www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Reflection on Immaculate Conception

The main objection I have heard against the Immaculate Conception from Eastern/Oriental Christians is that it deprives Mary of her humanity. The dogma apparently insists that Mary cannot sin and thus deprives her of the free will (and the attendant struggles) to resist sin. Thus, I have heard it argued, she cannot rationally be set as the model of humanity that both Orthodox and Catholics honor her to be.

I have just finished reading the words of the dogma. There is actually nothing in the dogma that says that Mary CANNOT sin - it simply says that she was preserved from original sin/ the effects of ancestral sin.

I am wondering what causes opponents of this dogma to assert that the dogma of the IC causes Mary to lose her free will. The way I see it, Mary, by the application of Christ's eternal merits from the cross, was simply created in the same state as Adam and Eve BEFORE the Fall. Do the Orthodox assert that Adam and Eve did not have free will before the Fall? If this is not the case, the Orthodox argument against the IC does not seem to make sense.

Comments?

Blessings,
Marduk

It does not answer your question, but the argument I've always heard is against the idea of original sin meaning the sharing in Adam's guilt. The argument goes that Adam's guilt was not passed to us, so Mary did not need to be spared from it. In that light, the idea that his guilt *was* passed to us sets Mary aside as not sharing in the fullness of what it means for us to be human. Obviously, it is not the "fullness" of humanity to have a stain of guilt on one's soul, so the argument tends to fall back on itself when trying to integrate both theologies into one.