[Magdalen] A question for you... I am curious...

[James Oppenheimer-Crawford]

There is a passage in the Gospel that has Jesus' family trying to get him
to come home with them; they say "he is out of his mind."  There are a few
scenes like that, but nothing more.

There is not any information as to how old Mary or Joseph were.  People
conjecture that Mary was young ("It makes sense," is the main evidence) And
they guess that Joseph was old because he is no longer mentioned later in
the gospels. Hardly solid evidence for absence. in the first place. There
is no information, fortunately, on the couple's sex life, other than the
terse note that Joseph did not have sex with Mary until after the birth of
Jesus. To me, that implies that they "did it" after the birth of Jesus, but
there is no compulsion to adopt that view. No information exists about her
later life or her death. Traditions have arisen to explain these things,
but traditions have also arisen to explain how the young Jesus was
basically a spoiled brat who snuffed life out of people whenever any
annoyed him, so ....

In other words, there's no real information on this.  However the Fathers
(emphasis on the fact that it was the fathers) had some filthy opinions
about the female condition and so they assumed that God could not have
allowed Godsself to be in the unclean human womb, so God caused Mary to be
free from sin. One might rightly ask if God can do that for one person, why
not for everybody, but then if God did that, there would have been no need
for the Gospels at all, if you assume their theology holds water to begin
with.

In any case, these traditions were developed to explain how it was possible
for God to be born of a woman and not be sullied horribly by the experience
(as if the rest of his life -- especially the end -- was not "sullied," but
on steroids).
The Church Fathers arrived at the speculation that Mary was without sin.
That being the case, she obviously had no carnal experience, as that would
just ruin everything. That's their story, and it has a certain reverential
charm. Women are generally given such a poor treatment by the Church for so
long, it hardly makes much difference if one tries to say Mary was chaste
or celibate or call it what you will.  It certainly has inspired a ton of
visions.
"Yes, but what is the truth?"  The truth is simply that we have absolutely
no idea whatsoever.  Jesus was not an ordinary Joe, and it would come as no
surprise that Mary is no ordinary mother, but no, we don't know anything
about that.  As has been mentioned, those traditions are very late. Most of
the people at the Council of Nicaea were dust when those traditions were
written down, based on Sybil's date, ca. 400 AD.

James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
*“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved,
except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy

On Tue, Jun 20, 2017 at 8:29 AM, sheila ketler via Magdalen <
magdalen at herberthouse.org> wrote:

> Hi everyoneI was listening to the praise sections of the service on Sunday
> and I heard the priest say "Blessed by Saint JosephChaste husband of Mary."
> Now correct me if I am wrong but somewhere in the New Testament (is it the
> book of Acts?)it  tells us that Jesus was somewhere and His brothers and
> sisters were also there... Is the theory that Joseph was mucholder than
> Mary and that he had children from a previous marriage? and that they
> remained chaste within the marriage?The theory of the Perpetual Virgin
> Mary... ?? How do they come up with that?? The thing I also don't get is
> how they figure that Mary just went up into heaven??
> As I am sitting here depressed beyond belief over 2000 dollars of car
> repair bills I need some distractions...
> Let's talk about this...
> The Adoration was full of pomp and pageantry and holiness... The incense
> filled the air. By the time I got throughservice two I was sniffling
> away... I must be allergic to that!!
> Sheila
>