The Marian Doctrines

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What an excellent crowd. We were very worried about how many people were going to show up tonight, and we're stunned at all the people that are here.

Catholics, Protestants, we see them all here. My name is Austin Bruce. A lot of people were saying to me, who organized this?

Well, nobody really organized this. A couple of guys organized this because we wanted to see a great debate. Two Catholics and a

Protestant decided that they wanted to see a great debate, and this is it. We're going to see a great debate on an important topic, the

Mary and Doug Catholic Church. Over the past few weeks, I spent a lot of time going around New York City putting up posters, as a lot of other people did, and one of the things that I discovered among some liberal priests is that they were a little worried about the word debate.

It kind of scared them. Poor dear. And it reminded me of a story.

When I was a little boy on the playground, there was another little boy, and I hated him, and he hated me, and it was inevitable that we'd fight, and we did fight.

And we rolled around on the ground, punching and kicking, and we eventually ran out of gas.

And then something magical happened, the kind of magical thing that happens all the time in the world of little boys.

We became best friends. And it occurs to me that, as I was thinking about tonight, what

I experienced that day a long time ago was ecumenism. It seems to me that ecumenism, in fact, is little boys rolling around on the ground and then becoming best friends.

I would bet that almost every man in this room has a similar story to tell. It's kind of the code of little boys, that first they fight before they become friends.

Our little friend will tell us that ecumenism, if you can, is something like conflict resolution. There are probably loads of homeschoolers here who ran away from the public schools precisely because of words like that.

We would believe that ecumenism is nothing so fragrant nor sissified as that, that ecumenism is the red -blooded yet unbloody disputation of strongly held beliefs among people who respect each other.

In fact, we might say that ecumenism travels the road from bruises to respect and sometimes even to love.

I had in mind a Catholic man standing next to a Protestant man in the South today, probably, rebuilding a church burned down by drunken teenagers.

I can see them hammering the nails in, whack, whack, whack, and the Catholic man says, this is what we believe about the real presence, whack, whack, whack, this is what we believe about the real presence.

Possibly the Protestant man gets sold a scripture and sideways. It seems to me that this is ecumenism.

Liberal churchmen believe that ecumenism means making Catholicism a little bit more like Protestantism and Protestantism a little bit more like Catholicism, which reminds me of a

Japanese man introducing himself on a plane to an American businessman and he says, my miserable religion is

Buddhism, what's yours? Well, basically, it's not ecumenism.

We would say, what is the good of faith? It is weakly held. It is only good for the secularizers and the evil ones.

Those miserable say that ecumenism is not making Catholicism more like Protestantism, it is more like making Catholicism into Protestantism and vice versa.

That after bruises, respect, and love, sometimes comes conversion.

During the funniest event of this event, I worked with an evangelical Protestant by the name of Chris Arnton and as we got to know each other on the telephone, we only met face -to -face tonight for the first time,

I said to him, you know, we're coming for conversions and he said, oh good, so are we.

This is ecumenism and it seems to me that this is precisely what we want to put on and I suspect this is precisely what you want to see.

Let me briefly thank the few people that made this night possible. I will be talking about people from the Catholic side because that's the club that I helped organize.

Greg Floyd from the National Coalition of Clergy and Lady was tremendous in this.

He gave wise counsel and he put me in touch with a number of Catholic activists on Long Island who sold tickets, beat the bushes, did private mailing, and all sorts of things.

Specifically, I'd like to thank Greg, Saddam Hussein, Dorie Frank, Imelda Jensen, Frank and Ginger Cherzen, and others that I don't know about.

I welcome all of you here, Protestants and Catholics alike. We're going to have an enormous amount of fun.

Let me introduce you to the man who did most of the work for this evening, my friend from WMCA Radio, Chris Humphrey.

Good evening. It is exciting to see so many people who care about what they believe.

And I just thank God that he is ushering you all into this room tonight. Before I say anything further,

I have some people to thank who are also very instrumental in making this evening possible by the grace of God.

Ray Toga of Paradise Limousine, we'd like to thank him. Spirit of the Dove Christian Bookstore in Baldwin, who was selling tickets for us.

New Color Christian Bookstore in Farmingdale, another ticket location. New Life Christian Variety Store in Jamaica, Queens.

And Maria Monte Religious Shop in Huntington. And there is a very, very special consideration that we should all be giving to the

Rock Christian Bookhouse in Wanto, Ohio, who not only was a ticket sales location, but who spent over $2 ,000 on radio advertising just for this event.

And they will be giving out a brochure for their store at the end of the evening. I also would like to give thanks to Andy Anderson of the

WMCA, who interviewed James White. Ken Gribble and Bruce Clark of WMRS Family Radio, who aired numerous messages and interviews to promote this evening.

Brad Crook of the Christian Lifetimes, who wrote an article on this event. And Vince Sawyer of Faith Baptist Church in Corona, Queens, who also promoted this event on his radio program,

WMCA Radio. Perhaps many of you recognize these words.

It was the best of times. It was the worst of times. It was the age of wisdom.

It was the age of foolishness. It was the season of light. It was the season of darkness.

And those words are the opening of A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. That passage that I read to you from A Tale of Two Cities, I think, perfectly reflects our modern age in regard to the relationship between Roman Catholics and Evangelical Protestants.

In many ways, it's the best of times. Never before in history have

Catholics and Protestants united in such force to oppose such evil as abortion, pornography, the gay rights movement, and many other things.

And that is to be commended. It's a righteous thing. It's a good thing. It's a necessary thing.

But I'm afraid it's also the worst of times. These are times when people not only cannot defend or articulate what they believe, whether they're a

Catholic or Protestant, but these are times when people don't care, which is much worse.

I was a bit shocked by some of the reaction I got from people, both

Catholic and Protestant, in opposition to this event. And I thank God that despite their opposition, we are all here, nearly 500 in this room, and I give praise, honor, and glory to God for that.

We have got to stop being what we are just because we were born that way. Many people may be born into an

Irish Catholic family, or a white Anglo -Saxon Protestant family, or an

African Methodist Episcopal family, and just by sheer virtue of their upbringing and nationality and ethnicity, they are embracing a faith just on those terms alone.

That's dangerous for anyone. No one should be both believing in the thing that cradles in its hand their eternal destiny just because of what country their ancestors were born in.

It's extremely dangerous. And just to give you an idea of some of the opposition that we received for this debate,

I just want to read you a quick note. This is a very quick note. It says,

Dear Mr. Arlington, I think you and your moronic ways of cooking up this Catholic Protestant debate scheme should be ashamed of yourself more than that in prison.

To put it bluntly, you sicken me. No, that's not enough. You revolt me. In this day and age of enlightenment, sleazebags like you whose only desire is to reopen old wounds and pour salt in them should be condemned for the evildoers that you are.

With torches in hand, we good, decent, and wholesome citizens should chase your prehistoric deformities back into your caves with the rest of the

Neanderthals and forever seal your tombs shut. The day that your wretched stench no longer pollutes the air and your hideous shadow no longer darkens the earth will be a day worthy of the most festive celebration the earth has ever known.

P .S. Don't forget to stop at Dairy Barn on the way home. We're out of milk and bread. Love, your wife,

Beulah. I would just like to close this whole session by saying that I commend each and every one of you who are fighting abortion because it's a wicked and hideous thing that this country is stained with.

I commend each and every one of you who are involved in the fighting of pornography and the gay rights movement and many other things that Catholics and Protestants unite on.

We must remember one very important thing. That is not the gospel.

It is not the gospel. If anyone ever tells you, whether they're

Protestant or Catholic, that there's no difference, run from that person as far as you can run.

Run from that person as far as you can run. Okay, I'd like to introduce to you all the speakers that we've been blessed to have here.

First to my right, James White, as the leading

Protestant representative engaging Roman Catholic apologists in debates across the United States.

He knows the issue as well. In addition to being a scholar in residence in the College of Christian Studies at Grand Canyon University, an adjunct professor teaching

New Testament Greek for Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary, he is director of Alpha and Omega Ministries, which is a theologically reformed

Christian apologetic organization in Phoenix, Arizona. He has written eight books, including

Answers to Catholic Claims and The Roman Catholic Controversy. He is also the critical consultant for the

New American Standard Bible. Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. James White. To my left is

Roman Catholic apologist Jerry Maddix. As founder and president of Biblical Foundations International, a

Roman Catholic apologetics organization in Front Royal, Virginia, and I believe it may have moved to Scranton, Pennsylvania.

It just recently moved to Scranton, Pennsylvania. Jerry Maddix's work has taken him all over the globe.

His conferences have drawn ratings of several thousand people. He has publicly debated well -known critics of Catholicism in academic settings, both

Catholic, such as Boston College, and Protestant, Denver Seminary and Baptist Bible Seminary in Minneapolis.

In addition to being a frequent guest on radio and television worldwide, including Mother Angelica Live, he co -hosts a nationwide radio program, where Catholics speak.

Mr. Maddix is the very first minister of the Protestant denomination Presbyterian Church in America, and I would like to invite you to converge to Roman Catholicism.

Mr. Jerry Maddix. Someone once told me that if you really want to settle a dispute, get a

Jewish attorney. The man behind me is a very dear friend of mine, and when

Greg Lloyd and I were trying to think of who should be a moderator, we said, you've got to pick somebody who's completely neutral.

On both issues, to be qualified, you can either be Protestant or Catholic, because someone is always going to claim that the moderator is biased, and it's going to ruin the whole thing.

So I'm not only Bob Unger, a Jewish, but he's also a close friend of both myself and Greg Lloyd, who helped coordinate with Austin Bruce, the

Roman Catholic side of things. Bob Unger is a talk show host who was formerly heard on WMCA radio.

He's a conservative political activist. And it's my hope that next year,

Bob Unger will no longer be qualified to be the moderator. I'm going to give him a grade of a four by Mr.

Jerry Maddix. And Bob Unger, ladies and gentlemen. Before I begin, we're going to be bowing for a moment of silent prayer.

I just wanted to quickly read a very short portion of James White's book with you, and even Jerry Maddix would agree with it.

The relationship between Roman Catholics and Protestants is an emotionally charged issue. Feelings run high on both sides.

Therefore, I ask that from the start, we make a commitment to hear out both sides, to think clearly, and to keep

God's truth at the forefront. I've done my best to avoid offense, but I know some will be offended nonetheless.

I ask that you remember one thing. Christian love cannot be separated from Christian truth.

True love rejoices with the truth. True love tells the truth. I am convinced that it is an act of love to speak the truth to someone, especially when it will cost you to do so.

Let's bow for a silent moment of prayer. All right, the debate will begin.

And before I walk away, I would not be a good and righteous man if I did not thank very sincerely two people that really were instrumental in making this a huge success.

Michael Rotolo of The Calvary Press and Claire Murphy, his assistant, who did an enormous amount of work on behalf of this event.

If you could please give them a round of applause. Okay, before we start our debate,

I just wanted to point out one thing. The old story is the bad news and the good news. The bad news is there is a disagreement.

I guess that was bad news. The good news is that everyone in this room and the debaters also agree on this point, that there is truth.

And there is an enemy out there that doesn't believe there is truth in the first place.

Now, of course, there is no truth to seek if truth doesn't exist. And just to show you what

I mean, I'm looking at a quote from a fellow named Benjamin Bloom, who is more influential in education, which of course is probably more important than anything else, because it's dealing with our kids, than any man in the history of America today is influential.

It's felt in every single public school in this country, and sadly to say, a good proportion of all religious schools in this country, so -called, quote -unquote, religious schools.

And here's what he had to say in 1956. Quote, We recognize the point of view that all truth and knowledge are only relative, and that there are no hard and fast truths which exist for all time and all places.

So I think we can certainly take solace, at least in this room, there are people that disagree with that statement, and that ultimately is where the battle lies, in my opinion.

And that's the end of my part of the day. Okay, we're going to start off with mathematics.

He's going to do an opening statement, which will be fifteen minutes, and ten of it will be on the

Immaculate Conception. Correct? We have fifteen minutes. Okay, fifteen minutes on that topic.

Do we have to leave still? Yes, you're off the podium, and then we'll time you. Oh, I see.

I think that you'll have to stay there while I record this. I want to begin by thanking, first of all,

Austin Roos and Greg Lloyd for all their hard work, and Chris Armisen and the people that helped him.

I want to thank James White once again for being willing to engage in a debate on these all -important issues.

We've debated many times before in the past. And I want to confess to you this evening that I approached this debate with quite a bit of apprehension.

I've just been, as was implied by the moderator, mentioned that we've moved to Scranton, Pennsylvania through a very grueling move.

I've just gotten done driving a U -Haul back and forth from Virginia, where we were living in front of Royal to Scranton, four times in the last week, loading and unloading it.

And I've got about two hours sleep a night over the last week. I haven't eaten at all today. I had a can of soda on the way as I was racing here, and I had to pack up my wife and kids and send them on to her parents in Massachusetts, because after this,

I drive back to White Plains, to class in Portland, Oregon, to speak at a conference there for about three days. So, I spent all of last night, all through the night, unpacking,

I have 10 ,000 books in my personal library, dozens and dozens of boxes, trying to find the books

I needed for this debate. And I had to leave at the very last minute, as you saw, I got here just in time, without having found those books.

So I come rather unprepared for this debate without the books that I think are most helpful for a debate on Mary, without any of the notes that I normally use.

To top it all off, of course, Mr. White is a superb debater. In all honesty, I think he's far better than I am.

So I do feel very much a little bit like David, with his five foolish little small stones here, going up against Goliath, or like Gideon, through all these setbacks and handicaps

I've had, that got his woodless army down and down, until he's wondering if he can even accomplish anything at all.

And yet, despite the many setbacks that we've had this past week, and the handicaps that I labor under this evening, I remain convinced by the grace of God, nevertheless, that Mr.

White cannot, with all due respect, with his prodigious gifts and his abilities, and his sincerity, cannot really win a debate on these four topics, for one simple reason.

What the Catholic Church, that Jesus Christ founded, teaches about Mary is quite simply the truth about Mary.

And the truth, ultimately, by the power of God, always triumphs.

The Catholic Church is simply proclaiming, by the authority of Jesus Christ himself, and his holy apostles, what

God has done for, and to, the mother of our Savior, Mary. As she herself said in her inspired song,

Praise Magnificat, the Lord has done great things for me, and holy is his name.

You're going to see me squinting once in a while, I was actually writing this on the road, and I was driving myself to Scranton, so I hope

I can read my writing, as I was getting here. And what God has done for Mary, the one and only mother of our

Savior, what God has done for Mary, no man, woman, angel, devil, preacher,

Protestant, Reformer, or anyone can undo. Now I'm going to admit to you up front, whether you're

Protestant or Catholic, I'm going to admit to you, up front, that what the Church teaches about Mary is outrageous.

Absolutely outrageous. And as an Evangelical Protestant for 14 years, I had no prior background in Protestants or Orthodox until the age of 14, when

I responded to an evangelistic call at a Billy Graham crusade that I watched on television.

For the 14 years that I was an Evangelical Protestant, I was convinced that there was no scriptural support for what the

Catholic Church had taught about Mary, let alone the other doctrines. And Mary, in the course of my deeper understanding of Scripture and my ultimate conversion to Catholic faith,

Mary was the last and the greatest hurdle for me to overcome. And I understand, with great sympathy, how difficult it is for a

Protestant to sit out there, to sit there, to sit anywhere, and to really try to assimilate what the

Catholic Church says about Mary and say, how can there be any biblical basis for that? I have sat where you are now sitting, if you are in that situation.

And I understand that, I appreciate that, and I empathize with that. And I'm going to admit that it's outrageous.

It is contrary to human wisdom, it is contrary to human expectation, it is contrary to human inclination to say that God would, from the very beginning of this woman's existence, so infuse her with the grace that God gives us through Jesus Christ, that He already did for her, at the outset of her life, what

He will eventually do for all the members of Christ's body, that is, make them sinless, and fill them with His grace and glory forever and ever in heaven.

It's contrary to human wisdom to think that she would be called to a married life and yet remain perpetually virginal, that she would be assumed into heaven at the end of her life in a way that is different than the way that you and I know the end of our lives, that she would then be given a special status in heaven.

But these things are no more outrageous than the gospel itself, the gospel of which all these things are part.

The incarnation, if you stop and think about it, Protestants and Catholics, is outrageous. The claim that Christians make to an anti -Christian world that God became man, that the infant became an infant, that the invisible became visible, and that little babe,

Bethel, that was none other than the creator of the cosmos, that is an outrageous claim. And the redemption is outrageous, to say that a mutilated criminal hanging bloody upon a cross is actually effecting the redemption of the world.

That too is outrageous. And it's no more outrageous to see in Scripture that Mary had a part to play in these great mysteries, these things that outrage and offend human expectations.

Now as we proceed this evening, first here at this opening to look at the Evangelical Conception, and then in the three subsequent segments to look at the other dogmas that we'll be looking at.

As we proceed this evening to look at the biblical evidence for these great privileges that God has bestowed upon his mother,

I want you to keep in mind three things. First of all, that Scripture itself does not operate with the expectation that everything that Jesus Christ himself, our

Lord, and his apostles taught would be explicitly committed to writing as the only possible way of preserving and propagating the good news.

Scripture itself testifies to the fact that there are many things that our Lord said and did that were not written down, either in St.

John's Gospels, as he says in John 20, 31, and 31, 25, or in independent Gospels, that there were many things not written down in the epistles.

And yet these, everything the Catholic Church teaches, I want to say this loud and clear, can be supported from Sacred Scripture, and I will do that tonight.

I am going to meet Mr. White on his own grounds. I am not going to quote papal encyclicals or church fathers as in any way proving any of the things that Catholics believe.

We're going to look to Sacred Scripture. But Sacred Scripture can suggest and can indicate certain things, as even

Protestants admit it. So I want you to keep in mind that this is a principle that Protestants themselves operate on the basis of.

If I ask Mr. White whether the Scriptures explicitly teach in just those words that God's trinity, he would have to admit, no.

It is an inference that he draws, and rightly so from Sacred Scripture. And I applaud him for drawing that inference.

We draw it ourselves. The Bible never says God is three persons in one being in just that compact and easygoing statement.

And yet that is the biblical truth. The same can be said for the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady, for perpetual fertility, for bodily assumption, and for twinning, for race.

We can apply the same standards. So there should be a double standard tonight. A second thing I want you to keep in mind is the Bible does not operate with the either -or dichotomy that all too often characterizes some

Protestant thinking. That it's either faith or works, but it couldn't be both. Or that it's either we're baptized with water or we're baptized with the

Holy Spirit, therefore water baptism is not essential. Or that we're saved by Jesus and therefore not by the things that he uses to bring us salvation.

Sacred Scripture, his body, the church, and so on and so forth. Keep in mind that we can avoid either -or mentalities we go through tonight.

Now, the first thing that we need to talk about is the Immaculate Conception. We know that every human being is commanded by God in the

Ten Commandments to honor his mother. We know that Jesus was a perfect, sinless human being so that he perfectly honored his mother.

He gave her all the honor that each son could ever give his mother. His perfect humanity required him to do so.

But Jesus was more than a perfect man. He was also God the Creator. And God, who can do anything, can create a sinless woman.

We know he did in the case of Eve, the first woman. He can keep a body from corrupting, as he did in the case of Jesus' body while he was in the tomb.

Now, if you were God and you could preserve your mother from sin, wouldn't you do so?

Jesus was God, and so he could do these things. He was also a perfect man, and so he would want to.

And whoever would deny that Jesus could have done this for his mother, Mary, is either denying that Jesus could do these things for Mary, or that he really wants to.

In other words, he's either denying Jesus' divinity, or his humanity. In other words, he's ultimately, implicitly denying the Incarnation.

The Scriptures are clear that God predestined our salvation before the foundation of the world.

Jesus Christ is the Lamb slain for the foundation of the world. It was all foreordained in the mind of God.

Mary didn't just happen to be the mother of the Messiah. And God, who had all eternity to contemplate and to consider how exactly he would shape our plan of salvation, desired to, since God himself,

God the Son, would be born of a woman, to honor her, to bestow special privileges and favors upon her.

And the first of these is what we call the Immaculate Conception. Let me define what it is.

The solemn definition, the scientific definition of it, is probably most prominently known in the

Decree, and it's by Felix Deius of Pope Pius IX in 1854, where he says, quote, that Mary, from the first instance of her conception, by a singular privilege and grace granted by God in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the

Savior of the human race, was preserved exempt from all stain of original sin.

Notice that. This was a privilege. It was a grace given her by God. In and of herself, she had no entitlement to this, any more than you and I have any entitlement to salvation.

But God willed that Mary would be the prototype of the Church. Nothing is predicated of Mary by the

Catholic Church that will not one day be true of the Church as a whole. The Church is this huge feminine entity, the bride of Christ, the spouse of the

Lord, that will one day be as St. Paul says, without any spot or wrinkle or blemish. And God willed that Mary would be a foretaste, a sneak preview, a prototype of the

Church's destiny. It should be a microcosm, a miniature model, a small scale model of the

Church's call to that complete holiness from the very beginning of her existence. And it was done by Jesus Christ, He saved her,

He saved her from the contractive disease of original sin. So I want to preempt at this point automatically what

Protestants might say, wait a minute, Mary said in the Magnificat, my soul does magnify the

Lord, my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior. If she were sinless from the moment of her existence, how would she call

God her Savior? Simply because God did save her in that way. St.

