This response is regarding the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, our Lord Jesus Christ, who is truly God. Explanation on the Holy Trinity, the Triune God, would be another post.
Some separated brothers hold the erroneous position that Mary is not the mother of God but the mother of the human nature of Jesus only. But this belief is similar of the ancient pagan Greek mythology of the demigods (50% god and 50% human). Jesus is not a demigod or a “semi-god” or a “partial god” (50% God and 50% man, or divided in some % God and the other % man) in order to say that Mary is the mother of only the human part. In truth, Jesus is 100% God and 100% man (this is called the hypostatic union):
“For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form” (Col 2:9 – NIV).
Jesus is full God and full man, therefore, Mary is the mother of God.
Now, the error of the belief that Mary can’t possibly be the mother of God also comes from their confusion between “Creator” and “Mother”. They think that “Creator” is the same as “Mother”, thus they conclude that Mary can’t be the mother of God because she didn’t “create” God. This of course, is erroneous. A mother is NOT someone who “creates” but someone who conceives, brings forth and nourishes/raises her child/children; thus, Mary is not the “Creator” of God or a “goddess”, but the “Mother” of God, the one who conceived Jesus who is fully God.
Mothers are not creators of their children for, by testimonies of some mothers, sometimes they don’t even know that they are pregnant and are even “shocked” that they are pregnant. Also, they don’t know how tall their children are going to be, how many hairs are they going to have, etc. So they have definitely not created their children.
“But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Luke 1:43).
St. Luke wrote this Gospel in Greek (for more information on this topic see the book “The Writing of the Gospels and Biblical Inerrancy” by Ron Conte) and it is interesting that the word for “Lord” used here is “κύριος,n \{koo’-ree-os}”.
καὶ πόθεν μοι τοῦτο ἵνα ἔλθῃ ἡ μήτηρ τοῦ κυρίου μου πρὸς ἐμέ;
Transliteration:
kaí póthen moi toúto ína élthi i mítir toú kyríou mou prós emé?
http://www.greekbible.com/index.php
And its definition, per same Greek Bible website, is the following:
“κύριος,n \{koo’-ree-os}
1) he to whom a person or thing belongs, about which he has power of deciding; master, lord 1a) the possessor and disposer of a thing 1a1) the owner; one who has control of the person, the master 1a2) in the state: the sovereign, prince, chief, the Roman emperor 1b) is a title of honour expressive of respect and reverence, with which servants greet their master 1c) this title is given to: God, the Messiah For Synonyms see entry 5830″
We can corroborate that St. Elizabeth is referring to God with “Lord” in Luke 1:43 with just a few verses later:
In Luke 1:45 we read that she says:
“Blessed is she who has believed that the Lord would fulfill his promises to her!”
The same word κυρίου / kyríou is used in the Greek and is referring to none other than to God.
In Luke 1:76 we read that Zechariah says:
“And you, my child [referring to baby St. John the Baptist], will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him”
Again, the same Greek word κυρίου / kyríou is used here and refers to none other than to God.
Now, who is this “Lord” who Zechariah refers to? – Well, is no other than God for the Archangel Gabriel told him so:
“He will bring back many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. And he will go on before the Lord,…” – (Luke 1:16-17).
If you are not still convinced that such “Lord” is referring to God, In Isaiah 40:3 we read:
“A voice of one calling: “In the wilderness prepare the way for the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.”
This prophecy is about no other than John the Baptist.
“John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.” – (John 1:23).
And as we saw in Isaiah 40:3, that “Lord” refers to God!
The Apostle John tells us:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” – (John 1:1).
“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. …. (John testified concerning him. He cried out, saying, “This is the one I spoke about when I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’)” – (John 1: 14-15).
How can John the Baptist say that “He” (referring to the Word, Jesus) was “before him” when he was older than Him in the flesh? – that’s because the Word, Jesus is God.
It can be no doubt that such “Lord” is God.
Therefore, it’s clear that St. Elizabeth referred to Mary as “mother of my Lord [God]” in Luke 1:43.
Furthermore, Elizabeth’s greeting in Luke 1:43: “But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” goes in line with King Davis’ expression in 2 Samuel 6:9 “David was afraid of the LORD that day and said, “How can the ark of the LORD ever come to me?”.
David was referring to God when he saw the Ark of the Covenant coming by calling Him “Lord”. And there is much evidence that such Ark was a foreshadow of Mary who carried our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. The Word made flesh. You can read more about this typology here. How more so Elizabeth’s “Lord” be referring to God when Mary is the fulfillment of that foreshadow. Mary the Ark of the New Covenant.
