L'anti-catechismo di Enzo Bianchi - di Antonio Livi

In nBQ

Ci eravamo lasciati in aprile con una polemica a proposito di una meditazione che Enzo Bianchi, priore della Comunità di Bose, aveva pubblicato su Avvenire con una esposizione che contrastava con il Magistero della Chiesa cattolica (chi vuole riprendere gli argomenti di quella polemica può cliccare qui). Ora siamo in un altro “tempo forte”, l’Avvento, e di nuovo Bianchi - sempre dalle colonne di Avvenire - ha modo di propinare ai fedeli cattolici il suo anti-catechismo.

Il 16 dicembre si è messo a pontificare sul giudizio di Dio, e anche in questo contesto torna a riferirsi  a Cristo, nostro Signore, in un modo che certamente urta chiunque viva la fede cattolica e abbia pertanto un sentimento di vera adorazione nei confronti del Verbo Incarnato. A un certo punto Bianchi, riferendosi al giudizio universale, scrive: «Gesù confessa la sua ignoranza relativa all’ora precisa del giorno del giudizio: “Quanto a quel giorno o a quell’ora, nessuno lo sa, né gli angeli del cielo né il Figlio, ma solo il Padre” [Mc 13,32]. Se Gesù non conosce l’ora, annuncia però il criterio del giudizio: il concreto amore fraterno». Ora, parlare di Gesù come di uno che «confessa la sua ignoranza» suona a bestemmia, almeno per chi ama Gesù come il Verbo eterno, consustanziale al Padre, che tutto sa e tutto può. Solo chi è ormai assuefatto al modo di parlare di Bianchi, che si riferisce sempre solo all’umanità di Cristo (lasciando intendere che Egli è un semplice uomo: un uomo esemplare, di grande spiritualità, tanto da poter essere chiamato “Figlio di Dio”, ma pur sempre un uomo) resta indifferente di fronte a questo discorso.

Bianchi può continuare a parlare così perché sa di poter contare, da una parte, sull’appoggio di molti opinion makers laici ed ecclesiastici, e dall’altra sull’ignoranza religiosa del pubblico cui si rivolge. La gran massa dei fedeli cattolici, infatti, soffre di una specie di analfabetismo di ritorno in materia di dottrina cattolica, e questa ignoranza è il vero dramma religioso che ci interpella tutti. Il relativismo dottrinale ha pervaso a tal punto la coscienza di tanti fedeli – quelli che non hanno avuto mai una adeguata catechesi circa il dogma trinitario e cristologico – che ormai non reagiscono più nemmeno di fronte a discorsi che sono oggettivamente blasfemi. E infatti la maggior parte dei fedeli non avverte alcun disagio nel leggere considerazioni spirituali o teologiche che riducono l’Emanuele, il “Dio-con-noi”, il Santo che nasce dalla Vergine Maria e riceve l’adorazione dei pastori e dei Maghi, a un santone laico o a “uno dei profeti”.

Ma chi ha sensibilità pastorale deve ragionare così: proprio perché c’è una carenza sempre più estesa di formazione catechistica nel popolo, è responsabilità degli operatori della pastorale far sì che gli strumenti della catechesi sappiano fornire argomenti di riflessione che mettano in luce, e non in ombra, il dogma centrale della nostra fede. Se non si predica che Gesù è Dio, come si può sperare che ci sia culto eucaristico? Come si può sperare che i “lontani” ritornino alle pratiche religiose, che sono tutte incentrate sull’adorazione di Cristo, vero Dio e vero Uomo, presente nell’Eucaristia «in corpo, sangue, anima e divinità»? Come si può attuare il programma pastorale del Vaticano II, che chiede di fare dell’Eucaristia «il centro e la radice di tutta la vita cristiana»?

L’artificio retorico cui ricorre Bianchi è quello tipico del “biblicismo”, che Giovanni Paolo II deprecava nell’enciclica Fides et ratio.  Esso consiste nel citare solo alcuni passi della Scrittura, selezionandoli e  interpretandoli con un’ermeneutica arbitraria, cioè per dare una parvenza di giustificazione alle proprie tesi di natura ideologica. Da secoli l’esegesi cattolica ha chiarito il senso di quella pericope evangelica nella quale Gesù parla ai discepoli del giorno del giudizio finale. La Scrittura non dice assolutamente che Cristo sia “ignorante” riguardo ai decreti eterni del Padre: dice solo che la rivelazione dei misteri del Padre da parte del Figlio è limitata, per divina disposizione, ad alcuni determinati contenuti, ossia che la missione di Cristo, rivelatore del Padre, ha dei limiti precisi nell’oggetto, nei modi e nei tempi. Chi adopera il metodo esegetico corretto (che esige il ricorso costante all’analogia della fede) ha presenti i passi del Nuovo Testamento nei quali ci è chiaramente rivelata l’onniscienza di Gesù.

In effetti, in Gesù non c’è una persona umana e una persona divina: c’è una sola Persona, ed è la Persona del Verbo eterno, consustanziale al Padre e allo Spirito santo. Per questo Gesù dice di sé: «Nessuno conosce il Padre se non il Figlio e colui al quale il Figlio voglia rivelarlo». Questo Figlio, secondo il Vangelo di Giovanni (Gv 1, 1-8), è il Verbo, che «è presso Dio ed è Dio». Certamente Gesù, Dio fatto uomo, ha una conoscenza umana limitata, fatta anche di esperienza e di acquisizione di nuovi saperi: ma in Lui questa conoscenza umana è unita ipostaticamente a quella visione immediata di ogni cosa che compete all’onniscienza divina. Tutti ricordano l’espressione di Pietro, dopo la Resurrezione, quando si rivolge a Gesù e gli dice «Signore, tu sai tutto!». Prima ancora, Tommaso apostolo rivolge al Risorto questa esplicita professione di fede nella sua divinità: «Tu sei il mio Signore, tu sei il mio Dio!». La Tradizione non ha mai tralasciato di porre l’accento sulla divinità di Cristo. Si pensi, ad esempio, a come parla dei Novissimi (il tema di cui si è voluto occupare Bianchi in un altro articolo su Avvenire del 6 dicembre) san  Giovanni Crisostomo: «Quando Tu, vita immortale, discendesti incontro alla morte, allora annientasti l’Inferno con il fulgore della tua divinità; poi però, quando resuscitasti i morti dai luoghi sotterranei, tutte le potenze che sono sopra il cielo esclamarono: “Gloria a te, o Cristo, Dio nostro, che dai la vita!”».

Non è comunque solo il dogma cristologico a essere ignorato da Bianchi con il ricorso ad arbitrarie interpretazioni della Scrittura. Anche il tema della giustizia divina e del castigo delle colpe è maltrattato nello scritto del 16 dicembre su Avvenire. Con una sicumera che non si sa su che cosa possa essere fondata, Bianchi afferma perentoriamente che «Dio non ci castiga mentre siamo in vita». Subito dopo, per giustificare in qualche modo questa sua tesi teologicamente ingiustificabile, scrive: «In questo caso [nell’ipotesi, cioè, che Dio ci castigasse mentre siamo in vita, ndr] saremmo “costretti” ad agire secondo il suo volere, senza la libertà che appartiene alla nostra dignità umana». Si tratta certamente di considerazioni antropologiche prive di qualsiasi coerenza logica, perché l’ipotesi che Dio ci castighi mentre siamo in vita non comporta affatto la perdita della nostra libertà, che certamente è la condizione per praticare l’amore e avere meritare il perdono in questa vita e infine la salvezza eterna. Nella teologia cattolica il concetto di “castigo divino” è visto in rapporto alla colpa dell’uomo, e quindi presuppone nell’uomo l’esercizio del libero arbitrio, con la conseguente responsabilità personale, sia prima che dopo il castigo stesso; per questo la teologia morale ha creato la figura morale della “recidività”, ossia l’ipotesi di una colpa liberamente ripetuta anche dopo un’eventuale ammonizione e un’eventuale castigo, persino dopo un eventuale pentimento.

