Testament Of Mary Quotes

Dreams belong to each of us alone, just as pain does.

Memory fills my body as much as blood and bones.

if you want witnesses then I am one and I can tell you now, when you say that he redeemed the world, I will say that it was not worth it. It was not worth it.

I remember too much; I am like the air on a calm day as it holds itself still, letting nothing escape.

If water can be changed into wine and the dead can be brought back, then I want time pushed back.

The Emperor Constantine the Great (272 - 337) and his Pauline bishops decided that all the Gospels that went against the politics of the emperor and the Hellenistic Christianity that was created by St Paul, were to be excluded from the New Testament. Proof of this can be found in the fact that the 27 books of The New Testament are but a very small fraction of the Christian literature that was produced in the first three centuries after Jesus lived. These documents are known as the Apocryphal Gospels (Greek, Apocrypha: ' hidden' or 'secret writings') and some of them retained quite a following and were highly respected in the communities of the earliest times...

And behold, he shall be born of Mary, at Jerusalem which is the land of our forefathers, she being a virgin, a precious and chosen vessel, who shall be overshadowed and conceive by the power of the Holy Ghost, and bring forth a son, yea, even the Son of God. And he shall go forth, suffering pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people. And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities.' -Alma the Younger (Alme 7:10-12)

What happened to Jesus after he was crucified? A historical reconstruction It is an undeniable fact that the New Testament Gospels present the crucifixion and the resurrection as the pivot upon which Christianity is based. However, this notion is most surprising when we take into consideration that this postulation was never part of Jesus's teaching. Certainly the evangelists 'Mark' and 'Matthew' do hint at these strange happenings, but it is a noted fact amongst the majority of the biblical scholars that these sequences were added several centuries after the original Gospels were written, and this was done so that the political editors of these Gospels could adapt the writings according to their political and theological needs...

The details of what I told him were with me all the years in the same way as my hands or my arms were with me.

In the meantime, when I wake in the night, I want more. I want what happened not to have happened, to have taken another course.

I do not know why it matters that I should tell the truth to myself at night, why it should matter that the truth should be spoken at least once in the world. Because the world is a place of silence, the sky at night when the birds have gone is a vast silent place. Words will make the slightest difference to the sky at night. They will not brighten it or make it less strange. And the day too has its own deep indifference to anything that is said.

The telescope destroyed the firmament, did away with the heaven of the New Testament, rendered the ascension of our Lord and the assumption of his Mother infinitely absurd, crumbled to chaos the gates and palaces of the New Jerusalem, and in their places gave to man a wilderness of worlds.

I told him before he departed that all my life when I have seen more than two men together I have seen foolishness and I have seen cruelty, but it is foolishness I have noticed first.

The White Mansion isn't boring, lass. Never boring. It's the grand demesne the Unseelie King built for his concubine. It's a living, breathing love story, testament to the brightest passion that ever burned between our races. You can follow the scenes through if you've time enough and are willing to risk getting lost for a few centuries.

What is hard to understand is that our dreams matter

Her tears, they ride the wind. She calls to me, And all I can do is whisper, You are strong, Stronger than your pain, Stronger than your grief, Stronger than them. —The Last Testaments of Gaudrel

I like it that they [disciples] feed me and pay for my clothes and protect me. And in return I will do for them what I can, but no more than that. Just as I cannot breathe the breath of another or help the heart of someone else to beat or their bones not to weaken or their flesh not to shrivel, I cannot say more than I can say. And I know how deeply this disturbs them, and it would make me smile, this earnest need for foolish anecdote or sharp simple patterns in the story of what happened to us all, except that I have forgotten how to smile.

The Church was spread throughout the entire Roman Empire before a single book of the New Testament was written.

The Bible is a work of art. Were it not art, were it simply an instruction manual, it would not satisfy or convince, and very likely would not have survived. So, to be faithful to the original work, which in Greek is normally chanted in churches, as the Torah is chanted in the temple and the Qu’ran is melismatically chanted in the mosque… the Bible here must resonate.

The world has loosened, like a woman preparing for bed who lets her hair flow free. And I am whispering the words, knowing that words matter, and smiling as I say them to the shadows of the gods of this place who linger in the air to watch me and hear me.

