©1996 by Thomas F. Heinze
Reproduced by permission

Yes! We do believe all that the Word of God tells us of Mary. The beliefs that we reject are those which men have come up with later without any Biblical basis. We believe that Mary was a virtuous woman, chosen by God to be the mother of Jesus Christ. Moreover, she was a virgin at His birth. On the other hand, we do not pray to Mary nor make images of her because the Bible teaches: You shall do homage to the Lord your God; Him alone shall you adore (Luke 4:8). The Bible consistently teaches that prayer should be directed to God the Father. When the disciples asked Jesus, "Teach us to pray," the first thing He said was "when you pray, say Our Father" and then went on to teach the Lord's prayer. Jesus once asked another group of people, "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and then not do what I say?" Since Jesus asks us to pray to the Father, let's do it!

Sometimes those who want us to pray to Mary say that since she was the mother of Jesus, He always granted her everything she asked of Him. You may judge for yourself whether or not this is true after reading the following passage from the Bible. His mother and his brothers arrived, and as they stood outside they sent word to Him to come out. The crowd seated around Him told Him, "Your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside asking for you." He said in reply, "Who are my mother and my brothers? and gazing around Him at those seated in the circle He continued, "These are my mother and my brothers. Whoever does the will of God is brother and sister and mother to me" (Mark 3:31-35).

In the Bible, there is no example of anyone ever trying to go to Jesus or God the Father through Mary. Instead we read, God is one. One also is the mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus who gave Himself as a ransom for all (1 Timothy 2:5-6). Jesus said, I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through me. (John 14:6). Christ is the only mediator. He puts us directly in touch with God by taking away the sins that separated us, so that we can come to Him directly.

History informs us that prayers to Mary began around the end of the fourth century after Christ. Certainly if she had still been alive she would not have permitted this practice! As a pious woman, she would never have accepted prayer, as it should be directed to God alone.

In Italy, the very center of Roman Catholicism, people tend to pray to the various images of Mary. Furthermore, they commonly believe each individual image has particular abilities. A number are believed to possess the power to heal in an exceptional way. Others protect from the lava of Mt. Vesuvius. Others are thought to protect particular groups of people, such as fishermen. The churches with statues which are particularly revered promote this belief. As a result, many people will drive for miles, passing hundreds of images of Mary to get to the one they think can help them the most. This is obviously idolatry and it is not this that I wish to discuss here as it has nothing to do with Mary who is one. Her powers do not change from statue to statue.

Rather, let us look at Mary, the mother of Jesus, a real woman like many of you who are reading this book. We believe that she was a fine woman, because God chose her for a very special task which would bring her to prominence and cause her to be held up as an example. There is, however, no reason to believe that she was conceived without sin, because after the birth of Christ we find her in the temple offering a sacrifice for her purification (Luke 2:22-24). This is the same action that all the Hebrew women took after childbirth (Leviticus 12). In addition, in her prayer of thanksgiving for being chosen to be the mother of Christ, Mary calls God my Savior (Luke 1:47). Had she been born without sin, she would not have needed either an offering for purification, or a savior.

The church of Rome teaches that Mary should be called the mother of God, an expression that is never used in the Bible. The reasoning is that she is the Mother of Jesus Christ, and He is God. While at first glance the reasoning sounds acceptable, if she were the mother of God, we would have to conclude that the creature was the mother of the creator: that is that Mary, who was born at a particular moment of history, was the mother of everything about God which has existed from all eternity (Genesis 1:1; John 1:1-3, 14). The Bible does not teach this. Instead, it teaches that God, who has always existed, took on a human nature by means of the virgin birth. Thus Mary was the mother of Christ's human nature, but not of His divine nature which has existed from all eternity (John 8:57-58). To avoid causing confusion on this point, we prefer not to use the term mother of God.

