Mother of Jesus Christ. In the New Testament she is most prominent in the stories of Jesus's birth (in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke), where the conception of Jesus is said to be of the Holy Spirit (Matt 1.18), and she is described as betrothed to Joseph. She only occasionally appears in Jesus's ministry, but (John 19.25) she was present at Jesus's crucifixion, and was committed by him to the care of the disciple, John. According to the Acts of the Apostles, she remained in Jerusalem during the early years of the Church, and tradition places her tomb in Jerusalem. She has become a subject of devotion in her own right, especially in Roman Catholic doctrine and worship, and apocryphal traditions were attached to her in works such as the Gospel of Mary and Gospel of the Birth of Mary. The belief that her body was taken up into heaven is celebrated in the festival of the Assumption, defined as Roman Catholic dogma in 1950. Her Immaculate Conception has been a dogma since 1854. Belief in the apparitions of the Virgin at Lourdes, Fatima, Medugorje and in several other places attracts many thousands of pilgrims each year. In Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christianity, she holds a special place as an intermediary between believers and God.
That Mary remained a virgin after the birth of Jesus is a doctrinal stance of the Catholic, Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches. The question of Mary's virginity is related to the interpretation of the New Testament references to Jesus' "brothers". Those who defend the doctrine of Mary's perpetual virginity point out that Aramaic, the language spoken by Christ and his disciples, lacked a specific word for "cousin," so that the word "brother" was used instead. Others argue that Jesus' "brothers" were sons of Joseph by a previous wife -- and thus Jesus' stepbrothers, who would have been regarded as his half-brothers by the people Jesus and Mary lived alongside, who were unaware of Jesus' divinity and assumed him to be the son of Joseph.
The most prominent leaders of the Reformation, Luther, Zwingli, and Calvin also defended the perpetual virginity of Mary against those who questioned it. But by the 17th century, the Catholic and Protestant churches came to see Mary as a major point of division, and Protestant theologians began arguing that Mary did not remain a virgin and that the "brothers" of Jesus were indeed his biological half-brothers, sons of Mary and Joseph. Despite the beliefs of these notable Reformers, today most Protestants reject the doctrine of Mary's perpetual virginity. Influenced by concerns of too much emphasis on Mary on the part of Catholicism, and finding no explicit scriptural mention of Mary not having other children, yet references in the NT that can be interpreted as referring to blood brothers of Christ, modern-day Protestants reject this doctrine. However, it is also said that Jesus' brothers were not believers (John 7:5) until after the resurrection (Acts 1:14), so some believe Jesus entrusts Mary to the beloved disciple (traditionally St. John), for that reason.
Muslims also believe that Mary remained a virgin for her entire life.
Dormition and Assumption
For Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholics alike, Mary's assumption into heaven, is seen as an instance of the resurrection of the body, a belief integral to Christian theology and found in the creeds.
The doctrine in Roman Catholicism
The belief in the corporeal assumption of Mary was formally declared to be dogma by Pope Pius XII in 1950. Pope Pius XII states in Munificentissimus Deus: "[W]e pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory. 2, §6) "the fact of her death is almost generally accepted by the Fathers and Theologians, and is expressly affirmed in the Liturgy of the Church," to which he adduces a number of helpful citations, and concludes that "for Mary, death, in consequence of her freedom from original sin and from personal sin, was not a consequence of punishment of sin. However, it seems fitting that Mary's body, which was by nature mortal, should be, in conformity with that of her Divine Son, subject to the general law of death." In keeping with the historical consensus of the Church, Pius XII himself almost certainly rejected the notion of Mary's "immortality" (the idea that she never suffered death), preferring the more widely accepted understanding that her assumption took place after her physical death.
The doctrine in Eastern and Oriental Orthodoxy
The Eastern Orthodox Churches teach that Mary died, and that after her death and burial, she was not resurrected but that her body was miraculously transported into heaven, as were the bodies of Enoch, Moses and Elijah. The Churches of the Anglican Communion celebrate the Purification of St. Mary the Virgin (February 2) and the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary (March 25) as principal feasts of the Church, and the Church of England requires that the Holy Communion be celebrated in every parish church on these two feasts. Until the revision of the Church's Calendar at the turn of the millennium, the main feast of St. Mary was her Nativity (September 8); however, the introduction of the celebration of the feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary on August 15 brought the Church of England into line with the major part of Christianity which treats that day as the major feast of Mary.
