A false problem

A question came up recently about the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary (IC). To Anglicans this is no dogma, but it is considered "a pious belief" that some Christians hold. "Pious" does not mean true, but that Anglicans are willing to tolerate it.

I do not have any intention of arguing the doctrine one way or the other; but, I offer critical thought about the underlying idea that it serves any purpose. To begin with, it is not a doctrine of Universal Church, even though the See of Rome, a single diocese, asserts its own ideas as "universal." The Eastern Orthodox do not teach it. Rome itself did not dogmatize the idea until the middle of the 19th century. Saints, including Thomas Aquinas, did not believe it, despite all sorts of sophistry employed to rewrite his position. The Fathers of the Church never mentioned it, and more so, seem never to have imagined a need for it. They never even discussed the alleged problem that it allegedly solves.

And, that itself is why IC cannot be a dogma. A doctrine that is wholly unnecessary cannot be a dogma (not to mention the fact that no such revelation appears in Holy Scripture). IC is the fruit of human speculation concerning an academic question. And, the question itself, especially when posited as a problem, presents a deeper problem still, and exposes a seriously flawed state of mind.

The same flawed state of mind is discernible in the "big rock question." You have all heard it: "Can God make a stone so heavy that He cannot lift it?"  This is supposed to make us cringe, and feel deeply challenged. The same people who consider it profound are the kind who think that the El Greco Fallacy should be taken seriously. The El Greco Fallacy was used by a professor of psychology at Harvard as an intelligence test, to weed out students who lacked sufficient intelligence. 

This is well described on the HSFP Journal website:

In his book Advice to a Young Scientist, Peter Medawar gives a test in logic based on the paintings of El Greco (Medawar, 1979). A striking feature of many of El Greco’s pictures is the way figures and faces often appear to be excessively elongated. In trying to account for this idiosyncratic style, an ophthalmologist proposed in 1913 that El Greco may have had a form of astigmatism, which distorted his vision and led to elongated images forming on his retina (Trevor-Roper, 1970). Although such an explanation may initially seem reasonable, it does not stand up to logical scrutiny. This is because even if El Greco did see the world through a distorting lens, the same distortion would apply to what he saw on his canvas. These two distortions would cancel each other out, and the proportions in pictures would remain realistic. Thus “if some of El Greco’s figures seem unnaturally tall and thin, they appear so because this was El Greco’s intention” (Medawar, 1979).

The Big Rock Question is flawed because it subjects the infinity of God, and His therefore infinite power, to the terms we know from the finite universe. The question itself does not represent a valid philosophical problem. The context in which it is asked, and in which an answer could be attempted, is insufficient to cover the subject itself.

This is one fallacy of treating IC as a dogma. Supposedly, IC answers a real question and solves a real problem. The question is, "How can God the Son be incarnate as a sinless man?" The answer, according to the Roman Catholic Church (as of 1850) is that the Church has always taught (retroactively, apparently) that Mary was born free of Original Sin. Therefore, her Son could be free of it.

The problem here is twofold. First, it has not been established that the Son would be tainted by Original Sin even if His mother was. That is simply a conclusion reached by the worst kind of scholasticisim. The larger problem is the question itself. 

In Christian theology we have no room for any question that includes the words, "How can God...?" We have one answer for every such presumptuous inquiry: "With God, all things are possible." (Matt. 19:26  Mark 10:27) Any question that includes the words, "How can God...?" takes us back to the fallacy of the Big Rock Question: As I said above, "it subjects the infinity of God, and His therefore infinite power, to the terms we know from the finite universe. The question itself does not represent a valid philosophical problem. The context in which it is asked, and in which an answer could be attempted, is insufficient to cover the subject itself."

If people want to believe in the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, well, I suppose we can live with that. What matters above all else is our shared conviction that her ability to conceive the sinless Son of God was by grace, and only by grace. It was entirely supernatural and charismatic, not due to her own merits.

The question, however, represents a false problem. It came about because men could not understand the infinite power of God, and the smallness of their own minds. Believe in IC all you want; but, know that it solves no real problem. At best, the whole subject is a waste of time.