Ma preme qui rilevare soprattutto come Bianchi manipoli la Scrittura. Egli commenta e interpreta un passo biblico facendo finta di ignorare tutti quegli altri passi, sia dell’Antico che del Nuovo Testamento, dai quali si evince che Dio, nella sua sapienza e giustizia infinita, infligge talvolta ai peccatori un castigo, già nella vita presente, in vista del loro ravvedimento. Ma chi conosce la Scrittura non ignora invece che nell’Antico Testamento c’è il racconto del  diluvio universale, della distruzione di Sodoma e Gomorra, delle piaghe che Dio infligge agli Egiziani, delle vicissitudini degli Ebrei nei quarant’anni dell’Esodo (ed è significativo che Dio punisca molte volte il suo stesso popolo per le sue ripetute infedeltà, e alla fine anche Mosè, l’«amico di Dio», è castigato e impedito di entrare nella Terra promessa). Così come non ignora, per quanto riguarda il Nuovo Testamento, che san Luca narra negli Atti degli Apostoli l’episodio drammatico di Anania e Saffira, e che san Paolo e l’autore della Lettera agli Ebrei parlano dei mali temporali che devono essere interpretati come castighi che Dio infligge per indurre i peccatori alla penitenza.  Le considerazioni astratte che si fanno per negare questa verità di fede  sono basate su fantasiose teorie pseudo-teologiche, di cui ho trattato già in passato e che sarebbe lungo ripetere in questa sede.

Resta il rammarico di constatare come l’autore di questo anti-catechismo non solo goda di ampia popolarità fra molti vescovi, ma addirittura trovi modo di propagarlo sistematicamente attraverso il quotidiano ufficiale della Cei che, da parte sua, tratta tesi molto opinabili (per non dire altro) da “verità sacrosante” al punto da escludere qualsiasi altro punto di vista, invitando a “vergognarsi” chiunque ci provi.

Só pode Amar quem Odiar - Nuno Serras Pereira

Nos dias que correm é difícil encontrar um cristão que tenha uma noção adequado de Quem é Deus no Seu Amor. E o que mais assombra é que a insistência na Misericórdia Infinita do Senhor seja o motivo ou o meio pelo qual se vem a ter essa ideia distorcida do Amor Trinitário. No entanto, se considerarmos que o anúncio da Misericórdia habitualmente não é acompanhado da proclamação de outras verdades Reveladas tais como a Justiça, e a Ira Divina, a exigência de conversão, com a consequente emenda de vida, a necessidade da penitência, da perseverança, da fidelidade até ao fim, repararemos que não há razão alguma para ficarmos assarapantados. Além disso, calar o que é o Amor, a Sua Santidade, ou seja, a incompatibilidade absoluta com o mal e o pecado; silenciar as Suas exigências, o Seu zelo pela nossa perfeição e salvação eterna é atraiçoar esse mesmo Amor. O Amor se o é o realmente tem, por isso mesmo, uma enfuriação contra todo o desamor, um verdadeiro ódio ou detestação daquilo que a Ele se opõe, estorvando os Seus desígnios de Redenção de cada pessoa humana. Daí que o Antigo Testamento (AT) afirme o ódio de Deus ao mal, narre as Suas tremebundas invectivas, O mostre rugindo fúrias contra o pecado. 

Estas passagens que infundem pavor levaram alguns, entre os quais se destaca Marcião, a separar o Antigo do Novo Testamento (NT), como se naquele não estivesse latente, aquilo que neste se torna patente; chegando ao excesso herético de afirmarem a existência de dois deuses, sendo que o do AT era mau e o do NT, pelo contrário, bom. Contra esta interpretação distorcida se levantaram os Evangelistas e a demais Igreja nascente. Há um só Deus, infinitamente benigno, que Se Revela tanto na Antiga como na Nova Aliança, que Se fez homem, nascido da Virgem Maria, pelo poder do Espírito Santo, foi crucificado, ressuscitou, ascendeu ao Céu e de novo há-de vira a julgar os vivos e os mortos. Jesus Cristo, nosso Redentor e Juiz, é a Chave de leitura, o critério definitivo e irrenunciável de interpretação da Sagrada Escritura, pois n’ Ele o Pai disse-nos tudo, Ele é a plenitude da Revelação.

Jesus Cristo “que passou fazendo o bem e exorcizando todos os que eram oprimidos pelo diabo”, Revelou-Se-nos como O poderoso guerreiro, O militante infatigável, O pelejador constante contra satanás e contra o pecado, em que ele nos tinha escravizados, para nos Libertar para a verdadeira Liberdade, que é a Comunhão de Vida e Amor com Ele. E, deste modo nos mostrou, contrariamente ao que hoje se presume, que não é possível fazer o bem sem combater denodadamente o mal e o pecado.

Que o amor a Deus, o único amor do qual todo o outro amor brota, e se corrompido nele se purifica, implique necessariamente um horror e abominação do pecado é ensinamento expresso deste Senhor infinitamente benevolente e benfazejo quando, por exemplo, proclama: Ninguém pode servir a dois senhores: ou há-de odiar a um e amar o outro, ou há-de apegar-se a um e desprezar o outro. Não podeis servir a Deus e ao dinheiro (Cf. Mt 6, 24; Lc 16, 13). Também nos adverte que se não nos convertermos pereceremos imprevistamente de modo semelhante aos galileus chacinados por Pilatos ou os jerosolimitanos esmagados pela derrocada da torre de Siloé (Lc 13, 2-5).  Será, possivelmente, da meditação desta passagem que terá surgido a oração que os nossos antepassados rezaram durante séculos implorando a Deus que os livrasse de uma morte súbita e imprevista. Esta súplica insistente e confiante brotava de uma consideração do peso da eternidade à luz da qual era vista esta vida. Para estes cristão o problema não era tanto a morte biológica, mas o Juízo de Deus, no qual se joga o destino eterno. De facto, o Mesmo Juiz que diz a uns “ … vinde benditos de Meu Pai, tomai posse do Reino que vos está preparado desde a criação do mundo … ” (Mt 25, 34) é o Mesmo que impera a outros “Retirai-vos de Mim, malditos! Ide para o fogo eterno destinado a satanás e aos seus anjos.” (Lc 25, 41). A Igreja, Cristo em nós, continuado e Presente na História de todos os tempos, durante séculos e séculos, apresentou o rosto de Jesus Cristo, Deus humanado, na Sua completude de Juiz Justo e Misericordioso. Era habitual, por exemplo, no púlpito, na pregação, no sermão, não só exaltar a Majestade Gloriosa de Deus, enaltecer as Suas obras, recordar os Seus prodígios em nosso favor, persuadir-nos do Seu Amor mas também trovejar cóleras contra o pecado, bramir iracundamente contra o derrancamento dos costumes, tendo como intento mover as almas ao arrependimento, em vista de uma confissão feita bem, que pudesse restabelecer a comunhão de vida e de amor com o Senhor, e com o próximo (além disso, ao desmascarem os ardis do Maligno e as manhas da natureza humana, possibilitavam o reconhecimento da culpa própria, e com ela a consciência de serem livres, e não meras vítimas inermes determinadas pelas circunstâncias). Deste modo, os penitentes aproximavam-se confundidos e temerosos, com grande atrição, dos sacerdotes para receberem a absolvição de seus pecados mortais, sendo-lhes assim perdoadas as penas eternas, devidas aos mesmos. Porém, no confessionário quem os acolhia não era já o rosto severo e rigoroso do Apocalipse, mas sim a face jubilosa, jucunda, transbordante de misericórdia, do Pai do filho pródigo. Este encontro conseguia frequentemente mover o penitente à contrição perfeita, isto é, a um arrependimento não já nascido do santo temor de Deus mas sim do santo amor. 

