The Perpetual Virginity of the Blessed Virgin Mary Explained

The Roman Catechism states, “[T]he faithful are bound to believe that Jesus the Lord was not only conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost but was also born of the Virgin Mary.” Elsewhere, referring to the birth of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, the Catechism explains this sublime mystery on the Virgin birth:

"... as the rays of the sun penetrate, without breaking or injuring, in the least, the substance of glass; after a like, but more incomprehensible manner, did Jesus Christ come forth from his mother's womb without injury to her maternal virginity, which, immaculate and perpetual, forms the just theme of our eulogy."

In 2006, “The Nativity Story” premiered, and it was rightfully boycotted by some Catholics, despite having its premiere in Vatican City, since it depicted Mary, the New Eve, in child birthing pains, which is heretical. Likewise, some protestants and non-believers alike attempt to claim that the Virgin Mary had other children with either St. Joseph or with other husbands by twisting the words of the Gospel of Mark 6:3 and the Gospel of Matthew 13:55–56, failing to understand as Rev. George Leo Haydock explains in this illustrious Bible commentary that was published in 1859, "These were the children of Mary, the wife of Cleophas, sister of our blessed Lady and therefore, according to the usual style of the Scripture, they were called brethren, that is, near relations to our Savior." These verses do not in any way refer to brothers and sisters of our Divine Lord, as we would say in modern terms.

The central mystery of the Catholic Faith – namely the incarnation of Jesus Christ to a Virgin – is beyond our understanding. Yet, rather than twisting the Scriptures and Church history to fit new, heretical views, we pray that we can slowly come to better understand this marvelous mystery on how God Himself took human flesh and was born of only one biological parent. This mystery harkens back to the beginning of Creation with Adam and Eve, and in Christ and our Lady the Catechism rightfully calls them the Second Adam and the Second Eve:

“The Apostle sometimes calls Jesus Christ the second Adam, and compares Him to the first Adam; for as in the first all men die, so in the second all are made alive: and as in the natural order Adam was the father of the human race, so in the supernatural order Christ is The author of grace and of glory. The Virgin Mother we may also compare to Eve, making the second Eve, that is, Mary, correspond to the first, as we have already shown that the second Adam, that is, Christ, corresponds to the first Adam.”

Sr. Lucia, one of the three children who saw the apparitions of Our Lady in Fatima in 1916, received a vision on December 10, 1925, of Our Lady, who requested at that time the practice of the First Saturdays. In a few months’ time, on June 12, 1930, in a request from her confessor for more information on the reason for the five Saturdays as requested by Our Lady, Sister Lucia explained that she had received a vision of our Lord on May 30, 1930, where our Lord Himself asked for these to correspond to the five kinds of blasphemies uttered against His Mother. One of those five was blasphemies against her perpetual virginity. Not only would we do well by learning and sharing this truth of our Lady’s virginity, but we should also make reparation for those who blasphemy her and who attribute child-birthing pains to the Blessed Mother.

The Blessed Virgin Mary is Ever-Virgin. She likewise did not suffer child-birthing pains. And those who contradict either of these statements succumb to heresy and have separated themselves from the Church. They must repudiate their errors and return to Holy Mother Church through the Sacrament of Confession.

Sermon by Saint Augustine
(Sermo 25, 7-8:PL 46, 937-938)

Stretching out his hand over his disciples, the Lord Christ declared: Here are my mother and my brothers; anyone who does the will of my Father who sent me is my brother and sister and my mother. I would urge you to ponder these words. Did the Virgin Mary, who believed by faith and conceived by faith, who was the chosen one from whom our Saviour was born among men, who was created by Christ before Christ was created in her – did she not do the will of the Father? Indeed the blessed Mary certainly did the Father’s will, and so it was for her a greater thing to have been Christ’s disciple than to have been his mother, and she was more blessed in her discipleship than in her motherhood. Hers was the happiness of first bearing in her womb him whom she would obey as her master.

Now listen and see if the words of Scripture do not agree with what I have said. The Lord was passing by and crowds were following him. His miracles gave proof of divine power. and a woman cried out: Happy is the womb that bore you, blessed is that womb! But the Lord, not wishing people to seek happiness in a purely physical relationship, replied: More blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it. Mary heard God’s word and kept it, and so she is blessed. She kept God’s truth in her mind, a nobler thing than carrying his body in her womb. The truth and the body were both Christ: he was kept in Mary’s mind insofar as he is truth, he was carried in her womb insofar as he is man; but what is kept in the mind is of a higher order than what is carried in the womb.

The Virgin Mary is both holy and blessed, and yet the Church is greater than she. Mary is a part of the Church, a member of the Church, a holy, an eminent – the most eminent – member, but still only a member of the entire body. The body undoubtedly is greater than she, one of its members. This body has the Lord for its head, and head and body together make up the whole Christ. In other words, our head is divine – our head is God.

Now, beloved, give me your whole attention, for you also are members of Christ; you also are the body of Christ. Consider how you yourselves can be among those of whom the Lord said: Here are my mother and my brothers. Do you wonder how you can be the mother of Christ? He himself said: Whoever hears and fulfils the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and my sister and my mother. As for our being the brothers and sisters of Christ, we can understand this because although there is only one inheritance and Christ is the only Son, his mercy would not allow him to remain alone. It was his wish that we too should be heirs of the Father, and co-heirs with himself.

Now having said that all of you are brothers of Christ, shall I not dare to call you his mother? Much less would I dare to deny his own words. Tell me how Mary became the mother of Christ, if it was not by giving birth to the members of Christ? You, to whom I am speaking, are the members of Christ. Of whom were you born? “Of Mother Church”, I hear the reply of your hearts. You became sons of this mother at your baptism, you came to birth then as members of Christ. Now you in your turn must draw to the font of baptism as many as you possibly can. You became sons when you were born there yourselves, and now by bringing others to birth in the same way, you have it in your power to become the mothers of Christ.