Augustine uses the analogy of a man who falls into a tar pit and then is pulled out and says to a person who pulls him out, thank you for saving me.

And then a woman who might be caught by the Savior before she even fell in. Would she say he hadn't saved her unless he let her fall in a wall in the field for a while first?

Of course not. You would far prefer, I know, as would I, to be given some vaccination by a doctor that would prevent you from contracting some dread disease that was decimating our population rather than go to some other doctor who could only give you a remedy after you had suffered horribly at this debilitating disease for a number of years.

You would not say that the first doctor with this greater vaccine was less of a Savior than the second.

So, God did save Mary in view of the foreseen merits of Jesus Christ, who has not not yet even incarnated yet, but God, of course, who is above time can see.

The Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world. There is nothing in Scripture, either in this statement of Our Lady, or in the statement of St.

Paul in Romans 3, that all have sinned that contradicts this special privilege that God gave.

Because, as I'll show, the statement is not intended to be an absolute universal that applies to every single human that could ever walk the face of the earth.

It certainly doesn't apply to Jesus Christ, who is a true human being, descended from Adam. He is an exception that is not mentioned by St.

Paul. So Mr. White will have to make at least an implicit exception here, even though it is not spelled out by name.

So there could, at least in principle, be a second one. In fact, there are several others, because St. Paul, when he says all have sinned, certainly would not include infants dying infancy, but all do through original sin.

But that's not what St. Paul was saying. He was saying all have sinned. So everyone must admit that that statement does not literally mean every single human individual ever conceived personally committed sins.

It cannot be used as proof text against. Because the only proof text used by Protestants against the

Immaculate Conception of Mary. On the contrary, there are things in favor of her Immaculate Conception.

The statement in Genesis 3 .15 that God foresees a woman who would be in total opposition to the devil.

Every time you and I sin, you do not oppose him. We correspond and cooperate with him. But more beautifully, the type of the

Ark of the Covenant, which I won't have time to delve into any further now since my time is almost up, but I will in my closing statement, or perhaps in the questions and answers that come up then, or in the cross -examination.

But we know that when the Archangel appeared to Mary, he said,

Hail, full of grace, Gehari Domene. And that perfect passive participle means that Mary has been already in a state based upon a past action which has been filled with the grace which is the antithesis of sin.

And he goes on to say that the power of the Holy Spirit would overshadow her, the Holy Spirit would come upon her. Echoing the words found in Exodus 40, verses 34 and 35, to describe the coming of the

Shekinah, the glory cloud, down upon the Ark of the Covenant. To show that Mary, by analogy, is as holiest, that most sacred object upon earth as the

Ark of the Covenant was in the Old Testament. Okay, time is up. Thank you. And by the way, just in case, you haven't been good so far, there's going to be no applauding, no interrupting, no yelling at everyone who says be cool.

Okay. Mr. White. Thank you.

I do appreciate the opportunity of being here, though I have to admit maybe Jerry would notice the same thing. Being this close to wood and fire is, you know, dialogue is a little bit uncomfortable.

It's the only way you're going to be able to see the fire. While serving as a chaplain in a major hospital in the

Phoenix area, I came across a pamphlet that I have right here, published by the Redemptorists, sitting on a seat in the chapel.

On the back was the slogan that no true child of Mary is ever lost. At first my mind provided a

Biblical translation to a true statement, that is, no true child of God is ever lost. But then

I realized what the passage actually said. And as I looked at the pamphlet, I encountered the following prayer, which I'm going to read for you.

O Mother of Perpetual Health, Thou art the dispenser of all the good which God grants to us miserable sinners.

And for this reason He has made me so powerful, so rich, and so valuable that Thou mayst help us in our misery.

Thou art the advocate of the most wretched and abandoned sinners who have recourse to Thee. Come then to my help, dearest Mother, for I recommend myself to Thee.

In Thy hands I place my eternal salvation, and to Thee do I entrust my soul. Count me among Thy most devoted servants, taking up Thy protection, and it is not for me.

For if Thou protect me, dear Mother, I fear nothing, not from my sins, because Thou will obtain for me the pardon of them, nor from the devils, because Thou art more powerful than all hell together, nor even from Jesus, my

Judge Himself, because by one prayer from Thee, He will be appeased. But one thing

I fear, that in the hour of temptation I may neglect to call on Thee, and thus perish miserably.

Obtain to me then the pardon of my sins, love for Jesus, final perseverance, and the grace always to have recourse to Thee, O Mother of perpetual health.

Now this prayer embodies all of the elements that Protestants reject concerning the Roman Catholic veneration of Mary.

Note the petitioner prays for deliverance from three things, his sins, the devils, and Jesus.

And the prayer is addressed to Mary, into whose hands the petitioner places his hope of salvation. When I read this prayer to my opponent a few years ago on WEC radio in Boston, his response to me was

Mr. White, I truly hope that someday you'll be able to pray that prayer with me. The Marian doctrines form the foundation of this kind of religious expression.

We gather this evening to honestly discuss the tremendous gulf that separates Protestants and Catholics on the issue of Marian devotion and teaching.

I ask from the outset that we place our feelings and emotions aside, and face the truth without hesitation.

The doctrines concerning Mary introduce us to the most basic and fundamental issues that separate us. These doctrines are pronounced and defined by the authority of the teaching magisterium of the

Roman Catholic Church, drawing, it is alleged, from Scripture and tradition. I submit to you that the

Marian doctrines more than anything else illustrate to perfection what happens when sola scriptura is rejected and the ultimate authority of Scripture is denied.

What is more, the idea of Mary as a co -mediatrix with Christ, Queen of Heaven, dispenser of graces strikes the very uniqueness of the work of Jesus Christ and mitigates the saving power of His gospel.

My friends, it is not an act of love or charity to hide the truth. I will pull no punches with you this evening.

If Mr. Matics is right, then Protestants are guilty of rejecting God -ordained authority and of refusing to give due honor to the very

Mother of God. But if I am correct, then we can only conclude that Rome is guilty of adding to the gospel, detracting from the authority of Scripture, and in the

Marian doctrines themselves engaging in nothing less than rank idolatry of the most heinous sin.

The stakes are high this evening. At least we should all be thankful that rather than engaging in worldly pursuits tonight, we have gathered to discuss something with eternal gratification.

This evening, you, the audience, will be asked to act as the judges. I, for my part, am here in line with the words of the

Apostle Paul of Timothy, who indicated that he pursued the ministry for the sake of the elect that they might obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus.

I know that many of you will not agree with me tonight. Others will agree with almost everything I say. But to those who find themselves simply wanting to know the truth and weigh the claims of Rome in the balance, it is to you that I speak now.

As you listen to the arguments put forward this evening, ask yourselves some key questions. Number one. Whose arguments are eternally consistent?

Does one person argue in circles assuming what has yet to be proven? If so, that person is not serving the animals of truth this evening.

Number two. Who is dealing honestly with the text of Scripture tonight? When definitions of words are used, is the person always or even often using obscure and secondary meanings to the words of the text, or is he using the primary meanings and going to other meanings only in order to do so by the context itself?

Is the person using meaningful methods of interpretation to take into account the language, the context, and the historical setting?

If a person claims that X is a type of Y, or this person is the anti -type of that person, does the text make this connection?

Do the New Testament writers give us this idea? Did anyone in the early church see the same type and anti -type? Or are you being given a modern idea that is ugly disconnected from the text itself?

And finally, what if it said that tradition says this, or tradition says that? Are you given evidence that this is the case?

Are you told when the earliest appearance of such and such a belief is in historical records? Keep these things in mind.

It is very important for my opponent said to the late Dr. Greg Bonson in 1992, quote, I find that my most effective talks about Mary are talks that simply stick to explicit statements of Scripture.

I think that you can produce the full -orbed Catholic doctrine on Mary just by quoting Scripture alone, not even having to go into church fathers whatsoever, end quote.

And Jerry just said pretty much the same thing, but don't mistake it. This evening I am asked to go first in two of the four presentations, and this is a little strange, since that forces me both to define, as well as to rebuff

Roman Catholic position in those instances. In defining the position, I hope all here this evening realize that I have been faced with a dilemma.

Which of the various Roman Catholic presentations do I respond to? My opponent this evening uses arguments that are, to say the least, a little bit unique at times.

He goes well beyond someone such as Ludwig Ott or John Harden, or I dare say the majority of American Catholic scholars today, in insisting that the

Bible actually presents the various doctrines, at least to the means of tithes and shadows, and some of those tithes and shadows are most interesting.

I have chosen to respond primarily to Mr. Manateeck's position, even when I am given the opportunity of going first.

If you don't happen to agree with Mr. Manateeck's, you may need to present your favorite arguments to me in another venue. But for this evening, there are only two of us up here with the job of debating, and just as I would not wish

Mr. Manateeck's to respond to a position I do not hold, so I will debate his position, not the position of someone else.

I will, however, make reference to individuals such as Ludwig Ott, especially when they comment on the arguments used by my own conceding.

Now, my fundamental objection to all of the Marian doctrines is simply this. These traditions of men formed the text of Scripture, as well as to its spirit, created a degrading parallel between the sinless

Son of God and the blessed but redeemed creature, Mary. Think about it.

Rome parallels Christ with Mary in the following ways. He is Redeemer, she is Redemptrix. He is Mediator, she is

Mediatrix. He is King, she is Queen. He is sinless, she is immaculately conceived. He is bodily resurrected, she is bodily consumed.

So deeply has this functional denial of the uniqueness of Jesus Christ entered the fabric of modern Roman Catholicism that on October 17th, 1904,

Pope Pius X, calling Mary the spouse of the Holy Ghost, announced that, quote, "...already

Adam saw her in the distance, the destroyer of the serpent's head, and the sight of her dried up his tears over the curse which had struck him."

He also said that Noah recalled her as he was preparing the ark. Abraham was a stop from sacrificing his son.

He thought of her. Jacob saw her in the ladder on which the angels ascended and descended, and Moses looked up to her at the burning bush.

My friends, there is one indeed who is seen in the Old Testament in this way, but it is not Mary, it is Jesus Christ, the one about whom the prophets spoke from the beginning.

The human traditions that have developed over time regarding Mary have functionally, in the lives of many, many followers of Rome today, eclipsed

Jesus Christ and made him a secondary figure overshadowed by the glorious Queen of Heaven.

All errors start small, as we shall see tonight. Again, with a small error built upon it, eventually you will have a massive structure built upon a small pebble.

And so we see with the starting point, that being the Immaculate Conception. Mr. Mattox has presented just a couple of passages.

He had very little time. He did, however, I believe, attempt to make a parallel with the Doctrine of the

Trinity, the idea that this is not explicitly stated in Scripture. My friends, we must differentiate between the argumentation before the

Marian Doctrine and the Doctrine of the Trinity. The Doctrine of the Trinity has been found throughout conspired Scripture.

The depth of the argumentation starts in Genesis and ends in Revelation, as found on almost every single page.

It allows us to do in -depth exegesis that is consistent with the language of the text. And we are able to find references to it from the earliest fathers straight on through.

You will not find any of that to be true with the Marian Doctrines. And therefore, to parallel the two simply has no merit whatsoever.

It is interesting that I find myself, in regards to the Immaculate Conception, taking the same position of as many as seven posts of the

Roman Catholic Church. It is rarely discussed, but Leo I says that Christ alone was free from original sin, and Mary obtained the purification through her conception of Christ.

Gregory I, Innocent III, Galatians I, who interestingly is also the one who condemned the very same literature in which we find the first mention of the bodily assumption as heretical.

Innocent V, John XXII, and Clement VI all taught contrary to the concept of the

Immaculate Conception, as did most of the Church fathers even in the medieval period who addressed this particular issue and discussed it themselves.

They had a lot of problems with this, but I want to focus primarily upon the arguments that are presented in Scripture, even though we will deal with Church history when it is relevant to do so.

Mr. Hatsheps asked, if you were God, and you had the ability to do so, would you preserve your mother from sin?

Well, I would also ask, why not preserve your father, your disciples? Certainly teaching disciples would have been a lot easier if they had been free of original sin, and so on and so forth.

Maybe Mary's grandmother? Bernard Clairvaux made the same argument. We might as well take it all the way back to a sinless

Eve, whomever fell. This type of argument could be used to prove almost anything at all. We are also told that the term picaratomene in Luke 1 .28,

right toward the end Mr. Hatsheps is hurrying, maybe you didn't have time to turn there in your Bible. But Luke 1 .28

is going to be the key Marian doctrine. Stick your finger in there if you've got your Bible with you. Make sure to look at it, because it is used to defend all four doctrines, really.

And the idea is based upon the form of the term that is used here where Mary is described as blessed.

Now, the problem that we have as we look at this and I have very little time to deal with it, but I think it's important that we do so to some level.

The argument that is being presented is that this perfect passive participle means that Mary has always been graced.

That it brings about a fullness of grace. The problem is, the same term is used of believers, for example, in Ephesians 1 .6,

where it says to praise the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed, literally graced on us in Christ.

The term caratato from which it is taken does not mean sinlessness. In any lexical form you might find it, and I would invite

Mr. Hatsheps to show us a lexicon anywhere that says that this word means sinless. So, the argument is not being made so much from the word itself, but from the form it's in, a perfect passive participle.

And this is supposed to indicate the perfection of this grace that is heard. The problem is that that really doesn't work too well either.

If you look at Matthew chapter 25 verse 34, it talks about believers.

Come you who are blessed by my Father with a perfect passive participle. So that means that everyone who has come unto

Jesus Christ has been blessed from the beginning of their life, back from conception, with a perfection of blessedness.

If that's what we're going to make this participle mean, that's what we're going to have to deal with. See, again, when you start listening to the arguments,

Mr. Hatsheps just made it again. Maybe he was hurried. But he just made a bold assertion. It means this.

Mr. Hatsheps has a bachelor's degree in Greek. I teach Greek. Mr. Hatsheps well knows that it requires far more than just simply the perfect passive form of the participle to indicate what is being asserted by the

Roman Catholic Church in the meaning of this passage. In point of fact, this is simply a greeting.

The angel is simply greeting Mary and is indicating that she has indeed been blessed by God, as are all believers blessed by God.

To turn it into a title and to read into it the imaginative conception and eventually the perpetual virginity and bodily assumption and queenly coronation of Mary is to demonstrate that one is having to look really hard for passages of the

Bible that even address any of these issues. Think about it yourself. I hope you'll take the time to take your

Bible, sit down with it, read the text, read the context, try to read it in the historical situation in which it was written, and ask yourself the question, did

Luke mean to indicate when he wrote Luke 1, 28 that Mary was immaculately conceived?

Or when he records the Magnificat and Mary talks about God my Savior, did

Luke mean to indicate, did Mary mean to indicate that she actually knew that she had been preemptorily redeemed, a concept that did not develop for a thousand years after the writing of the

New Testament that was rejected by the majority of the fathers when it was brought up?

Are we to actually understand that that's what she understood? We have to put ourselves in the context of the writers themselves and ask ourselves the question, is this what they meant?

Or is someone taking a doctrine that comes from another source? Remember, Mr. Matrix does not believe in sola scriptura.

I mean, I've debated it more than once and I think I can say that without fear of misrepresenting it. He does not believe in sola scriptura.

He believes in tradition. He believes in the magisterium of an infallible church. So Mr. Matrix has another source of theology, and the question you have to keep before your mind all evening is, is that other source of theology determining the exegesis of scripture or the other way around?

That is what happens when you look through Matrix's procession. Thank you. Okay, now we're going to have some cross examination.

We're going to first have Mr. Matrix question Mr. White for five minutes, and then vice versa, and I'm going to back up out of the way because I forgot my bulletproof vest.

Mr. White, you warned the audience to be aware of circular reasoning this evening, and yet you provided a beautiful example of just that, and you said, are we really to believe that Mary understood these special privileges in the way of the cabiners?

Well, since you or I have no immediate insight into exactly what Mary was aware of, our whole burden tonight is not to simply say, come on, folks, it could have been to show just that.

Now, you want to... No, my question is this, since rather than simply reading into or presupposing, and circular reasoning, a huge word, does, the idea that Mary could not have understood it in this way, would you agree that it is a fundamental axiom of justice that someone should be innocent until proven guilty?

Okay. Now, you want to indict Mary with being a sinner. Can you provide for us, please, any evidence in Scripture, any statement that she did commit any particular sin?

Well, I said yes or no. No, there is no passage in Scripture that says Mary sinned. Okay, thank you.

Now, that being the case, aren't you perhaps a bit...

Well, I'll let you answer that in your own terms later on, but you admit that there is no statement that Mary is guilty of sin.

There is no explicit word in Scripture that says Mary specifically sinned. You took the audience to Ephesians chapter 1, verse 6 and said, look, nothing is said about Mary in Luke 1 .28,

it isn't said about us. No, I said that the term karatalo is used of us just as it is used of Mary in Luke 1 .28.

But isn't it in fact the case that there is a different term actually being used in Luke 1 .28?

Does the term, does the perfect passive -partisan, okay, keharitomeni, translated, hailed full of grace, or however you wish to translate it,

I realize you would want to balk at that translation. Yes, it's a passive, not an active. Having been filled with grace.

It's a condition based upon a past action. Is that statement, excuse me, here's my question, is that verb, keharitomeni, is that ever applied to any other person, any other

Christian anywhere in the New Testament? No. Exactly. So to say that, to quote

Ephesians 1, which says that God gave us grace is really not the point, is it?

Since no Catholic denies, no Catholic denies that God has given us grace, but the question is he hasn't filled us with grace.

Well, first of all, there's nothing in the term that talks about filling. Secondly, you're making the positive assertion that the term has a particular meaning.

It is not circular to say, you need to back up the positive assertion that this term carries everything that you are asserting, it carries within it.

And therefore, as you know, Jerry, when you examine the term of the Greek, you examine not only the lexical form of the root, but you also examine its grammatical form.

And I have simply pointed out very basically that the root word karataho does not mean sinlessness, it has nothing to do with the assertion that this has anything to do with sinlessness.

And the second point that I made is that the perfect passive participle also does not carry that meaning. That is simply how you do exegesis.

Of course, I understand that, but my point is that something is said about Mary in Luke 1 28 that is not said in that same way about any other believer on earth.

You will agree that that phrase used to encourage women, nowhere else occurs in the United States, nowhere else in the planet.

Now, do you agree or disagree that there is a parallel drawn, as many

Protestant scholars are willing to admit, although they won't follow the top conclusions, that the language used by the

Archangel Gabriel, that the Holy Spirit would come upon her, and the power of the Holy Spirit would overshadow her, is language found only one other place in the entire

Bible, namely the references to the descent of the Virgin Mary upon the

Ark of the Covenant, upon the Tabernacle of the Inevitable Step. Do you strongly disagree? Do you strongly disagree? Do you strongly disagree?

Could you name for us therefore one other passage in the Bible where those two verbs are used together in that same way?

Well, you didn't identify the verbs. That's the problem that I think we're having here, Jerry, is that you're operating upon the assumption that the words that Luke uses are consciously drawn from Exodus chapter 40 in the

Septuagint. Is that not the statement that you've made in other talks to me? I'm simply saying that the language used by the angel, those two

Greek verbs used there are, in fact, yes, do only show up in one place in the Old Testament, and that is Exodus chapter 40.

The problem is you're in error there. They are not found in Exodus chapter 40. In fact, the stronger case could be made that Luke is specifically avoiding parallelism there because, first of all, there is nothing about the

Holy Spirit coming down to anything in Exodus chapter 40. That is, the glory cloud comes down on the Holy Spirit. Secondly, there is no term overshadowing in the text.

The term that Luke uses in Luke 1 .35 is ephelusetai, which comes from Erechamon. The terms used in the

Septuagint in Exodus 40 .34 are echalusen, from Caluto, and epleiste, which comes from Pythlene.

Therefore, if Luke was specifically attempting to parallel the two things, it's very strange he wouldn't even use the terms that are used in the

Septuagint with which he was so intimately familiar. Well, I'm simply going to have to refer people to get a copy of the

Septuagint and see for themselves. Yes, please do. I have a copy of it up here if you'd like to check that. Good. Thank you.

The verb episkiaze, overshadowing, is found there, and the point is that there is a parallel, therefore, between the descent of the glory cloud, which

I agree is not explicitly identified as the Holy Spirit, but nonetheless is a representation of the infinity in the

Old Testament coming upon Mary. Now, is that parallel not an article we're going to have to cut to?

Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. Mr. Mattox, in regards to the teaching of the

Immaculate Conception, is it not true that a number of the early Church Fathers were willing to assert that Mary had, in fact, sinned?

You'd have to give me some specific examples. Well, is it not true that Origen, John Chrysostom, and Cyrus of Alexandria, and Basil all thought that she had engaged in such sins and doubt, vanity, and ambition?

They never committed sin, no. Well, I hope everyone will look into those citations.

I'd be glad to provide them to anyone. Why would you require them? Well, there's a number of them we provide, and unfortunately most of them are in Latin, but these particular early

Church Fathers, such as Origen's commentary on John, provide those types of things. I was surprised at that. Are you familiar with what happened when the feast of the

Immaculate Conception began and Bernard de Clairvaux encountered this in the city of Guillaume?

Yes, I am, Mr. White. Are you aware that some of the controversies about the

Immaculate Conception revolved around the growth in psychology as to when exactly a human being's body is informed by the soul and so forth?

Can you name a single Church Father who argues that Mary was born in a sinful condition?

Born in a sinful condition? Yes. Is there a single Church Father who taught that Mary was born?