Será recto e justo dispensar o modo como Deus nos falou na Sagrada Escritura, na Tradição da Igreja, enfim nos Seus Santos, ou seja, naqueles que Ele fez participantes da Sua Santidade? 

Haverá ainda muitos cristãos que saibam que o pecado existe? E conheça a gravidade do mesmo? Que acredite no Inferno? Que saiba o que é o bem e o que é o mal? Que os saiba distinguir? Que não os troque?

Será ainda possível designar o mal e o pecado pelos seus nomes sem que as pessoas se sintam agredidas, em vez de agradecidas pela verdade/amor que lhes é comunicado? 

Seja como for, a verdade permanece: é impossível amar sem odiar. E não se pode praticar o bem sem combater o mal. 

20. 11. 2012

Mary the Virgin Mother (Part 4) - by Mark P. Shea

In CRISIS magazine

Last week we spoke of Mary as the New Eve and Virgin Bride and noted that virginity always speaks of purity. The purity of Mary’s faith, so closely bound up with her virginity, leads to the other great Marian image found in John’s Gospel: Mary as the Virgin Mother. For at the very climax of the story, a curious thing happens that John obviously regards as extremely important. He writes:

One of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water. He who saw it has borne witness – his testimony is true, and he knows that he tells the truth – that you also may believe. (Jn 19:34-35)

Why does John interrupt the narrative of his Gospel here, of all places, to make sure we believe blood and water gushed from Jesus’ side? Is he really interested in the anatomical details of pericardial rupture? No. He is interested in pointing out the meaning of this event, which he saw with his own eyes: namely, that the Church, the bride of the second Adam, is born from Jesus’ side in the waters of baptism, just as the first Eve was made from the side of the first Adam. For John, there’s a clear and obvious connection between “the spirit, the water, and the blood” (1 Jn 5:8). It is by “water and the Spirit,” flowing from the bleeding side of Jesus, that Christ cleansed the bride “by the washing of water with the word, that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish” (Eph 5:26-27). The creation of the second Eve parallels the creation of the first. Moreover, it brings us back with immense force to the mystical vision of Ezekiel we discussed last week. For now we’re seeing the source of the waters that flowed from that mystical temple: the heart of Jesus Himself whose temple was destroyed but raised up in three days.

So Mary is shown at the wedding of Cana as the icon of the bride but at the cross as the mother of the children of the second Adam. For John carefully preserves this scene from the crucifixion:

Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing near, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home. (Jn 19:25-27)

John is not simply interested in chatting about first-century domestic arrangements for Jewish widows. As with all the details from his Gospel, this scene also is written down for a theological purpose: “that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name” (Jn 20:31). In other words, he means for us to understand that we are the beloved disciple, that Mary is our mother and we are her children. For Jesus is our older brother, the “firstborn of many brethren” (Rom 8:29). Therefore, Mary is the mother of all Jesus’ brothers and sisters.

So the paradox of the gospel is made complete. You lose your life to save it. You must admit you’re blind to see. And, as Isaiah prophesied of Israel, so it’s even truer of Mary that the virgin daughter of Zion becomes the mother of a billion people:

For the children of the desolate one will be more
than the children of her that is married, says the Lord.
Enlarge the place of your tent,
and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out;
hold not back, lengthen your cords
and strengthen your stakes.
For you will spread abroad to the right and to the left,
and your descendants will possess the nations
and will people the desolate cities.

Fear not, for you will not be ashamed;
be not confounded, for you will not be put to shame;
for you will forget the shame of your youth,
and the reproach of your widowhood you will remember no more.
For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name;
and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer,
the God of the whole earth he is called. (Is 54:1–5)

The thing to note here is that, once again, Mary’s life is a referred life. The point of the perpetual virginity of Mary, as of the virgin birth, is that – again – the point is not about Mary. It’s about Christ and His Church.

Mary Guards the Truth about our Relationship to God . . .

In the virginity of Mary, we see reflected to us the essential truth of the gospel: that it’s God who is the author of our salvation. That’s as deeply offensive to us today as it has ever been, because people don’t want to hear that we can no more save ourselves than a corpse can jump. We are much more comfortable thinking of ourselves as heroes who achieve something great and earn the respect of God and our peers through our achievements. In short, we believe in power, not love. It is the poison that has gnawed at our vitals since the serpent bit us in the Garden. It is pride.

And so, the world teaches us to treat life as a power struggle among economic classes, races, man, and woman – and between God and us. Mary’s self-surrendering virginity offends this approach to life deeply because she says, “It’s about love, not power.” To the power addict who can only conceive of a world neatly divided between the cunning and the stupid, Mary’s way is the way of death. So, for instance, Simone de Beauvoir recoils from such surrender when she writes of Mary:

For the first time in history the mother kneels before her son; she freely accepts her inferiority. This is the supreme masculine victory, consummated in the cult of the Virgin – it is the rehabilitation of woman through the accomplishment of her defeat.

For surrender is death, according to the world. And so the world produces men and women who distill the worship of power down to ever more bitter dregs, to gain the whole world while losing their own souls. But Mary’s surrender to God leads to the mystery of total dependence on God – and the paradox of happiness through the cross. The Son before whom she kneels is not some selfish boor of this fallen world, but the second Adam who undergoes a defeat far more profound than her own self-surrender so that He may exalt her to a glory above all other creatures. In Him and Him alone, power and love are reconciled, and we find not servility crushed by domination but humility crowned with glory.

. . . and the Truth about Our Relationship with One Another

That’s not, however, all that Mary’s virginity shows us. It is not just a sign calling us to our own complete dependence on God. It guards another truth at once profoundly repugnant and profoundly attractive to our culture: the truth that purity is fruitful.

Mary’s purity reflects and signifies the purity of the Church, the bride without wrinkle, spot, or blemish. G. K. Chesterton, in one of his typically insightful remarks, noted that heresy has always tended to identify purity with sterility, while Catholic teaching “always connects purity with fruitfulness; whether it be natural or supernatural.” This is seen not only in ancient forms of false teaching that tried to scrape spirit clean of all contact with icky disgusting matter, but in more modern heresies as well. For example, it’s one of the strange contradictions of our age that the cultural apostles of sexual insanity constantly declare that “sex is nothing to be afraid of,” while at the same time desperately urging everyone to have “safe sex.” By this, they mean sex that is something like the Roman vomitorium, where you get all the pleasures of a bodily act but none of the consequences. With perfect tone-deafness, the emissaries of “safe sex” thereby set themselves squarely against the only two things sex is actually for: union with the beloved and fruitfulness. For that’s precisely what God is saying when He tells us that the two shall be “one flesh” and then bids us to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 1:28; 2:24).

Sex is the pledge of one’s total self to another. It is, as Pope John Paul II has pointed out, a kind of language that says, whether we admit it or not, “I give all of myself to you.” Sex is the only human activity that creates people – other beings in the image of God. Even a moment’s contemplation of these facts reveals the sheer idiocy of saying sex is nothing to be afraid of. One may as well say walking through a dry forest with a lit torch is nothing to be afraid of. And, if we’re honest, we are afraid of it – and none more so than the timid creatures who try to keep all the commitments sex implies – promises to husbands, wives, and children – at bay with a thin layer of latex (give or take a few hundred million abortions, STDs, ruined hearts, and broken lives).

We fear fire enough to keep it in the fireplace, but we’ve lost the elementary knowledge that God has ordained the fireplace of marriage for the fire of sex. The problem is not with wanting the fire, but with not wanting the fireplace. So our culture avoids the blessing of sex and makes it a curse instead. And we do it by making sex artificially virginal and virginity artificially sexual.

