Born of the Virgin Mary

During Mass each Sunday, Holy Day of Obligation and Solemnity we recite the Nicene Creed, praying: "by the power of the Holy Spirit, He was born of the Virgin Mary." Notice "born of the Virgin Mary" (which also exists in the Apostles' Creed used when praying the Rosary). What we profess has great significance.

We confess: Mary remained a virgin, "born of the Virgin Mary," even in the process of giving birth!

Mary's Perpetual Virginity involves three categories:

a) Virginity before the Birth (Virginitas ante partum);
b) Virginity during the Birth (Virginitas in partu);
c) Virginity after the Birth (Virginitas post partum).

We now treat her Virginity during the Birth of Jesus.

The Dogma of Mary's Virginity During the Birth

Meaning. Mary is the Ever-Virgin means that the humble maiden of Nazareth who was chosen by God from all eternity to become Jesus' Mother persevered in her Virginity and at no time relinquished it. Mary's Virginity during the Birth, the "Virgin Birth" or "Virginity in Childbirth," signifies that while giving birth, she experienced no lessening or alteration of her virginal state.

At the appointed time, the Baby Jesus left His chaste Mother's womb in a miraculous way without opening it or any other part of her body or causing rupture. Father Juniper Benjamin Carol, O.F.M., S.T.D., (+ 1990), in Fundamentals of Mariology (New York: Benziger Brothers, Inc., 1956), used an analogy: "... as the light goes through a glass without breaking it, so Christ passed through Our Lady's body into the outside world without any detriment to her virginal seal" (page 147).

Scripture. In Mary in the Mystery of the Covenant (New York: Alba House, 1992), Father Ignace de la Potterie, S.J., S.S.D., believes that Saint Luke's Gospel explicitly maintained Mary's Virginity in Childbirth. He, along with some Church Fathers and medieval theologians, translates Luke 1:35 as acknowledging the Virgin Birth: "hence He Who will be born holy, 'in a holy way,' will be called Son of God."

The Prophet Isaiah (7:14) distinctly affirmed: "the virgin shall conceive and bear a son and he shall be called Emmanuel." The original Hebrew is: "Behold, the virgin conceiving and bearing a son…." Isaiah prophesied that the same virgin who conceived would also virginally bring forth the Child.

The Church Fathers. Again, Father Carol: "There are few Catholic Church dogmas which can claim the unanimous support of Tradition with as much right as the dogma now under discussion . . . not a single Father of the Church can be quoted as bearing witness against it" (page 149).

Note this partial roll of Church Fathers of both the West (and the East) who referred to the Virgin Birth: Saints Ignatius of Antioch (+ c. 107), Irenaeus (+ c. 200), Clement of Alexandria (+ c. 215), Zeno of Verona (+ c. 371), Ephrem (+373), Ambrose (+397), Jerome (+ c. 420), Augustine (+430) and Peter Chrysologus (+ c. 450).

The Magisterium. Throughout two millennia, the Magisterium, the Church's "Teaching Authority," has continually proclaimed and defended Our Lady's Virginity in Childbirth, for instance: the 392 letter written to Bishop Anysisus and traditionally attributed to Pope Saint Siricius (384-399), but perhaps written by Saint Ambrose, expressing disgust of the error "which holds that He (Jesus) could not be born of a virgin"; the 449 Tome to Flavian, Patriarch of Constantinople by Pope Saint Leo "the Great" (440-461), asserting that Mary "brought Him forth without the loss of virginity, even as she conceived Him without its loss"; the 553 Second Ecumenical Constantinople Council, referring to the Madonna with the Greek word aeiparthenos (Ever-Virgin); the 649 Lateran Council already mentioned; the 1555 Bull Cum quorumdam of Pope Paul IV (1555-1559), which condemned a Unitarian error that alleged that Mary did not preserve her Virginity in Childbirth; the 1964 Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (Lumen Gentium) of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council (1962-1965), stating that "Jesus, at His Birth, did not diminish His Mother's virginal integrity but sanctified it" (#57).

In "Ambrose and Karl Rahner: Reflections on the 'Virginitas in Partu,"' an article that appeared in Mater Fidei et Fidelium—Collected Essays to Honor Theodore Koehler on his 80th Birthday (Dayton, Ohio: University of Dayton, 1991), Father James Thomas O'Connor, S.T.D., emphasizes that a note to article 57 of Lumen Gentium cited this text from "On the Instruction of a Virgin" by Saint Ambrose: '"This door will be closed and it will not be opened.' This good door is Mary, who was closed and not opened. Christ passed through her but did not open her.... There is a door of the womb, although it is not always closed; indeed only one was able to remain closed, she through whom the virgin's Offspring came forth without loss of genital intactness…" (page 731).

The official English translation of the 1970 Missale Romanum (The Roman Missal), published by order of Pope Paul VI (1963-1978), refers to the Virgin Birth in the special insert to Eucharistic Prayer I (Roman Canon) to be used on Christmas and during its Octave: "In union with the whole Church we celebrate that day (night) when Mary without loss of her virginity, gave the world its Savior."

The normative English translation of the 1992 Catechismus Catholicae Ecclesiae (Catechism of the Catholic Church), published by directive of Pope John Paul II (1978-2005), reads: "The deepening of faith in the virginal motherhood led the Church to confess Mary's real and perpetual virginity even in the act of giving birth to the Son of God made man" (#499).