While the Bible teaches that Mary was a virgin at Christ's birth, it gives us no reason to believe that she remained a virgin all of her lifetime. In fact, Mary was obedient to God who, when speaking of married people, said that the man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife and that they two should become one flesh (Ephesians 5:31 and Matthew 19:6). Speaking specifically about Mary and Joseph, the Bible explains: He had no relations with her at any time before she bore a son, whom he named Jesus (Matthew 1:25). This passage obviously establishes the fact that Joseph had not had relations with Mary before the birth of Jesus, and other passages clearly declare that she was a virgin at His birth. Stating, He had no relations with her at any time before she bore a son, however, purposely excludes from the time in which they had no relations, the time after she had a son. Neither do any of the other passages which speak of Mary's virginity ever infer that she was to remain a virgin after Christ's birth. Rather, it is implied that after the birth of Christ, Mary and Joseph had normal husband-wife relations. To maintain that Mary remained a virgin all of her life infers that she did not obey God's will for married women, and this does not really honor her.

In addition to inferring that Mary did not remain a virgin forever, the Bible speaks of Christ's brothers a number of times as well. In the gospel of Matthew, we read, Isn't Mary known to be His mother and James, Simon, and Judas His brothers? Aren't His sisters our neighbors? (Matthew 13:55-56). After the birth of Christ, almost every time that the Bible speaks of Mary she is with Christ's brothers. As far as we can tell, they all lived together as a normal family (see Matthew 12:46, 13:55-56; Mark 3:31, 6:3; Luke 8:19; John 2:12). Some Catholics maintain that the brothers of Christ were in reality cousins. Many older translations of the Catholic Bible translated the word "brothers" as "cousins" with no textual basis, and only in the case of the brothers of Jesus Christ. Everyone else's brothers were translated as brothers. The dishonesty of this kind of translation was so apparent that almost all recent Catholic translations use the word "brother".

Some Catholics say, "Yes, they were brothers, but only in the spiritual sense and not the physical." This interpretation is also in error because until after the resurrection, Christ's brothers did not believe in Him. John 7:5 puts it very clearly, For neither did His brethren believe in Him (The Roman Catholic Douay version, in agreement with virtually all others). If His brothers did not believe in Him, they were not "brothers" in the spiritual sense. The translators of the New American Bible evidently recognized the problem that this poses to the Roman teaching that Mary remained a virgin even after the birth of Christ. They have slightly weakened the statement in this translation as follows: As a matter of fact, not even His brothers had much confidence in Him (John 7:5). Several passages of the Bible actually distinguish between Christ's spiritual brothers and His physical brothers. One example of this is John 2:12. After this He went down to Capernaum, along with His mother and brothers and His disciples… (See also Matthew 12:46-50; Mark 3:31-35, 6:1-3; Luke 8:19-22). Passages like this make it clear that the Bible distinguishes between Christ's brothers and His disciples.

On the mistaken foundation of the perpetual virginity of Mary, philosophers down through the centuries have built a tower of fables; ideas that have no roots in the Bible or in other literature of the period in which Mary lived. Jesus Christ did not encourage the excessive glorification of Mary that is so common now. We read, While He was saying this a woman from the crowd called out, "Blest is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!" "Rather," He replied, "Blest are they who hear the word of God and keep it," (Luke 11:27-28; See also Matthew 12:46-50; Mark 3:31-35).

Giving Mary the glory that should be given to God is not the right way to honor her. If I were to honor you by calling you "her majesty, the queen of England," or by saying that I think it is wonderful the way you bravely faced the perils of the ocean to discover America, would you feel honored? Probably you would think that I was either awfully ignorant, or else making fun of you. You would prefer it if I said something nice about what you really were or had done.

Another way that we can honor Mary is by doing that which would have pleased her. The Bible records only one commandment that Mary gave. It was given at the marriage in Cana, in Galilee: Do whatever He tells you (John 2:5). She was telling the waiters at the marriage dinner to obey whatever Christ told them. Since her commandment was given in a particular situation to specific people, we can avoid keeping it if we wish. Nevertheless, in our hearts, we know that Mary would be more pleased if we obey Christ than if we fail to, and then say that we are honoring her. So let's honor Mary in a way that does not go against any Scriptural teaching, a way that both she and God would approve of. Let's follow her command to do what Christ said.