The artificial virginity of contraceptive sex boils down to the permanent attempt to strip mine the gold of pleasure from the sacramental union of love and fruitfulness, enthrone autonomy and pleasure, and declare love and fruitfulness “optional” rather than what revelation declares them to be: the very heart of reality. It is the attempt to replace love with power. But as power exalts itself over love, it naturally preys upon the weak, which leads to the artificial sexualization of virginity. For the simple fact is, a culture that despises virginity is a culture that despises children, who are both its weakest members and the last images we have of both purity and virginity. A culture that dedicates all its psychological resources to despising virginity is a culture ready, willing, and able to make war on childhood. The most obvious manifestation of this is, of course, abortion. But less obvious (and more insidious) is the insistent sexualization of children with clothes, media, and music urging them at ever earlier ages to be “bratz,” “studs,” and even to “explore same-sex attraction.” So, for instance, a fairly typical story fished at random from daily headlines tells us:

Push-up bras. Thong underwear. Eyeliner and mascara. Skirts up to here and shirts down to there. Bare bellies and low riders. Sexually explicit rap lyrics and racy adult television shows.

They’re not just the domain of young women anymore. Before parental anger forced them off the shelves, Abercrombie & Fitch marketed a line of thongs decorated with phrases such as ”wink wink” and ”eye candy” to youngsters. In a recent survey, the steamy adult series ”Desperate Housewives” ranked as the most popular network television show among kids ages 9 to 12.

Prime-time television, with its ubiquitous commercials for Viagra and Cialis, tells youngsters about erectile dysfunction. Nielsen ratings show that 6.6 million children ages 2 to 11 watched Janet Jackson’s ”wardrobe malfunction” during [2004's] Super Bowl. The Internet offers kids a whole new source of information on sex, including pornography. Even the children’s film ”Shrek 2″ contains scenes in which the honeymooning Shreks are making out, clearly preparing for sex.

Constantly bombarded with sexual images and lyrics, girls today seem to be going straight from toys to boys, without a stop at the tween years.

”The idea of girlhood as being a time of playfulness seems to have gone away,” says Jill Taylor, who teaches in the women’s studies department at Simmons College. ”I think the culture is pushing them to grow up faster. You see the girls and they’re 12 going on 16.”

Last Halloween a group of 13-year-old girls in Brockton dressed up as prostitutes, with fishnet stockings, tube tops, miniskirts, and high heels. ”We’re ho’s,” one girl told the local newspaper. The news that a 15-year-old girl at Milton Academy performed oral sex on five older boys has prompted a wide discussion about sexualized behavior among kids. And it’s not just sex – girls today, on average, take their first alcoholic drink at age 13, according to the American Medical Association.

Catherine Steiner-Adair, a clinical psychologist who works with adolescent girls, says cultural forces are causing girls to grow up fast today. ”We’ve really lost what used to be called middle school years,” says Steiner-Adair. ”It’s almost like kids go from elementary school to teenagers. There’s no pause.”

This sickness has only one cure: the return to making sex sexual and virginity virginal. That is, a return to honoring the sacrament of marriage, which can only be fully honored by honoring the even higher call of virginity. It’s the only medicine that will heal and, therefore, it’s a medicine that will provoke a violent reaction for the reason summed up by Chesterton long ago:

The Saint is a medicine because he is an antidote. Indeed that is why the saint is often a martyr; he is mistaken for a poison because he is an antidote.

In few places is this truer than in the reaction of contemporary culture to virginity. On the one hand, the horror of our sex-soaked, sex-marinated, sex-obsessed, sex-enslaved culture at the thought of any restraint is palpable. The sheer loathing directed at Christ’s virginity (in, for instance, The Da Vinci Code or the play Corpus Christi‘s portrayal of Jesus as an active homosexual) hits you in the face like the heat of a furnace. The same is true for Mary as she endures the “honors” the world has ever bestowed on Christ’s faithful ones (such as Chris Ofili’s painting Holy Virgin Mary, which features a clump of elephant dung on one breast and cutouts of genitalia from pornographic magazines in the background).

Yet, at the same time, the world rings with longing for true love and total self-giving. People paid a billion dollars to watch Jack save Rose from the Titanic (albeit after the obligatory Hollywood sex scene in the backseat of a car). They bawl their eyes out at a woman who loves a man so much she will risk death with him, and at a man who loves her so much he undergoes a baptism of death in the icy deep to save her “in every way a person can be saved.” People pay billions more to songwriters to assure us either that such love exists and will find us or that the terrible pain we feel when it doesn’t is something we will laughingly crush by our own power. There is a massive hunger for pure, self-sacrificing love – and a terrible devouring fear of it, whether it comes in the form of marriage or virginity. Karl Stern describes that confrontation between burgeoning hope for self-sacrificial love and the primal terror that goes with it. He noted that:

Besides a thousand natural obstacles, besides the fear of cowardly betrayal, besides the anxiety of isolation, [there is] something else; there is a seemingly invincible horror, something which reaches deep down beneath the social and biological strata of the personality, something that seems to arrest the pulse and make the blood curdle in the veins, there is a cosmic fear, a panic of death and dissolution.

And with good reason: in a fallen world, love and death are alike. They are both forms of self-sacrifice and, in the mystery of Christ, therefore inseparable. So we have only two choices: live our lives trying to get love without death, or else find the courage to take the plunge, however ineptly, and die to ourselves for love. We may think we’re only trying to help a co-worker who needs a little time off, or cutting grandma some slack, or being nicer to that irritating neighbor. But if we continue down any road that starts with the attempt to love, we will sooner or later discover that we did not build the road; that Jesus has walked it before us; and that the little voice that prompted us to take that first step, and all the steps after that, was His, however faint it may have been. And should we continue to walk that road, we will discover it leads to still more calls to sacrifice until we reach the sacrifice of our lives. For as the great Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer observed, “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.”

St. Teresa of Ávila, confronted with this painful truth after falling from a horse and being unceremoniously dragged through the mud, was told by the Lord, “This is the way I treat all my friends.” To which the plain-spoken saint responded, “Then, Lord, it is no wonder you have so few.”

No wonder indeed. In fact, it’s a wonder that the terrible and frightening goodness of God found – in at least one of the Church’s members – a welcome at all when it came to earth. But it did – in Mary. And the welcome continued, even when she was warned that the one her soul loved was “set for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is spoken against (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also)” (Lk 2:34-35).

That was a miracle of grace as well: a miracle that planted some of Christ’s own holiness in the very heart of the Church as a kind of outpost or colony to assure that, no matter how weak, sleazy, or lukewarm the Church’s members became, Mary would always be the sign that the Church was, in her deepest being, holy by the grace of Christ. And that would be the ultimate fruit of the virgin who was given the singular grace to be, in the words of Georges Bernanos, “younger than sin” in the miracle of the Immaculate Conception.

But that story must wait for another time.

Mary’s Perpetual Virginity: Why Does It Matter? (Part 3) - by Mark P. Shea

In Crisis magazine

The first thing to note about the perpetual virginity of Mary is that it’s the natural extension of the dogma of the virgin birth. Many modern people assume that, at its core, the virgin birth was basically a stunt. That is, the common modern assumption is that the meaning of Mary’s virginity is pretty much exhausted when somebody says, “Wow! She had a kid without the assistance of a man! Cool! He must be God Incarnate or something! Let’s check him out!”

The problem is that this approach to the miraculous is constantly repudiated by Jesus:

Then the devil took him to the holy city, and set him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will give his angels charge of you,’ and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’” Jesus said to him, “Again it is written, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’” (Mt 4:5-7)

And the Pharisees and Sadducees came, and to test him they asked him to show them a sign from heaven. He answered them, “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather; for the sky is red.’ And in the morning, ‘It will be stormy today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times. An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of Jonah.” So he left them and departed. (Mt 16:1-4)

God does perform miracles, but He does them in His own time and for His own reasons, not because curiosity seekers like Herod Antipas want to see nifty stunts as though God has to prove Himself to them. Those people are met with silence, as Jesus met Herod Antipas’s requests with silence (Lk 23:8-9).

