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Re: the above,

No offense meant to my Orthodox brother Andrew...

Have a great trip if you read this, and may God bless.....

In Christ,
Alice

I don't see any problem or any sense in which we're trying to have it both ways. Mary is sinless by grace, while Christ is sinless by nature. Her sinlessness was a gift FROM God. Christ's sinlessness is intrinsic to His very being because He IS God.

As Emily Litella would say, "Oooh, that's very different!"

And don't forget Enoch (mentioned as Number Seven (! ! ! !) in the genealogical list) and Moses!

Dear Theist Girl,

What you have said is SO profound, my sister!

Did you read that somewhere or was it your own enlightenment? In any case, it makes alot of sense, and I will try to remember it as accurately as I can.

God bless you.

In Christ,
Alice

Reader Andrew,

I guess we will have to disagree. I do not agree that had Adam and Eve not sinned they would have had the same life whether or not Christ became incarnate.

Christ took on our fallen nature and subjected himself to the natural law, though he indeed remained sinless. Although I must say refering to Christ as sinless is a bit redundant. Of course he is sinless, He is God and He can hardly sin against himself. And this is what makes his condescension all the more amazing. He emptied himself for our sake taking on our nature that it might be restored. What is not assumed is not deified say the Fathers. While Christ was God He did not walk the earth as Superman but suffered as we suffered and, while immortal, suffered death for us that death itself might be transformed.

Again, it is our deification in Christ through his Incarnation, Death, and Resurrection that makes our communion with the Trinity possible.

In Christ,
Subdeacon Lance

What a sweet thing to say, Alice, thanks!

I don't know if I read it somewhere or not, but it's certainly possible (probable!). I'm a bookworm from way back.

But it just seemed like good ol' Missouri common sense when I sat down to think it over. Maybe "Someone" gave me the right words!

In light of the contemporary Jewish usage at the time of the New Testament in which "Glory" refers to the visible form God took when he revealed himself to the prophets such as Isaiah, Exekiel, Abraham, etc., and which has the same meaning in Luke's Gospel (e.g., Simeon in the Temple refer to Christ being brought into the Temple as the "Glory of your people Israel") and elsewhere in Paul, Paul here means we all fall short of our likeness to the Divine Image (i.e., Christ himself, the divine person in whom God reveals himself to humanity in both the Old and New Testaments). So the text cannot refer to the Incarnate Christ. Also I don't see how one can be both sinful and all-holy. Arvid

"She who is higher than the heavens and more glorious than the Cherubim, she who is held in greater honor than all creation, she who by reason of her surpassing purity became the receiver of the everlasting Essence , today commends her most pure soul into the hands of her
Son. With her, all things are filled with joy, and she bestows great mercy upon us."
Apostika of the Forefeast of the Dormition (Sophia Press translation)
This hymn seems to stress the place of Mary's sinlessness in the economy of redemption, much as Pius IX did while avoiding Augustineanism of the the doctrine of Original Sin. Arvid