A 1960 letter of the Holy Office (the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) warned about the publication of theological opinions "in which the delicate question of Mary's Virginity in partu is treated with a deplorable crudeness of expression and, what is more serious, in flagrant contradiction to the doctrinal tradition of the Church and to the sense of respect the faithful have."

Objections. Efforts to deny the Virgin Birth have been persistent. Martin Luther (1483-1546) and Ulrich Zwingli (1484-1531) defended Mary's Virginity in partu. On February 2,1546, Luther wrote that Mary "remained a virgin also at the birth and after it." Zwingli averred in January 1528: "I recognize Mary as ever virgin and holy." Here are two common objections against it and corresponding replies.

Objection #1. Inspired by the Holy Spirit, Saint Luke described in his Gospel the diligence with which Mary and Joseph took the Baby to the Temple. "After the days of her purification, according to the law of Moses, were accomplished, they (Mary and Joseph) carried Him to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord, as it is written in the law of the Lord: Every male opening the womb shall be called holy to the Lord" (2:22). Why was the Madonna subject to this law if Jesus' birth did not open her womb?

Response #1. Although not bound since her Virginity remained after giving birth, Mary freely submitted to the law in an admirable spirit of obedience and humility so as not to arouse suspicion or give scandal. The "days of purification" was a legal term that indicated when the first-born male had to be presented in Jerusalem's Temple. Because Jesus was the first-born of Mary and Joseph, the legal precept did apply to the Holy Family of Nazareth, which they fulfilled punctually and completely.

Objection #2. Traditionally, the Church has attached specific miraculous elements to the explanation of Mary's Virginity during Childbirth: the lack of bodily rupture and lesions; the absence of pain; the nonexistence of afterbirth. Today, some deny that these components pertain essentially to the dogma. In analyzing this position which purports to emphasize the "humanness" of Jesus' Birth, Father Peter Damian Fehlner, F.F.I., S.T.D., penned in Virgin Mother the Great Sign (Washington, New Jersey: AMI Press, 1993): "... the miraculous and supernatural character of the virginal motherhood of Mary consists essentially in the virginal conception by the power of the Holy Spirit, without carnal intercourse. Except for this miraculous conception the gestation and birth of the Savior were entirely normal, i.e., exactly like any other" (page 2). This opinion (to which Father Fehlner does not subscribe) holds that Mary experienced rupture, lesions, pain and afterbirth similar to other mothers, and those who advance it argue that a Christian may legitimately embrace it.

Response #2. Mary is human, but she is not exactly like us. She was conceived without Original Sin, is the Mother of God, shared intimately in our redemption on Calvary and was assumed bodily into Heaven, there interceding for us in singular fashion. Why couldn't the sinless, human Mother bring forth her sinless, Divine Son in a manner never previously observed? The Almighty could dispense His daughter from the normal course. Saint Peter Chrysologus, a credible witness to the Sacred Tradition transmitted by the Apostles, wrote: "It is characteristic of divinity to leave the Virgin sealed after birth...." Father Fehlner contends: "In the face of denials for the sake of defending the fully human character of Mary's maternity and Christ's Birth the Church insisted both on the fully human and on the absolutely unique character of this motherhood and birth, to be defined in one word: virginal, whose meaning both at conception and at birth was a matter of revelation rather than science—without seed and without opening the womb, i.e., 'incorruptly' or 'without loss of integrity'" (page 13).

Conclusion

Pope John Paul II, on May 24, 1992 at the conclusion of the International Study Conference that commemorated the 16th Centenary of the Plenary Council of Capua which considered Mary's Perpetual Virginity, commented: "... some Church Fathers set up a significant parallel between the begetting of Christ ex intacta Virgine (from the intact Virgin) and His resurrection ex intacto sepulchro (from the intact tomb).. . the Church proclaims as factually true that Mary... truly and virginally gave birth to her Son, for Whom she remained a virgin after birth; a virgin—according to the holy Fathers and Councils which expressly dealt with the question . . . also in everything which concerns the integrity of the flesh . . . ." (L'Osservatore Romano (English edition), June 10, 1992, page 14).

Having entered the Third Christian Millennium, the Church still adheres (and always will) to the Virgin Birth. Father O'Connor observes that "an ecumenical council (Vatican II) has chosen the clarity of the Ambrosian text to indicate what the Church intends when she proclaims the doctrine of the virgin birth" (page 731).

The Virgin Birth proves Mary's "biological integrity." Monsignor Arthur Burton Calkins, S.T.D., in "God's Masterpiece: Blessed Mary Ever Virgin" (Washington, New Jersey: World Apostolate of Fatima, 1992), stresses that the Virginity during the Childbirth, while not lessening the splendor and value of marriage, "should be seen as pointing to the fact that the bodily integrity of Mary is a physical sign of her total spiritual virginity, that the virginity of her flesh is an indication of the virginity of her heart" (page 10).

By pondering the Virgin Birth, we will grow in our gratitude to the Lord Who has done such marvels for us, and in our appreciation for the Ever-Virgin who was—and remains—receptive to the Almighty in all things!

Msgr. Charles M. Mangan, is an official of the Vatican Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life.