Women enjoy a different history of madness. From witchcraft to hysteria we're just bad news. We know that women were condemned as witches because they were mentally unstable but no one has considered the numbers - even few as they might be - of women who were stoned to death for being bright. That I havent wound up chained to a cellar wall or burned at the stake is not a testament to our ascending civility but to our ascending skepticism. If we still believed in witches we'd still be burning them.

The Bible is filled with discrepancies, many of them irreconcilable contradictions. Moses did not write the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament) and Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John did not write the Gospels. There are other books that did not make it into the Bible that at one time or another were considered canonical—other Gospels, for example, allegedly written by Jesus’ followers Peter, Thomas, and Mary. The Exodus probably did not happen as described in the Old Testament. The conquest of the Promised Land is probably based on legend. The Gospels are at odds on numerous points and contain nonhistorical material. It is hard to know whether Moses ever existed and what, exactly, the historical Jesus taught. The historical narratives of the Old Testament are filled with legendary fabrications and the book of Acts in the New Testament contains historically unreliable information about the life and teachings of Paul. Many of the books of the New Testament are pseudonymous—written not by the apostles but by later writers claiming to be apostles. The list goes on.

Paul gives us an astonishing understanding of waiting in the New Testament book of Romans, as rendered by Eugene Peterson, 'Waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don't see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.' With such motivation, we can wait as we sense God is indeed with us, and at work within us, as he was with Mary as the child within her grew.

Paul suggests that gentiles can practice a law written in their hearts, which will be seen as not only equal to but also above the written Torah…It should be remembered that in Paul’s day the only religious law for Paul was that of the Jewish Bible, in Hebrew… Though Torah and the New Testament, including Paul’s letters, will eventually shape church law, the New Testament’s books are not in themselves composed as law. They are not a self-consciously composed constitution. They contain no Ten Commandments in form or statement.

On one of the nights during my journey I wandered out under the sky which was lit with stars and I believed for a moment that soon these stars would cease to glitter, that the nights of the future would be dark beyond dark, that the world itself would undergo a great change, and then I quickly came to see that the change would happen only to me and to the few who knew me; it would be only we who would look at the sky at night in the future and see the darkness before we saw the glitter. We would see the glittering stars as false and mocking, or as bewildered themselves by the night as we were , as leftover things confined to their place, their shining nothing more than a sort of pleading.

Joseph Voilà c'que c'est, mon vieux Joseph Que d'avoir pris la plus jolie Parmi les filles de Galilée Celle qu'on appelait Marie Tu aurais pu, mon vieux Joseph Prendre Sarah ou Déborah Et rien ne serait arrivé Mais tu as préféré Marie Tu aurais pu, mon vieux Joseph Rester chez toi, tailler ton bois Plutôt que d'aller t'exiler Et te cacher avec Marie Tu aurais pu, mon vieux Joseph Faire des petits avec Marie Et leur apprendre ton métier Comme ton père te l'avait appris Pourquoi a-t-il fallu, Joseph Que ton enfant, cet innocent Ait eu ces étranges idées Qui ont tant fait pleurer Marie Parfois je pense à toi, Joseph Mon pauvre ami, lorsque l'on rit De toi qui n'avais demandé Qu'à vivre heureux avec Marie

It was my companion, my strange friend who woke me in the night and again in the morning and who stayed close all day.

[...] all my life when I have seen more than two men together I have seen foolishness and I have seen cruelty, but it is foolishness that I have noticed first.

people shouting that if he could heal the sick and make the crippled walk and the blind see, then he could raise the dead.

But that will be the beginning.” “Of what?” I asked. “Of a new life for the world,

his legs where the bones had been broken,

Her two visitors are clearly some of the apostles, the men who wrote the New Testament; others, such as Miriam or her “cousin” Marcus, are invented.

He was the boy I had given birth to and he was more defenceless now than he had been then.

At this point, the Blessed Virgin appeared to him, accompanied by three Angels of heaven, and she said: “My dear Dominic, do you know which weapon the Blessed Trinity has used to reform the world?” “My Lady,” replied St. Dominic, “you know better than I because next to your Son Jesus Christ you were the chief instrument of our salvation.” Our Lady added: “I want you to know that the principal means has been the Angelic Psalter, which is the foundation of the New Testament. That is why, if you want to win these hardened hearts for God, preach my Psalter.” The Saint arose, comforted. Filled

In my end is my beginning, as someone once said. Who was that? Mary, Queen of Scots, if history does not lie. Her motto, with a phoenix rising from its ashes, embroidered on a wall hanging. Such excellent embroiderers, women are.

