Greetings MrMoe, I just wanted you to know, I'm still working on my explanation for the jumping back and forth in The Visitation. I'm almost finished, I plan on going to Eucharistic Adoration tomorrow and finishing up my meditating on it and then, later that evening, I will post, sort of a basic overview of it and than on Friday, I'll go into a more in-depth explanation of it, you'll know why I'm doing it this way when you receive the first post.
Now, back to Revelations 11 & 12
The sun, moon and stars are a reference to Joseph's dream in Genesis 37:9 and Isreal is described as being like a woman in birth pains.
Also some Catholics don't believe Mary experienced birth pains, so this goes against Mary being the woman in Revelation.
Revelation 11:19 talks about flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake and a severe hailstorm. The sun, moon and stars don't usually appear when there is lightning, thunder and severe hailstorm, but this is a vision so this argument is not as good as my others.
Like I said, Israel is described as a woman giving birth. The Messiah came out of Isreal.
Your church says the woman is the church but that would make no sense since the church did not come into existence until Acts after Jesus' ascension. The Church did not give birth to Jesus.
How did the serpent try too make war with her other offspring since Mary had no other children according to the church?
I'll deal this objection first since part of the answer came to me earlier today, while I was praying a Rosary Novena for this thread. Specifically the part about an earthquake in Revelations 11:19, originally, when I read about an Earthquake in Revelations 11:19, the first thing that comes to mine is one of the Four Marian Dogmas, that we might debate sometime in the future. But today, when meditating on the Glorious Mysteries of the Most Holy Rosary, and read the First Glorious Mystery I read:
"Now after the sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Mag′dalene and the other Mary went to see the sepulchre.
And behold, there was a
great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone, and sat upon it.
His appearance was
like lightning, and his raiment white as snow.
And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men.
But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid; for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified.
He is not here; for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay." Matthew 28:1-10 RSVCE (Emphasis added)
I already knew that Mary's birth pangs in Revelations 12, symbolized her pain at the foot of the Cross, but only now did I realize that the earthquake in Revelations 11:19 actually referred to the earthquake that occurred at Jesus' death on the cross, what's more (I just realized this part now while looking up Matthew 27:51, although I might have heard it before), in Matthew 27:51 at the same time that the earthquake is occurring, the Temple veil that separates the outer sanctuary from the Holies of Holies where the Old Ark sat, was
rent in two!
Praise be to the Lord! Who has opened my mind to the truth about His Beloved Mary, the Living Ark!
Hail Mary!
Now at the Crucifixion, Mary had birth-pangs and gave birth to her mystical daughter, the Church. The Fathers and Doctors of Church agree that the Church was born at the Crucifixion, the Blood and Water which flowed from Jesus' side calls back, Eve, Adam's bride being drawn out of Adam's side. The eclipse, symbolizes the end of the Old Covenant and the beginning of the New Covenant, most of the Early Church Fathers view the Moon as symbolizing the Church, see the following video:
Note: some of what this Traditional Priest says may be hard for you to understand, just pay attention to what he says about the Moon. You can skip ahead to 5:30 if you want to get straight the Lunar symbolism, but I'd encourage you watch the whole thing
Now you may have already figured this out, but the reason that Mary is Mother of the Church is that the Church is Jesus' Mystical Body, and thus Mary being the Mother of Jesus is the Mother of His Mystical Body. When combine this, with a common sense understanding of John 19:26-27, we can easily find out who Mary's other children are, who are they? Well, you're reading the words typed by one of them! Yes! What's more, if you were baptized in the Trinitarian Formula,
you are one of her children, albeit a very disobedient one.