They might disagree as to when exactly whether she was Immaculate Conceived, whether her soul, whether she was cleansed by the

Quickening, but would you agree that there is no Church Father who argues that she was sinful after birth?

Obviously, all those who thought that she committed sin would have been correct. And you still have not given us an example of one. Anyone who ever said they say

Mary sinned. Well, I'll be glad to provide those specific references to you and write them up for you if you'd like to look at them.

Just read one now, since you haven't. Well, okay. That is true.

I will do so when I have the opportunity of doing it. Now let me ask you something, Mr. Mantoux.

When you say that is there any one place in the

Bible that says Mary sinned, is there any one place that says that Thaddeus sinned?

No, not to my knowledge. Is there any one place that says that I have sinned?

No, of course not. So to simply say that, well, there's not a single place, is it not true that the great father

Augustine had a real hard time with this whole issue in regards to Mary, because he saw it as violating the universality of original sin in his arguments with Latin?

No, that's not true. In fact, on this very point, St. Augustine said I do not wish anyone to dispute over this matter, since there is no scriptural evidence that Mary ever did sin.

And my point, you're misconstruing my argument. My argument is not simply because there's an omission of the statement of sin, that therefore we conclude that she was sinless any more than we conclude that Thaddeus was.

My statement, and my contention, the captain's contention, is that there is a tradition going back to the time of the apostles that Mary was indeed without sin.

There are indications in Scripture, and there's nothing in Scripture to contradict that. You are accusing a woman of sinning with no evidence about it.

And that, to me, at least, at the very least, is unshoulderous and I think I'm Christian. Well, again, Mr. Matzik, the problem is you're making a positive assertion that, well,

Mary is an exception to the rule of universality of sin. No, but you agree there's a tradition that she was special.

And there's no tradition about Jesus. Yes, that's my point. No, the problem is, Mr. Matzik, when you claim a tradition, can you trace this tradition beyond old...

can you trace it before and I see it? I don't have to, but I certainly could. Of course

I could. Since you're asking for references from me, how can I help? Well, there's various Assyrian fathers, like Ephraim the

Assyrianite, and so forth, who speak about Mary as being the ultimate loving one without any blemish or stain in her, and they see the references in the

Song of Songs as being fulfilled typologically. Did they? Off the top of my head,

I couldn't get it to you. But my question is... Can you show me anyone in the Apostolic Fathers?

That's a hell of a question. Irenaeus. Could you show me an Apostolic Father who taught that Mary's... I'm asking you the questions.

Irenaeus, Ignatius, you're making a positive assertion. So, Papias, Irenaeus, Ignatius, did any of them even address the issue, even talk about Mary?

Well, Irenaeus certainly does when he compares Mary to Eve, and he says, through the disobedience of the first woman, sin and death was loosened to the world.

By contrast, he sees Mary as a second Eve, and through her constant obedience, he says, sin...

But he had the opportunity to do so, and he didn't. He had the opportunity to indicate that she was a sinner, and he didn't.

He spoke of her obedience. Okay. Now we're going to have three -minute closing from Mr.

Benedict. Because we wanted to deal with all four dogmas, you can see that we're having to gallop through these in,

I think, a very unfortunate way. I think it would be much better served if we had one evening for each of these.

But in any case, let me sum up by simply saying this. I think it's highly absurd to suppose that the

Catholic Church would have taught and, in fact, solemnly defined a little over a hundred years ago and bound the consciences of Christians with the teaching that Mary was, by the grace of God, saved by Jesus Christ from the moment of her conception.

If this teaching was so contrary to Scripture that anybody could pick up a Bible, flip it open, and say, well, obviously there's no good basis for it.

You need to see how absurd that is. On the other hand, there is a teaching constantly coming down through the centuries that God gave this special privilege to Mary.

Church fathers attest to it. We have a feast of the Immaculate Conception. We have hymns that would celebrate the good things that God has done for Mary.

And there is no Scriptural evidence to the contrary. That is my point.

My point is that Mr. White, if he is going to stand on Scripture tonight and say, I'm a

Bible -believing Christian has no biblical basis to stand before you and say, Mary is a sinner.

Because there is no verse that says that. On the contrary, as I said, we have indications that God called her to a very special vocation of holiness.

And she was found by the Archangel Gabriel already having been filled with grace. Mr. White agreed that we will all be full of grace in Heaven.

And there will be no place for sin in being filled with grace. And therefore, if Mary is already found by the angel on earth in that state of being full of grace, there is no place for sin there.

The Ark of the Covenant parallel is not something that can be easily dismissed as Mr. White would like to think. Because even if someone says, well,

I disputed, Mr. White did, whether this language really indicates that she is the Ark of the

Covenant. If you move on in Luke chapter 1, you find too many parallels to simply abandon.

First of all, Mary, after immediately receiving these special statements, goes to visit her cousin

Elizabeth. And Elizabeth says when she greets her,

Hail! And she says, Blessed are you among women.

And she says that the baby in my womb leapt for joy at the sound of your voice.

We read that Mary traversed the hill country of Judea to get to her.

And we read that she breaks forth in a sacred song. All of these things are said in 2

Samuel 6 about the Ark of the Covenant. That David leapt before the Ark, as John the Baptist leapt before the entrance of Mary.

That David broke in a sacred song as Mary does. That the Ark stayed in the house of Obed and Nebuchadnezzar for three months, as Mary stayed in the house of Elizabeth.

And the parallels, as you continue, there's about eight of them, are so strong that even the Proxen coming to submit that Mary is indeed portrayed in the

Ark of the New Covenant, the holiest thing on Earth. Remember what happened to Uzziah when he touched the Ark. He was stricken on the spot.

Mary, to be in close conjunction with her Divine Son, the Holy of Holies, God only himself, was similarly made as Holiesman by the grace of God.

Go ahead. Just very quickly, since I said I provided them, all you have to do is pick out the most obvious fundamentals of Catholic dogma.

Look at page 203 of the list. Origin, Basil, Chrysostom, and Alexander. As Todd and Mary suffered from menial personal faults, ambition and vanity.

Doubt about the message of Daniel. So on and so forth. And if you want the entire list, I can give you references specifically.

Here in A .S., Chrysostom, and many other places, including specific references generated on page 117 of Shaft's work on creeds, if you'd like to look them up.

Now, in regards to the Ark of the Covenant, which again is going to be presented to us here, I have not heard any substantiation of the claim that the

Ark of the Covenant, Luke 1 .28, means Mary is sinless. But again, I want you to use this as an example of how closely you have to listen, because it sounds really good when you hear these alleged parallels, doesn't it?

First time I heard Jared give this list of parallels, I went, wow, that sounds really good. I wrote down everything he said, and I checked out everything he said against the

Septuagint. And it didn't work. As I pointed out, Mr. Matchick says, for example, talked about the

Ark of the Covenant passing through the hill country of Judea. Allegedly, Mary does the same thing, though actually you look at the geography, we're not sure exactly where that is.

1 Samuel 7 .2 says that the Ark had been in Kyriath -Jerim for 20 years. Where does that parallel to Mary? See, when you start talking parallels, where do you stop?

See, there are no rules, this type of interpretation. Mary must have been in some place for 20 years in Kyriath -Jerim.

If not, why not? As to passing through the hill country of Judea, this is Luke's phraseology, it's not that of Septuagint, no mention of Judea, only of a hill upon which a house is situated in the

Old Testament narrative. We're told that David left before him with joy. He says, who am I? The Ark of the

Lord should come to me. Those are Jerry's own words, but actually Jerry didn't say that, he said who am I? How can the

Ark of the Lord come to me? We're told that when he leaps for joy, this is a technical term, the same thing happens with the baby in the womb, a liturgical dance before the presence of God, that doesn't hold up, it's not the same term, it doesn't have that meaning, simple fact of the matter is, you have to go and do some homework.

I can't do it for you, he can't do it for you, and I appreciate the fact that this room is filled with people who at least care enough to find out what the issues are, but I believe that every one of us sitting here this evening is responsible for God and what we believe.

And that means you're going to have to do some homework, and I submit to you that if you do some homework and examine these alleged parallels, these alleged types, you'll discover that they can prove anything.

I submit to you yet once again, when Luke wrote Luke 1, 28, when Mary wordly uttered the words of the

Magnificat and talked about God, my Savior, did she have in her mind the idea that she was immaculately conceived?

Is that what you really believe is going on here? It is not an issue of having to find a word that says

Mary sinned, I think we can all see that. The Bible says all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

The positive affirmation being made is Mary's the exception. Where is the proof? We haven't found it.

Okay, now we'll have Mr. White opening on the subject of perpetual virginity.

I began by allowing my opponent to speak from the past. In a seminar on the Marian doctrines in 1992 he asserted the present tense course of Mary's words to the angel,

How can this be since I am a virgin? Luke 1, 34. He, quote, This is my vocation.

That's why I'm called to be. She had taken a vow of virginity. Tradition tells us, although the Bible doesn't show it clearly enough, she had taken a vow of virginity in her youth to dedicate herself to God.

She was giving something up, you see. She loved God so much she was happy just being a spouse. And so what the real danger is, how can

I be the mother of the Messiah when I am under a vow not to be the mother of anyone? I am a virgin.

That is my consecrated state in life. The question makes no sense in any other way. End quote. Now such an assertion, as Ludwig Ott rightly points out, cannot be reconciled with the fact that Mary was betrothed to Joseph.

Verse 27 of Luke 1 describes Mary as a virgin engaged to a man whose name was

Joseph. End quote. Betrothal was more than mere engagement. It required a writ of divorce to end and if one of the two parties was unfaithful during the betrothal, it amounted to adultery.

Verse 19 even uses the specific language of Joseph, her husband, during the betrothal period.

Luke 1 20 records the angel saying to Joseph that he should not fear to take Mary as his wife.

Again, the Roman position requires taking all of these terms in an unnatural way. That is, to take a woman as wife carries with it all the natural and proper things, including the natural marital relationship.

Joseph is told not to fear taking Mary as his wife. The term means just that. Wife. This is no mere protectorate, no celibate relationship between an old man and a young maiden.

Such assumptions have no basis in the text at all, but in fact derive not from Christian sources, but from 2nd century

Gnostic Gospels. Regarding Mary's specific words, I do not know a man, the literal rendering of this is a common idiomatic expression to mean,

I do not have a husband. It indicated that Mary had no means of conceiving and was not engaging in sexual relations with Joseph or anyone else.

There is nothing in the language or context that would begin to substantiate Jerry's claims regarding this phrase.

Now, if you have your Bible, please turn to Matthew chapter 1, verses 24 -25, where we read,

And Joseph awoke from his sleep, and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a son, and he called his name

Jesus. Note a few things about this passage. First, Joseph took Mary as his wife. He had been contemplating putting her away secretly, but upon learning that the angel of the child had been begotten by the

Holy Spirit, his doubts and fears were relieved, and he does what the patronal involved, taking this woman as his wife.

But secondly, notice the plain, obvious meaning of the words of the passage. If you could only for a moment set aside any traditions, preconceived ideas, or devotions that you might have, and simply listen to the word of God.

Matthew tells us that Joseph took Mary as his wife, however, he kept her a virgin, literally, he did not know her until the birth of Jesus, because she was already with a child.

But don't stop there. Matthew tells us that the normal course of the marriage was interrupted, but only for a season, and only for a reason.

Matthew says that Joseph did not know her until the child of Jesus was born. Now, my opponent joins other

Roman Catholic apologists in pointing out that the bare term, until, does not tell us anything about what happened after the birth of Christ.

They often make a field of passage like 2 Samuel 6 23, where we are told that Michal, the daughter of Saul, had no child until the day of her death.

In the Greek translation of this passage, it has a suffix, the term epos is used. The argument is that obviously

Michal didn't have children after she died, either. There are many problems with this argument. First, is the poor passage of sight, since dead people normally don't have children in the first place.

But most importantly, Mr. Matic, Mr. Carl Keating, who likewise uses this argument, and many other apologists, have missed an important point.

Matthew does not merely use the term epos in Matthew 1 21. He uses a phrase, epos cu.

And what does that mean to us tonight? It means a lot. First, remember the context. Matthew has explained that a real marriage takes place, but that the normal sexual union is put off for a season, and that for a reason.

But he makes sure we realize that Mary and Joseph had a normal family relationship by saying that this lack of sexual union was only until the birth of Christ.

Next, an examination of the use of the phrase epos cu in the New Testament reveals that in each instance where it is used in the way it is used here, that is when it refers to a point in time at which an action is completed, rather than the other use where it is simply translated while, it refers to a point in time at which the action of the main verb of the clause either comes to an end, is changed to some other kind of action, or is actually reversed.

Let me illustrate. In Matthew 17 9, as they were coming down to the mountain, Jesus commanded them, saying,

Tell the vision to no one until the Son of Man has risen from the dead. Obviously here, the command not to tell anyone of the vision they had seen was valid only up to the point when the

Son of Man rose from the dead. Then the apostles were free to tell everyone what they had seen on the mountain. There are many other examples, but I only have time to give you one more.

Luke 24 49 And behold, I am sending forth the promise of my Father upon you, that you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.

Here again, we see the phrase translated until refers to a point in time at which things change.

In this case, the disciples are to stay in the city until the coming of the Holy Spirit, at which time they will then obviously leave the city to begin the evangelization of the world.

Now, coming back to Matthew 1 25, I would like to challenge my poem this evening to show us any use of the phrase,

Havosku, in the Gospel of Matthew, or I'll be generous, the entire New Testament that gives us the bare meaning of until, without making a statement about what comes after this point in time.

Mr. Matic is asserting that this passage does not indicate that Joseph and Mary lived as husband and wife.

He is making the positive assertion and asking us to abandon the natural contextual meaning of the passage.

Let him bear the burden of proof. Let him show us that Havosku does not carry its normal meaning here.

Now, to add to the way the passage is already cited, we note the rather obvious fact that gospel writers had no problems in mentioning frequently the results of the marriage of Joseph and Mary, that is, their offspring.

James, Joseph, Simon, and Jude are all identified as the Adolfoi of Jesus, that is, his brothers. They are often associated with Mary in the normal family relationship of mother, brothers, and even in a few places, sisters are mentioned.

Now, Mr. Matic has said regarding this quote, the word brother here in the Greek, Adolfos, or the word sister,

Adolphe, in the feminine form, it simply means a near relation, a kinsman or kinswoman. It does not necessarily mean a uterine sibling, someone from the same womb, end quote.

He's right, to a point. There are uses of brother, but metaphorical, as when someone is called brother in the

Lord, in the Septuagint we find some uses of the term to refer to someone who is not a uterine sibling.

However, the normal, regular meaning of the word Adolfos, and the feminine Adolphe means, quite simply, brother as in male sibling, and sister as in female sibling.

One must have strong contextual reasons for abandoning the basic fundamental meaning of the term, and no such contextual basis exists outside of the extra -biblical claims to authority of the

Church of Rome, speaking in many cases, a thousand years or more after the events recorded in Scripture. Now, there were terms available in the

Gospel writers to describe cousins or kinsfolk, or whatever other theory we might hear this evening. In Colossians 4 .10

you see the term for cousin used, and other places the term for kinsmen is found. Why did the Gospel writers use these terms?

The reason is simple. They were not talking about cousins or kinsfolk, they were talking about the children of Mary and Joseph.

Let me quickly address one other argument that is often brought forward. In John chapter 19 at the cross, the Lord Jesus entrusted

Mary, his mother, to the beloved disciple John. Some have asserted that Jesus would actually be breaking the Mosaic Law to do this, if in fact he had brothers.

Of course, this ignores the pupillary problems. His brothers were unbelievers. In fact, they had mocked him in John chapter 7.

But more obviously, they were not at the cross. John was. John, the beloved disciple and a believing follower of Jesus, would be far closer to Mary as a fellow believer than her natural children ever could be, unless they, like her, came to believe in the

Messiah. Now, in closing, I have to ask from whence did this doctrine arise? Did it originate in the believing community?

Did it originate in the exegesis of the Scriptures? Historically, the answer is no. The Notre Church historian

J. N. B. Kelly indicates that the earliest affirmation we have of the perpetual virginity of Mary comes from the apocryphal, and I dare point out heretical, ascension of Isaiah, when the words her womb was found as it was before she became pregnant.

Likewise, the ode to Saul, intinged with Gnosticism, denies any physical pain in the birth of Jesus. But most importantly, we have the

Protean Evangelium of James, a mishmash of almost laughable mythology and storytelling, a work of second -rate fiction at best if you've ever read it.

Yet the ideas it presented, drawn from a century after the events, ended up forming the very basis of the position being presented this evening regarding the perpetual virginity of Mary, and many other elements of the

Marian doctrines. I invite all of you to read the work for yourselves as it is generally available. Romans says the perpetual virginity is a truth of revelation.

I say that the tradition of men, without biblical support, contrary to plain biblical teaching, based upon improper viewpoints of dignity of childbearing, derived from Gnostic writings of the second century, nurtured on the historical rise of monasticism and celibacy.

As such, the Christian who proves all things must likewise test this doctrine and find the one.

Thank you. Mr. Medetev? Here, Mr.

White, as Proximate Poets in General, are actually at their weakest. On these four doctrines,

I think it's easiest to prove that they lose the ability or the right to qualify themselves as simply sticking to what

Sacred Scripture has to say. I want to make three simple points. Number one, there is no scriptural statement whatsoever that Mary had any other children, or anything that would require you to believe that.

Secondly, there is scriptural evidence for her perpetual virginity, and thirdly, most

Protestants are shocked to discover that the original Protestant Reformers, before anti -Democratism continued to sort of grow and grow and fester, agreed that their biblical evidence required you to believe in the perpetual virginity of Mary.

Let me make those three points. First of all, there is nothing in Sacred Scripture contrary to the teaching of the perpetual virginity of Mary.

Mr. White made a very able attempt by citing Matthew chapter 1, verse 25.

He said that Joseph had no relations with Mary until she gave birth to the Son, and that the context requires us to interpret until and meaning after that they did have relations.

Now here's a classic example of what's known in logic as ipse fixit, the logical fallacy, meaning that I tell you what the normal, regular rendering or interpretation of the phrase is, and it's up to my opponent to show me otherwise.

My contention, and the contention, I think, of any objective grammatical lexicon is that the preposition until in and of itself doesn't tell you if in one way or the other.

It might mean that things changed after that point. It might mean that they continued in the same way.

And although Mr. White gave you several examples where until means that there was a change.

For example, tell no man the vision until after I have risen from the dead, or stay in Jerusalem until you receive the

Holy Spirit. He has no authority in and of himself to say, I, James White, decree that this is the normal meaning.

And any time it means something different, that's abnormal, folks. The lexicon itself would not tell you that.

I could give you all sorts of instances where it continues to mean the same thing after the point that is reached.

For example, when Noah sets loose the dove in Genesis chapter 8, verse 4. And we read that the dove hovered over until the waters were abated.

It does not mean that the dove at that point ceased to hover and came back to the ark.

Or when we read in Luke, he said, I want an example from the New Testament. When we read in Luke that in chapter 1, verse 80, that John the

Baptizer lived in the desert until he began his public ministry. It does not mean that he at that point became a city dweller.

He continued to live in the desert. He continued to preach in the desert. That's exactly where he carried out his vocation.

So both of us can give you instances where the word until means it's true up until point

A and it ceases to be true. And on the other hand, situations where it's true up until point

A and then it continues to be true. So there's no way of resolving this issue simply from the meaning of the

Greek preposition chaos or the Hebrew preposition odd before it. And he mentioned already, one that I was going to mention, the statement in 2

Samuel 6 .23 that Michal had no children until the day of her death. It's not that she started having children after that particular point.

The absurdity of her having children at that point is not the point. The point is that until tells you in and of itself nothing.

Now, Mr. White leans very hard on the fact that the context requires you to believe that he began to have relations afterwards because he took her as his wife.

One of the glaring defects of all the respect of Protestants who espouse it to the

Protestant position on this is that there is this preconception, this assumption that sexual relations are somehow essential to wifehood, that Mary really wouldn't be

Joseph's wife if they didn't have sexual relations. And I think a little deeper reflection upon that could realize how horrendous the consequence of that kind of thinking could be.

Mr. White, if I on my way home after this debate and after the conference that you go to in Portland, Oregon found myself hopelessly crippled by some accident, or my wife were for that matter, and we could no longer have normal sexual relations,

I would not think that she was any less my wife and I would not be any lesser husband. We do not bow down before sexual relations as the be -all and the end -all or an essential component of marriage.

One can be truly married without enjoying sexual relations. Granted, it's unusual, but that's precisely our point.

We're not saying that this is some standard thing that's found in all marriages. Obviously, the Catholic midst that we're making a special and unique claim with regard to our

Blessed Mother. So Matthew 1 .25 cannot be used as a proof text, nor can other proof texts which

Mr. White did not get to even just Luke 2 .7 where we read that Mary brought forth her firstborn son.

Some argue rather superficially from that, oh, she must have had others if she was the firstborn. And it's rather easy to dismiss that by pointing out that in Exodus 13 we're given a ceremony for the consecration of the firstborn that takes place the moment you have that child.

You don't have to say as you begin the prayers to consecrate the firstborn to God, wait a minute, honey, we can't do this until we have a second child.

Then we'll know this is the firstborn. One is a firstborn child that is the one that makes one apparent whether there are any subsequent children or not.

And there are firstborn children who are only children. Scripturally speaking it is not necessary that there be subsequent siblings to qualify as the firstborn.