Now, Mary was only a young woman when she went to visit Elizabeth who was an old woman (Luke 1:6) and, on top of that, the wife of an Aaron’s descendant Priest (1:5) so Elizabeth was a respected woman. But notice how Elizabeth “lowers herself” at her encounter with this young lady for she says: “why am I so favored” and calls an early stage pre-born person “Lord”, a pre-born who was not even noticeable in Mary’s womb at that time for Mary hurried to visit Elizabeth right after she conceived Jesus (Luke 1:38-40). How could Elizabeth know that Mary was pregnant? – Mary didn’t previously say “hey I’m pregnant”. It was because Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit (1:41). By the way, paintings of the Visitation showing Mary with a “big belly” are not biologically correct at that particular stage, it is only to catechize via visualization that she was pregnant.
Also:
“On coming to the house, they [the Magi] saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him…” (Matt 2:11).
Here the Magi (or “wise men” in their own right) went to visit a baby and started to “worhip” Him. How could these grown respected men travel to worship a baby if they didn’t consider Him to be God? For worship is due to God alone and we see that Scriptures do not condemn this act of worship by the Magi who were gentiles (non-Jews).
This should be clear to indicate that Sacred Scriptures tell us that Jesus is truly and fully God and that Mary is His mother.
See also (John 1:1) (1:14) (8:58), (Philippians 2:5-8), (Hebrews 1:5-12).
-Francisco Figueroa.
the reproach of Christ 
For a future article… Please comment on Episcopalis Communio. Is it a “devolution of papal power” sidelining both the Curia and the ecumenical council of bishops? Does it make changes so that discipline becomes part and parcel of the ‘ordinary magisterium of the pope’ — potentially infallible teaching? And finally, was the change in the death penalty section of the catechism a “test balloon” for a process that allows substantial changes to be adopted quickly, while lacking “sufficient deliberation”?
You know, just a few years ago, I had to argue with many conservatives against their claim that everything every Pope teaches is infallible. And I had to argue against the claim that the teaching authority of the Church is only authentic if the Pope teaches the same, even during a Council. Conservatives complained about the excessive collegiality of V2. And now conservatives are complaining about a lack of collegiality and treating every papal teaching as if it were error.
It does not make discipline part of the ordinary magisterium. Anything in a document that is not a teaching would still not fall under the ordinary magisterium. The ordinary magisterium is only infallible if the Bishops dispersed in the world agree on one position definitively to be held. The test balloon question is a baseless accusation of ill intent on the part of the Holy Father. I believe that God’s grace prevents every Pope from ill intent concerning the Church and the Faith. Sufficient deliberation has never been a criterion for authentic teaching.
Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them…. (Acts 4:8)
The Magisterium teaches infallible (no error) and non-infallible (degree of limited error).
All infallible teachings require the full assent of faith. Infallible teachings are certainly true, and are therefore irreformable. Rejection of infallible teachings is heresy. Infallible teachings are defined under 1. Papal Infallibility – a solemn definition of a doctrine on faith or morals by the Pope. This definition is called a defining act. 2. Ecumenical Council – a solemn definition of a doctrine on faith or morals by the body of Bishops led by the Pope gathered together in a Council. This definition is also called a defining act. 3. Universal Magisterium when the Pope and the Bishops dispersed through the world teach one doctrine of faith or morals definitively to be held. This occurs by a series of non-defining acts.
All other teachings are non-infallible, subject to a limited possibility of error, and require only the religious submission of will and intellect, not the full assent of faith.
The change by Pope Francis on death penalty does not fall under the infallible Magisterium because it does not meet its requirements to be so. Now, the Pope has *not* taught that “the death penalty was once not intrinsically evil and now it is intrinsically evil”. No. The Pope has made the change that the death penalty is now inadmissible during these times (paraphrasing here).
One can look at the dictionary and find out that “Inadmissible” means: not allowed, invalid, unacceptable, impermissible, disallowed, forbidden, prohibited, precluded; whereas “intrinsically evil” means inherently evil, by itself, by its very nature evil.
So what the Pope is basically saying that the death penalty (which is not intrinsically evil, not evil by itself or by its own nature ) is “no longer allowed” or permissible in our times. This particular teaching falls under the non-infallible Magisterium so there is a limited possibility of error. Since this new teaching of the Pope des not fall under infallibility, the faithful is free to disagree to a limited extent (basing his decision on Tradition, Scripture, Magisterium).
In another situation, the Church has never taught that cremation is intrinsically evil, but She prohibited it for thousands of years until recently that She has now allowed cremation under certain conditions, though burying the dead is still preferred.