Religious attitudes towards Mary
Veneration of Mary: Divisions Among Christians
Roman Catholic, Orthodox and some Anglican Christians venerate Mary, as do the non-Chalcedonian or Oriental Orthodox, a communion of churches that has been traditionally deemed monophysite (such as the Coptic Orthodox Church of Egypt and the Ethiopian Tewahedo Church). Additionally it includes composing poems and songs in Mary's honor, painting icons or carving statues representing her, slightly kneeling before such images as a token of respect to the one portrayed by them, and conferring titles on Mary that reflect her position among the saints. (See Liturgical year.) Protestants have generally paid only a small amount of reverence to the Blessed Virgin compared to their Anglican, Catholic, and Orthodox counterparts, often arguing that if too much attention is focused on Mary, there is a danger of detracting from the worship due to God alone. On this showing, Catholic traditionalists would argue that there is no conflation of the human and divine levels in their veneration of Mary.
The major origin and impetus of veneration of Mary comes from the Christological controversies of the early church - many debates denying in some way the divinity or humanity of Jesus Christ. So not only would one side affirm that Jesus was indeed God, but would assert the conclusion that Mary was the mother of God, although some Protestants prefer to use the term God-bearer better. Catholics and Protestants agree however, that "Mother of God" is not intended to imply that Mary in any way gave Jesus his Divinity. hyperdulia, accorded only to the Blessed Virgin Mary, usually translated simply as veneration;
The surge in the veneration of Mary in the High Middle Ages owes some of its initial impetus to Bernard of Clairvaux. Bernard expanded upon Anselm of Canterbury's role in transmuting the sacramental ritual Christianity of the Early Middle Ages into a new, more personally held faith, with the life of Christ as a model and a new emphasis on the Virgin Mary. In opposition to the rational approach to divine understanding that the schoolmen adopted, Bernard preached an immediate faith, in which the intercessor was the Virgin Mary. In early medieval thought the Virgin Mary had played a minor role, and it was only with the rise of emotional Christianity in the eleventh century that she became the prime intercessor for humanity with the deity." (Cantor 1993 p 341)
Some early Protestants venerated and honored Mary. Martin Luther said Mary is "the highest woman," that "we can never honour her enough," that "the veneration of Mary is inscribed in the very depths of the human heart," and that Christians should "wish that everyone know and respect her." John Calvin said, "It cannot be denied that God in choosing and destining Mary to be the Mother of his Son, granted her the highest honor." Zwingli said, "I esteem immensely the Mother of God," and, "The more the honor and love of Christ increases among men, so much the esteem and honor given to Mary should grow." The Catholic practice of celebrating saints' days and making intercessory requests addressed especially to Mary and other departed saints they considered (and consider) to be idolatry. With the exception of some portions of the Anglican Communion, Protestantism usually follows the reformers in rejecting the practice of directly addressing Mary and other saints in prayers of admiration or petition, as part of their religious worship of God. Protestants will not typically call the respect or honor that they may have for Mary veneration because of the special religious significance that this term has in the Catholic practice.
Today's Protestants acknowledge that Mary is "blessed among women" (Luke 1:42) but they do not agree that Mary is to be venerated. Indeed the word that she uses to describe herself in Luke 1:38 (usually translated as "bond-servant" or "slave") refers to someone whose will is consumed by the will of another - in this case Mary's will is consumed by God's. Rather than granting Mary any kind of "dulia", Protestants note that her role in Scripture seems to diminish - after the birth of Jesus she is hardly mentioned. Cantor, The Civilization of the Middle Ages 1993
Joint Anglican-Roman Catholic document
On May 16, 2005, the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches issued a joint 43-page statement, "Mary: Hope and Grace in Christ" (also known as the Seattle Statement) on the role of the Virgin Mary in Christianity as a way to uphold ecumenical cooperation despite differences over other matters. Carnley has reportedly said that Anglican concerns, that dogmas about Mary are not provable by scripture, would "disappear", with the document discussing that Anglicans would stop opposition to Roman Catholic teachings of the Immaculate Conception (defined in 1854) and the Assumption of Mary (defined in 1950) as being "consonant" with the Biblical teachings.
Mary in Other Religions
Some followers of non-Abrahamic religions, particularly followers of Wicca, link Mary to the Earth Mother of various Neo-pagan traditions.
Current Attitudes Towards Mary
Mary is the focus of original research both by church authorities and other scholars.
Portrayals
Mary has been portrayed in several films:
Linda Darnell, The Song of Bernadette, 1943 Angela Clarke, The Miracle of Our Lady of Fatima, 1951 Siobhán McKenna, King of Kings, 1961 Olivia Hussey, Jesus of Nazareth, 1977 Verna Bloom, The Last Temptation of Christ, 1988 Pernilla August, Mary, Mother of Jesus, 1999 (TV) Maia Morgenstern, The Passion of the Christ, 2004 Keisha Castle-Hughes, The Nativity Story, 2006
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