So if the virgin birth is not a stunt to prove that Jesus, being born of a virgin, must be one amazing guy, what is the point of it?

The point is that the virginity of Mary is a sign, not a stunt. Stunts merely draw attention. They often don’t mean much beyond, “HEY!” And, at any rate, Jesus’ virgin birth drew no attention at the time it took place. But signs – and especially divine signs – are crammed with meaning. That is, signs signify. So the question becomes, “What did the virginity of Mary signify?” And the answer of the Catholic Church is that Mary’s perpetual virginity signifies crucial things, both about the “person of Christ and his redemptive mission” and “the welcome Mary gave that mission on behalf of all men” (CCC 499). And since, like all divine signs, this one goes on signifying long after its immediate time, Mary’s virginity is appropriate, fitting, and significant on a perpetual basis.

God Is in Charge

The first thing the perpetual virginity of Mary makes clear is that the entire project of salvation is God’s initiative, not ours. That’s not me talking. That’s the Catechism of the Catholic Church – the Catholic Church that, as an Evangelical, I had often been told denies God’s grace and teaches “salvation by works”:

Mary’s virginity manifests God’s absolute initiative in the Incarnation. Jesus has only God as Father. “He was never estranged from the Father because of the human nature which he assumed . . . He is naturally Son of the Father as to his divinity and naturally son of his mother as to his humanity, but properly Son of the Father in both natures.” (CCC 503)

Jesus, like all of us children of God who call Him our older brother, is born “not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (Jn 1:13). Jesus has God as His Father not as a stunt, but because this is the deepest truth about Him. And because it’s true of Him, it becomes true of us when we’re adopted by God through His grace.

Because of this, we are, so to speak, made members of a new human race headed by a New Adam (1 Cor 15:45-50). But that New Adam has a corresponding figure: the New Eve whose “yes” to God allows life to enter into the world, just as the “no” of the first Eve brought death into the world. And that “yes” is the fruit both of God’s predestining grace and of her own free assent:

Thus, giving her consent to God’s word, Mary becomes the mother of Jesus. Espousing the divine will for salvation wholeheartedly, without a single sin to restrain her, she gave herself entirely to the person and to the work of her Son; she did so in order to serve the mystery of redemption with him and dependent on him, by God’s grace:

As St. Irenaeus says, “Being obedient she became the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race.” Hence not a few of the early Fathers gladly assert . . . : “The knot of Eve’s disobedience was untied by Mary’s obedience: what the virgin Eve bound through her disbelief, Mary loosened by her faith.” Comparing her with Eve, they call Mary “the Mother of the living” and frequently claim: “Death through Eve, life through Mary.” (CCC 494)

All of which means that Mary is identified with the family of the New Adam just as much as the old Eve was identified with the family of the old Adam. Therefore, Mary’s virginity is a sign of joy that echoes down the ages even more than the weeping from the fall of Eve.

Virginity and Consecration to God

The notions of consecration and virginity have always been part of the Christian tradition. Indeed, as we have seen, pre-Christian tradition (both pagan and Jewish) also recognized at some instinctive level that the two went together. For virginity entails self-denial and, in some mysterious way, new life in God. It is a kind of sacrifice and, contrary to modern notions, it’s the sacrifice of something supremely good, not of something “dirty.” As David said, he would not offer “burnt offerings which cost me nothing” (1 Chr 21:24). The entire principle of sacrifice rests upon the reality that something really good – not a piece of trash – is being offered to God.

Whoever offers the sacrifice recognizes that God is the author of the very gift being offered back to Him – a gift that is (like the offerer himself) next to nothing in comparison to God. Our Father receives such gifts gladly and pours out on the worshipper abundances of grace and glory absurdly beyond the value of the sacrifice. And so, says St. Paul, we go from glory to glory (2 Cor 3:18).

The great exemplar of this pattern is, of course, Jesus Himself, who is both God and High Priest – and a virgin totally consecrated to God. The power of such virginity is indisputable. And so our culture still recognizes the “fitness” of virginity in someone especially close to God. That’s why The Da Vinci Code irritates the devout and titillates those who delight in attacking the gospel. Both sides recognize that the idea of a Jesus with an active sex life is a jab at the notion that He was specially consecrated to God. Yet though we feel this instinctively, we still need to ask why virginity is so bound up with the idea of consecration to God.

Certainly not because there’s something wrong with marriage. Indeed, it’s one of the great paradoxes of the Church that, while she exalts virginity as a higher estate than marriage, she simultaneously understands that Jesus established marriage – not virginity – as one of the seven sacraments.

Yes, you read that right: Virginity is a higher estate than marriage. That’s not some bitter anti-human enthusiasm left over from the Dark Ages. That’s Paul of Tarsus, who sums up the Catholic picture succinctly: “He who marries his betrothed does well; and he who refrains from marriage will do better” (1 Cor 7:38). St. Paul is just repeating the teaching of his Master, whose disciples once shrugged at His teaching on lifetime fidelity in marriage by saying, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is not expedient to marry” (Mt 19:10). Those disciples were surprised when He didn’t correct their wisecrack, but agreed with them, saying,

Not all men can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given. For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to receive this, let him receive it. (Mt 19:10-12)

So the relationship between marital sex and virginity is not “bad/good,” but “good/better.” And the proof of it is Jesus Himself, who lived a life of earthly virginity so He could live a life of heavenly marriage with His bride the Church. It’s the classic pattern: Die to yourself and live to God, and you get back thirty, sixty, or a hundredfold more than you sacrificed (Mt 13:23). Jesus gave up the good of marriage for the greater good of the heavenly wedding banquet. That’s why the “first of His signs” was done at a wedding (Jn 2:1-11). John’s point is not that the sign was the first in a series of signs. He means for us to understand this sign as the archetypal sign, the sign that makes sense of all the other signs. If you want to understand what Jesus is about, John is saying, start here. And if you want to know who the real bridegroom at the real wedding is, says John the Baptist, then understand that it’s Jesus, the virgin who turns out to be the bridegroom of all bridegrooms (Jn 3:29).

Such nuptial language pervades the gospels. The Kingdom of Heaven is like a wedding feast (Mt 22:1-14). Paul tells us that not just the wedding at Cana but every marriage is an image of Christ the groom and His bride the Church (Eph 5:31-32). The book of Revelation portrays the cosmic consummation of all things as the marriage feast of the Lamb (Rv 19:5-7). The ultimate love story is the story of Jesus and the Church, according to Scripture. All our earthly love stories are just dim shadows of that reality. But love stories require two lovers, not just one. And that leads to the question, “What does total consecration in holiness look like, not for Jesus, but for His bride?”

Happily, it’s a question that John has already answered. For, as we already know, the holiest thing in the old covenant was the Ark of the Covenant. And for John, as for Luke, the ark of the New Covenant is Mary, who was overshadowed by the Holy Spirit, and who is the cosmic woman of the Book of Revelation, and who therefore is the icon both of the virgin daughter of Zion and of the Church. And that, in turn, leads us to the reality summarized in the words of Ambrose of Milan: “Mary is the type of the Church.”

Mary Signifies the Church’s Consecration to God

John sees Mary as a sign and icon of the Church, just as the early Fathers did. All of them thought her virginity, like Christ’s, was significant. For Mary is the model disciple whose sacrificial offering of virginity responds to Christ’s sacrificial offering, just as the disciple’s offering of the body as a “living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God” is the fitting response of worship to the Lord (Rom 12:1). More than anybody, Mary models the self-donating love of the disciple in imitation of Christ. For her face is, as Dante said, “the face that is most like the face of Christ’s.”