Just as the genealogies break off at the end, because Jesus was not begotten by St. Joseph, but was truly born of the Holy Spirit from the Virgin Mary, so it now can be said of us that our true "genealogy" is faith in Jesus, who gives us a new origin, who brings us to birth "from God.

Some equestrians were involved in the potentially lucrative business of provincial taxation, thanks to another law of Gaius Gracchus. For it was he who first arranged that tax collecting in the new province of Asia should, like many other state responsibilities, be contracted out to private companies, often owned by equestrians. These contractors were known as publicani – ‘public service providers’ or ‘publicans’, as tax collectors are called in old translations of the New Testament, confusingly to modern readers. The system was simple, demanded little manpower on the part of the Roman state and provided a model for the tax arrangements in other provinces over the following decades (and was common in other early tax raising regimes). Periodic auctions of specific taxation rights in individual provinces took place at Rome. The company that bid the highest then collected the taxes, and anything it managed to rake in beyond the bid was its profit. To put it another way, the more the publicani could screw out of the provincials, the bigger their own take – and they were not liable to prosecution under Gaius’ compensation law. Romans had always made money out of their conquests and their empire, but increasingly there were explicitly, and even organised, commercial interests at stake.

The New Testament uses a similar word—“weaker”—to reinforce that women are the softer, more vulnerable ones. This does not at all imply that women are inferior to men. However, women are physically and emotionally more tender, and are thus more susceptible to being hurt. According to 1 Peter 3:7, God expects men to honor them for this beautiful feminine trait. He warns men not to treat women like “one of the guys.” God expects men to handle women like Swarovski crystal, and not like Bridgestone tires!

The writers of Luke and Matthew, for instance, in seeking to make the life of Jesus conform to Old Testament prophecy, insist that Mary conceived as a virgin (Greek parthenos), harking to the Greek rendering of Isaiah 7:14. Unfortunately for fanciers of Mary’s virginity, the Hebrew word alma (for which parthenos is an erroneous translation) simply means “young woman,” without any implication of virginity. It seems all but certain that the Christian dogma of the virgin birth, and much of the church’s resulting anxiety about sex, was the

The four gospels that made it into the official canon were chosen, more or less arbitrarily, out of a larger sample of at least a dozen including the Gospels of Thomas, Peter, Nicodemus, Philip, Bartholomew and Mary Magdalen.51 Some of these gospels, the known Apocrypha of the time, were the additional gospels that Thomas Jefferson was referring to in his letter to his nephew: I forgot to observe, when speaking of the New Testament, that you should read all the histories of Christ, as well of those whom a council of ecclesiastics have decided for us, to be Pseudo-evangelists, as those they named Evangelists. Because these Pseudo-evangelists pretended to inspiration, as much as the others, and you are to judge their pretensions by your own reason, and not by the reason of those ecclesiastics.

But it was never actually that big a deal. Jenkins didn't really disbelieve in the Resurrection: he merely questioned the historical veracity of the New Testament narratives. It was mildly interesting: one side saying "I really believe that Jesus was the Son of God, and that the Bible gives a journalistically accurate account of the circumstances surrounding his birth," and the other saying "I also really believe that Jesus was the Son of God, but I think that the story of Mary and Gabriel may be a legend." A real disagreement, an important one, but not a fundamental fault line along which a church can split. The people who think that the stone really was rolled away, and the people who think that it was rolled away in a very real sense are clearly part of the same religion. But it is hard to see how people who think that it doesn't particularly matter whether or not the stone was rolled away, provided we live in the way that Jesus would have wanted us to, are part of the same religion; or, indeed, of any religion at all. I think that this is what some evangelicals think some liberals think. I think they may be right.

Thus there is need of deeper reflection. Before entering into an examination of individual texts, we must direct our attention to the whole picture, the question of structure. Only in this way can a meaningful arrangement of individual elements be obtained. Is there any place at all for something like Mariology in Holy Scripture, in the overall pattern of its faith and prayer? Methodologically, one can approach this question in one of two ways, backwards or forwards, so to speak: either one can read back from the New Testament into the Old or, conversely, feel one’s way slowly from the Old Testament into the New. Ideally both ways should coincide, permeating one another, in order to produce the most exact image possible. If one begins by reading backwards or, more precisely, from the end to the beginning, it becomes obvious that the image of Mary in the New Testament is woven entirely of Old Testament threads. In this reading, two or even three major strands of tradition can be clearly distinguished which were used to express the mystery of Mary. First, the portrait of Mary includes the likeness of the great mothers of the Old Testament: Sarah and especially Hannah, the mother of Samuel. Second, into that portrait is woven the whole theology of daughter Zion, in which, above all, the prophets announced the mystery of election and covenant, the mystery of God’s love for Israel. A third strand can perhaps be identified in the Gospel of John: the figure of Eve, the “woman” par excellence, is borrowed to interpret Mary.

