying the deity of Christ is that Mary being the Mother of Jesus is in that sense the Mother of God since Jesus is God and Mary is His mother touching His human nature. There's no confusion there at Chalcedon that would indicate that this title being ascribed to Mary would describe any vague notion of deity to her. But it simply articulates the fact that she was the earthly mother of the One who was God incarnate.

It's as simple as that. So I have to say that again, historically there has been no Protestant objection officially to the title Mother of God – Holy Mary, Mother of God. Those terms could be used obviously to mean a lot more than what they were used at Ephesus and at Chalcedon, but the words in and of themselves – properly qualified, properly defined – are not an occasion of controversy. Holy Mary, Mother of God, and how about this? Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death the intercessory work of Mary. Now that is an objection to the vast majority of Protestants, not every Protestant community, but the vast majority of Protestants would certainly raise objections to viewing Mary as one who intercedes for us either now or at our death and appealing to Mary because in this sense this makes Mary a kind of mediator of our redemption. And Protestantism insists, generally speaking, on the sole unique mediatorial function of Jesus Christ.

We also have the mediatorial function of God the Holy Spirit, but outside of the Trinity we are reluctant to use such terms as mediator of redemption. In addition to the use of this concept of Hail Mary in the liturgy, we find the existence of shrines dedicated to the veneration of Mary throughout the world. And we find two kinds of shrines, those which are public institutions to which people may make sanctioned pilgrimages tied in with the indulgence matter. A pilgrimage to a Mary shrine may bring certain indulgences to a person who is working through their penance.

But also there is the matter of private shrines. There was again the big fad in the 50s in America where a Roman Catholic household was not doing its full duty unless it had some kind of garden shrine, a statue, a little grotto within their own yard, a private place for the celebration of Mary. Of course the most famous shrines to Mary, there are several, a lacerate, but the most famous would include Lourdes where certain miracles have been alleged to occur, miracles of healing. And also again in Fatima where Mary was allegedly seen by a couple of young girls and then an extremely strange phenomenon of the sun was allegedly witnessed by thousands and thousands of people and people who have gone there and claimed all kinds of miraculous cures from this small town in Portugal. These are both very important celebrated shrines to Mary. Mary was supposed to have appeared at Lourdes in 1858 to the girl there, I believe it was Bernadette, was it not?

And in the so-called Song of Bernadette. And she was supposed to have said to Bernadette, I am the Immaculate Conception. It's interesting that the papal encyclical that confirmed the Immaculate Conception was published in 1854 and Mary appeared then publicly to ratify it in 1858 at Lourdes. Celebrations in her honor are done within the church. There's the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, which is an annual feast time in the Roman Catholic Church. Countless schools and churches have been named in her honor.

Orders of mission helpers, of nuns, etc. have also been named in her honor. And as I said, certain titles have been ascribed to her, one of which is the title Theotokos. Two other titles that I may mention just in passing is the title Co-Redemptrix. This title is one that has been given to Mary, but it is a title that has not yet in any way been officially sanctioned by the Roman Catholic Church, and the title itself is a question of dispute within the Roman Church.

Again, we'll look at that in a moment when we examine Vatican II. And another title that's a common title for Mary is Mater Misere Cordiae, Mother of Sorrows. Mother of Misery is calling attention to Mary's participation in the passion of her own son.

All right, that's the popular background. And as I said, the papal encyclicals that have defined Maryology are not things that occurred de nova in the life of the church, suddenly and without warning. They didn't appear in a vacuum, but there's a whole long history of development and popular veneration of Mary within the church. And that's what I just wanted to indicate to you, the atmosphere of the popular approach to Mary within our own day. Now let's look at the official pronouncements of the church concerning Mary.

I've already mentioned earlier Pius IX encyclical in 1854 in which the Immaculate Conception was defined, and let me ask you if I can, what is the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception? Right, so often you know, I find this among Protestant people, I say, what's the Immaculate Conception? And they'll say it's the virgin birth of Christ. And it has reference to the fact that Mary was a virgin when she had Jesus as a baby.