That’s more than poetry. For Jesus, we must remember, took His humanity from her. At the very level of physical appearance, it is quite likely that they strongly resembled one another. But even more profoundly, she was the disciple who spent more time in the direct presence of Jesus, loving and learning from God Incarnate more than anyone else who ever lived. And she didn’t begin her discipleship by crying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinner” (Lk 5:8), nor with the necessity of being knocked to the ground and blinded to get her attention (cf. Acts 9), but with immediate, complete, and loving submission to the will of God (Lk 1:38).

In every other case, the overture of grace is received imperfectly. But in one case – Mary’s – it received a perfect welcome on behalf of the whole Church, enabled (like all sacrificial gifts) by the power of God’s grace. Mary was the disciple who loved Jesus more deeply and lived with Him more closely than anyone, and the living sacrificial offering she made of her body was like nobody else’s. For Jesus Himself was the living sacrifice of her body and the very fruit of her womb. When the lance pierced His heart, it pierced hers, too (cf. Lk 2:34-35). No other disciple of Jesus has ever offered more to God than she offered.

“But,” says the Protestant doubter, “mere physical relationship doesn’t save! Remember when the woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, ‘Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that you sucked!’ Jesus replied, ‘Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!’” (Lk 11:27-28).

All true – which is why virginity matters as a sign not of deprivation and sexlessness but of faith. For “Mary is a virgin because her virginity is the sign of her faith ‘unadulterated by any doubt,’ and of her undivided gift of herself to God’s will. It is her faith that enables her to become the mother of the Savior: ‘Mary is more blessed because she embraces faith in Christ than because she conceives the flesh of Christ’” (CCC 506). Mary was not blessed because she gave birth; she gave birth because she was blessed: blessed to be chosen by God and more blessed still to have the pure faith to respond with an unreserved “yes” to God’s call – a pure faith she never lost or tainted, all the way through the bitterness of Golgotha. It’s not just her face, but her love for God, that most resembles Christ’s.

The Significance of the Wedding at Cana

That’s why John is careful to note that Jesus’ first miracle (at Cana) is done in response to Mary’s intercession (Jn 2:1-11). Mary, the icon of the bride and the counterpoint to Jesus the groom, is exactly the importunate supplicant Jesus tells us He is looking for in the Parable of the Unjust Judge (Lk 18:1-8). She doesn’t take “no” for an answer but first taps Jesus on the shoulder and says, “They have no wine” and, after a seeming rebuff, goes with perfect trust to the servants and tells them, “Do whatever he tells you.”

There is a strong tendency in Protestant circles to read this story as yet another example of Jesus “rebuking” Mary. But the longer I contemplated it, the more problematic that way of seeing it became. For instance, if Mary is being “rebuked,” the question is, “Why?” For her “faithlessness”? That makes no sense. She obviously expects Jesus to be able to do something about the wine. But such an expectation is clearly an act of faith in Him as Messiah, since there’s no reason, humanly speaking, to think a poor carpenter would be able to do anything. So she’s obviously expecting something supernatural here.

At this point, many an Evangelical replies, “Yes, she had faith, of a sort. But it was a worldly faith. She wanted Jesus to perform wonders, but didn’t understand the depth of what His mission would ultimately mean. That’s why Jesus rebuked her with the words, ‘O woman, what have you to do with me? My hour has not yet come’” (Jn 2:4).

But this makes no sense, either. If Jesus is displeased with her allegedly worldly faith and her supposed hankering after mere publicity stunts, why does He grant her request? Everybody else who comes to Him with worldly demands and requests for publicity stunts is invariably refused. Whether it’s Herod Antipas (Lk 23:8-9), or the man who wanted Jesus to adjudicate an inheritance dispute with his brother (Lk 12:13-21), or a mob who wanted to crown Him king (Jn 6:15), or Pharisees seeking a cool special effect from heaven (Mt 16:1-4), or His own disciples wanting a dazzling display of divine artillery against the Samaritans (Lk 9:51-56), all such crude demands for worldly power and selfish stunts are flatly refused. Yet, according to a common Protestant take on this story, Jesus allegedly “rebukes” Mary’s supposed crude desire for a publicity stunt – and then capitulates completely and does the stunt anyway.

Once again, this picture of Mary as pushy stage mother and of Jesus as a sort of sullen young actor shoved – whining about His unreadiness – on to the stage of history tells us far more about some Protestant attitudes toward Mary than it tells us about the actual events at Cana. Once again, the specter of Mary as Mommy Dearest is conjured, but now with the added absurdity of an omnipotent divine Son too wimpy to stand up to His domineering Jewish mom. It is simply insupportable to anyone of common sense. So are there other alternatives?

Rev. Sam Harris at Evangelical John Ankerberg’s ministry offers a less harsh but still unsatisfactory take. After noting (accurately) that the address “Woman” (Greek: gunai) is perfectly polite and does not have the cold ring in Jesus’ native language that it has in English, he continues:

“What have I to do with you” was a common conversational phrase. Again, it meant no disrespect. Jesus answers Mary’s request, not because she is His mother, but as part of His work as the Messiah. According to a footnote in the New Geneva Study Bible, “This indicates that Mary’s special role as Jesus’ mother gives her no authority to intervene in Christ’s messianic career.” Barclay suggests that Jesus was saying: “Don’t worry, you don’t quite understand what is going on; leave things to Me, and I will settle them in my own way.” It must always be understood that Jesus was respectful of His mother, but He was beginning to distance Himself from His previous role as a dutiful son.

This reading also fails for a number of reasons. To begin with, it is difficult to see why Jesus’ first miracle, done in direct response to Mary’s request and even over His apparent protests, signifies Mary is powerless to intervene in Christ’s messianic career. It would appear, judging from the end of the story, that Mary’s intervention here had a rather pronounced impact on Jesus’ messianic career.

Second, it is not at all clear that Mary “doesn’t quite understand what is going on.” Still less is it clear that Jesus thinks Mary doesn’t quite understand what is going on. On the contrary, Jesus’ response shows He thinks Mary knows perfectly well what is going on: He’s the Messiah, and she wants Him to manifest Himself to Israel.

And finally, it’s difficult to see in the text just what is compelling Jesus to “distance Himself from His previous role as a dutiful son.” The subtext of that statement is that Mary (again) has some sort of false or worldly notion of what “Messiah” means (i.e., military hero, or miraculous stunt man, etc.) and so Jesus must “distance Himself” from her false expectations to pursue His true mission. But, in fact, nothing in the text of the story justifies the assumption that Mary has false expectations of the Messiah. On the contrary, this assumption about Mary originates not with the text of Scripture, but with a prejudice brought to the text by Harris and the sources he cites.

A Catholic reading would urge us to move away from the assumption that Jesus and Mary are in conflict at all. Indeed, my former pastor, Rev. Michael Sweeney, O.P., now the president of the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology in Oakland, California, has repeatedly remarked to me that it is legitimate to note a certain playfulness in their exchange. What we’re seeing here is not Jesus the Teenage Messiah hagridden by mom and her neurotic need to impress the ladies from the Women’s Auxiliary with “My son, the Miracle Worker.” Nor are we seeing Jesus politely trying to escape the false expectations of a well-meaning but dim disciple. Rather, we’re seeing a piece of conversation – almost banter – between two people who are both acutely aware of who Jesus is and what He is called to do.

