ECT on Mary

If you have not already read the latest statement from Evangelicals and Catholics Together, you should. The topic is Mary. Most ecumenical statements are pretty bland and predictable. We’re all familiar with the conciliatory nuances involved with statements on soteriology or ecclesiology. But when it comes to mariology, it’s pretty hard to nuance “conceived without sin” or “bodily assumed into heaven.” So, we have the Evangelicals saying, more or less, “Nope, not gonna go there. What Bible are you reading?” Actually, they did a very admirable job of accommodating, albeit minimally, certain intentions enshrined in the Catholic position. For example:

Evangelicals find unnecessary and unbiblical the notion that Mary was preserved from the stain of original sin from the first moment of her conception. Still, we affirm much of what this teaching is intended to convey—that Mary was the object of God’s gracious election in Christ; that she was uniquely prepared to become the mother of our Lord; that she is an extraordinary model of the call to discipleship and the life of holiness; that her assent to the purpose of the Lord was itself the result of God’s unmerited favor toward her—an example of sola gratia; and that she should be honored and called “blessed one” in all places and by all generations.

The entirety of the Evangelical response is marked by a deep understanding of both the history and the theology behind the Catholic position. Thus, they rightly note the apocryphal sources as varying tradents, as well as the pious intentions in the trajectories which yielded the dogmatic formulas. I was very impressed. I would really like to know who was the principal writer for the Evangelical response — perhaps Professor John Woodbridge (TEDS) and/or Professor Kevin Vanhoozer (Wheaton), signers of the statement.

The Catholic portion of the statement was also well done. Of particular interest, the Catholic position makes it clear from the beginning that they are working with a “progressive revelation” of sorts (of course, they would never say “progressive revelation”). Thus, we read:

The Bible is the foundation of all Catholic teaching. Catholics also believe, in accordance with Jesus’ promise to send the Holy Spirit to teach the Church all things (John 14:16), that, under the influence of the Spirit, the gospel of grace is more fully and completely understood. Thus the Catholic Church believes that in its listening to, praying with, and reflecting on the truth of Holy Scripture, the Spirit is active as a divine guide, leading to a rich and comprehensive consideration of God’s Word. The Spirit leads the Church to see the full implications of the gospel through the teaching of the early Fathers, through ecumenical councils, through prayer and liturgy, through the lives of the saints, and through the study of theologians. All of these help the Church to see more clearly the profound meaning of Christ’s message and the extraordinary role of his mother, Mary, in the history of salvation.

The key word here is “implications.” St. Thomas and others would say, “fittingness.” The bridge between fittingness and knowledge is the Roman Catholic magisterium. That’s the divide between Evangelicals and Catholics.

Mary’s Memory

I just read a highly interesting article by José Granados, “Through Mary’s Memory to Jesus’ Mystery” (Communio 33:1, Spring 2006). Granados basically argues that the post-Resurrection apostolic memory of Christ must necessarily include that of Mary, the only witness to Christ’s divine origin in a virginal conception, a “memory” of necessity immaculate if the Church is to have a true comprehension of the Son’s full deity in the Father and full humanity from his mother — building off her faithful “pondering in her heart.” Okay, that little synopsis does little justice to Granados’ arguments, so you’ll have to read it.

It was interesting to read this after reading some of Matthias Scheeben’s Mariology (volume 1 and volume 2). While Scheeben’s work contains some fine moments, he is still working with traditional proof text arguments, so, e.g., Luke 1:34 “proves” that Mary took a vow of virginity. A lot is built off of this. Similarly, in volume 2, chapter 4 (“Proof of the Dogma of the Immaculate Conception from Sacred Scripture”), Genesis 3:15 requires that Mary be immaculate from her conception (otherwise, there would have been enmity between her and Satan). I don’t think too many Catholic theologians today are quite as confident to utilize scripture in this way. Certainly such texts can be used more along the lines of corroborative evidence, but more fundamental and more systematic reasons must be given — and this is the sort of work that Granados is doing well, and similar to the marian work, little that I’ve read, of Joseph Ratzinger and Hans Urs von Balthasar. Granados’ presentation, while necessarily limited in scope, is far more plausible to a Protestant than that of Scheeben. It is rooted in history and the Church (and the Church’s gospel), as with von B’s ecclesially-centered marian arguments, and as such gives the Protestant reader a plausible path to the high mariology in the Church’s history.