Are you praising God, or cursing Him, during the storms of your layoff? How many times in the New Testament do we read of Jesus telling His disciples to ‘get in the boat, let us go to the other side?’ He and the disciples ALWAYS REACH the other side. Sure, they encountered some storms along the way sometimes, BUT they also witnessed just who they were friends with, and what He could do. Layoffs are definitely like storms, and chances are good you were not the one to suggest getting into the boat and having your emotions, not to mention your finances, relationships, health, etc., tossed to and fro, frightened out of your mind at times. Have you asked Jesus to sit in your boat with you? If so, you can rest assured, He has you covered whether you see it in a tangible way, or not. And, He will take you safely to the other side. The storm (your layoff) will end.

Interestingly, however, in the New Testament, Christ does not appear to his mother after his death, although he reportedly made appearances to over five hundred over people on at least a half dozen occasions. The fact that Queen Isabella added this noncanonical image to the mix suggests that she was interested in giving the mother of Jesus a more important role in the Christian story, either for her own reasons or because she felt that Mary’s role was being undervalued by the church. At the same time she was actively advocating the growth of the female religious order called the Conceptionists, which promoted the Virgin Mary as holy in her own right, not just through her son.

those with doctorates in theology. No, he chose fishermen, tax collectors, and other unlikely candidates. He taught them humility by washing their feet at the Last Supper and then told them, “I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you” (John 13:15). Jesus told his disciples, “The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). This theme of humility is seen throughout the New Testament. The entire Christmas story is, in part, a story about the reversal

Believers hold that every word in the Bible has not only been inspired but also literally dictated by God. Thus we are to believe every verse and every story as spoken directly by God, and this creates some serious problems, including: Intellectual difficulty with overgeneralizations, conflicts with science, and contradictions. Moral difficulties where God is portrayed at times as partial, vengeful, and deceptive, while in other parts of the Bible universal love is taught; the history of the Hebrews in the Bible shows progress in moral concern rather than a static code; injustice in the Bible including the slaughter of innocent people and minor transgressors. Moral difficulty with concept of endless torture in hell. Problem with occasions of Jesus expressing vindictiveness, discourtesy, narrow-mindedness, and ethnic and religious intolerance. Intellectual difficulties with the human decision-making process for deciding the books of the Bible and questions of the value of other writings not included. Non-uniqueness of Judeo-Christian teachings and practices. Other religions have similar rituals and beliefs, including sacrifice and vicarious atonement through the death of a god, union of a god and a virgin, trinities, the mother Mary (Myrrha, Maya, Maia, and Maritala), a place for good people who die and a hell of fire, an apocalypse, the first man falling from the god’s favor by doing something forbidden or having been tempted by some evil animal, catastrophic floods in which the whole race is exterminated (with details analogous to the story of the flood), a man being swallowed by a fish and then spat out alive, miracles as proof of power and divine messengers. Moral difficulties with intolerance and oppression in today’s society, which are based on the Bible. Intellectual difficulties with New Testament authors’ interpretation of events as fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. There are a number of references to “scriptures” that simply don’t exist.

As the Old Testament also insisted on the handing down of a message which was the coming of the Messiah, so they awaited this Messiah. Since that time it is no longer a promise which we have to transmit - it is Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and we have to hand down this admirable treasure - a treasure so extraordinary that it transcends our capabilities. It is our duty to hand down this message faithfully, in imitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary and of St. Pius X, our patrons. If there is anyone who has handed down Our Lord Jesus Christ faithfully in this world, it is the Blessed Virgin Mary. She received Him by the grace of the Holy Ghost; she who was immaculate in her conception, which great privilege we celebrate today. Our Lord Jesus Christ was truly handed down to humanity by the Blessed Virgin Mary, until His last breath on the Cross, when she too was present; she fulfilled her role perfectly. And that is why she can truly be called Virgo Fidelis - Virgin Most Faithful. She was faithful to all the details of her duties as mother, of her duty to hand down Jesus to us for our redemption. In the midst of the upheavals of history, in the midst of the errors which appeared right at the beginning of this century, and which had their roots in the century which came before, a Pope also arose. God gave us an admirable Pope i the person of St. Pius X, the last Pope to be canonized. St. Pius, too, was faithful; he, too, wanted to transmit the message which Our Lord entrusted to him. And he expressed it in a wonderful manner in these words: "Instaurare omnia in Christo - Restore all things in Christ." This is the message handed down to us by Pope St. Pius X and with these examples before you - the Blessed Virgin Mary and Pope St. Pius X - you, too, will be faithful. (Sermon of December 8, 1979)