The third and the most important argument that Protestants use is the reference to brothers.

And again, Mr. White gave us several examples at St. Dixon saying I say to you that the normal, regular meaning is that it comes from the same uterus, from the same womb.

And yet there is no basis for that grammatically or lexically. The word is used in the narrow sense and in the wider sense throughout

Scripture. Genesis chapter 13 verse 7 Abraham says to Lot, we shouldn't be arguing for we are brothers.

And yet we know from the context, from the passage that Abraham is Lot's uncle and Lot is his nephew.

The same thing is said in Genesis 14 14. And there are other brethren in Scripture, not used metaphorically as Mr.

White said, but used in a physical sense to mean a close kinsman. But not necessarily a child from the same mother.

It can mean that, of course it can. No one is denying that. But it doesn't have to mean that.

Now if we do a little bit more careful look at these brothers and sisters of Jesus that are mentioned in Mark chapter 6 and Matthew 13, we find some interesting indicators that they did not do the children of Mary.

First of all, they are never referred to as the children of Mary. It's odd to me again that a Protestant who says, look,

I just stand on Scripture, I only believe what Scripture teaches, accuses Mary of having other children when in fact it never makes that statement.

It never calls these brothers of Jesus the children of Mary. It names them James and Joseph and Simon and Jude.

But if you take the statement of these brothers in Matthew 13 and just go a little bit further, or I should say towards the end of the

Gospel, in Matthew 27, and compare that with what St. John wrote in John 19, you find out that a different Mary, Mary the wife of Cleopas, is the one who is spoken of as the mother of James and Joseph.

So the Bible itself shows you that these brothers of Jesus are children of a different woman.

There is a James who is referred to as the brother of our Lord in Scripture. And we know from Josephus, the writer of the

Jewish War in the 1st century, that this James, who subsequently becomes a leader in the church, was stoned by the

Jews in the 60s during their revolt against Rome prior to 70 AD. And we are told that he was age 9 when he was put to death.

Now you can pull your calculators out or simply do the math yourself. Here is a man who is called a brother of Jesus, and yet he could not have been a child of Mary because Mary wasn't even born yet, let alone able to give birth to him at the time that he was born.

He died in the age of 89 in the 60s AD. So we have ample evidence from Scripture and from early church history and eyewitness accounts that people can be referred to as the brother of someone without having the same mother as them.

So, the brother argument doesn't work. Now, to my second point is that there are indications which

Mr. White himself alluded to, when our lady says how can this be since I am a virgin?

She couldn't have been asking how can I become a mother by ceasing to be a virgin. Every woman knows how that happens. Her reflection was how can

I become a mother while remaining a virgin? She was called the wife of Virginity in Ezekiel 44 in a type of the eschatological temple, a temple indicating the body of the church, our individual bodies as temples, and the body that gave birth to our

Messiah. Speaks in Ezekiel 44 verse 2 as having a special gate that remains shut.

The Messiah mysteriously comes through it and yet no one enters and no one else exits. It's interesting, thirdly and finally, that Luther, Slingley, Calvin, all of them say that Mary was a virgin before the conception of birth and remained a virgin at the birth and after this.

I recognize Mary as ever a virgin of all these things he says and Calvin says no one should cause dispute over this matter unless he goes beyond what is written.

On the contrary there never was a man who would contradict this in obstinacy unless he were a pig -headed and fatuous person.

I know that Mr. White is not such a person so I would encourage him to listen to his mentor Calvin and say Calvin would have been a good scholar like Luther and Slingley.

If they were satisfied that Calvin was right, you should be too. Okay, now

Mr. White will first examine. Mr. Matzko, can I quote from Calvin's paper? Is that an accurate quote?

The quote he just gave from Calvin you had said that the reformers believed this was a biblical position.

Isn't it true that what Calvin actually said was that the passage wasn't clear on the matter and wasn't self -evident? Well, I'll read you the quote.

Concerning what has happened since this birth, the writing of the gospel says nothing. Since the birth, he says the gospel of Matthew says nothing.

Certainly it is a matter about which no one will cause dispute unless he is somewhat curious. On the contrary, there never was.

That was the point I wanted to bring up. He was saying no one should bring up a dispute about this. He didn't really cite one or the other, did he?

No, he did. He goes on to say in his sermon on Matthew quote, there have been certain folk who have wished to suggest in this passage

Matthew 1 .25 what you just did that the Virgin Mary had her children, and the children had been the son of God, and that Joseph had then waltzed with her later.

My point was that when you read it very quickly in the end, you made it sound like he was saying that anyone who would say otherwise would be paid, and what he was saying was anyone who brings up disputes about it.

That's all I wanted to clear up. Jerry, you a couple of times throughout a number of passages you brought up Genesis 8 .4

in the book and the meaning of until, right? You brought up Luke 1 .80 and John the

Baptist Do any of those passages have a host who? First of all it is only your it's a dictum that says you have to have a host who.

Do any of them use a host who? Without a if you give me a requirement, you have to answer that question.

I have it on my computer, but actually I have a listing here of the 22. They use host who. They use host who. They do not use host who.

I know it's irrelevant Jerry, if you say it's irrelevant, can you show me one place in your testament, just one

I'm only looking for one where host who or host hatu is used in the way that you're using it.

Just one. There may be, I don't know because I was not expecting your rather idiosyncratic insistence in the book yesterday.

The preposition is host. But as you know, there are phrases in Greek. Akrivu? Would you separate

Akrivu? You know that Akrivu has a meaning by itself. So there's host who and host hatu.

All I'm asking is have you ever looked at thrown this at the Septuagint at the New Testament, at the secular writings of the

Have you ever looked at it? I've looked at it, and I would contest your contention that host who and the who is somehow intrinsic to the meaning of the phrase.

Well, I would simply, I have a list here of 22 places in the New Testament for those of you to be glad to provide them to you. You will not find a single place that will substantiate your position.

I'm simply asking you if you have looked at it, provide it to the choice. That's not my position.

Okay. My position is not that host who can be used in either sense.

And you have looked at them and you can show me a place that's the case. I'm saying you're selecting a body of verses that bear out your position.

I'm simply using the phrase that Matthew uses himself and pointing out that this is a consistent meaning of the text throughout the

New Testament. That's all I'm pointing out, Jerry. Now, you then talk about, it's the Dixit, and you said that I'm just simply saying the

Lexicans in the New Testament, are you saying that when I have said the normal lexical meaning of Adelphos his brother, that that would not be borne out by looking at the

Bauer papers, Dr. Greg Lexton of the New Testament early Christian literature. Lo and Edith lexical and lexical based upon Semantic domains.

Thayer's based upon Brim. Are you telling me that you can pull those out and demonstrate that I'm misrepresenting what

I'm saying? If you look at those lexicons, they will give you several meanings for the word. Yes, they will. And it doesn't say that the other meanings, like the near kinsmen is somehow abnormal.

Now, Mr. Matrix are we disagreeing that there is a normal meaning to a term and there are extended meanings based upon context?

I'm saying there can, in many instances in many words, be several normal meanings. And no, it is not, unless you are going to quote one of those lexicons as saying, this is the normal meaning, everything else is abnormal.

I'd be happy to hear that. If you're making a positive assertion that, are you making the positive assertion that the term

Adelphoi used of Jesus' brothers, specifically does not mean deuterant siblings.

You're making a positive assertion that it is not possible that one meaning is right there. Is that correct? No, I'm making the assertion that Adelphos, in and of itself, doesn't give you the right to say these were children married.

So it's possible that they were children married. Is that what you're saying? The word itself doesn't determine it.

I know that it's not possible that they were children married from the other indications that I referred to.

So you recognize that that can't have that meaning because of the teaching of their own Catholic church, ultimately. I'm saying that, as you have said, every term must be interpreted by its context.

By its context. And you find something in the context of the, if someone came to the back door and announced that,

Jerry, your mother and brothers are outside wanting to talk to you, the first thought that crossed your mind would be, that's actually my mother and my cousins.

So the normal meaning of the word that says, your mother and your brother is staying outside wanting to talk to you, would be your mother and your brother.

And when the people in John 6 say, do we not know his mother and his brothers and his sisters, are they not here with us? Isn't the normal meaning of those words, brothers and sisters?

That's one of the normal meanings, but not the only meaning. The Bible itself shows the verse, the word being used in a different way.

How about the word life? Can you show me other references in the New Testament where the word life means someone who is merely under a protectorate to an elderly man?

Mr. White, you're tilting at windmills. The Catholic Church admits that Mary was called to a special location.

You are having to assert that, Jerry, and I'm just asking you, you're making a positive assertion, and I keep asking you to bear the burden of the positive assertion.

You're asking me to show other situations similar to the marriage, and I'm saying, of course there's not.

So there's no other reference in the New Testament to that type of marriage, and in fact, in 1 Corinthians chapter 7, do we not find discussion of marriage to be contrary to Revelation?

What is the term marriage? No, we do not. If there were situations in which such relations were not possible, one would still have a bound, not a barrel state.

I don't have a problem with that, but of course that begs the issue in regards to marriages, because it assumes something that is not, it assumes facts of the facts that are not in evidence.

Now, I've got to start my talk, are we on? If you'd like to just go on, that's fine.

Mr. White, you engage in another law of the cross, you know, it's poisoning the well when you said, isn't it the case that this doctrine of the infidelity of Mary actually comes to us from the oaths of Solomon and apocryphal gospels and Gnostic things.

Mr. White, is there any evidence other than, again, your that this doctrine actually comes from those gospels?

I mean, does anybody assert that in the early church? Is there anybody who says, where did we get this idea?

We got it from reading these books. No, we just simply examined historical references and discovered that the first references to this doctrine were found anywhere.

I will take that back. Yes, there is. Clement of Alexandria, or Origen, I'll admit, wanted to specifically make reference,

I think it's Clement, to the Proto -Evangelium of James as his basis for making that assertion.

So yes, there was the influence of these works. They are the earliest text of references we have in any type of ancient sources to the ancient concept.

And, interestingly enough, they also end up leading into bodily assumption concepts as well. But don't you agree that there are many early church fathers who argued for the progeny of Mary, like Jerome, who became famous for it in his disputes with Helvidius, in which he does not use these works at all.

The fact that some... Let me answer the question. I think that was a question because you've got to realize, as all scholars of history recognize, the

Marian doctrines began to develop into full flower in the middle of the 4th century. And, of course,

Jerome, and especially Ambrose, are excellent examples of this. But I hope that the listeners are not understanding us to mean that every church father even addressed these things.

As you well know, most of them didn't address any parts of it at all. And hence, to simply use terms like early fathers, in a broad sense, we sometimes might mislead someone.

But your question is that Jerome specifically cited a quoting that guy named James? No. He's writing 200 years after it was written.

But I am saying that some of the early fathers who began to introduce these things didn't specifically cite from them, and that the earliest reference we have is not from Christian sources.

But the fact that someone can argue for it without citing those proves, does it not, whether you think the doctrine is right or wrong, that one could hold to that doctrine and argue for that doctrine without being dependent upon a gospel that you and I would both agree was remarkable.

So it's irrelevant. Mr. Maddox, there are probably 100 people in this room who believe that doctrine, who had never heard of the

Ode to Solomon before they walked into this room. So, obviously, that is a given. The historian wants to ask the question, from whence did these doctrines arise?

Whence did they arise? But St. Jerome is not in class with you or I, let alone other people in the room.

And so to argue that St. Jerome is somehow evidently ignorant of the reference or the existence of these words is not true.

I've argued for Jerome's correctness on a number of issues against you in the past. So, no, I look at the fathers and I recognize that they could be right on certain things and wrong on others, just like we do.

If that's the case, then the fact that you can quote a church father against the Prophecy of Virginia, or against the Magnet of Conception, in and of itself, doesn't prove anything, does it?

It only proves there is no such thing as a unanimous consent of the fathers on these issues. Right.

And that is not something that the Catholic Church teaches, that every single father was absolutely unanimous on every single issue.

So, again, that's not true. Well, of course, Magnet of One did use the term unanimous consent of the fathers on a different issue, but not on this particular issue.

It said that when something was unanimous, then we could know that that was from the Apostles. It didn't restrict the

Apostles. Well, that one specifically was in reference to Matthew 16 and the interpretation of that. Mr.

White, are you willing to admit that there is no statement in Scripture, in the New Testament, that Mary had other children?

Use of the term children? No. Or that she gave birth? Or that she had any kind of maternal?

She's never referred to as the mother of these individuals. Well, actually, when you say gave birth,

I think you need to recognize that that term is used. In fact, a number of the early fathers, they referenced the fact that the language used of Mary giving birth to Jesus is the normal use of the woman giving birth.

There may be a lot of people in the audience that have no idea, Jerry, but what you're defending is the perpetual virginity of Mary before the birth, during the birth, and after the birth.

That is, that even after giving birth to Jesus, she remains a virgin, not just in the sense of not having had relation to man, but that she physically remains intact.

Is that not the position you're defending? It is, but you're side -setting my question. No, there is one statement that she brought forth, someone else.

There is only the reference to brothers and sisters. Is there a reference to her being the mother of these other children? No. Well, outside of your mother and your brothers is a natural use of that term.

No. Does it say that she's the mother of these other people? Does it ever say Mary was the mother of Jesus?

Only in reference to Jesus. Exactly. So, again, you are out on a limb somewhat in stating that Mary is the mother of these people, she gave birth to them, that they emerged from her womb, when there's no scriptural evidence of that whatsoever.

Not at all. Thank you. Okay, Mr. White, closing? I don't think that I'm out on a limb at all when you have the clear statements of Scripture referring to the brothers and sisters of the

Lord Jesus, the normal term. Are we willing to understand that the crowds in John chapter 6, they talk about who is this guy?

We know his brothers and his sisters. What they meant was his cousins, or his kinsfolk.

No, they understood exactly what they were talking about. This issue, again, did not become a part of the doctrine of the early church until other contexts entered it, including celibacy, the ascetic movement, and I would say a very unbiblical view of marriage.

The idea was that the womb that gave birth to Jesus Christ, it would be improper, it would be unfitting for that womb to have given birth to anyone else.

A lot of people say, hey, that's the best argument there is, really. In fact, a lot of Roman Catholics will agree that these doctrines don't come primarily from Scripture, they come from tradition.

They come from the teaching magisterium of the church. The problem is, I don't agree with that type of argumentation with regards to child bearing.

The marriage bed is undefiled according to the book of Hebrews. There is nothing sinful about having children. I would still like to suggest to you that there is nothing in the

New Testament that even begins to suggest that Mary remained a virgin after the birth of Jesus.

Listen to what the argument is put forward. Did you notice Ezekiel, the argument about the temple, and there is its gate that is not open?

Ezekiel 44, 1 -3. And the prince comes through this gate. I want you to ask yourself a question.

When it comes to biblical argumentation, when it comes to something having weight, what has more weight?

The identification of Mary as the temple in Ezekiel 44, and hence a gate not being open, means that Mary remains virgin throughout her life.

Or the plain statement of Scripture that Joseph took Mary as his wife until the birth of Jesus, that the phrase heos hu, despite the denials, never has any other meaning than that in the

New Testament as it is used. And that the New Testament speaks over and over again of the brothers and sisters of Jesus.

Now which is more of a direct argument, my friends? Which is more of a biblical argument?

And which one requires you to have some external source of authority? Some source of authority outside the

Bible that's telling you, you must find this doctrine in Scripture. Therefore, when you look at the term Adolphos, oh, the main meaning of the

New Testament may be brother, but we have to go with this other meaning. That meaning can't be right. Why?

Because Mr. Mattox has admitted his ultimate authority is not solo scriptural.

It is Scripture and tradition. It's what the Church has taught. And therefore, the very meanings of words have to be subsumed under that ultimate authority.

Keep that in mind. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. White, just for the record,

Catholics, please listen carefully. My ultimate authority is Jesus Christ, truly

God and truly man. Everything that He taught, which we are told in Scripture, was not written down.

Everything that He taught to Himself personally and through the Apostles who added to the things that He taught as He predicted they would when

He said the Holy Spirit will come and guide you to all the truth. Everything Christ and the Apostles taught is true, whether it was written down or not.

That is the biblical view. St. Paul says, hold fast to all the traditions received from us, whether they were written or oral.

2 Thessalonians 2 .15 My only authority is the Word of God. And I will not let Mr. White argue in a circle that the

Word of God is Scripture alone. We've argued that in the past, and I've attempted to show him the biblical evidence against that.

Now, Mr. White, again, insists on taking these sort of presumptive aesthetics of Apostles and saying, are we really to understand?

Well, again, it begs the question. And Mr. White's mind, no, we're not to understand these verses this way.

But there are others who read the verse and say, of course they can mean this. So, again, to simply put it before the question of the audience doesn't solve the problem,

Mr. White. Secondly, you say there's an unbiblical view of marriage at heart here. I strongly disagree, Mr.

White, that the view of marriage in the Catholic Church I believe is the highest and the holiest view possible.

Marriage is a sacrament. It is an indissoluble union till death do us part. There is a special blessing pronounced upon those who are open to life.

In fact, it's necessary to be open to life in the marriage bond. And the Catholic Church has gotten no end of flack through the ages for condemning the utter immorality of our transgression as Protestants agreed up until 1930.

So to say that the Catholic Church is a real source of the perfection of the faith of marriage is this idea that having other children would be sinful is complete canard and a gross caricature of what the

Catholic Church... You have attacked not the Catholic Church's position but a misrepresentation of it.

There's nothing sinful about having children. That's not the argument. The Catholic Church encourages as many children as possible.

I only have seven, but my wife and I pray that God will give us more. That's not the issue.

The issue is that Jesus is special. Jesus is God. And Mary's body was set apart from all eternity to be that special gate through which the

Messiah would come into the world. And it would be at that point anti -climactic for her to give birth to non -divine persons who would be born in original sin.

I would simply sum up by saying again there is evidence here that has certainly convinced

Protestants such as Calvin. He argues in his sermon the Gospel writer did not wish to record what happened afterwards.

He simply wished to make clear Joseph's obedience. Scripture thus speaks thus of naming the firstborn whether or not there was any question of the second.

Calvin himself argues that there is no evidence in Matthew 1 .25 that Mary had other children.

Mr. White disagrees, but my point is simply that Protestants who know the scriptures, read the same scriptures the

Catholics read and come to Catholic conclusions. And there's no reason why Mr. White couldn't as well. Okay.

We're going to take a ten -minute break, but we're going to adhere to that ten -minute break. Steady.

We're now going to debate the issue of bodily assumption. And we're going to start out with a ten -minute opening from Mr.

Mannington. I'm going to take one of my ten minutes to make an announcement. I'm sorry we didn't have the flyer get the moderator so that it wouldn't come out of my time.

It didn't come out of Mr. White's, but I will be back in this area. I said I'd be in Portland, Oregon this weekend at a conference, but in terms of something close, at the

Montvale Rye Inn on Sunday, August 25th, from 12 till 8, there will be a conference on evolution.

There will be a brilliant microbiologist from Lehigh University, Dr.

Michael Lee, and Dr. William Vera, a well -known philosopher at the

University. Dr. Alice von Hildebrand and myself will be speaking on the philosophical, scientific, and the biblical evidence against evolution at Sunday, August 25th, from noon till 8pm.

There's a dinner included as well with that. That's Montvale Rye Inn. You can get more details about that maybe from this gentleman here afterwards.

I'd also like to give very quickly my address so that it gets on the tape.

If you would like a free catalog of our various audio and video tapes, we have a few copies here, but we're going to run out.

You can write to us at Biblical Foundations, Post Office Box 721 -245,

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 73172, or you can call us at 405 -373 -4134 or fax us at 405 -373 -4135.

We have a lot of material for you. In fact, I have a 90 -minute tape on the Biblical Foundations of Marian Beliefs in which

I have a little more time to develop these in a little less hurrying pace than we have to getting through all four of them in the very quick, you know, 10 -minute directions back and forth.

This third doctrine that I want to look at now that the Catholic Church proclaims as part of the

Good News, the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, is that Jesus Christ, our

Lord and Savior, did for His mother at the end of her life upon earth what

He will one day do for the entire church, which is also, as I said, on a grander scale, this spouse of the

Lord. You need to keep in mind the parallel between Mary and the Church.

In fact, the Second Vatican Council's Dogmatic Constitution on the Church has a marvelous way in its closing sections of connecting the doctrine of Mary with the doctrine of the

Church, showing the similarity, showing that she is part of the Church. She is the first part.

She's the first Christian, a Christian before Christ. So she's a prototype and a preview of what the

Church as a whole will experience. Please keep that in mind, folks. When people say, whether Mr.

White or anyone else, that certain claims made about Mary are scandalous or offensive or contrary to Scripture, nothing is said of Mary that will one day not be true of the

Church itself. We will enjoy in Heaven, those that make it there by the grace of God, the same sinlessness that Mary possessed from the moment of her conception.

We will also be like that, we will be that virgin espoused to God.

St. Paul uses that language in 2 Corinthians 11 -2 and he says, I espouse you to Christ as a virgin.

I don't want you to be seduced by the claiming of the devil. In 2 Corinthians 11 -2, he has in mind this affection seen in Genesis 3, contrasting once again the

Church with me. He wants me to maintain its innocence, its virginity, spiritually speaking. And we also know from the statements of St.

Paul in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 and 1 Corinthians chapter 15 that when our

Lord returns in power and glory, that he will catch his bride up off of the earth in a phenomenon that has been popularized by the term rapture.

