The faith of our fathers - Carmel Apologetics

"""THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 201The Canon of the Mass, which isvery probably ofApostolic antiquity, speaks of her as the gloriousEver Virgin,"and in this sentiment all Catholic tradition concurs.There is a propriety which suggests itself to everyChristian inMary s remaining a Virgin after thebirth of Jesus, for, as Bishop Bull of the ProtestantEpiscopal Church of England remarks, cannot"Itwith decency be imagined that the most holy vesselwhich was once consecrated to be a receptacle of theDeity, should be afterwards desecrated and profanedby human use." The learned Grotius, Calvin, andother eminent Protestant writers, hold the same view.The doctrine of the perpetual virginity of Mary isnow combated by Protestants, as it was in the earlydays of the Church, by Helvidius and Jovinian, onthe following grounds:1st. The evangelist says that Joseph took untohim his wife, and he knew her not till she brought1forth her first-born son." This sentence suggests todissenters that other children besides Jesus were bornto Mary. But the qualifying word tillby no meansimplies that the chaste union which had subsistedbetween Mary and Joseph up to the birth of ourLord, was subsequently altered. The ProtestantHooker justly complains of the early heretics ashaving abused greatly these words of Matthew,gatheringagainst the honor of the Blessed Virgin,1 Matt. i. 25.