One more thing in regards to Revelations 11:19, I know you don't consider the description of of lightning and hail as a strong argument against Revelations 11 & 12 being linked, but I want to bring this up because what I'm about to point out is a strong argument against the Woman being Israel and a good argument for the Woman being Mary:
In Ezekiel 1, the prophet has a vision of God which includes a great cloud and flashes of fire and lightning, Ezekiel sees the Lord (I personally believe, it's God the Son) enthroned on a Firmament, clothed in fire, with His face shining like the sun. In Revelations we also see the Son of Man with His face shining like the sun at full power, now look at the Woman in Revelations 12, notice she's clothed with the sun, what does that symbolize? The central and greatest joy of Heaven is seeing God face to face, and as we have shown, the face God the Son is represented as shining like the sun and in John 14:9 Jesus says "he who has seen me has seen the Father" thus, the Woman being clothed with the sun, shows that she extremely high in Heaven, that she is extremely close to God. This can't be Israel since nothing in the New Testament implies Israel being close to God apart from merely being the first to know God, you may say point out that Israel, in the Old Testament is referred to as a "Holy Nation" but that refers to the Old Covenant which is inferior to the New Covenant. The only way can get of this (apart from conceding that the Woman is Mary) is by admitting that the Early Church Fathers are right and that the Woman represents the New Israel, the Church. Now I can go on in prove that this Woman is both the Church and Our Lady, but for now, I will address some of your other arguments, although I might have time to come back to this.
Most, meaning not all, meaning if it was obvious all of the early church fathers would have interpreted the woman in Revelation 12 as the Catholic church.
I misspoke there, what I meant by that was, "All the Early Church Fathers that I've read so far..." I'm a revert to Catholicism so I don't everything, I honestly expected to find Early Church Fathers to speak of the Woman as both Mary and her Mystical Daughter (I already knew that some of the Fathers spoke of the Woman as symbolizing the Church). This is a defect in myself, not the Faith.
Could you please tell me when was Mary given wings like an eagle and fly into the wilderness away from the serpent?
When did the serpent try to carry Mary away with a flood?
How did the serpent try too make war with her other offspring since Mary had no other children according to the church?
Wings symbolize swiftness, angels are depicted as having wings because they travel at the speed of thought. The Blessed Virgin Mary is given wings to foreshadow her various apparitions throughout history, the Queen of Heaven and Earth is like a queen in a game of chess, she is most mobile. The wings could also symbolize her angelic intellect, the Gospel according to Saint Luke, St Luke mentions both in 1:29 (which also implies that the St. Gabriel's greeting should be translated as "Hail full of grace" not "greeting favoured one" but I digress) and in 2:51 (notice it's just Our Lady, not both Our Lady and the Humble and Chaste Saint Joseph), Catholic Mariology teaches that basically (I'm not an expert in this area, but I'm assuming that she doesn't have full access to this until the age of reason) from the moment of conception Mary was already a the highest level of mental prayer, she could easily enter the deepest form of meditation in a heart beat.
In regards to Satan's flood, this refers to Satan's attack on Marian devotion throughout history. I already talked about Marian apparitions, well Satan has flooded the world with false Marian apparitions, such as Medjugorje, which teaches things clearly contrary to the authentic teachings of the Catholic Church. An addition false apparitions Satan has also employed many other devices to destroy Marian devotions, St Louis de Montfort said that the purpose of the black death, was for Satan to destroy information about the Rosary, likewise Modernist heretics have used the "spirit of Vatican II" to eliminate the Rosary and other Marian devotions before Pope Saint John Paul II stepped in. These just a few examples I could lots more including an obvious one that I won't mention for obvious reasons.
I already answered the question about Satan making war with the rest of her offspring (us), but I'll provide one more example that shows both Satan's contempt for Our Lady and the power and importance of Marian devotions: There once was a man in France, who suffered a car crash and was taken to a Catholic hospital where he died of his injuries. The man had no identification, but he did have a full of notes, the nurse, looking after the man kept the notes and read them, and discovered to her shock that the man was an undercover Communist spy who had infiltrated the Catholic Priesthood, among the notes is one where the spy writes that the best way undermine belief in God in the clergy was to discourage the praying of the Rosary (Remember how the Rosary revealed to me how, the earthquake in Revelations 11:19 pointed to Our Lady's Sorrows on Mount Calvary?). You can get the Communist spy's notes here:
AA-1025: The Memoirs of a Communist's infiltration in to the Church.: Marie Carre: 9780895554499: Books - Amazon.ca
No I mean Isreal. The sun, moon, and twelve stars are a clear reference to the Joseph's dream in Genesis 37:9. The eleven stars being Joseph's eleven brothers which make up eleven tribes of Isreal, Joseph being the twelfth tribe so he is the twelfth star in Revelation.
