Feast of the Immaculate Conception

[Jon Miller]

Yeah, but Mary seems to be the worse of it.

JM

[Boris Godunov]

I just don't get the belief that sex is a sin, even between man and wife.

[Jon Miller]

I don't get that either, but surely most of them don't think so?

JM

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I don't get that either, but surely most of them don't think so?

JM

I guess those who are doctrinally pure see it as a "necessary evil" to produce babies.

But most Catholics are just fine with sex, marital or otherwise, in my experience. It's always been the case that the majority of Catholics don't adhere to strict church doctrine on many issues, of course.

[Japher]

Do you think it would be better to adopt doctrines that are acheivable but more realistic. Or, would it be better to set doctrines that no one will be able to acheive and repent when they are broken.

On one hand I think it would be a good idea to have something to strive for, but it seems that breaking from the doctrine, since it will be seen as unavoidable, will not be held in such infamy. Thus, "greater sins" will be more common, and then the debate of a sin heirarchy just causes more confussion and more animosity.

On the other hand having a doctrine within your already set moral bounds does nothing for you to try and better yourself. Unless, that is, you try and better yourself because you actually care to be better. In this case you obtain real moral elevation. Of course, what is "better" will be defined by that wider encompassing doctrine.

I don't know, just thought I throw it out there.

[Felch]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
I just don't get the belief that sex is a sin, even between man and wife.

WTF? That is simply not true.

[DirtyMartini]

Catholic chicks were always "better dates" than their protestant peers.

edit: was expanding on Boris' comment.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Felch
WTF? That is simply not true.

Then why is Catholicism insistent that Mary remained a virgin her whole life?

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by DirtyMartini
Catholic chicks were always "better dates" than their protestant peers.

edit: was expanding on Boris' comment.

True for the boys, too.

[Elok]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
Then why is Catholicism insistent that Mary remained a virgin her whole life?

Well, the justification I've heard is that "it's hard to imagine someone choosing to return to normal human relations after an event as life-altering as giving birth to one's creator," something like that. Or--because if I don't phrase it this way, I know some doofus here will--"once you've gone YHWH, you'll never go back." Not that I am implying there was actual sex involved; just pre-empting the snark.

...aaaanyway, just because it's not a sin doesn't mean they're not uncomfortable with it. I've never really encountered Catholic culture myself, only parodies of it, so I don't know. For us it's mostly just that people were insisting she remained a lifelong virgin back in 200 AD, and our policy is to continue the tradition for as long as it remains even remotely practical.

[Boris Godunov]

Even so, you have the fact that sex/reproduction itself didn't exist except as a direct consequence of the Fall. That strongly implies that the act is part of God's punishment for eating the Forbidden Fruit.

And then there's the church's adamant condemnation of any and all forms of contraception, which imply that if you're not having sex for it's "necessary evil" component (conceiving children), then it's wrong.

[Elok]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
Even so, you have the fact that sex/reproduction itself didn't exist except as a direct consequence of the Fall. That strongly implies that the act is part of God's punishment for eating the Forbidden Fruit.

...where did you get that idea? AFAIK the Bible just says childbirth became painful after the Fall, not that it didn't exist before. Even if it did happen that way, I suppose you could make the argument that childbirth only became necessary with the appearance of death, since with only two mortal people the human race would go extinct rather quickly.

And then there's the church's adamant condemnation of any and all forms of contraception, which imply that if you're not having sex for it's "necessary evil" component (conceiving children), then it's wrong.

That's a Catholic doctrine, so I won't comment.

[Ben Kenobi]

"Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?"

I suppose we're in for another round of "the word the Bible uses doesn't really mean that, in this one instance."

This is one case where it's helpful to rely on tradition, not scripture.

The tradition has been that Christ had cousins, but not a brother or a sister in the way we usually use the term. Added to this is the fact that 'brother and sister' are used for followers of Christ in other contexts.

There are many teachings which are not explicitly found in scripture, including the trinity.

[Ben Kenobi]

Wiki tells me Mary's parents had sex to conceive her and that her IC occured then, and that it wasn't a virgin birth like Jesus...

Nope, just Christ was the only virgin birth.

this is where I was getting confussed, I thought Mary's birth was also a virgin birth, but it appears that is not the case. Thus, it just seems like a "I called it" after the fact to make her seem like a diety or give her more worth than the Bible did.

Right, we all bow down and worship Mary which is why we have statues of her and Joseph.

Look, it's been the teaching of the Church since the very beginning that Mary was sinless. If she was sinless then she must have been immaculately conceived. That's all there is to it.

[Ben Kenobi]

I personally don't understand why Christians construct such complicated beliefs, since the only way to reach their conclusions is through some mumbo jumbo reasoning (even for religion). At least progress to an Emersonian perspective, instead of acting as if you can make sense of the inconsistencies and nonsense of the Bible.

You might well ask the same of the physicists. Why isn't everything so simple. Why is reality so complex?