No, no, no. Again, all Christendom has confessed belief in the virgin birth. Individuals, of course, have repudiated it, but the main body of Christians has always affirmed the virgin birth because of its being clearly taught in the New Testament. But the Immaculate Conception doesn't have to do with Mary's bearing Jesus. It has to do with Mary's birth and Mary's conception in the womb of her mother, Anna, that Mary was conceived without sin. The point here is that Mary was born without original sin and that this was necessary in order to see Mary as living a life of sinlessness. And so behind the concept of the Immaculate Conception is the affirmation of the church of the sinless life of Mary. Now that encyclical and that concept of Immaculate Conception has raised enormous problems within the world of Protestantism.

Why? What are the issues there concerning the Immaculate Conception? Yes, but if Mary were free of original sin and if she lived a sinless life, why wouldn't He be? Must His mother be sinful in order for Him to be human? Must He have two sinful parents in order for Him to be human? To have a human nature, yes, but must it be sinful? Was Adam a human being before he fell? So you don't have to be sinful to be human.

I want this Bardianism to creep into your head here. Alright, it would give her the same nature, but what else? She would not need a Redeemer? Okay, there's no problem with that. What else? What positive benefits would accrue from that? It would be a problem of her dying?

What else? Yes, under the Old Covenant, if she is a sinless person, through and through, she herself could be the champion of our redemption, couldn't she, in some degree? And this is one of the reasons why it's been since 1854 that the whole question of co-redemptrix has come into being, because Mary is really adding something of her own merit and obedience to the obedience and the merit of her Son. But again, we'll look at that more closely in a second. Incidentally, the supreme theologian of the Roman Catholic Church, the Dr. Angelicus, Thomas Aquinas, in his day repudiated the notion of the sinlessness of Mary, appealing to the Magnificat as his biblical grounds for denying the sinlessness of Mary.

Now there's a couple of points that are significant there. One is that that indicates that as early as the Middle Ages, there was a movement and a public movement to speak in terms of Mary as being immaculate, sinless, free of original sin, that sort of thing. So again, that's not a new idea in the Roman Catholic Church, but when St. Thomas dealt with it, he rejected it because of Mary's words in the Magnificat, "'My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit doth rejoice in God my Savior.'" He's saying that that speech by Mary is ordained and inspired by the Holy Ghost, and Mary is confessing in the Magnificat her own dependence upon a Savior, and if she were sinless, she of course would not need a Savior. Now, the Roman Catholic Church is faced with the embarrassing situation that their supreme theologian had at one time in history denied this doctrine that has now become a defeat a doctrine of all faithful Catholic people.

How do they respond to that? Theologically, historically, and exegetically, they can argue it this way. First of all, St. Thomas was speaking before the doctrine was defined. He was not speaking infallibly. He was merely a theologian, a great theologian to be sure, but not infallible, and had Thomas known that the church had defined it, accordingly he certainly would have believed it on the basis of a fides implicitum, that is, an implicit faith in whatever the church declared.

So there's that answer to the question. The other answer is that he could have been wrong. You still have to answer the question about his objection, the biblical objection. What about the exegetical question of Mary saying, I rejoice in God my Savior? Well, the exegetes of Rome are very quick to point out that the term Savior doesn't always mean one who saves from sin. You can be saved from other things, and that salvation can mean, in a broader sense in the Bible, an experience of benefits at the hands of God, and indeed Mary did receive great benefits, and in that sense, God was her Savior. That is, He was her benefactor.

He gave certain blessings to her that He didn't give to anybody else, but that doesn't mean salvation in the sense of being saved from sin. That is a possible interpretation of that passage linguistically. I think it's somewhat strained, it's somewhat forced, but nevertheless we can't retaliate with an absolute exegetical case against it. Then in 1950, Pius XII's encyclical, Munificentissimus Deus, this papal encyclical defined the bodily assumption of Mary into heaven, that Mary was taken up into heaven bodily, and already at this present time participates fully in what the church has called the resurrectionis carnus, the resurrection of the body, that which all believers look forward to in the future, that Christ was the firstfruits of those who have been raised from the dead, and Mary herself, according to this encyclical, experienced resurrection and was taken bodily into heaven.