Mary, after all, is no fool. She knows her Bible. She knows the meaning of the mission of Israel. And most of all, she knows her Son. A quick read of her Magnificat (Lk 1:46-55) shows that she has spent a long time pondering how, in the coming of Jesus, God “has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his posterity for ever.” Every word both Jesus and Mary speak is spoken in light of their shared awareness of that messianic mission and of the words of the prophets who taught Israel to await His coming. With all that as the backdrop of their conversation, Mary is revealed to be using language laden with double meaning to lovingly call Jesus to get on with His mission, not to impress the neighbors with a special effect or publicity stunt. Her point is not simply that the wedding guests have no wine; it’s that the whole nation has no wine. All Israel is waiting for the coming of the Messianic Son of David when

the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of fat things, a feast of wine on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wine on the lees well refined. And he will destroy on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death for ever, and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth; for the Lord has spoken. (Is 25:6-8)

This image of the “new wine” of the messianic age is not unfamiliar to Jesus. He has read the prophets, too, and their imagery is His own. Indeed, Mary was one of the people who taught Him to read the prophets. And so He announces the dawn of the Messianic Age in language that once again links the image of a wedding with the image of wine:

Then the disciples of John came to him, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast. And no one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch tears away from the garment, and a worse tear is made. Neither is new wine put into old wineskins; if it is, the skins burst, and the wine is spilled, and the skins are destroyed; but new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.” (Mt 9:14-17)

So Jesus acknowledges Mary’s messianic expectation by replying that His “hour” has not yet come (a reply that makes no sense unless He knows Mary is calling Him to begin His messianic mission). More subtly still, He acknowledges His messianic mission by calling her “Woman.” This is more than simply a polite address. It is, like all the rest of their exchange, as allusive to larger Old Testament prophetic realities as Mary’s request is. For in addressing her so, he is reminding us of another woman and the promise she and her seed were given long ago (Gen 3:15) to “crush the serpent’s head.” The whole conversation makes it clear that Mary believes it’s time for Jesus to announce His identity as Messiah and inaugurate the final decisive battle, not with Rome, but with “that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan” (Rev 12:9); that Jesus knows perfectly well this is what she means; and that she knows He knows it. Rather than some inane request for drinks all ’round followed by a meaningless “rebuke,” what we’re really looking at here is a profound conversation in which Jesus and Mary know and understand each other perfectly.

Which is why Mary doesn’t back down, and Jesus doesn’t expect her to. The bride – the second Eve confronting the second Adam – seeks the new wine of the kingdom. Indeed, she does so with just the brass and stick-to-itiveness her Son urges all His disciples to have. And the result is precisely what she sought: “This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory; and his disciples believed in him” (Jn 2:11). Mary, standing as a kind of icon of the whole Church in persistent and importunate prayer, chases Jesus until He catches her, and the courtship of Jesus and His bride the Church begins with Mary as the consecrated icon of the consecrated bride saying, in effect, “Maranatha! Show yourself, O Lord!” It is the cry of the Church down through history.

Which brings us, finally, to the other great image of Mary in John’s thought: not merely the virgin bride, but the virgin mother. Of which more next week.

Perpetual Virginity as Prophetic Sign (Part 2) - by Mark P. Shea

In CRISIS magazine

Last week, we looked at the basic evidence for the perpetual virginity of Mary: the “why the Church thinks that the record shows, as a matter of historical fact, that she remained a virgin” evidence. But, of course, the question remains, “Why does the Church think this is a big deal?” There are, after all, lots of true things you can say about Mary. Mary had red blood. Mary ate food. Mary drank water. Mary breathed oxygen. Yet the Church does not bind the faithful to believe and profess these things as articles of faith. So why is her perpetual virginity one of the Four Essential Things Catholics are bound to believe and profess about her (along with her title Theotokos, or “Mother of God”; her immaculate conception; and her assumption)?

To get at the answer to that question, we need to realize that the perpetual virginity of Mary is, of course, a kind of extension of the virgin birth into history. In other words, the perpetual virginity of Mary matters to the early Church because the virgin birth matters to the early Church. And the reason the virgin birth matters is because it is not merely a stunt, but a fulfillment of prophecy.

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a young woman shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. (Is 7:14)

Signs signify. And so the early Church Fathers sought to understand the full meaning of the sign of the virgin birth, the sign of Immanuel.

The Witness of the Prophets

Given the witness of Mary, Joseph, the evangelists, and Jesus Himself, we saw last week it’s not surprising to find the early Church Fathers firmly embracing the belief that Mary was ever-virgin. They, too, recognized the connection between Mary and the ark, and saw in Mary’s perpetual virginity something that attends everything else about Jesus’ life – the fulfillment of prophecy. So, for instance, in the Fathers, we see Mary, just like Jesus, repeatedly linked to sundry Old Testament types. In Gideon’s fleece, wet with dew while all the ground beside had remained dry (Jgs 6:37-38), Ambrose sees a type of Mary receiving in her womb the Word Incarnate yet remaining a virgin. Likewise, the Fathers derive images and titles of Mary from the Old Testament, such as:

• the “Temple of God” – she is the Holy of Holies in which God dwelt (Ephraim the Syrian, Jerome, Ambrose)
• the “Rod of Jesse” from whom blossomed Christ (Ambrose, Tertullian, Jerome)
• the “Ark of the Covenant” (Athanasius, Gregory the Wonder-Worker)
• the “Staff of Aaron” (Ephraim the Syrian)
• the “Burning Bush that is Not Consumed” (Gregory of Nyssa)

This is the same pattern at work in the patristic reading of the prophet Ezekiel. And we do well to pay close attention to it to see how the early Church, following Jesus’ guidance on the road to Emmaus (cf. Lk 24:44-47), sees in this prophecy, as it sees in all prophecy, that everything in the law and the prophets is ultimately about Him and His body, the Church – since He is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets.

Ezekiel lived about 500 years before Christ. In Ezekiel’s day, the ten tribes of the northern kingdom of Israel had been scattered by the Assyrian Empire (hence the “Ten Lost Tribes of Israel”), while the southern “rump” kingdom of Judah had itself been carted off to captivity in Babylon after the destruction of Solomon’s Temple. It seemed that Israel was doomed to be annihilated, crushed between the hammer of Assyria and the anvil of Babylon.

But then God raised up prophets like Ezekiel to promise that Israel had not been forsaken and that the Almighty would restore her fortunes, return her to her land, send her a Messiah, and use Israel to bless all the nations of the earth, just as He had promised Abraham long ago (Gn 12:1-3). In Ezekiel’s case, this prophetic message included a lengthy vision –recorded in Ezekiel 40-48 – describing a restored temple, a revived land of Israel, and a renewed city of Jerusalem.

Now the temple was indeed rebuilt (cf. Ezra and Nehemiah), but it didn’t (and couldn’t) look like the temple of Ezekiel’s prophecy. Why? Because in Ezekiel’s visionary temple, things like this happen:

Then he brought me back to the door of the temple; and behold, water was issuing from below the threshold of the temple toward the east (for the temple faced east); and the water was flowing down from below the south end of the threshold of the temple, south of the altar. Then he brought me out by way of the north gate, and led me round on the outside to the outer gate, that faces toward the east; and the water was coming out on the south side.

Going on eastward with a line in his hand, the man measured a thousand cubits, and then led me through the water; and it was ankle-deep. Again he measured a thousand, and led me through the water; and it was knee-deep. Again he measured a thousand, and led me through the water; and it was up to the loins. Again he measured a thousand, and it was a river that I could not pass through, for the water had risen; it was deep enough to swim in, a river that could not be passed through. And he said to me, “Son of man, have you seen this?”

Then he led me back along the bank of the river. As I went back, I saw upon the bank of the river very many trees on the one side and on the other. And he said to me, “This water flows toward the eastern region and goes down into the Arabah; and when it enters the stagnant waters of the sea, the water will become fresh. And wherever the river goes every living creature which swarms will live, and there will be very many fish; for this water goes there, that the waters of the sea may become fresh; so everything will live where the river goes. Fishermen will stand beside the sea; from En-gedi to En-eglaim it will be a place for the spreading of nets; its fish will be of very many kinds, like the fish of the Great Sea. But its swamps and marshes will not become fresh; they are to be left for salt. And on the banks, on both sides of the river, there will grow all kinds of trees for food. Their leaves will not wither nor their fruit fail, but they will bear fresh fruit every month, because the water for them flows from the sanctuary. Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for healing.” (Ez 47:1-12)

There never was (and never will be) a physical temple with a river flowing out of it. So what is Ezekiel getting at? To find out, we must pay attention to a rabbi named Jesus of Nazareth as He comes to a rebuilt temple 500 years later to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles (Jn 7).