Many people might say, well, as a Catholic, you know, I don't believe in the rapture. The term is not important.

In fact, the word rapture actually comes from a Latin verb. Since I'm a traditional Catholic, I don't have any prejudice against Latin.

It comes from the verb rapere, meaning to snatch or to seize or to take up. And if you look at 1

Thessalonians 4 verses 13 -17 and then 1 Corinthians 15 -22 and following, you will see the very clear doctrine that when our

Lord returns, he will catch the Church up off of the earth and he will glorify her.

He will transform her mortality into immortality so that she can enjoy the perpetual presence of God and in fact sit at his right hand, sit in his seat, in his throne.

He says to the one who overcomes, I will grant a seat with me in my throne as my Father has granted me to sit in his throne.

I'm quoting our Lord's words there in the Apocalypse chapter 3. So, all of these things were experienced by Mary at the end of her life and that's what we deal with in this second half of the evening.

Her assumption, her bodily being taken up off of her at the end of her life and then her coronation as Queen.

You might say, those are outrageous claims and in a sense they are. Mary is the only person that has experienced that yet.

But she does it to show us what we will all experience on the grander scale. Now you say, is there any indication in Scripture that she would be appropriately given this type of privilege?

Yes, there is. In the Old Testament we had several interesting examples, scriptural examples now, of rather unusual deaths, of unusual departures from this earth of unusually righteous people.

So the genre of unusual deaths of unusually righteous people is already established in the Old Testament.

We see it in the case of Enoch who walked with God and then he was gone for God took him in Genesis chapter 5 verse 23.

And we read in Hebrews 11 .5 a commentary on it, that by faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death.

And he was not found because God had taken him. And before he was taken he was attested as having pleased

God. We read something similar about Moses, one of the two great leaders of the

Law and the Prophets. Moses embodying the Law and Elias, or Elias embodying the Prophets.

That Moses' departure from this earth was also somewhat mysterious. That God himself buried him in Deuteronomy 34 verse 6.

There's something rather unusual about the disposition of Moses' body. And we read in the New Testament, in Jude chapter 9, that as a result a dispute arose over the

Archangel Michael and the Devil over the disposition of the body of Moses. But I think the most interesting example of this unusual death of the next person is the prophet

Elijah. At the end of his life, this great prophet is taken up into heaven in a spectacularly dramatic fashion as God honors his prophet who had honored him throughout his life.

Now Elias was not a perfect prophet. He quailed before the throne of Jezebel, and he fled into the wilderness.

God had to restore him to fellowship, and in fact he lost his prophetic mantle to Elisha, his successor.

But what's interesting is that Elias or Elijah, I'll stick with the more familiar

Protestant form of the name, Elijah is the spiritual father of his successor

Elias, or Elisha. Excuse me. Elijah is the father of Elisha.

Elisha asks to remember, let me have a double portion of the spirit that you have. That's his request as Elijah is about to depart.

He didn't mean I want twice as much as you. He meant of all the prophets who follow you, there was a guild of prophets we can see there in the books of Kings.

I want to be your spiritual firstborn son. The firstborn son in Mosaic law gets the double portion, he said.

If we were under Hebrew law, then I would divide my inheritance among my seven kids, not in seven parts, but in eight.

And my son Daniel, twelve, would get two eighties, or a fourth. There were reasons for that legally and economically, but they don't mean to detain us now.

The point is simply this. And in fact, he says to Elijah, my father, my father, but cherry seems to be the worst when everybody leaves.

So Elijah is the father, spiritually speaking, of Elisha. Elisha, New Testament scholars admit, is a type, the clearest type, and is the miracle underworking powers of our

Lord Jesus Christ in the New Testament. And our Lord does miracles such as multiplying bread, and miracles involving water, raising the dead, that are only done by Elisha.

So Elisha is a type of Christ. Elisha is the son of Elijah. Christ, we know, is the son of Mary.

So we're led by a kind of geometric reasoning to at least wonder whether there might be any sort of parallel, since we draw the three sides of the parallelogram, whether Elijah, in any sense, is a type of Our Lady, we see that she is.

In many ways, in Scripture. That, in fact, her speaking in these last days is going to be able to warn people to turn back to God.

She comes in the spirit and power of Elijah, as John the Baptizer came before the first coming of Our Lord, to make people ready, to get them ready.

Now, if that's the case, then Mary would also be honored in the special way she left the earth.

She did not ascend, Christ alone ascended by his own divine power. But she was taken up off the earth, as Elijah was.

If God could do it for Elijah, sinful prophet that he was, imperfect that he was, why not for the

Blessed Mother herself? And the fact is that it's a universal tradition in the early church that there is no place on earth where Mary's body remains.

It's amazing that in early, there is no city on earth, no Christian center, in which there are there's a tradition that St.

Paul died here, St. Peter, there are relics. The relics of Mary would have been more enthusiastically sought after than the relics of anyone else, but there's a deafening silence on this issue.

The testimony is constant, that there is no place where Mary's earthly remains exist upon earth.

And therefore, this early feast grew up of the body assumption that was finally defined by Pope Pius XII in our day, in 1950.

I would argue, therefore, there's biblical indications that it would be appropriate that one would do this, both in the

Old Testament type, and in the fact that scripturally, she foreshadows the rapture of the church at the end of time, and there's nothing in Scripture that shows that she died in a very particular place.

Okay, ten minutes goes away. Thank you very much. There is, of course, nothing in Scripture that indicates that almost anyone ever mentioned that Scripture died in a very particular place, and that we do not assume that any of this was assumed.

We have here a doctrine that, as Luther God says, direct and express scriptural proofs are not to be had.

And many Roman Catholic theologians admit this doctrine is from tradition, it is from tradition only, and to find elements of it in Scripture simply doesn't work.

In fact, finding it in the tradition of the church doesn't work either, because this is not a doctrine that was believed by anyone, and set forth as a dogma by anyone for at least a thousand years, to a significant degree.

Yes, starting about the middle of the 7th century when people started talking about it, and we'll tell you where they got it from in just a moment.

But I want you to keep one thing in mind, my friends. We are not here this evening to debate possibilities.

We are not here this evening to debate well, it's possible that maybe this word means this, and maybe if you see this type over here, and maybe if you take this analogy over here and put it all together, you have one doctrine, and based upon that doctrine it's possible to maybe see in this person a picture of this person, and maybe when you put it all together you have this.

Rome says that up to this point, now the next point isn't going to be the case, but up to this point, this isn't speculation, this isn't something you can disagree on, this is doctrine binding upon the conscience of the

Christian person. And my friends, when you say that something is binding upon someone with the power of the anathema of the church behind it, you cannot simply present to us mere possibilities.

You cannot present to us well, it's possible to see it this way, it's possible to see it that way. If all his genetics gives you tonight, and I submit that all he has given you tonight is, well it's possible to see this, or it's possible to see that.

Let me give you an example. It is possible that the Arizona Cardinals will win their first football game this year.

In the NFL, this is the first game they're going to play. Not highly likely, but it's possible. In fact, if you guys would like another football team here, we would be very glad to give you ours.

It's possible they might win the first game. It is possible they might win the second game, in fact it's possible they might win the third game, but when you go to the point of saying they're going to win all three games in a row, it gets less likely, and less likely, and less likely the farther you go down the line.

Speculative arguments have that nature. If you start speculating about the Immaculate Conception, and you speculate about the perpetual virginity, and then base that and speculate about bodily assumption, by the time you get to the end of your argument, you're just talking about pure speculation, and yet Rome binds this upon the conscience of men with the anathema of God.

I submit to you, that cannot be done. Because the magazine says keep in mind the parallel of Mary and the church.

Well, you have to keep that in mind. You know why? Because you'll never see any of this argumentation unless you've already accepted that parallel and said, may

I ask you, or Mr. Matitix, where does the Bible present this parallel? Where do the

New Testament writers present it? In fact, the New Testament writers have this in their mind. Why is it that Mary disappears after a brief appearance in Acts?

Oh, doesn't she appear in Revelation chapter 12? Well, even the early church interpreted that differently, and Roman Catholic scholars disagree about that, but let's put that one aside.

Where's Mary? When Paul writes to the churches about the function of the church, and the nature of the church, and Ephesians, where's

Mary? She's nowhere to be found. Why? Because she's not parallel to the church.

Hold Mr. Matitix to the point of proving. Mr. Matitix says, my only authority is the word of God alone, quote unquote.

But where is the parallel of Mary? We've been presented with an alleged parallel of the

Old Testament to the Bible. You see, since Elisha asks for a double portion of the Spirit from Elijah, that makes a relationship of father -child there, and since Elisha's like Jesus, that makes

Elijah like Mary, and since Elijah's taken up to heaven in the fiery chariot, Mary must be too. My friends, that type of argumentation can be used to prove anything you want to be used to prove.

My Mormon friends use it to prove Joseph Smith prophesied on the Bible. Exact same type of arguments, and I asked

Mr. Matitix, show me one person in the first 1 ,000 years of the church who made the same application.

He talks about the universal tradition of the church. The universal tradition said, he used the term, universal tradition, no fellow or Mary is ever married, yet Roman Catholic Mariologist Giovanni Maiti, the

Virgin Mary, the Roman Catholic Mary of Doctrine says, she departed like only and modestly as she had lived it, and none remembered the place where verily even if the traditions were of the mid -fifth century, gave her a sepulchre near Jerusalem like Arabic Yosemite.

Why isn't that quote unquote tradition, which precedes the first appearance of the bodily assumption in the historical documents, by over two centuries, what

Mr. Matitix will follow. Why? Because it's not a matter of what history or the Bible says, it's what the overriding authority of the

Roman Catholic Church says, that determines the interpretation of history, and the Bible itself, and the very words of the

Bible. Where did this belief come from? Can you find anyone in the first century who believed it? No. Second?

No. Third? No. Fourth? No. Fifth? No. Sixth? No. Middle of the 7th century toward the end of that time, you encountered this belief.

The Biblical God says, the idea of the bodily assumption of Mary is first expressed in certain transitive narratives of the 5th and 6th centuries, even though these are apocryphal, they bear witness to the faith of the generation in which they were raised, despite their legendary clothing.

Well, what is the good doctor ought to say? Roman Catholic historian and Mariologist Juniver Carols has said, the first expressed witness in the

West to a genuine assumption comes to us in an apocryphal gospel of the transitive Biati Mariae of Pseudo -Volito.

What's that? It is a document that was put on, what we would call today, the index.

Called heretical, and placed under the anathema by Pope Galatius I, who according to records, was the first pope we know who was called

Vicar of Christ. He said it was heretical. His decree was affirmed by Pope Ormistus.

Karl Rahner, in commenting on these sources, says, at best, it can only be considered as evidence of theological speculation about Mary, which has been given the form of ostensible historical account, he says, that there is nothing of any historical value in such apocryphal works.

It was unbelieved that by the leading fathers of the

Christian Church for a thousand years, and even when it began to enter into the tradition, it was rejected by most.

Until Duns Scotus finally helped push things along, and others,

I may be wrong about him, but it took forever. Now, in opposition to this, in the

East, at least since the 6th century, and in Rome, at any rate, since the end of the 7th, the Church celebrated the Feast of the

Dormition of Mary. And yet, as this doctrine became more popular, the name of the feast was changed to the

Feast of the Assumption of Mary. Odd admits we have no

Biblical evidence. Mr. Maddox presents to us types and shadows. In fact, he even presents in some of his talks

Caleb. Caleb is a picture of Mary, because he crosses the River Jordan, and the

River Jordan represents death, and he is grieved with sorrow and unbelief of his people, and he follows the

Lord's will, and this makes him a parallel to Mary. In fact, he even comes up with Mary's age, and she's assumed at 85 years of age.

My friends, anything can be proven by this type of argumentation.

I can find a parallel to John, the beloved disciple, and all sorts of things in the Old Testament you can find.

The Psalms would be a rich place to find parallels to anything you want to find. This isn't

Biblical exegesis, it's Biblical eisegesis, reading in the text that which was never a part of the thinking of the original authors, and in this case the earliest

Christians all along. It is a doctrine that plainly parallels the person of Jesus Christ in an unbiblical and unscriptural manner.

See the parallels as they build up. In active conception, perpetual virginity, now the bodily son of Jesus is assumed, assumed?

Resurrected into heaven. Mary's bodily assumed into heaven, to do what? To sit as queen of heaven in the Christian exegesis.

Is this what the Scriptures teach about Mary's role? Again, my only authority is the word of God alone.

My friends, if your only authority is the word of God alone, you will never ever believe that Mary's bodily assumed into heaven because there's nothing in the

Bible even beginning to suggest it. So I suggest to you that it is not a true statement to say my only authority is the word of God alone.

My only authority is the word of God alone as interpreted by your own Catholic Church, which claims the ability to do so through the power of apostolic succession.

That's what we need to understand to learn how to do it. So we have a doctrine that comes to us from anathematized, apocryphal gospels and has not become binding until this century.

Is that binding upon a Christian? My friends, no it's not. Only that which is found in the inspired

Scriptures is binding upon the conscience of the Christian. Okay, now we will have

Mr. Matics questioning first. Mr. White, your closing statement now was only that which is found in Scripture is binding on the conscience, of course, that ignores what

I quoted from Scripture itself, 2 Thessalonians 2 .14 in which you believe everything that the Apostles taught whether it was written or oral.

Actually, that's 2 Thessalonians 2 .15 and the passage says that we are to hold to the tradition that were delivered to us in two ways.

You didn't answer my question. You did ask a question. You said I ignored something, and I'm pointing out to you

I'm not ignoring anything at all, Mr. White. That was an assertion. My question, based on that assertion, is do you understand, first of all, that the

Catholic Church claims that Mary is a student in Heaven based on a historical fact not upon speculations about possibility?

Do you understand? I'm not asking you to agree, I know that you don't. But do you understand that the Catholic Church claims that the assumption of Mary in Heaven was a verified witnessed historical fact like the ascension of Jesus in Heaven?

Do you understand that? Then is it a little bit misleading to the audience? I would suggest that it is to argue that I'm simply giving you possibilities based on typology and speculations.

The same authority that we have for believing in the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead the same authority we have for believing in His ascension is the authority we have for believing the assumption of Mary.

Is that a question or an assertion? I'm asking you isn't it, in fact, the

Catholic claim that it's the same authority? I realize you reject that. I reject that, and that is the

Catholic claim. I'm simply saying, you're misrepresenting it by saying that it's only after, you know, centuries and centuries that all of a sudden they do imagine maybe

Mary... Now you're misrepresenting me because I didn't say that. I said that your arguments for the bodily assumption not the

Catholic understanding of it according to the dogmatic teachings of the Church but that your arguments for this are based upon possibilities and probabilities.

But do you not understand the difference Mr. White, between showing the appropriateness of something by spiritual or scriptural analogies and the basis on which we know it.

Do you understand what the Catholic teaches, that the reason we know that Mary was ascended to heaven is because it was a well -witnessed fact.

It was a historical fact. It's space -time history, like the resurrection of Jesus Christ and like His ascension.

I would say there are many Roman Catholic scholars who would not say that, Mr. Matic. Because it is quite obvious that the ascension of Jesus Christ is witnessed to by eyewitnesses whose records we have and the bodily assumption of Mary, we have absolutely positively known documentable historical evidence for a minimum of 600 years.

So are you saying that the actual proclamation of the Church says that there is the same historical document?

I didn't say that. I didn't say the same. I said that when you do get references in the early

Church Proverbs of the Ascension of Mary that they, you know, in the passages referred to, they speak of the apostles gathering about and witnessing the taking of her body into heaven.

I'm sorry. I only have three minutes. Yes. I'm sorry.

There's two more. You just asked me a question about the early

Church Proverbs. What early Church Proverbs did you say? I need to answer the question. You said they gathered around.

An early Church Proverbs, who said that? St. John Damascene, for example. What's his name?

In his homily. I'm simply saying when he preaches a homily on the Dormition of Mary, who he refers to as the

Immaculate One, by the way, he refers to the scene of the apostles gathering.

He describes it as a historical event, not something that he infers from spiritual parallels or typologies.

I simply want you to think. Mr. White, will you also agree to the audience, will you also agree to the audience that the disagreements as to whether Mary actually died and then was taken into heaven, whether she fell asleep, or whether she immediately translated from an earthly to a heavenly state, all of those are not bound up in the dogma.

The dogma itself makes a statement about how her life ended, simply that at the end of her life, whether she died or not, her body was taken up in heaven.

Will you agree to that? I made no comment to the contrary. Well, you didn't, but you do something that you enjoy doing, and that is by saying, there was all this dispute about whether she fell asleep, and so the name of the priest was changed for the

Dormition of the Sonnet. That's irrelevant to the dogma, because the dogma does not require us to believe that Mary died, that she fell asleep, or that she simply entered heaven in her life.

That's not part of the dogma. So it's a lot of smokescreen. No, I will repeat the charge, it's smokescreen.

The obvious fact of the person who wants to analyze the historical background of this, rather than just accepting it by the ipso dixit of Roman Church, is is there historical evidence contrary to the dogma?

And the feast, the Dormition of Mary, and the fact that it had to be changed to the Assumptio of Mary over time, is a historical fact that needs to be dealt with, and indicates to me as a historian that that particular feast would not have existed had this been an apostolic doctrine that people understood a tradition that was being passed down.

No, the Dormition is a perfectly valid concept. That's what I'm saying.

I realize what you're saying, but I'm pointing out that you're assuming that this was the doctrine. I'm pointing out that people believed that Mary died, and they didn't have to say that she was a sinner.

Right. Your turn. Mr. Matrix, what's the date on John Nancy? Can you just read that? Let's see.

From about 8645 to 8749 is roughly the lifespan. Okay, so the middle of the 8th century.

So what I had said in regards to the transitive literature, are you familiar with the claim by numerous

Mariologists and scholars, Roman Catholic scholars in fact, including Ott? Do you agree, let me put it this way, that the idea of the

Vatica Assumption of Mary is first expressed in certain transitive narratives of the 5th -6th century. Would you agree with that statement?

Of the extant literature that we have, yes. But I don't share your prejudice against literature that has some gap with the immediate events that occur.

Okay, we have a lot of Augustine's writings, right? Yes, we do. Do you say a lot about Mary? Here and there in his writings, yes.

Did he ever say anything about it? Not to my knowledge. How about Ambrose? Ambrose was a real big fan of Mary's devotion, wasn't he?

Not especially. Among the church fathers of his age. He did say a lot about Mary, though, didn't he? Not out of the ordinary.

Did he say anything about the doctrine? I'm not aware that he did. Did anyone in the 2nd century say anything about the doctrine?

Well, again, that's a big question. In the extant literature, did anyone say anything about the doctrine?

We don't have an explicit testament in the early 2nd century.

Yes, you're right. In the 3rd century? It doesn't really matter. I'm asking questions, Mr. Mattis. In the 4th century?

No. Not to my knowledge. Did these individuals during his free time, and are you familiar with the 38 volume set of the early church fathers published by Erickson?

I'm not sure that I have it. Okay, so do I. In all of that set of writings, are there not numerous commentaries on the

Gospels by people like Augustine and John Christensen? You understand,

Mr. White, that the Gospels, the commentaries on the Gospels, I'm not going to mention this because the Gospels don't record their assumption precisely because they were written prior to the fact that that practice was happening.

So, do they comment upon any of the passages that you use, including Caleb, Elijah, in fact, do you know of anyone who has made the identification of Elijah with Mary in the first thousand years?

It's irrelevant. Okay, well, when we talk about... Would it not be fair then to say that the universal tradition of the church stands solidly against the position that you now define as being the position of the church?

No, I wouldn't say that at all. So you can't show me this doctrine in the greatest fathers of the church for 6 or 7 centuries and yet, they discuss these things, they discuss

Mary, they discuss all sorts of other aspects of Mary. You may reference them like Jerome. Jerome, did he mention any of it?

Mr. White, you bring your Protestant prejudice in favor of written documentation, Sola Scriptura.

Excuse me, let me finish. You're bringing it to the life of the early church. One thing you're forgetting, Mr. White, is that life is not something found in books.

And simply because we don't have books and we only have a fraction of the books that were written at that time, doesn't mean that the church didn't believe things, celebrated.

You've got to look at things like liturgy, Mr. White. You've got to look at things like feast days. You've got to look at things like when they're piloted.

You have the assertions. I'm asking the questions, right? So I was wrong that the first expression is not in the transitive narrative.

No, you didn't quote him correctly. The idea that while the assumption of Mary is first expressed in certain transitive narratives in the 5th and 6th centuries, even though these are apocryphal, they bear witness to the faith of the generations that are written in 5th and 6th centuries.

Why are you referring to the writings? I'm saying that certain truths are celebrated by the church in many ways other than...

And how do you know that outside of written documentation? How do you know they were being celebrated outside of written documentation?

By the tradition of the way the church celebrates, the way it carries out its sacraments. Jennifer Carroll is a noted author on this, and he says, in these conditions, we shall not ask patristic thought, as some theologians still do today, in one form or another, to transmit to us, with respect to the assumption, a truth received as such in the beginning and faithfully communicated in subsequent ages, such an attitude would not fit the facts.

Is he wrong? Well, I don't have to agree with what every

Catholic scholar, especially those in view of the spirit of rationalism, might say today. In other words, they might normally take a more skeptical view of certain historical evidence than a more believing

Catholic would. So, the view of historical evidence, even though you haven't presented any historical evidence, if you have a believing view of historical evidence, you'll see it, even though you can't present it to us.