That's as late as 1950. In 1953 and 1954, two papal statements are important, one entitled Folgen's Corona. I won't write these for you, you don't need the titles, and the other one, ad coelae regnum, defined for the church the coronation of Mary as Queen of Heaven. So we've had these matters defined since the Reformation, the immaculate conception and sinlessness of Mary, the bodily assumption of Mary into heaven, the coronation of Mary in heaven as the Queen of Heaven, reigning with the King who is Jesus, has been crowned King, and He reigns with His mother as the maternal Queen. Some other papal statements that are more or less obiter dictus statements, statements that are part of other encyclicals but were not directed specifically for the definition of Mariology include the following statement from Leo XIII who said, quote, he would consider it a great blessing when all our exhortations have the effect that to each believer there is nothing more sacred or more dear than the veneration of Mary. Nothing more sacred or more dear than the veneration of Mary. Pius XI writing in concurrence with Pope Benedictus, he said, and I quote, with Jesus, Mary has redeemed the human race.

There's the notion, which is quoted again and again by advocates of the term co-redemptrix, there it is in papal print. Pius XI says, with Jesus, Mary has redeemed the human race. Again, just to give you one more taste of modern statements regarding Mary, I would like to read the conclusion of Pius XII's encyclical Mysticae Cor Porus Christi, which we talked about the other day, which identifies the Roman Catholic Church with the body of Christ. The end of that encyclical is a lengthy statement on the role and the function of Mary. It was she, the second Eve, the second Eve, who free from all sin, original or personal, and always most intimately united with her Son, offered Him on Golgotha to the eternal Father for all the children of Adam. That statement there is perhaps the most repugnant statement that has ever come out of the Roman Catholic Church regarding the role of Mary, that it was Mary who offered the Father on Golgotha the perfect sacrifice of Christ. There is a wide gap between how Roman Catholics and Protestants view the mother of Jesus, and it was Dr. R.C.

Sproul's firm conviction that recognizing that difference has eternal consequences. You're listening to Renewing Your Mind on this Friday. We're glad you've joined us. We have been airing all week R.C. 's series on Roman Catholicism, revealing the doctrines that are at the heart of the Catholic-Protestant divide.

R.C. taught this series in five messages, and we'd be happy to send all of them to you as part of what we're calling the Reformation Resource Drive. It includes six additional teaching series, along with six e-books and several digital editions of Table Talk magazine. Contact us today with your gift of any amount, and we'll be glad to send it to you. Our number is 800-435-4343. You can also make your request and give your gift online at renewingyourmind.org. And today is the last day we're making this offer available.

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My colleague Barry Cooper hosts a podcast each week called Simply Put. It's called Theology in Simple Terms. And in one episode, Barry addressed the Catholic concept of purgatory. — What happens to Christians when they die, while they await the resurrection of the body, a resurrection guaranteed by the resurrection of Jesus 2,000 years ago?

Well, historically there have been several different answers to this. One answer from Roman Catholicism is the idea of purgatory. According to this idea, Christians who die but who are still imperfectly purified must undergo a set time of punishment in purgatory until such time as they are pure enough to be with Christ. Another answer is the idea of soul sleep, which is a state of personal unconsciousness and temporary separation from Christ. But both of these ideas fall short of scriptural teaching.

One theologian amusingly notes, the history of the doctrine of the intermediate state shows that it's hard for theologians and people in general to stay within the limits of Scripture and not attempt to be wiser than they can be. You'll enjoy Barry's weekly podcast. Again, it's called Simply Put.

Each episode is about five minutes in length, and you can subscribe at simplyputpodcast.com or on your favorite podcast app. Well, talking about putting things in simple terms, there is one word that shines a bright light on this divide between Protestant and Catholics. That word is alone. Join us next week as we examine the five solas of the Reformation, part of R.C. 's series, Chosen by God. That's beginning Monday here on Renewing Your Mind. .