First comes the Sanhedrim in Jerusalem plotting against the life of the Just One. Then comes Mary at Bethany, in her unutterable love breaking her alabaster box, and pouring its contents on the head and feet of her beloved Lord. Last comes Judas, offering to sell his Master for less than Mary wasted on a useless act of affection! Hatred and baseness on either hand, and true love in the midst.

He, in effect, says to us thereby: Be not afraid to regard my death as an act of the same kind as that of Mary: an act of pure, devoted love. Let the aroma of her ointment circulate about the neighborhood of my cross, and help you to discern the sweet savor of my sacrifice. Amid all your speculations and theories on the grand theme of redemption, take heed that ye fail not to see in my death my loving heart, and the loving heart of my Father, revealed..4

The wildflowers— which typically fell to their demise in the late summer months— were still blooming that October. It was a peculiar instance, one of which Marie Fernsby chalked up to being a miracle. George— being the more realistic of the two— decided the unprecedented strength of the wildflowers was due to the unseasonably warm weather and nothing more. Like most married couples, the Fernsbys quite often disagreed. But, stuck alone in the farmhouse with little exposure to the outside world, neither husband nor wife found pleasure in accusing the other of being wrong. It was their testament to the longevity of their love.

God’s holiness did not change from the Old to the New Testament.

In all of the Gospels of the New Testament, Mary Magdalene is mentioned only one time during Jesus’ entire public ministry prior to his crucifixion, and in that one reference we are simply told that she was one of three women who accompanied Jesus and his disciples during his itinerant preaching ministry and who gave them the funds they needed to survive (the other two were Joanna and Susanna). That’s it! There are no references to her being a prostitute, having anointed Jesus (that was a different, unnamed woman), or having been the woman caught in adultery (that was yet a different unnamed woman)—let alone having been Jesus’ wife and lover. Where, then, do people get their ideas about the Magdalene from? From legends told about her many decades or even centuries after her death. These are stories that are made up—sometimes (for example, in the case of her having Jesus’ baby) made up in modern times by novelists or “independent researchers” who want to sell books.

Luke has interspersed with an account of the nativity of John the Baptist (no doubt obtained from the rival sect of John) a parallel nativity of Jesus built on John's model. Not that Luke himself was the one who composed it; it, too, was most likely pre-Lukan material. [...] Though Luke used prior sources, probably in Aramaic, for the nativities of John and Jesus, it appears he himself contributed bits of connective text to bring the two parallel stories into a particular relationship so that John should be subordinated to Jesus, whom Luke makes Jesus' elder cousin. This original, redactional material is Luke 1:36, 39-45, 56. It consists of a visit of Mary to her cousin Elizabeth, whereupon the fetus John, already in possession of clairvoyant gifts, leaps in the womb to acknowledge the greater glory of the messianic zygote. All this is blatantly legendary, or there is no such thing as a legend. Luke probably got the idea from Gen. 25:22, where according to the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, Rebecca is painfully pregnant with twins. [...] In this way Luke tries to harmonize the competing traditions of Jesus and John, whose cousinhood is no doubt his own invention.

Elaine once replied, “I was going to quote from the Old Testament, and say that ‘a man sharpens his face on the face of his friends.’ This is why important movements in art have always taken place where groups of artists could get together. And then something happens. It’s some kind of electricity. A movement is never started by one; it’s always give and take.”27 Elaine’s and Bill’s relationship involved a continual exchange of ideas that wasn’t restricted to conversations with friends.