No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying you can present scriptural prototypes. You can present the fact that the church enjoyed this and celebrated this, and church history books would tell you that.

And you don't have to have learned treaties designed for it to be true. That's my simple point. Okay, we'll have a closing by Mr.

Benedict. Three minutes. I would very simply dispute

Mr. White's contention. I'm sorry I'm looking this way because my worthy opponents are over here, and I feel like I've been ignoring people on this side of the room.

I would dispute Mr. White's contention that this type of argumentation can be used to prove anything. I would like to see him give us some examples of it.

The fact is that Protestants themselves, in their commentaries, in their writings, say on the tabernacle, engage in typologies and analogies all the time.

That's a common approach. And in fact, for someone who reads the Church Fathers, as diligently as Mr. White claims to do, he should be aware of the fact that this is the very stuff and substance of biblical exegesis.

This is how the early church understood Scripture. They drew inferences.

They saw allusions. They drew parallels. And Mr. White seems to have a problem with parallels.

He says that the Assumption of Mary is this offensive parallel to the Ascension of Jesus. First of all,

I ask him if he understood that there's an absolutely called -in distinction between the

Ascension of Jesus under his own power and the Assumption of Mary. Why does that threaten the unique divine power of Jesus?

And say the Assumption of Elijah in the Old Testament is not. If you can accept the one, why can't you accept the other when

Mary is far more worthy of it? Even Protestants would admit that Mary was a model disciple of Jesus, even if they wouldn't go so far as to admit her immaculate conception of sinlessness.

If God could honor an imperfect servant under the Old Covenant, then how much more could he honor even by Protestant standards, a more acceptable servant under the

New? Secondly, this idea of parallels bothers Mr. White. Oh my gosh, she's the queen of heaven, or the parallel between Mary and the

Church. But the fact is that this union between Jesus and Mary is taught in the

New Testament, as Mr. White would have to admit, between Christ and the Church. The Church is called his body.

What more intimate union, what more intimate image to describe him? He could be conceived. The Church is described as his spouse.

Jesus is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Therefore, the Church is his queen. We sit on his throne,

Jesus said. Do you not know that we will judge angels, St. Paul says to the Corinthians in 1

Corinthians 6. So to see Mary's exaltation at the end of her life, to see that she's given a queenly departure from this earth, and a queenly coronation, as we'll see in the next segment, is not to predicate anything about Mary that is not predicated to the

Church. And if Mr. White has a problem with this concept, that Jesus has to be in a vacuum by himself for his glory to remain intact, then he has a problem with the

New Testament itself. It's this, once again, either -or dichotomy. It's got to be Jesus only, and no place for anything around because it's going to somehow jeopardize the glory of Jesus or detract from it, rather than seeing the biblical concept that it reflects and refracts the glory of Jesus.

This is the genius of an artist is reflected in his masterpieces, rather than diminish their bond.

Thank you. Mr. Matzek has pointed out that the method of allegorical interpretation has a great tradition in the early

Bibles, and he's exactly right. There's no question about that at all. In fact, the farther and farther they became separated from the

Old Testament backgrounds of the Old Testament, the less accurate the interpretation of the Old Testament became. Many Roman Catholic scholars recognize that today.

In fact, it's interesting to look at some of these statements of the Vatican over this past century saying that you need to go back to the original meanings of the text, and examine those original meanings for your support.

But the point is, since those people from origin on were extremely allegorical, what does it tell you that they never came up with the allegories of Jerry?

I mean, that was their bread and butter, but they didn't come up with it. Why? Because they didn't believe the doctrines that Jerry does. They didn't believe like he did.

In fact, if I've got a problem with allegory, it's interesting. When Protestants argue that the

Church of Rome is identified in the Book of Revelation, and in a very negative way, how do

Roman Catholicologists normally respond? Oh, that's just allegorical interpretation. That doesn't really have any validity.

You can't have your cake at the same time. Mr. Matzik has said, for example, this term tradition.

He says the tradition is constant. That God, because she was sinless, preserved her with a body, a fusible body, and faced the figure of a young woman when he was talking about Caleb.

She was kept young because she never sinned. My friends, go to the original documents.

When I talk about a historical source, check me out. When I talk about tradition, check me out.

Do the same thing for both of us. I am confident that if you do that, the debate will go very well for me on this evening.

Willard Samuels, writing about the arguments used to support the bodily assumption, said the Protestants view Scripture as the only secure anchor for theology.

Catholic Meriology, having cut loose from this anchor, is hopelessly adrift upon a sea of splendid but dubious

Roman logic. And they quote Victor Vespasian, who said, The non -Catholic student of Meriology who tries to follow the shaky premises and strained conclusions finds himself in a kind of theological

Alice in Wonderland in which things, despite their seeming logic, become curiouser and curiouser.

We have started from slim biblical evidence. We've gone to no biblical evidence, and yet you have just heard, in this section of the debate, the assertion made that the very same basis upon which we know that Jesus Christ rose from the dead is the basis upon which we know the bodily assumption.

That scares me to death. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is a historical fact that we can go back to and demonstrate we do not have to depend upon Gnostic, unchristian sources from the middle of the 6th or 7th century for the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and to parallel is

Nihilism. Right. Okay, now we'll have the final segment of the debate on the coronation, mediation, and this is why we will open it.

It is most unfortunate that it falls to me to both present as well as rebut Roman Catholic concepts regarding Mary as mediatrix, co -redemptrix of Christ, and queen of heaven.

It is unfortunate because while I have heard this fanatic speak about such things, it is quite clear that there are many Roman Catholics who not boast these ideas, either as having binding and doctrinal authority or as being reflective of the real teaching of the

Church. I'll begin with the words of Carl Keating in his book, Catholicism and Fundamentalism. Mary is the mediatrix of all graces because of her intercession for us in heaven.

What this means is that no grace accrues to us without her intercession. We are not to suppose that we are obliged to ask for all graces through her that her intercession is intrinsically necessary for the application of graces.

Instead, through God's will, grace is not conferred on anyone without Mary's cooperation. True scriptural proofs for this are lacking.

Theologians refer to a mystical interpretation of John 19 .26, woman behold thy son, son behold thy mother.

An interpretation sees John as the representative of the human race, Mary thus becoming the spiritual mother. They know the doctrine is reasonable because it is fitting.

This is a little consolation to fundamentalists, of course, who see little fitting about it, and who put little stock in speculative theology and even less in mystical theology.

As a practical matter, this kind of doctrine is one of the last accepted by someone approaching the Church, particularly someone coming to the

Church from fundamentalism, and is accepted ultimately on the authority of the Church rather than on the authority of clear scriptural references.

To the final words written by Mr. Keating, I can only say amen. Unless one is accepted the ultimate and final authority of Roman hierarchy, one will never find a reason to believe that Mary is

Queen of Heaven, a Mediatrix, or no grace accrues to men outside of her. Such beliefs are not only absent from the

Scripture in the early history of the Church, but are opposed to Scripture and the teachings of the early Christians. There is little to be said for biblical arguments here.

We have gone so far from anything that can logically or legitimately be called biblical exegesis that in most instances it is better to just let the

Roman Catholic apologists try to point to verses and let them stand as their own reputation. In fact, if such ideas as the

Queen Mother in the Old Testament are brought forward this evening, these would serve as a good example of how far someone has to reach to find anything whatsoever that can be applied to what is obviously a non -scriptural and an ahistorical human tradition.

But since my earlier quote mentioned one passage, John 19, verses 25 -27, I will simply allow

Michael O 'Carroll, writing in the Theological Encyclopedia of the Blessed Virgin Mary, to comment, quote, The fathers of the

Church and early Christian writers did not so interpret the words of the dying Christ. Development of the idea of Mary's spiritual motherhood was slow and did not enter the consciousness of the

Church until medieval times. During those early centuries, the sacred text did not immediately convey the notion that some lengthy reflection was needed to reach it.

End quote. The idea that Mary is Queen in Heaven, a dispenser of grace and help, a prayer answering mediatress, is the final capstone of the

Roman Catholic attempt to present a parallel person mirroring the unique functions of Jesus Christ.

Oh yes, Rome is quick to deny such a thing, but the very fact that she has to make such strong statements that she is not compromising the unique dignity of Christ only shows how obvious it is that her doctrines lead inexorably to that end.

It has often been said that there is only one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. And sadly, it is just as often pointed out by Roman Catholic apologists that just because there is only one mediator in the full sense does not mean that you can't have supportive mediators in a lesser sense.

The problem with such a position is two -fold. First, it ignores the simple fact that in many, many places today,

Mary has eclipsed Christ as the mediator. Such is obvious to anyone reading modern

Marian literature. Listen to the words of Alphonsus Lucurius. He quotes Saint Bernard. Quote, the saint says

Christ is a faithful and powerful mediator between God and men, but in him men fear the majesty of God.

A mediator then was needed with the mediator himself, nor could a more fitting one be found than Mary.

End quote. Rather than a confident approach to the throne of grace promised in Christ Jesus, such piety presents

Christ as a stern judge to be feared, and hence not a fitting and merciful mediator. Much of this goes to the defects of Rome's doctrine of justification, salvation, and atonement.

But for our purposes this evening it is obvious that Mary's role as a mediator does not in practice remain subordinate to Christ.

But most importantly, the position presented by Roman apologists ignores the point Paul is making.

There is only one mediator between God and men because there is only one God -man. Jesus Christ is uniquely qualified to be the mediator.

As God has all power, can hear all prayer, and can do worship, which is what prayer involves in the first place.

As man, he laid down his perfect life, and hence has a basis published to intercede for his people, that being his all -sufficient, finished, and completed sacrifice.

Hence he is the only mediator, and no one else is suited to do what he alone can do. Mary is not a mediatrix of graces for many reasons.

Grace comes from the Father and the Son, freely, sovereignly. It is a divine act to give divine grace. Mary is not divine.

Mary cannot hear your prayers. She is not a condition, and she has no difference standing before God than any other redeemed person this day.

Philip Schaaf, the church historian, writing long before the great advances in Marian dogma that had marked this century, saw the situation plainly, and he spoke bluntly, being prepared.

After the middle of the 4th century, in the church, overstepped the wholesome biblical limit and transformed the mother of the

Lord into a mother of God, the humble handmaid of the Lord into a queen of heaven, the highly favored into a dispenser of favors, the blessed among women into an intercessor above all women, nay, we may almost say, the redeemed daughter of God Adam, who is nowhere in Holy Scripture exempt from the universal sinfulness, into a sinlessly holy co -redeemer.

Thus, the veneration of Mary gradually degenerated into the worship of Mary, and this took so deep hold upon the popular religious life of the

Middle Age that, in spite of all scholastic distinctions between Latria, Dulia, and Hypergulia, Mariology practically prevailed over the worship of Christ.

Roman devotions scarily utter a Peter Noster without an Ave Maria, and turn even more frequently and naturally to the compassionate, tenderhearted mother for her intercessions than to the eternal

Son of God, thinking that in this indirect way, the desire to give is more sure to be obtained. To this day, the worship of Mary is one of the principal points of separation between Greco -Roman

Catholicism and Evangelical Protestantism. It is one of the strongest expressions of the fundamental Romanist era of unduly exalting the human factors or instruments of redemption and obstructing or rendering needless the immediate access of believers to Christ by thrusting in subordinate mediators.

Nor can we but agree with nearly all unbiased historians regarding the worship of Mary as an echo of ancient heathenism.

It brings plain into mind the worship of Ceres, of Isis, and of other ancient mothers of the gods, as the worship of saints and angels recalls the hero worship of Greece and Rome.

How much stronger would Schaff speak today? It was only a few years later that Pope Leo XIII said in an encyclical, "...with

equal truth may it also be affirmed that, by the will of God, Mary is the intermediary through whom is distributed unto us this immense treasure of mercies gathered by God, for mercy and truth were created by Jesus Christ.

Thus, as no man goeth to the Father, but by the Son, so no man goeth to Christ, but by his mother."

Pope Pius X, a few years later, added, having called Mary the supreme minister of the distribution of graces, "...Jesus

sitteth on the right hand of the Majesty on high. Mary sitteth at the right hand of her Son, a refuge so secure, and a help so trusting as to all dangers, that we have nothing to fear or to despair of under her guidance, her patronage, her protection."

And John Paul II, in his recent encyclical, Veritatis Splendor, said, "...Mary is the mother of mercy, because it is to her that Jesus entrusts his church and all humans."

End quote. It is no wonder, then, that when I picked up that little pamphlet from the hospital chapel, that the motto on the back was not, "...No

true child of God is ever lost," or "...No true believer in Jesus Christ is ever lost," but instead, "...No

true child of Mary is ever lost." Indeed, my opponent this evening, when speaking to a group of Roman Catholics and teaching on this topic, said, "...Have

you accepted Jesus as your personal Savior?" Yes. "...Have you accepted Mary as your personal mother?"

A Catholic appeal to the conscience could very well say that, because if Jesus is your Savior, he's also your brother, the Bible says, and therefore his mother becomes your mother, and you have an obligation to honor your mother and your

Father in Heaven, to adopt her as your spiritual mother into your heart and into your home.

End quote. God takes his worship seriously. Ask Joseph, the man who refrained the ark by putting his hand on it, touching it,

God struck him dead. Ask the two sons of Aaron who died before the Lord. Ask Ananias and Sapphira. God is a consuming fire.

In the same way, the worship of Jesus Christ cannot be mixed with the worship or veneration of anyone or anything else. In fact, idolatry and the giving of the honor due to God alone to anyone else is the essence of paganism.

It is hardly surprising to me that an unbiased examination of the historical documents reveals that in most cases, indeed,

Marian doctrines first show up not in Christian writings, but in Gnostic pagan writings, and then make their way over time into Roman theology, and eventually find themselves being read back into the scriptural texts where they do not belong.

Jesus Christ is not a co -redeemer with anyone. He will not give his glory to another. It is not possible to call

Mary a queen and Beatrice and call Jesus Christ Lord in the biblical sense. The contradiction is too great.

At the end of the book of Jude, we read, Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to make you stand in the presence of his glory, blameless with great joy, to the only

God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory and majesty committed to the authority, before all time, now and forever.

Amen. Such praise flows from the heart of the Christians toward God and God alone. The redeemed heart is jealous of the glory of God and hence must reject as utterly false any suggestion that any creature, including the

Blessed Mother of the Lord, is exalted to the position of Queen of Heaven, as suggested by Roman Catholicism today.

Thank you. Applause Certainly strong words from Mr.

White, but in the midst of his strong words, so many logical fallacies I hardly know where to begin. Mr. White began by saying, unless one has already accepted the authority of the

Catholic Church to teach God's infallible truth, then one would never come to his conclusions.

But the fact is, folks, that I am here as an example of the untruthfulness of what

Mr. White just said. Because I was an anti -Catholic Protestant who studied these various doctrines and came to see the biblical basis of them, and therefore became a

Catholic. I was not born and raised a Catholic. I came to the conclusion that the

Church which taught these things must be correct after coming to the conclusion that these doctrines themselves are rooted in sacred

Scripture. So Mr. White's contention falls flat on its face, as it does in the case of many, many other converts to the

Catholic faith, from the ranks of unadulterated Protestants, who simply said, I'm willing to follow the

Scripture wherever it leads, and it led me to that one holy, Catholic, non -Catholic Church that Christ founded.

He said the example of Mary, or the analogy between Mary and the Queen Mother of the Old Testament is just an example of how far you have to reach when you depart from the standard of the

Torah. But the fact is that we only have Mr. White say so, once again, that this is a far reach.

But who says it's a far reach? Let's stop and consider the biblical evidence. We know that Solomon was a

Davidic king, the king of the covenant of God's people, the one who sat on the throne of David.

We know that his mother Bathsheba was a queen. We know that Jesus Christ is the one who said of himself,

Behold, a greater than Solomon is here. He is the Davidic king par excellence. He came proclaiming a kingdom, not a democracy,

Mr. White. And I think some of your concerns flow out of your perhaps American blinders that we have all been handicapped by not living in a monarchic society, where some of these ways that a monarchy works, which is what the church is, it's the kingdom of God.

Jesus is not our elected official. And a king in God's covenant has a queen mother.

She's the first lady of the land, not his wife. Unfortunately, some have had more than one. But the mother of the king has this special status in the society.

We see that taught, not speculated, Mr. White, not woven out of thin air, but taught by the

Bible itself in 1 Kings chapter 2, 3rd Kings chapter 2 if you're using the new way of reading this, where Bathsheba enters the throne room of Solomon, he rises up, bows down, commanded to the throne be placed at his right hand.

The very phrase that Mr. White found so offensive, his problem is with the Bible, not with Catholic textbooks.

And he said, whatever you want from me, I will give you. Now Mr. White is going to be reminded, yes, she did eventually achieve her intercession.

She was a sinner. Solomon was a sinner. And the situation had many other imperfections worked into it.

But if our Lord could save himself, be holy, greater than Solomon is here, if sinful Solomon would so honor his mother, how much more would the spotless son of God, the spotless son of David, honor the queen mother of the new covenant kingdom, the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven.

We have an obligation to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. He's our Lord. What does it mean to call the

Lord Lord? Because we go to the things that he does. And one of the things he does is honor his mother in a greater way than Solomon.

If Solomon commanded the throne to be placed at his right hand, how much more would Jesus Christ himself?

And again, far from being a biblical concept, that is exactly the destiny of the whole church, to sit at Christ's right hand.

If Mr. White wants to deny that, he's going to have to deny the entire teaching of the book of Revelation, the

Apocalypse of St. John. Now, he goes on to say that he has problems with this teaching because it develops so slowly over time.

But the same argument could be lodged and is lodged by Jehovah's Witnesses at the

Doctrine of the Trinity. There is no statement in Scripture that there are three persons and one God. There's no statement that Jesus is one divine person with two natures.

Those things took time for the church to come up with a proper formulation. The truth was there.

Jesus knew it. His mother knew it. The apostles knew it. But exactly how to express this to avoid, on the one hand, the errors of polytheism, and on the other hand, a kind of modalism where the three persons were really just different modes or states of the career of one person, that took time.

Granted, those things were hammered out earlier than the various Merian doctrines we're discussing tonight.

But I'd be the first to agree with every Catholic apologist that obviously the Doctrine of the Trinity is more central to our faith than the doctrines concerning Merian.

After all, we're talking about God in the first instance and not a creature of God, albeit the highest creature that God has made and endowed with His grace.

So of course these would take later time. And if Mr. White's going to say, look folks, if you can't get any clear testimony on this until three, four, five, six, seven centuries after the facts, and then that just ain't so, to be absolutely just and consistent in this data, you would have to say, you do not have to believe that God, that Jesus Christ is one person with two natures because that actually wasn't put in the formula with just those words until 431 of the

Council of Epistles or 451 of the Council of Chalcedon. So I think there's some terrific injustice here. If Mr.

White accepts what's in the principle in reference to Jesus, then certainly in the case of Mary, who's less important, less central than Jesus, although very much a part of His plan of salvation, we would expect that there would be a greater lapse of time before these things would become clear.

Mr. White also engaged in a false dichotomy between this idea of this

God who is free and merciful and loving and we have instant access to His presence with the idea that he claims

Roman Catholicism fosters of this just judge, this stern God who is going to make us look about for some sort of maternal intercessor to kind of soften his heart.

But the fact is the Bible itself shows us that the mercy of God is by God's own plan activated by intercessors.

In the Old Testament, we have the example of God being ready to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah and he encourages

Abraham to intercede. Now, if Abraham hadn't stopped at ten, he surely ought to have gotten ten believers, then perhaps the city would have been spared in God's plan.

Of course, it didn't happen. And when he stopped, with the assurance that if there were ten righteous people, it would spare the city, he discovered that there weren't ten righteous people, but Abraham's intercession was part of God's plan.

God was going to destroy the Israelites for worshipping the golden calf. And Moses interceded, and God said, because you've interceded,

I will relent. Now, I hope Mr. White isn't going to fall into the liberal trap of saying, well, that was the old God in the

Old Testament. He was harsh and stern, but in the New Testament we have a God of love. It's the same God, Mr. White. He is a

God of justice and a God of mercy throughout the two Testaments. He's not a change in God. I am the Lord, I change not, he said in Malachi chapter 3, verse 6.

So God is simultaneously a consuming fire. Use the words yourself.

And that is a New Testament verse. In the New Testament, we see our Lord himself in the Apocalypse, showing himself to be a wrathful judge.

He says to the churches, if they don't shave up, they'll come and fight against him with the sword in his mouth. And yet he asks

Christians to intercede on behalf of one another. John's is in 1 John chapter 5, verse 6. If you see a brother sinning, intercede for him and God will spare his life.

If you don't, God may strike that person down. Is that Roman Catholic theology,

Mr. White? Well, you wouldn't say so, but unfortunately, it's there in the Bible. I would say yes, it is Roman Catholic theology, because what the

Catholic Church teaches is simply what the Bible teaches here. The Bible clearly teaches that although God is a

God of love and mercy, he does at times take punitive measures against his worrying children.

And he, on his own divine appointment, asks us to intercede for each other so that he might relent and show his mercy.

And indulgence. In fact, the very passage which says there is one mediator between God and man, 1

Timothy chapter 2, verse 5, if you would look at the context, is smack dab in the middle of a passage, commanding

Christians to pray for one another. Look at verse 1. First of all, St. Paul says, I exhort you to pray and intercede for one another for kings and all those in authority.