The Feast of Tabernacles is described in Leviticus 23:33-43 and Deuteronomy 16:13-16 as a commemoration of Israel’s living in tents in the wilderness (Lv 23:43) and a thanksgiving for Israel’s permanent home in the Promised Land. In addition, the feast also offers thanks for the temple, the successor of the Mosaic tabernacle (Ex 25-31) as a permanent place of worship. Note that both the tabernacle and the temple were home to the Ark of the Covenant until the ark vanished several centuries before Christ’s birth.

As Israel wandered in the wilderness during the Exodus, the people suffered from thirst. In answer to their complaints, Moses strikes a rock, from which water flows to quench Israel’s thirst (Nm 20). By Jesus’ day, this event was commemorated in the Feast of Tabernacles in a curious ritual: Every morning during the feast, a priest went down to the Pool of Siloam and brought back a golden pitcher of water to the temple (the successor of Moses’s tabernacle). This water was poured on the altar of holocausts amidst the singing of the “Hallel” (that is, Psalms 112-117) and the joyful sound of musical instruments. Interestingly, this practice became part of the feast after the rebuilding of the temple following the Babylonian Exile – that is, after the prophecy of Ezekiel’s river flowing from the temple.

So, during the Feast of Tabernacles, Jesus announces to the crowd, “If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water’” (Jn 7:37-38). As we already know, Jesus uses the image of living water to refer to the Holy Spirit (cf. Jn 4). Yet curiously, there’s no passage in Old Testament Scripture that says, “Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water.” What, then, is Jesus referring to?

He is referring to Ezekiel 47 and following. After all, Jesus has already told us what the true temple is when He declared, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (Jn 2:19). As John makes crystal clear, “He spoke of the temple of his body” (Jn 2:21). So Jesus is declaring to all at the Feast of Tabernacles that Ezekiel’s vision is not a physical description of a stone building, but a spiritual description of the true temple, the Body of Christ. For the same reason, John says that Jesus “tabernacled” among us (Jn 1:14) when He became man. Paul makes the same connection, referring both to individual Christians and to the mystical Body of Christ as the temple (1 Cor 3:16-17; Eph 2:21).

So Jesus is identifying Himself with the temple of Ezekiel’s vision. He is making clear that He is the true temple and His heart is the Holy of Holies. The waters of the Feast of Tabernacles, the water flowing from the rock of Moses, from the rock on which the visionary Temple of Ezekiel is founded, flows from His heart. The rock, as Paul makes clear, is Christ (1 Cor 10:1-4). And, as we shall see presently, John will make this even clearer as his Gospel reaches its climax.

In other words, the Incarnation is being likened to God coming to dwell in His temple in majesty. Or rather, the Old Testament moments in which God descended in majesty on the tabernacle and the temple in the pillar of cloud (cf. Ex 40:34-38; 1 Kgs 8:10-11) are revealed to be prophetic foreshadows of when God truly came to dwell in His temple: when the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us.

Now the interesting thing, the Fathers noticed, is that Ezekiel speaks directly to this image of the Lord coming in majesty to dwell in His temple. For the prophet wrote:

Then he brought me back to the outer gate of the sanctuary, which faces east; and it was shut. And he said to me, “This gate shall remain shut; it shall not be opened, and no one shall enter by it; for the Lord, the God of Israel, has entered by it; therefore it shall remain shut.” (Ez 44:1-2)

In short, the gate into the Incarnation (i.e., Mary) shall be holy to the Lord and not for any common purpose. And in token of this, the gate of the mystical temple shall be shut to all but the Lord.

As an Evangelical, I had long regarded the reading of Ezekiel 44:1-2 to support Mary’s perpetual virginity as mere “proof-texting.” I thought the Fathers were beginning with this passage and then trying to build a doctrine of perpetual virginity on it. But the more I saw how the early Church (including the New Testament authors) linked the tabernacle, the temple, and the Body of Christ, and the roles of Mary, the ark, and the gate of the temple, the more I came to realize that the Church’s faith in Mary’s perpetual virginity was not derived from Ezekiel 44:1-2 any more than her faith in the virgin birth was derived from Isaiah 7:14. Matthew did not sit down, stick his nose in Isaiah, read something about virgin, and then declare, “Hey! If we’re going to cook up a Messiah, we should say he’s the son of a virgin, because this random passage in Isaiah says something about a virgin.”

Rather, the virgin birth happens, and it is only with hindsight that Matthew connects it with the passage in Isaiah and realizes that this event (which he can only know about from the Blessed Virgin) fits the pattern of prophecy in the Old Testament. It’s exactly the same with the perpetual virginity of Mary. As with the virgin birth, the perpetual virginity of Mary happened, and only afterward did the Church begin to realize that the events of her life, like the events of her Son’s, were strangely – one might even say prophetically – foreshadowed in Ezekiel 44:1-2. There is a real, organic, un-manufactured connection between Mary and something the prophet Ezekiel had been inspired to see.

The Witness of the Fathers and the Church

Patristic sources who affirm that Mary’s perpetual virginity was taught by the apostles include the author of the Protoevangelium of James, Origen, Hilary of Poitiers, Athanasius, Epiphanius of Salamis, Jerome, Didymus the Blind, Ambrose of Milan, Pope Siricius I, Augustine, Leporius, Cyril of Alexandria, Pope Leo I, and the dogmatic teaching of the Second Ecumenical Council of Constantinople. And they’re only the beginning. For the entirety of Christian history until roughly the 17th century, Christians agreed with them – except for two guys.

Those two guys are:

Tertullian. A fierce North-African lawyer and defender of the faith who lived in the late-second and early-third century. He fell prey to a spiritual disease that sometimes afflicts those who come to love apologetics more than they love Jesus: Tertullian got so intent on building up antibodies against heresy that he eventually contracted a sort of spiritual autoimmune disease and started building antibodies against the Body of Christ itself. Eventually, he abandoned Christianity for Montanism. But along the way, Tertullian wrote some brilliant – and virulent – stuff. He did nothing by halves, and he was no stranger to the deep end when it came to contradicting his opponents. And so, when he encountered Docetists (people who denied Jesus was truly human), Tertullian countered by arguing that not only was Jesus human, but his mother, being herself fully human, must have had a bushel of other kids, too! True to form, Tertullian didn’t argue this from biblical evidence (because, as we’ve seen, there isn’t any), but from his own polemical needs at the moment. In fact, Tertullian’s passionate opposition to Docetism also prompted him to argue that Jesus was ugly! He was an extremist with an axe to grind and a blinding need to win an argument at any cost, not a very reliable witness to the constant faith of other Christians.

Helvidius, who lived in the fourth century. He wrote a pamphlet (lost to history) that argued most of the same things that Evangelicals argue against Mary’s perpetual virginity. How does Helvidius know Mary had other kids? He doesn’t. He just cites Tertullian and says that it seems to him she must have had them, using all the misreadings of Scripture we have just looked at and discredited.

It’s worth noting that when Jerome wrote his famous refutation Against Helvidius in defense of Mary’s perpetual virginity, his argument was seen by his all contemporaries as completely non-controversial: It was Helvidius who was universally regarded throughout Christendom as the kook. Jerome’s view was regarded as simply normal by Christians everywhere. And that remained true right down through the Reformation, whose leading lights – such as Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, and even John Wesley – also accepted Mary’s perpetual virginity as clear and unarguable biblical teaching. Far from “contradicting” Scripture, the dogma of Mary’s perpetual virginity is at least as well attested, both biblically and historically, as the dogma of the Trinity and is universally regarded (until well after the start of the Reformation) as the fulfillment of Scripture.

So what does that have to do with our relationship with Christ today? More on that next week.