The Twelve Stars refer to the Twelve Apostles: Simon whom Our Lord changed to Peter (Aramaic: Kepha "rock"), St. Andrew, St. James the son Zebedee, St. John the Evangelist, St. Philip, St. Bartholomew, St. Thomas also called Didymus, St. Matthew the tax-collector, St. James the Son of Alpheus, St. Simon the Zealot, and St. Matthias who succeeded Judas Iscariot. The majority of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church see a very disturbing prophesy in this vision, I won't say what it is, because it might be scandalous to say, I'm checking with fellow Catholics to see whether or not it's appropriate and I'll back to you on it, if it's okay with to say it.
This is not true, you can truly love God without imatating another human. This is similar to some who claim you are not really saved unless you speak in tounges.
JayW, you should pay attention to this part as well,
That's true in theory, like I said before, in theory Marian devotion is not necessary for Salvation, but in practice it is almost impossible! (In fact, for me, just typing "Marian devotion is not necessary for Salvation" makes me cringe!) Why?
1. God loves Mary and Mary loves God
2. No Mary, no Jesus! Know Mary, Know Jesus
Now why is imitating Mary ideal for Salvation?
"
27 And it came to pass, as he spoke these things, a certain woman from the crowd, lifting up her voice, said to him: Blessed is the womb that bore thee, and the paps that gave thee suck.
28 But he said: Yea rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God, and keep it." Luke 11:27-28 DRV
Now who did this best? The one who said "fiat" Our Lady. Our Lady's "fiat" what makes her so holy, so Godly, it's what make her the greatest Human being in all of time and eternity! What better can we say to God than "Fiat?" This is why we Catholics pray the
Angelus three times a day (except for this season, this season we pray the
Regina Caeli). This is all about God! What better way to please God than by loving that which He loves the most? God has mind and will of His own and He loves Mary, His daughter, His Mother, His beloved!
I'm running short of time, so I'll make just address your recent posts on the on that rotten fruit of Protestant and the Eucharist:
I probably won't be able to address your objections for a really long time, because there a lot more important, but I just want address how you twist, and yes that is twisting! ***(
Correction: That was a rash judgement! I realize now that you could genuinely not see the logical outcome of this. I'm sorry, I really messed up here)*** You twist that well-founded accusation around and accuse Catholics of "objectifying Mary" when stated, or at the very least implied, at the beginning of this thread that Mary was superior to the Old Ark by being a
Living Ark, a Living Person! When twist that well-founded accusation around, that strikes me as desperate! It kind of reminds me of how rebellious RadTrads attack our refusal to sinfully bash the Pope by accusing of "De-facto Sedevacantism!"
Also, Luke 23:27-31 doesn't just foreshadow abortion, it foreshadows a lot of other things, including contraception, which abortion basically is, but I'm getting ahead of myself, I just thought I'd add this because, I hate contraception with a fierce hatred!
In regard to the Eucharist, I didn't expect you buy it because you need supernatural faith in order to believe this Most Holy Sacrament, but I will address a couple of your objections:
1. Yes, Jesus was ambiguous towards the Jews, but here it's different because here: (a) Jesus repeats this claim
four times! Why would Jesus repeat an ambiguous phrase four times? (b) Jesus doesn't repeats this to the Jews, He repeats it to His own disciples and doesn't explain it to them, and this is form the Gospel according to Saint John, one Jesus' closest disciple, many leave Jesus over this in John 6:66 (sound familiar?)
2. The Early Church Fathers may differ on a couple of things, but here they are unanimous! I would be shocked! Shocked! if you provided me with an undeniable, authentic quote from an Early Church Father denying the real presence Jesus in the Eucharist!
3. You touch on Jesus' encounter with Nicodemus, this episode refers to another, very holy Sacrament, Baptism! In it is very correct that Jesus would use the same words, I find kind of significant that Nicodemus doesn't understand Jesus in this episode.
We'll come back to the Eucharist if we have time, because I love the Eucharist, The Son of God in the flesh! What could be better!?! In fact I'm going to be worshipping Him tomorrow, where I'm going meditate on and perfect my response to your objection of the jumping around in the Visitation. Keep in mind, the Early Church Fathers saw no problem in the jumping around in the Visitation, and if they're wrong on all these things, how can we trust them with the Dogma in the Trinity? Or any other Dogma or Doctrine we receive from them? How is it that we had to suffer through the Middle Ages, with a whole bunch of crazy stuff, and only a few good things, until Martin Luther and the like came along and finally set the record straight?