At the time of Mary's birth the whole world was plunged in darkness. The heathen nations were steeped in vice and pride. The Jews, too, had corrupted their ways and departed from God. Everywhere there was sin and gloom, no bright spot on the face of the earth. But when Mary was born a light arose amid the darkness; the dawn of the glorious day that was to usher in the Redeemer. So, too, the darkness of the sinner's soul is dispersed by Mary's holy influence. Where the love of her is born in the soul, all becomes full of light, and Jesus comes to make His habitation there. Mary, in the first hour of her life, brought more glory to God then all the Saints of the Old Testament. In her were made perfect the obedience of Abraham, the chastity of Joseph, the patience of Job, the meekness of Moses, the prudence of Josue. It is because she is the model and pattern of these and all other virtues that she can communicate them to us. (September 8 The Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary)

First of all I will confess quite simply—I believe that the Bible alone is the answer to all our questions, and that we need only to ask repeatedly and a little humbly, in order to receive this answer. One cannot simply read the Bible, like other books. One must be prepared really to enquire of it. Only thus will it reveal itself. Only if we expect from it the ultimate answer, shall we receive it. That is because in the Bible God speaks to us. And one cannot simply think about God in one’s own strength, one has to enquire of him. Only if we seek him, will he answer us. Of course it is also possible to read the Bible like any other book, that is to say from the point of view of textual criticism, etc.; there is nothing to be said against that. Only that that is not the method which will reveal to us the heart of the Bible, but only the surface, just as we do not grasp the words of someone we love by taking them to bits, but by simply receiving them, so that for days they go on lingering in our minds, simply because they are the words of a person we love; and just as these words reveal more and more of the person who said them as we go on, like Mary, “pondering them in our heart,” so it will be with the words of the Bible. Only if we will venture to enter into the words of the Bible, as though in them this God were speaking to us who loves us and does not will to leave us along with our questions, only so shall we learn to rejoice in the Bible. . . . If it is I who determine where God is to be found, then I shall always find a God who corresponds to me in some way, who is obliging, who is connected with my own nature. But if God determines where he is to be found, then it will be in a place which is not immediately pleasing to my nature and which is not at all congenial to me. This place is the Cross of Christ. And whoever would find him must go to the foot of the Cross, as the Sermon on the Mount commands. This is not according to our nature at all, it is entirely contrary to it. But this is the message of the Bible, not only in the New but also in the Old Testament. . . .

This anthology is a testament to American Indian consciousness continuing to circulate, regardless of past or present genocidal attempts, whether cerebral, endemic, systematic, or otherwise.

Thus we have it illustrated in the story of the snake who was sent to kill Hercules, when an infant in his cradle; [482:2] also in the story of Typhon, who sought the life of the infant Saviour Horus. Again, it is illustrated in the story of the virgin mother Astrea, with her babe beset by Orion, and of Latona, the mother of Apollo, when pursued by the monster. [482:3] And last, that of the virgin mother Mary, with her babe beset by Herod. But like Hercules, Horus, Apollo, Theseus, Romulus, Cyrus and other solar heroes, Christ Jesus has yet a long course before him. Like them, he grows up both wise and strong, and the "old Serpent" is discomfited by him, just as the sphynx and the dragon are put to night by others.

In Christianizing these Pagan temples, free use was made of the sculptured and painted stones of heathen monuments. In some cases they evidently painted over one name, and inserted another. This may be seen from the following Inscriptions Formerly in Pagan Temples. and Inscriptions now in Christian Churches. 1. To Mercury and Minerva, Tutelary Gods.   1. To St. Mary and St. Francis, My Tutelaries. 2. To the Gods who preside over this Temple.   2. To the Divine Eustrogius, who presides over this Temple.

If the reader will turn to the apocryphal Gospel called " Protevangelion" (chapter xiii.), he will there see one of the reasons why it was thought best to leave this Gospel out of the canon of the New Testament. It relates the "Miracles at Mary's labor," similar to the Luke narrator, but in a still more wonderful form. It is probably from this apocryphal Gospel that the Luke narrator copied.

God accommodates [Moses'] complaints and makes in-course corrections. God does not take a human being so fully into the divine confidence--you might say, God does not depend on a human being so fully--until Mary conceives by the Holy Spirit.

My opposition is based on two grounds; first, the right of every rational being to become a "Priest unto himself," and by the test of enlightened reason, to form his own unbiassed judgment of all things natural and spiritual: second, that the reputation of the Bishops who extracted these books from the original New Testament, under the pretence of being Apocryphal, and forbade them to be read by the people, is proved by authentic impartial history too odious to entitle them to any deference.

