23. St. Matthew
says that Joseph knew her not till she brought forth her first-born son.
Nor did he. And the expression "till" in Hebrew usage has
no necessary reference to the future. Thus in Gen. VIII., 7, we read that
"the dove went forth from the ark and did not return till the waters dried
up." That expression does not suggest that it returned then. It did not
return at all, having found resting places. Nor does the expression firstborn
child imply that there were other children afterwards.
Thus Exodus says,
"Every first-born shall be sanctified unto God." Parents had not to
wait to see if other children were born before they could call the first their
first-born!
24. Matt. XIII, 55-56,
says, "His brethren James and Joseph, and Simon and Jude: and his sisters, are they not all with us?"
The Jewish expression
"brothers and sisters of the Lord" in Scripture merely refers to relationship
in the same tribe or stock. Cousins often came under that title. In all
nations the word brother has a wide significance, as when one Mason will call
another a brother Mason without suggesting that he was born of the same mother.
The same St. Matthew speaks explicitly of "Mary, the mother of James and
Joseph" in XXVII., 56, obviously alluding to a
Mary who was not the mother of Jesus but who was married to Cleophas, the
brother of Joseph.
25. There would not be
two girls in the one family called Mary.
There certainly could be.
And St. John XIX., 25, writes that there stood by the cross of Jesus "His
mother, and His mother's sister, Mary of Cleophas." But even here, Mary of
Cleophas need not have been a sister in the first degree of blood-relationship,
but rather of the same lineage in more remote degrees of either consanguinity
or affinity.
26. Why are
Protestants, who believe in Scripture, so convinced that Mary had other
children?
They are not inspired by
love for Christ, or for the mother of Christ, or for
Scripture in their doctrine. Their main desire is to maintain a doctrine
differing from that of the Catholic Church. But it is a position which is
rapidly going out of fashion. Learned Protestant scholars today deny as
emphatically as any Catholic that Mary had other children. When Our Lord, dying
on the cross, commended His mother to the care of
27. You urge these
privileges granted to Mary as the foundation of your devotion to her, yet
Christ said, "Rather blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep
it." Luke XI, 28.
Would you presume to say
that Mary, whom the angel addressed as full of grace, did not hear the Word of
God and keep it? You have missed the sense of the passage to which you allude.
In Luke XL, 27, a woman praised the one who had the honor to be the mother of
Christ. Christ did not for a moment deny it, as you would like to believe. The
sense of His words is simple, "Yes, she is blessed. But better to hear
God's word and keep it, thus attain holiness, than to be My
mother. You cannot all imitate Mary by being My mother; but you can do so by
hearing God's word and keeping it" The thought that those who hear God's
word and keep it are rather blessed than Mary because she did not is simply
absurd. "Henceforth," declared Mary prophetically, "all
generations shall call me blessed." Lk. I., 48. And
(From the
booklet "Quizzes to a Street Preacher, Virgin and Statue Worship")
http://www.prayrosary.com/shoppingcart/vitem-q&a.php3