Occasionally I’d get complete agreement instead of Flesh-to-Pile-of-Rocks, but nothing in between.

You understanding is correct, the Immaculate Conception is God’s special gift of Grace preserving Mary free of Original Sin, so as the a pure ark of the new covenant.

Not to be the Catholic Theology police, but Immaculate Conception does not refer to Christ’s conception through the Holy Spirt. Christ’s conception is referred to as the “Virgin Birth” and is expressed in the Apostles Creed as “He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, and was born of the Virgin Mary” and in the Nicene Creed as “For us men and our salvation he came down from heaven: by the power of the Holy Spirit he was born of the Virgin Mary and became man.”

These Creedal statements are defining the Faith expressed in the St. Luke’s Gospel (Lk 1:26-38) and St. Matthew’s (Mt 1:23) where he cited the prophecy from Isiah 7:14 [cites from the Septuaigiant LXX version] which read “Therefore, the Lord himself will give you this sign: the virgin shall be with child and bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.”

pax et bonum

Does the New Testament present the incarnation as the kind of metaphor that you have described? Please show me clear evidence that it does.

Has the church ever believed that the incarnation is the kind of metaphor you have described? Again, please show me some evidence.

You wrote:

“When we live out the same sacrificial, merciful, and non-violent protests against imperialistic values, then we can become the body of Christ. That’s Paul’s metaphor, not mine.”

The only thing you have in common with Paul in these two sentences is that you both use the phrase “body of Christ.” But how does Paul use that phrase? I challenge you to produce one shred of evidence that for Paul the “body of Christ” means anything close to the political moralism that you are referring to here.

There is a big difference between using biblical language and communicating biblical ideas. And my concern is that, if you have no concern for the ideas, you might as well drop the language too.

Another great illustration!

If we say “Lincoln freed the slaves” (as if one proclamation can do such a thing), but we refuse to incarnate that idea into reality, then it would still be only an “idea”, right?

Historical events happens only once, the truth-filled metaphors of our sacred text continue to happen on a daily basis. There were still many people in bondage after 1863. Forced labor continued for decades in the south along with beatings and deaths. The proclamation had not been “lived out” or incarnated into our nation. It still hasn’t. For many, it is still an immaterial unfulfilled dream waiting to be birthed into their reality. Simply declaring slaves free did not make those people or their children and grand children truly “free”. To accept God’s call of emancipation means we should seek the freedom of everyone who is held captive. To say “I’m certain slaves are free” does nothing if the statement is not incarnate in the world.

You said: “This shows that the line between slavery and freedom is just Cartesian dualism”

I’m not sure if you were being sarcastic. I can’t follow that logic. Do you know what dualism is? I’m speaking about both the Cartesian form we deal with in the post-enlightenment era, and the version of Plato, which the Church father’s used to build many of their doctrines and later fed Descartes views.

peace

I don’t think “emancipation” needs to be a matter of mental assent, to say, “The slaves in the South were emancipated by proclamation on January 1, 1863.” That is just too narrow. We show we believe in emancipation not by reciting so-called “facts” about the “Civil War,” but by everyday acting out God’s mission of emancipation in our own “civil war” against injustice in our communtities.

What I’m saying is really biblical too. We are “free in Christ,” but “we are slaves to Christ.” This shows that the line between slavery and freedom is just Cartesian dualism. it is really a shame that ancient interpreters of Scripture were so negatively influenced by reading Descartes.

I agree there has been many cases where Christian theologians mistakenly took symbolic illustrations literally (Gen. 1 for example). Words have many connotations. The following is a perfectly acceptable definition that illustrates my use of the word:

“Incarnation: a person or thing regarded as embodying or exhibiting some quality, idea, or the like: The leading dancer is the incarnation of grace.”

In this way, I affirm that Jesus is the incarnation of God’s values and character. When we live out the same sacrificial, merciful, and non-violent protests against imperialistic values, then we can become the body of Christ. That’s Paul’s metaphor, not mine. It would be problematic to imply some kind of physical/spiritual substance shift to these metaphors.

When I got married I said my wife and were now “one”. I did not assume that meant we were one substance. I simply meant that the two of us were of like vision, like mission, and equally committed together on one path? To interpret the incarnation story as being a physical substance shift from some imagined non-physical substance to a physical substance is as strange as assuming I had a substance transformation when we said our wedding vows. But it does make for a beautiful metaphor!

As with most religious squabbles, the problem is simply the inability of modern readers to understand a metaphor without trying to mistake it for modern history or science. We need better literature courses in schools to help people understand these common age old literary devices.

News Flash: You are neither too white nor too young to participate in the ongoing struggle for civil rights. What you need are eyes to see and ears to hear.

Please return to earth where the incarnation took place with all its beauty and mystery.

I think you sidestepped the true intention of my illustration. I wasn’t contrasting a belief in civil rights as a proposition with taking action to advance the rights of others. I was expressing how absurd it would be for me, a white male born in 1980, to call myself a champion of the black struggle for civil rights. It is something that not only is not true, it is something that cannot be true.

Sure, I can do things to advance the right of others, just like I can do things that reflect the character of Christ. But participating in the black struggle for civil rights is something I cannot do. I am both ethnically and historically too far removed from the events. Similarly, I am a creature. I cannot participate in the incarnation. To say that I can is to turn the whole notion of incarnation on its head.

Progressive Faith, why keep a term if you are not going to use it to refer to what it normally means? Why not just come up with another word or phrase? Is that really fair to people with whom you communicate? Don’t you think it really clouds the issue to use a word that you know will register one way in someone’s mind when in fact you mean something totally different (indeed, something diametrically opposed)? Maybe I’m too hung up on precision, but it seems to me that the best way to communicate and to be understood is to use language in such a way that you minimize the potential for misunderstanding.

If you’d like, I’ll even help you come up with a substitute word or phrase for what you are trying to express. How’s that sound?

I won’t even charge you anything.