Matthew, however, explicitly affirms that Jesus was virginally conceived (Matt. 1: 18–25), and Luke strongly implies it (Luke 1: 26–38). Some Protestant Christians believe that, following Jesus’ delivery, his mother may have borne other children in the ordinary way. According to Roman Catholic doctrine, however, Mary remains perpetually virgin. Jesus’ “brothers” (translating the Greek adelphoi) are to be understood as close male relatives, perhaps cousins or stepbrothers (sons of Mary’s husband, Joseph, by a previous marriage). (An apocryphal infancy Gospel, the Protevangelium of James, which probably dates from the second century CE, depicts James as Jesus’ older stepbrother and Mary as eternally virgin; see Chapter 20.)

Oh, Gram. Don't you think falling in love in one week is about the silliest thing you've ever heard? Not that I'm falling in love, mind you. That's so...so...Harlequin.

Will looked up at Garrison. "Did you get some shots?" Garrison held up a Canon with an impressive lens. "Got 'em, boss.

The most ancient pictures and statues in Italy and other parts of Europe, of what are supposed to be representations of the Virgin Mary and the infant Jesus, are black. The infant god, in the arms of his black mother, his eyes and drapery white, is himself perfectly black. [335:8]

The reason assigned by the Christian priests for the images being black, is that they are made so by smoke and incense, but, we may ask, if they became black by smoke, why is it that the white drapery, white teeth, and the white of the eyes have not changed in color? Why are the lips of a bright red color? Why, we may also ask, are the black images crowned and adorned with jewels, just as the images of the Hindoo and Egyptian virgins are represented? When we find that the Virgin Devaki, and the Virgin Isis were represented just as these so-called ancient Christian idols represent Mary, we are led to the conclusion that they are Pagan idols adopted by the Christians.

By borrowing this language from {Old Testament] scripture, Luke shows us that what was from the start a distinguishing feature of God's people—his presence among them in the Ark of the Covenant—was only a hint of the far more marvelous truth. Mary is a "new Ark" through which not only God's glorious presence but also God himself in the flesh comes to live in and with his people!

Are you praising God, or cursing Him, during the storms of your layoff? How many times in the New Testament do we read of Jesus telling His disciples to 'get in the boat, let us go to the other side?' He and the disciples ALWAYS REACH the other side. Sure, they encountered some storms along the way sometimes, BUT they also witnessed just who they were friends with, and what He could do. Layoffs are definitely like storms, and chances are good you were not the one to suggest getting into the boat and having your emotions, not to mention your finances, relationships, health, etc., tossed to and fro, frightened out of your mind at times. Have you asked Jesus to sit in your boat with you? If so, you can rest assured, He has you covered whether you see it in a tangible way, or not. And, He will take you safely to the other side. The storm (your layoff) will end.

With the Incarnation, the ‘promises’ and ‘figures’ of the Old Testament become reality: places, persons, events and rites interrelate according to precise divine commands communicated by Angels and received by creatures who are particularly sensitive to the voice of God. Mary is the Lord’s humble servant, prepared from eternity for the task of being the Mother of God. Joseph is the one ... who has the responsibility of looking after the Son of God’s ‘ordained’ entry into the world in accordance with divine dispositions and human laws. All of the so-called ‘private’ or ‘hidden’ life of Jesus is entrusted to Joseph’s guardianship.[440

For a man to surrender the option of divorce (a startling renunciation of rights within Matthew’s patriarchal cultural context), to enter marriage with the expectation of living it as a binding covenant, is to commit his life without reservation to one other particular human being. (For an interesting narrative example, see the story of Joseph and Mary in Matt. 1:18–25.) Thus, Matthew places the renunciation of divorce alongside renunciation of anger, alongside turning the other cheek—even alongside love of enemy—as a sign of the character of God’s kingdom.

Kopiaō speaks of “exertion and toil,” “the process of becoming tired,” and the “consequent fatigue and exhaustion.”191 Peter used this word, for example, when he told the Lord that he and his companions “toiled” all night fishing and had caught nothing (Luke 5:5). Nothing more is known of a certain Mary whom Paul simply greets as one who “bestowed much labour” on Him and other servants of Christ (Rom. 16:6). He praised three others in the Roman church—Tryphena, Tryphosa, and Persis—for the same reason. All these godly servants tirelessly and sacrificially served the Lord.