Certainly, Paul doesn't think that the intercession of Christians for other Christians jeopardizes the unique mediation of Jesus Christ.

He is the only unique mediator because he is alone God and man in one person. And no Catholic prayer book, no

Catholic traction will find that any Catholic, proselytist or white, will ever say that Mary is divine and human in one person.

So there is no threat to the uniqueness of Jesus Christ. And the very passage that I alluded to in the

Psychobatting Council document makes that crystal clear. It quotes 1 Timothy 2 .5. It shows why the mediation of Mary or any

Christian on behalf of other Christians does not violate this special intercession of Jesus Christ.

He said it again in another logical leap of I don't know what to call it. Oh, Mary can't hear all your prayers?

She's not omniscient. She doesn't need to be, folks. That's a logical non -sequitur. The number of prayers, however many they offer up, are finite.

She does not need to be infinite. Can we be able to happen to hear what's said by people on earth? Of course.

Luke 15 .10. Our Lord Himself says that there is joy in heaven among the angels over one sinner who repents.

They're not often this sound -proof belugar who seems to think utterly unaware of what's going on here on earth.

We pray for each other, we love each other on earth, and when we go to heaven, we're a graduator to a higher level of awareness and charity, not a lesser one.

The communion is intensified with God and with our fellow believers. It is not diminished. And on that basis, we can rest with assurance on the confidence, the biblical principle, that Mary indeed is not only close to God, but close to all of us.

She is indeed the mother of all the living, the spiritual living, as Eve was, of the Old Covenant.

We are the seed of the woman. So the statement that we're children of Mary is not in conflict with the fact that we're children of God.

She is the one, by Christ's own appointment, who has this maternal relationship with each of Christ's disciples because, as He said in John 19, accept her as your mother.

Thank you. Thank you for doing this. Okay, now we'll have President Benalem. President Benalem.

Mr. Matics, you say this. I have to fix it again. This is far -reached. I hope everyone will look at the passage of 1

Kings about Solomon and Bathsheba. Does anyone in the New Testament make the application that you do of this passage to Mary?

Mr. White, that question... It's a yes or no question. Does anyone in the New Testament do what? Make the application.

Of the passage between David and Bathsheba? Yes. No, but so what? Is there anyone in the pre -Nicene period in the

Christian Church who makes the application that you make? I really don't know, Mr. White, because it's not...

It doesn't affect the validity of the analogy. Thank you very much. Now, in that passage, it is said that Solomon says to bring a throne.

Could you tell me why it wasn't there if this position was a position she held on? Mr. White, you accused

Catholics of engaging in speculation. I'm not going to follow you into that same provision. Could you just answer the question? You're asking me to speculate.

All right, that's fine. You've already said speculation is bad, so I want to follow your example and avoid it.

So there wasn't a throne for the Queen Mother there normally, was there? I don't know. Maybe it was kept in a special antechamber and brought in when she entered the king's presence.

You pointed out that Bathsheba did not actually get what she desired. Is that not a parallel also indicating that Mary would fail to get what she requested of Jesus?

Obviously, Old Testament types of Jesus fall short because they have simply been being so in types of Mary.

So when there are exceptions to the type, it just doesn't matter? No, Proxents have said that too.

Joshua was a sinner. He's a type of Jesus. You would agree with that, wouldn't you? Has it made Jesus a sinner?

Now, Mr. Matantex, you made a parallel trinity again. You admitted, well, the trinity is much more central and that's why it came about early, right?

Of course. Mr. Matantex, what is the earliest church father that you can go to to see the doctrine of the

Trinity outside of the New Testament? The doctrine or the word? The doctrine. The same type of doctrine that you've been trying to find in various of the early fathers.

Not still the words you say, but the belief. Couldn't you go to Pliny?

Obviously, you have something up your sleeve. Would you agree with me that it is a fair statement that the earliest

Ecclesiastical writing we have, say, let's take Clement, the letter of the

Corinthians, let's use Ignatius. Would you not agree with me that both of these documents, especially

Ignatius, are filled with Trinitarian passages and references to David Christ? They're just rehashes of what you have in Scripture.

You have references to the grace of God and the law of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of the Holy Ghost. Of course, the

Bible does too. So, the point is that the doctrine of the Trinity, you can find people functioning on that basis in the earliest patristic references.

Now, may I ask you if you will find anyone functioning on the basis of Mary as Queen of Heaven, Mediatrix of all graces, and that all grace accrues to men by God's will to Mary alone in any writing post -Nicene.

How far do you want to go? What's the earliest you're going to find? It's irrelevant. It's later.

In other words, you can't answer the question. I just answered it. It's going to occur at a later time.

You're going to have clear articulations of Mary's union with Jesus later than you have clear articulations of the Trinity.

You said it was a terrific injustice of me to point out how long it took for this document to be asserted and made dogma, of course, within the century.

And you can parallel this with the Council of Chalcedon, which in 451 defined that two natures of Christ.

If the amount of time indicates the importance to the Church, would it not follow that a document that is defined 1 ,500 years after the nature of Christ means that it's rather unimportant?

No. It would mean that it's rather unimportant, maybe relatively less important than other agendas that were ahead of it. And yet, can a person be in full union with the

Catholic Church, in your opinion, and reject the idea that Mary was bodily assumed death?

Mr. White, my opinion is irrelevant. You know the answer to that question. The Catholic Church teaches that you have to believe that in every fact about Mary.

Is it a fact of Revelation? Of course it is. So it's a fact of Revelation that no one knows with absolute certainty until 1 ,950 years after?

No. That's not true. The people who witnessed it certainly knew with absolute certainty.

But you don't have any evidence that they existed, do you? Of course I do. Where? In the fact that there was a tradition passed on down.

You say there was a tradition passed on down. You can't show us where it is. You admit there was a tradition passed on down, Mr. White. You simply think the tradition is not founded in fact.

But you admit there's a tradition. No, I don't. You don't. Well, that was a question.

Now it's your turn, so I guess you don't believe me. 1 ,950. Is that what you're saying? No, I'm not saying that. What I'm saying is that there was no ancient tradition that has any type of meaningful historical basis to it.

That there were eyewitnesses. You paralleled it with the resurrection of Jesus Christ, Jerry. Let's ask ourselves the question.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ. Who were the eyewitnesses? Did they write? Did they preach?

Do we have evidence of this outside of the New Testament? The answer to all of these is yes. Now we ask the question about this alleged tradition of eyewitnesses and the assumption.

Did they write? No. Did they preach? No. Does anyone outside of the Christian church or even in the Christian church ever make reference to this in the first half millennium?

No. There is no parallel. No, show it to me. Well, that was his turn to ask you a question.

So let me get that question in. Well, that was... I was answering his question. Mr.

White, you said that we can go back and demonstrate. You said there's a fundamental difference here.

We can go back and we can demonstrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. How, Mr. White, how can you demonstrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ?

Well, the same way the Christian people have been doing it for a very long time, and that is you can point to the eyewitnesses who wrote, who preached, who died for their faith.

They left us a text that is the greatest and most accurate text of any ancient document that exists in all the world.

And the very fact they went out and changed the world, and that this is even recorded for us in secular materials...

But you're precisely... I'm not making any point. I'm pointing out to you that the basis upon which we know the resurrection is not the authority of the modern

Roman Catholic Church. You have the authority. Now, see, you're putting an equivocation here. It's not the modern Roman Catholic Church.

You believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ on the authority of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Is that not correct?

And Paul, and... How do you know that Matthew wrote that gospel?

Well, first of all, this is a very interesting statement because it goes to the issue of sola scriptura, the issue of the canon, and it is interesting to me that this question continues being asked over and over again when...

I'm going to go on asking until I hear the answer. Because, first of all, whether Mark, or whether Matthew wrote

Matthew, and as you know, the gospel of Matthew does not say that, right, is not relevant to the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and you know that.

But the fact is, the only medium that you have, the point I'm trying to make, Mr. Wenger, for the audience's sake, is that the only way you know you have documents coming from my witnesses is that church fathers said this comes from an apostle, this comes from an apostolic associate,

Mark comes from Peter's associate secretary, Luke is written by Paul's companion, John is written by the

Apostle John, and that same basis in which you... Don't misunderstand my question, folks.

I accept Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, as every believing Catholic, as a valid testimony to the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

I'm not trying to sow seeds of skepticism in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, I'm simply trying to say, if you believe in that resurrection, by the very same principles, you have to believe in the other things the apostles taught.

Is that a question? Yes. My response is, they didn't teach the doctrine you're trying to parallel. With any historical evidence, you are assuming the existence of historical evidence, and I keep asking you,

Mr. Medetics, if you say that the apostles taught this, are you saying that the apostles taught this? Yes, I am.

Then show me some evidence! The passage that you cited to me in 2 Thessalonians says that we are to hold tradition that was taught to us by word, mouth, or by letter.

That passage says that those traditions had already been taught to all Thessalonians. This wasn't any secret thing.

Where is the evidence, Mr. Medetics? There isn't any evidence. You only have your own scholarly evidence.

Mr. White, you don't have the original documents the apostles wrote. You have a tradition that the documents you hold in your hand, that you hold in your testament, are faithfully transcribed and transmitted copies of the original autographs.

Yes, you do. No, sir, that is not true. All you have is the testimony of the church that the documents you have now do indeed come from the apostles.

You mean we don't have the documents themselves? You don't have the documents they wrote.

You have copies. The validity of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, sir, is not based upon someone who lived 200 or 300 years later.

It's based upon the fact that you've been given a patrimony. You've been given something that says, this comes from the apostles.

Now, if you're going to... If you're going to... You're arguing in circles. You don't know if they're scriptures if the people who tell you they're scriptures are untrustworthy.

Now, those same people also give traditions saying the apostles taught special things about marriage.

If you impeach those witnesses and say, those church prophets don't know what the heck they're talking about, you have no way of knowing that they're giving you a

Bible you can trust. Athanasius gave me... Athanasius gave me the same canon in the new testament

I have. Show me one place where you're taught about Assumption of Marriage or Queen of Coronation. I don't have to... How about in the councils?

Hippo? Carthage? I don't want Mr. White. You're making the assertion that they taught these same things and I'm undercutting my own self.

They didn't teach you the same things. I don't have to demonstrate that every single church father taught every single thing.

How about just one of them? Anybody that wants can pick up any edition even by a protestant like J.

M. D. Kelly, Mr. White. You can get published by Oxford University Press the early

Christian fathers, later Christian fathers, and you will find testimony by the early Christian fathers, the same ones who testify to the apostolic origins and authorship of these books.

You will hear them talking, saying things about Mary, for that matter, about Peter and Christ, about Baptism, that Mr. White rejects.

That is my point. Are you saying that they're teaching the

Queenly Coronation of Mary and the Body of Assumption? Not in the detail that it's taught in. Of course not.

They taught the Divinity of Christ in the way that it was defined centuries after them.

That is untrue. They did teach the Divinity of Christ in very plain lessons. Okay, now we'll have our closing verse by Mr.

White. We have audience questions after this. This could be interesting.

My friends, we've been here a long time and we've argued a lot of things. I'm not going to give you three minutes.

I'm not going to give you any statements written out or anything else at this point. I just want to invite you to think.

To begin, I ask you to examine the arguments placed before you. Do they assume things not in evidence?

Are they certain? Are they based upon authority claims, such as the authority claims based upon the

Catholic Church? I ask you to examine the biblical argumentation. Does it partake of the original meanings of the words, or does it read meanings into words that were never part of what the original authors said?

I ask you to examine all these things. And I honestly believe that you will do so outside of the heat of battle, maybe tomorrow in your opportunity to review some of these things with the truth being evident to you.

I simply want to close by pointing out that what we are talking about in regards to Mary being the

Queen of Heaven dispenser of graces simply is the capstone of what

I've said from the beginning. The Roman Catholic doctrine of Mary parallels Jesus Christ.

Mr. Matthews keeps saying, oh, that's because she's a picture of the Church, but it doesn't show us in the New Testament that she is a picture of the Church. That is a hermeneutic that you must assume before you come up with anything at all, but even then it does not follow.

Jesus Christ is the sole mediator between God and men because the term is used there does not have anything to do with well, just pray for somebody.

I want you to admit that we couldn't. Jesus Christ is the sole mediator between God and men because grace by its very nature is divine and Jesus Christ as the divine

God man gives us grace. And my friends, if any of you can read that prayer that I read, if any of you here this evening fear the name of Jesus, if any of you fear that you have to pray to Mary to protect you from your sins, the devils and Jesus, I want to introduce you to a

Jesus that you do not have to fear. Whose blood was shed for your sins, whose grace is sufficient for you without anyone coming between you and him.

The fact is because the sufficiency of His word, the writer of Hebrews says, we can come with boldness before the throne of grace.

For immediate, immediate grace that our Lord Jesus gives to us.

All the arguments inside, all the disagreements, this is an important discussion.

It has to do with how we're saved. It has to do with the authority by which we know the gospel itself. So whatever you do, do not let the time you walk out of this door be the last time you think about this issue.

Look up the references. Do the homework. I challenge you to do it in God's name. Final closing by Mr.

Mansfield. I'm going to ignore Mr. White's cheap shot at the beginning of this evening about being uncomfortable in a

Catholic dialogue about being this close, this close proximity to wood and fire. Because the fact is that of course both

Catholics and Protestants put each other to death at a time and an age when people thought the truth was absolute.

I hope that behind Mr. White's jive is not some sort of doubt that when

God spoke about the strong mission being taken against people in the area of the

Bible that God himself was somehow unjust. But the fact is that gets us nowhere.

The point is, who can, as he said, present the truth? We have made several statements tonight that I would like to reiterate.

First of all, I would like to deny that the arguments I've made are circular. Mr. White has said that all evening long.

But he's not given us a single example of a circular argument. Again, it's not that it's based on his part. If you want to shove an argument circularly, you've got to show the person presupposes what they set out to prove.

And he hasn't done that once. I would argue that by his own standard, Mr. White fails because he has read things into certain passages that say, come on, are we supposed to believe that Luke believed what the

Catholic Church said or that Mary believed about herself or what the Catholic Church said about her? Clearly not.

That, folks, is a circular argument. There's no proof. Mr. White can't show us an x -ray of what St. Luke was thinking or what the

Blessed Mother was thinking. Secondly, he said you should avoid anyone who reads meanings into words.

And yet, Mr. White said, for example, in Matthew 1, 25, and he did this throughout the evening, that clearly the verse means that Joseph had abstained from secular relations only, he said, for his words, quote, only until Jesus was born.

Now, the word only isn't there in the verse. Look it up yourself. It doesn't say that Joseph abstained from relations only until he was born.

That reminds me of Luther adding the word only to all the references to salvation justification by faith. We believe justification by faith, but not by faith only or by faith alone.

It's an undeniable concept. James 6, 24 says so. We're described by words and not by faith alone. It's a heresy.

Mr. White also said that the Roman Catholic doctrine parallels Jesus Christ. And again, I do feel that there's this either -or dichotomy.

Calvinism is rife with this fear that the Church can somehow share in the glory of Christ.

Not in the sense in which God forbids it, but in the sense in which God generously shares His grace with us.

The union of the Church with Christ, a union so intimate that it's described as being a union of body with head, of wife with husband, is a biblical concept.

The fact that the Church must share Christ's authority, share Christ's glory, not by virtue of our own powers or merits, but simply by the gift of God's grace, is a biblical concept.

So if Mary again shares those things, there's nothing contrary to Scripture in that at all. Mr. White has accused

Mary of being a sinner, having other children, dying, and by implication she was about to be molering somewhere in some grave, and yet he hasn't given evidence for this anywhere, either in Scripture or in history.

I say innocence will prove guilty, since Mr. White is not in any biblical verses proving these things. Mr. White loses weight as our standard.

He cannot prove the concertions that he has made, because there are no biblical verses which teach that Mary had her children, which teach that Mary sinned, which teach that Mary's body corrupted, or which teach that Mary can't hear our prayers or has no interest in praying for us in heaven, or being a means through which

God dispenses grace. As He used each of us, as He used the Apostles. Thank you. Now I think it's

I think it's appropriate for you to express your appreciation for these two very intelligent people as well as for the

Quarrel House which is very hospitable to us. Come to the

Quarrel House next time you've been at the Bar Mitzvah. I would just like to thank you

I'd like to thank you both again for your time, your effort, your preparation, your delivery. It's more taxing than I'm sure you can begin to understand.

Thank you. And in the spirit of fellowship that Jesus calls us to trust with and that Paul exhorts us to, might

I address three brief questions from Samantha? Thank you very much. Regarding the term

Queen of Heaven, as you know, the Bride of Christ, the Church, the called -out people that have covered

Christ's blood, and will have in each generation, is the Bride of Christ, the Queen of Heaven, and there can't be two queens.

Should not her title be Princess Angel? Is the Church subject only to her? And also, as you recall, in the ancient

Babylonian religion, her title, the mother of the temple, the baby mother, was Queen of Heaven.

And as you know, Babylonia was a system set up in direct proposition to everything God stands for, set up by Nimrod.

Let me answer that first question. The mere fact that a title is found in a pagan religion doesn't mean that it's not also biblical or consonant with the biblical religion.

I mean, in the Old Testament, God is referred to as Lord. The Canaanite term used here would be

Baal, but it was Baal -worshipped by the Phoenicians. But the fact that the Phoenicians or pagans referred their deity as Lord does not mean that it would be blasphemous for Abraham to refer his true

God as Lord. So the fact that Babylonians referred to Ishtar as Queen of Heaven doesn't disprove that there could not be a real queen, but you yourself admitted that the church is the

Queen of Heaven. So your argument would attack not only Roman Catholicism, but Protestantism even for saying that the church is queen.

The fact that she's queen is clear from the fact that she's the spouse of Christ, who is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords?

There was another part to your question in the first part that I... Oh, can there not be two queens then?

Oh yeah, okay. Again, it's either -or dichotomy. Mary is part of the church, you see.

So if the church is the queen, the spouse of Christ the King, then Mary as a disciple, as a saved one, is going to be legitimately recipient of the title as well.

Thank you. I understand your explanation as a Roman Catholic, a 43 -year -old Christian. Okay, I'm starting to come back. The best is to write down and don't respond.

We can't go on to look. Two quick points. I think that there's great wisdom in the

Apostle said not to go beyond what is written. And when you go beyond what God has revealed in God's written scripture, you end up in all sorts of areas of speculation that end up leading to all sorts of difficulties, which is what we have here.

Secondly, in regards to the relationship of the Marian doctrines as Philip Schaff said, I'll just remind you of it.

During the medieval period, most historians do recognize that there was a tremendous amount of impact of these false relations upon the development of Mariology.

You probably had to have been in Brazil to see a lot of the same type of thing happening together today in popular tradition.

That's all I have to say. Next. Second question. When a woman told Jesus... I'm sorry.

We can't hear that. We have 50 people. We have 50 people.

Please, thank you. When a woman asked Jesus blessed is the woman I worry, Jesus replied rather blessed is those to whom he the word of God.

But he believes in the church at the same or higher level of standing in his kingdom than his mother. If there ever was a place for Jesus to institute or establish veneration on his mother, this would have been it.

But the word he used to concern the woman was not one of contradiction, that she isn't blessed, but rather a gentle correction.

He did not want that woman to leave that area thinking that what she said was correct. He told her blessed rather are the believers.

I think it's a fundamental misreading of the passage. Any idea that Christ, the best of sons, was trying to publicly belittle his mother is absurd and not blasphemous.

Jesus is showing, he's taking people's elevated thinking from a physical to a spiritual level.

He doesn't say Mary's not blessed. Again, we read into the passage what we want to find there. He says, yea, rather.

He says, I'll show you a higher blessing, those who hear the word of God and do it. That applied to Mary as well.

Jesus' point is that the mere physical union with me is not the highest possible union.

That it would be greater to hear the word of God and do it. That establishes the true supernatural family.

But Mary had both. She had an intimate physical union with Jesus. In fact, I didn't have the time to develop the fact that, remember, our lady had the closest biological intimacy with Christ.

Her womb actually was the tabernacle in which God presided for nine months. And to argue that God, who would not come down upon an ark or dwell in an ark that was anything less than perfect and had to be golden would have inhabited the womb of us.

A sinful woman for nine months. A sinful womb is to misunderstand all the scriptures and teachings of the

Old Testament. But Jesus' point is that yes, there's a higher and greater blessing and Mary has it too.

So she still outstrips us. She has the physical plus the spiritual union. Unless you want to deny that Mary was a believer. I don't think any

Protestant should want to deny that. But yeah, he would really be without evidence for that. Very quickly, I just think I want you to hear what was just said.

Jerry admits that it is a higher blessing to do the word of God and to believe in the word of God.

But Mary has that blessing as well, he says. And yet I just ask you to think. Is that all

Rome is really saying about Mary? Or is she not in a singularly unique position that is much higher than any blessing that's put upon a person who simply obeys the scripture?

We are not queens of heaven obviously. And so there is obviously a higher blessing from the Roman perspective.

It just doesn't fall. Next question. Thank you very much. Mr. White, can you do me a favor?

I think that is it possible that you can poll the Catholics here and ask them, because you continue to dislike about Catholics worshipping

Mary, can you ask all the Catholics here, as we exit, do you worship Mary and take a tally of yeses and noes?

And I would guarantee scholarly that it won't happen before they know. So continue to perpetuate that lie.

It's very unfair. Why do you continue to do that, someone so scholarly and so articulate as yourself?

I'm not too smart, but it doesn't go over my head. Perhaps you didn't listen closely.

I listened very closely. I read Philip Schaap. Philip Schaap used the term worship.

I am not. Excuse me. I asked you to ask the Catholics here. This is not a debate.

I'm going to ask you a question for you now. I recognize the differentiation between Lottery of Julia and Hyper Julia in Roman Catholic theology.

I reject it as a biblical basis. In fact, it is contradicted by the use of the term mahab in Hebrew, and the

Greek terms are translated in the Septuagint. There is no New Testament basis for differentiating between Lottery of and Julia.

Hence, I would say to you that veneration or hyper veneration is the same as worship, but I recognize, and in my writings and Mr.

Mattox will have to verify this, very carefully distinguish between the two and accurately represent their own

Catholic position that you claim you do not worship Mary, but that you venerate Mary. The only terms

I used of worship in my statement was when I was greeting Philip Schaaf, who himself said that the distinctions between Lottery of Julia and Hyper Julia do not...

What do you personally believe of Catholics, Mr. White? Do we worship Mary? I believe that the distinction between Lottery and Julia is endless, and yes, it means worship.

Yes. So, I'm representing all the Catholics here. We do not worship Mary, so let's put an end to the lie.

We believe that Mary... Prayer is an act of worship to God.

If you pray to Mary, you are worshiping her. That is the principle. Because we know she's in heaven.

We say, Mary, pray for us. We do not pray to Mary. Why would you believe someone who does not pray to Mary?

I do that. I know what I do. Please don't stop me. I'm only asking questions, I'm not taking any of your speakers.

Just ask a question. The very fact that Catholics say, pray for us, who have recourse to thee, proves that he or she understands that Mary is not

God. If he asks her to pray for us, then he is a being, and there is a higher being than Mary.

Obviously, there is some unfortunate confusion on this issue, but I don't think it exists, frankly, in the minds of Catholics.

I think it's a bugaboo that Protestant apologists have concocted. I don't claim that all

Catholics' prayer life and spiritual life is as completely precise as it should be.

We don't claim that. But the teaching of the Catholic Church in word and deed has never been that Mary is

God. There is an infinite gulf between any creature however exalted and the creator. God alone is omniscient,

God alone is omnipotent, God alone is eternal, and Mary is a creature, and there is a clear indication of that.

By the way, the word worship is used in the King James Bible, 1 Chronicles 29 .20, and they vowed themselves to worship

God and then the king. Clearly, this example of worship is used in an attenuated sense. In other words, it means to recognize the worth of someone, and it depends on the type of being you're acknowledging.

God is in a class by himself, so when we acknowledge his worth, we are not doing anything even remotely resembling what we do when we recognize the worth that God has given

Mary. Okay, one question and no debating. Go ahead. I recently spoke to another

Protestant who said that Catholics are wrong when they kneel to Mary to pray or to the saints.

I think that's the way this person put it. And I said, no, we do, yes, we do kneel when we pray to Mary or to the saints or to God because it's an appropriate attitude and posture for us because we are below the saints, we are below Mary, we're below God in our station and our position in this world because we don't have we haven't achieved samehood, we haven't arrived to that position in heaven.

So therefore, the attitude of kneeling and praying is appropriate. In times before, people would kneel when they approached a king or a queen in olden days.

And so this is What's the question? Well, I'm just making the point that it's a wrong and wrongeous thing for Protestants to think that it's wrong for people to pray when they kneel and that in Protestant churches, as a matter of fact, they don't even kneel, there are no kneelers.

So if they mention Christ's name and they don't kneel, they're breaking the law of God.

They simply say every kneel, every knee should bend and then we catch a bow at the mention of Jesus.

I've never seen a Protestant church where there are no kneelers. Alright, next. Hi. There were questions.

Well, I think there was one thing that needs to be commented on there and that was, first of all, the lady does talk about praying to Mary in the previous

I don't pray to Mary, and so I think there's a problem. My statement was made, we're lower than saints.

My friends, if you are redeemed in the blood of Jesus Christ, you are as much a saint than any other person.

The idea that there is excess merit that is gained by doing works in the state of grace is undivisible and it denies the perfection of the righteousness of Christ and so you're not below any saint.

I would badly disagree. There is no place in the Bible to support that kind of radical egalitarian idea that we're all on the same level of grace or merit.

I know that's a common idea in our New World Order. It's not a biblical one. The Bible shows degrees of glory to the degrees of punishment in hell.

God gives talents, some ten, some five, and some two, and that all the statements about the effective prayers of a righteous man accomplishing much would be completely meaningless if we were all equally righteous in every sense of the word.

The Bible says to follow after the holy mission, for that was known to the Lord. In terms of kneeling, I agree that there are societies which have required people to kneel, to be knighted, to kneel in various situations in a superior men kneel before their wives when they propose to them.

That is not an act of worship, although I certainly acknowledge my wife's a higher order of being a knight, but that wouldn't take much.

But kneeling is not per se some offensive or dishonoring to God posture. Please, from now on, just ask a question.

Let's see if somebody can actually ask a question. I'd like to thank you both very much.

The gift that God has bestowed on you is one like none else. I only wish that this energy that you share with us could unite us and make us true followers of Christ if we call ourselves

Christians. Question.

I'd like to ask you both to pray for me. And also, there's one other question that's been bothering me with Scripture because I'm not a scholar by any means.

And that is, and that is, where in the

Bible does it say so the

Scripture alone? I thank you. Since not everyone believes it there, and Mr.

Maddox doesn't, first of all, I'd like to simply state that I'm not making this something that he has to do.

But I think it's pretty obvious tonight that Sola Scriptura is at the bottom of our disagreements. And I would like to invite

Mr. Maddox, should the kind folks who have beaten themselves to death putting this one together want to do it again sometime in the near future,

I'd invite Mr. Maddox to come back and debate on Sola Scriptura, and I'd like to see if he'd be the first one who would positively defend the positive claims of Rome in regards to the infallibility of the teaching magisterium in Rome.

I would be more than happy to engage in a full debate on that subject before you because I think it's vitally important.

And I think, if you ask Mr. Maddox, do you make our Omaha debate available through your catalogs?

Absolutely, yes. Both of us make available through our ministries how long was it, two and a half?

Three hours. A two and a half, three hour debate that he and I did on a very cold November night in November of 1992 on this very issue.

And so, I would direct you to that. Where does the Bible teach it? The Bible teaches the

Sola Scriptura. You need to understand Sola Scriptura. It's a positive claim that the Bible is the sole and valid rule of faith in the

Church. It is a negative claim that there is no other valid rule of faith in the Church. I believe it teaches it in passages such as Matthew 15, 1 -9, where all traditions are subject to the higher authority of Scripture, and 2

Timothy 3 -16 -17, where Manshaw is equipped to do all good works by the

Scriptures. I cannot defend those two statements in 30 seconds. I do so very thoroughly in the book, in the debate against Mr.

Maddox. I'd be glad to do so again in your book. By the way, whoever has the pad going around, name some addresses, bring it up.

Oh, there's a book right here, called Sola Scriptura. And finally,

I'm sure Jerry has probably lamented this, but I think Jerry will admit this is the first book that's come out in many, many years on the subject of Sola Scriptura, and that addresses the issue of the

Bible. I would be happy to, as the Church said, Mr.

Weiss, to come and debate here on Sola Scriptura. We have debated before, and frankly, I'm skeptical as to whether we're going to achieve or accomplish anything new.

I think with all due respect and in all humility that I've done an adequate job in that debate and many other debates showing that the phrase

Sola Scriptura does not occur in the Bible, but the concept does not occur in the Bible. The Word of God is the supreme authority, yes, but the

Word of God comes in a primarily oral fashion throughout the Old Testament. It's binding on people, whether it's written down or not.

Jesus' preaching was binding, even if it wasn't written. The Apostles' preaching was binding and most of it was oral and not verbal.

And St. Paul says to hold fast to all the traditions, whether they are oral or written. So the concept of Sola Scriptura is not there.

Mr. Weiss read something into Matthew 15. It doesn't say all traditions are accountable to Scripture.

It says the traditions of men are in subjection to the Word of God. He reads into the phrase

Word of God. The presupposition Word of God is always a written thing of the Scripture, but I would be happy to debate him again on that if God could bring any good to him whatsoever.

And I would agree with him that it is basically at the root of this. I think the root error of Protestantism is this unscriptural notion of Sola Scriptura.

It's nowhere taught in Scripture. Once you begin to question that, then the whole edifice of Protestantism becomes collapsing.

We appear to be missing the pad that went around with people's names and addresses, so anybody who wants to be on the mailing list, at the end of the night, you can leave your name and address up here.

Now on, please, just unlike Dan Rather, who doesn't know the difference between opinion and fact, let's get people to know the difference between name and subject.

Thank you very much. Dr. Weiss. Thank you to the debaters, and especially to Laura Bar, our patient moderator.

My question is principally for Mr. Weiss. How can we defend, first of all, a

Babylon connection? You are very slow to point out the historical

Babylon connection of the Catholic religion. My question for you is, is the reason for that is that you are vulnerable for lack of Sola Scriptura on the

Seventh -day Sabbath, which is the fourth commandment, which you do not observe, on the Babylonian Feast Days, which you observe as the

Catholics have taught you, on the suppression of the sacred divine name of Yahweh, the Tetragrammon, and also on the three -person doctrine which you've inherited from the

Catholics. Do not all of these make you a flagrant violator, also, of your concept of Sola Scriptura?

No. I mean, there were fourteen different things that were presented there that, obviously, you have your own agenda, and I'm not going to debate you on them, but the answer is, the reason that I don't go for Babylonian connections is because I don't think that they're strong,

I don't think that they're valid, and there's no reason to pursue them. All they do is create all sorts of emotional heat and very little light, and therefore,

I think that the American doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church failed on the biblical and historical evidence without having to appeal to anything else.

That's all there is to it. You did answer about fourteen things. I'll waste my time because I'm having a hard time.

Next question. Please make it short for me to get everybody.

I don't want to stay here all night, but I don't know if the Coral House, I don't know, would be good. I literally wouldn't stay here.

In fact, when we're thrown out, if someone wants to leave you for days or somewhere, we can go all night. I'd be happy to go with you if you want.

I've got to get to the western sphere before I can get to Sam. Okay, I'm going to make this short then for you.

Mr. Matitix, I have a question regarding the relationship of the supposed oral tradition of the

Word of God in the Roman Catholic Church and its relationship to the written Word of God which we Protestants affirm.

My question is this. Can there be a tradition in the church that is accepted to be the

Word of God and is therefore binding upon the consciences of Roman Catholics that has no referent whatsoever in the

Holy Scriptures? If there has to be a referent, why is this necessary?

If there doesn't have to be a referent rooted in the Word of God, why should Catholics be troubled about any official teaching of the

Roman Catholic Church that's not rooted in Scripture? Excellent question. First of all, understand that the preaching of Jesus to the apostles, truths connect other truths.

It's like a big, you know, finger toy system or like a fabric, a tapestry. So you expect, even in the

Bible, you can see that the teaching on salvation has correlations or connections with the teaching of the church and the teaching of eschatology and the teaching of baptism.

Even though we can make logical distinctions, you would expect that what you learn about baptism is consonant with what you learn about discipleship or the

Eucharist or what have you. Do you see what I'm saying? The Catholic would look for that same sort of consistency and connectivity in the

Word of God as Catholics understand it as being both written and oral. So, even though not every

Catholic teaching such as the Magna Conception has to have full -blown explicit formula in Scripture, there should at least be echoes or reverberations of what was being taught orally that wasn't written down.

There would be things in Scripture that would, you know, resonate to that. And there would be nothing, certainly in Scripture, that would conflict with that.

There could be no teaching that was taught orally by the Apostle Paul that would contradict something he wrote down that would make it consistent.

It's all coming from the same mouth. But the last thing I want to say is this.

You have to understand that even if we were all Protestants here, and there were no such thing as Catholics, we would disagree on what certain passages from Scripture mean.

And St. Peter warns us in 2 Peter 3 .16 that there are some things in Scripture, not everything, but some things that are hard to understand.

So, please factor into your equation the fact that Protestants who only restrict themselves to a body of materials, they all agree on the parameters of it.

They say, we only follow the Bible. Even they disagree on things like the rapture, women as ordained ministers, infant baptisms, speaking in tongues, how often we should have the

Eucharist, whether we should have it, and all those types of things. And so, if Scripture alone would solve the dispute and have us all walk out of here hand in hand, then it would have done that 500 years ago, and it hasn't.

So, in addition to Scripture, which is an infallible authority, it is God's inspired, infallible, unwritten word, in addition to tradition, you still need that entity which the

Bible itself points to, the pillar and foundation of the truth, 1 Timothy 15.

The Church of God. The Church can tell us whether we're interpreting Scripture erroneously or not.

This very fact that we've had a debate tonight proves that, folks. If you needed an authoritative church that Jesus can say, let him hear the church,

Matthew 18, then we never would have been here to debate. It's not a question of Jerry's opinions versus James White's opinions.

We could back that back and forth all night. The very fact that we're here disputing so vigorously proves that Mr.

White and I need an umpire, a supreme court that can call the shots. Interestingly enough, there are only

Catholics that sit over here in Bay Area, and a number of decisions demonstrate that the argument that Scripture is not very theological unity, somehow proving

Sola Scriptura is wrong, also works in demonstrating that you can find a huge variety of beliefs amongst non -Catholics.

Does that mean that the Church is also insufficient? Let's be consistent. My turn, my turn, my turn,

Jerry. You've got about three minutes there. One very, very simple statement. When you discuss

Sola Scriptura, never ever forget that the choice you have to make is between the

God -breathed Scriptures, as the sole and valid rule of faith, or the Church, as the sole and valid rule of faith.

Sola Scriptura versus Sola Ecclesia, because the Church defines the canon, the

Church defines the interpretation of Scripture, the Church defines what is and what is not tradition, the Church defines what tradition does and does not say.

It's not a three -legged stool, it's a one -legged stool. The choice is between Sola Scriptura and Sola Ecclesia.

That is the choice that has to be made, and that's what we need to debate. Question. My question is for Mr.

Weiss. On the subject of Mary conceived without sin, how is it possible for God to choose anything other than a pure vessel for the nine months of conception for His son, our

Lord Jesus Christ? The overshadowing of the Holy Spirit is more than enough to sanctify any vessel in which the child

Jesus would be born. There is nothing, it is really to my perspective, a Gnostic concept that there has to be somehow this mystical separation.

And the simple fact of the matter is you could make the same argument in regards to the Lord Jesus surrounding

Himself for three years with apostles who were filled with doubt, filled with wrong ideas, filled with sin, and yet He associated

Himself with those individuals and brought them to redemption. You may disagree with that if you want, sir, but that's your point.

I get a chance to comment. I think there's a world of difference, Mr. Weiss. Obviously Jesus came to save sinners.

He was a friend of drunkards and immoral people and so forth.

But the gentleman's question was really about all the pedagogy that God undertook in the

Old Testament to say that that ark had to be just so. It had to be according to His exact specifications and ten times in Ages 40 we read that it was done exactly as God commanded.

And when it's all done according to God's precise measurements and prescriptions, then God comes down in the glory cloud and indwells it.

And the point is somehow lost, I guess, on Protestants, that if God demanded that much exactitude in an

Old Testament type that as Hebrews 10 says, the law was only a shadow of the fullness of Christ, then how much more would

God demand that the womb which literally physically housed Jesus, no comparison to the man and the people who lived with them or where would it stop?

That womb had to also be a holy, sanctified womb. Next question.

Yes. This is for Dr. White. It seems to me that a large majority of your argument for the illegitimacy of church doctrine is based on the lack of writings by the church.

You mentioned in particular between the centuries of the 1st and 7th, very early.

Do you think you could tell me, Mr. Matics, what's the percentage of documents that have survived that period of time?

Well, of course, it leads to that question and I have to know what all the documents were and then know how many of them have gotten lost, and of course

I can't. I mean, it is a fact that church fathers do refer to other treatises that are now lost. We have only fragments, for example, of the writings of Pappius, who was a direct disciple of the

Apostle John. And it would be nice to have the whole thing.

We have only fragments of the commentaries of Hippolytus on Daniel, Prophet Daniel, and other things.

So we know things got lost throughout this time. We know even that God in his inscrutable wisdom chose to allow even some of the writings of the

Apostles to get lost, because Paul, in what we call 1 Corinthians, refers to a previous peninsula. My point is not that point.

It's not a question of the percentage that survived. My point is that the Protestant approaches this whole question with a preconceived notion that only written down stuff is really good and reliable.

And I'm saying that's a Protestant cultural prejudice that the Bible itself does not support.

For thousands of years, what God taught Adam, and Eve, and Abel, and Seth, and Noah, was faithfully transmitted long before the first mention of writings in the book of Exodus.

And God nowhere operates with the presupposition that orally transmitted truth is bound to go awry.

And I'm sick of all the analogies to the party game of whispering in the next guy's ear and so forth. Yes, in a human situation, by the time it hits the 10th verse, the line can be all garbled, but that can be true of human writings too.

God superintended the process which was written orally to preserve the truth. That's my point.

Before you address the question,

I'd just like to add to it. I just wanted to comment that there were, considering the persecution that the

Christians went through during that period of time, it can only be assumed that there wasn't really that much written. There's a huge body of literature.

38 volumes just of a select library of documents up until that period of time that Mr.

Manatee makes reference to. It is fascinating to me, what we're being asked to believe is that these doctrines are apostolic in origin and when we ask the question, show us we're told we don't need to.

But when we talk about other doctrines, oh we're very quick to point to the early church, or we're very quick to say, oh well, you can't find anyone who believed the soul of Scriptura in the early church, so therefore it must not be true.

There is a huge double standard going on here. The simple fact of the matter is, if you take the time to look at Ott, look at Roman Catholic historians, look at any work that deals with the history of the church, there is plenty of documentary evidence to allow us to reconstruct the theology of these individuals.

Many of them wrote, I mean Origen wrote thousands of volumes, and we have a large portion of that.

The simple fact of the matter is, while I continue to point this out, is that Mr. Medetic says these doctrines were delivered by the apostles.

Where do you have evidence of it? You have to assume that it was orally transmitted without ever stumbling into the life of the church, the liturgy of the church, the writings of the church, until long after the events took place, and those of us who don't automatically accept the authority claims of Rome seem to be somewhat skeptical

Next question. We only have time for five more minutes.

Okay, Mr. Medetic, you had said that Mary was without sin, and now she's up in heaven and she's interceding for us.

Well, then that makes her supernatural. Why didn't Jesus, when she was on earth, when she was on earth, why didn't

Jesus make her supernatural? And why didn't he tell people to go to her, and to talk to her, and to learn from her?

He told people to learn from him, and he never sent anybody to her for that.

And on the line of interceding, in the Old Testament, the other intercessors, when they were interceding on the parts of other people, were not praying to themselves as the intercessor.

They were praying to God for those people, so they were not interceding in the same way that Mary is supposed to be interceding for us because Mary was up in heaven.

So that does not parallel the same interceding. And the other thing is, is that when

Lucifer was up in heaven, God didn't want anybody near his level.

God is a jealous God, and God wants worship to him alone.

He doesn't want anything nearby him, and nothing is compared to him. So why would he send, why would he make

Lucifer leave heaven? Because he wanted to be like God. And everyone in the, and we are worshiping, those who pray to Mary are worshiping

Mary, because they are giving her honor and glory when all the honor and glory is to go to God and God alone.

Where's the answer to these questions? There really weren't questions, there were statements, but let me respond to them.

First of all, if you're willing to believe what the Bible teaches, and you really are, then read very carefully the references to the scenes in heaven that were shown in the last book of the

New Testament, the book of Revelation, the Apocalypse of St. John. There we see beings surrounding the throne of God who are involved in perpetual worship of God.

They are also aware of what's going on on earth, and they ask God to intercede and rejoice when

God pours out his judgments. And we read that the 24 elders pulled up bowls of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.

Now, I don't care how you interpret the word saints. You can say it refers to the people already completely sanctified in heaven.

Or you can say no, like Mr. White might want to say, I don't know what words it's about, but you might say no, saints refers to the prayers of God's people on earth.

You and I are saints. The fact is, you're still showing, however you cut it, you can't escape the fact that the

Bible shows you beings in heaven holding up something that is mediating the prayers, let's say of the people on earth, to God.

They have a part to play in it, but the fact that they're directing everything to God shows that God is still central.

They're not directing it simply to themselves and saying, we don't need God. The same is true of whether they're the oldest intercessors like Moses and Elias on earth, aligned in praying and the heavens being shut, or once these people are brought to heaven, they're going to go on loving their fellow

Israelites. You're going to go on praying. You and I are going to go on. So, the point is that there is no conflict between the uniqueness of God.

There is a requirement that we pray for one another. That requirement doesn't stop when we die. There was a first part to your question.

How do we know that? Is there something that says in the Bible that we're going to be praying for one another? I just told you in the book of Revelation. How do we know it's not angels?

How do we know it's not angels out there? Well, if it's angels, then all the more it's saints, because the Bible says that saints will have a higher status in heaven than angels.

Can I just ask one more question really quick? If it says there's one intercessor between God and man, where is there somewhere that says that Mary is an intercessor between God and man?

No scripture there. I think we're not going to be able to answer all these questions before... I'd be happy to talk to you after.

Yeah, you can follow these two along as Mary. I live in Phoenix, son.