Summary of the Responses Received
After ten pages of discussion, a clear pattern has emerged: while respondents differ significantly in how they attempt to defend the position that Mary and Joseph later had normal marital relations, they remain unified in their conclusion. The problem is that they are not unified in their reasoning.
In fact, many of the arguments offered contradict one another, and several cannot be true simultaneously. More importantly, none of the proposed explanations adequately account for the textual challenge that was originally raised.
My challenge was never:
- Whether perpetual virginity is an official Catholic doctrine.
- Whether Jesus had "brothers."
- Whether Matthew 1:25 implies later marital relations.
- Whether marriage is honorable.
- Whether virginity is superior to marriage.
- Whether Mary should be specially honored.
- Whether Protestants or Catholics are correct overall.
- Whether spouses owe one another conjugal rights.
- Whether church tradition should be trusted on this issue.
The challenge was far narrower and entirely textual:
Why does Mary ask "How will this occur?" rather than "When will this occur?" in Luke 1:34, and why does Gabriel respond by explaining miraculous conception and appealing to Elizabeth's otherwise impossible conception, if Mary was simply expecting to conceive through normal future marital relations with Joseph?
That question has remained unanswered throughout the discussion.
The Different Types of Responses
1. "Mary was only stating that She was presently a virgin."
This response argues that Mary simply meant She had not yet had sexual relations.
However, this does not address the actual question.
The issue is not whether Mary was a virgin at that moment. Everyone agrees She was.
The question is why present virginity would create confusion about a future conception if She expected normal marital relations shortly thereafter. The explanation merely restates Mary's condition without explaining why She regarded conception as requiring further explanation.
2. "Mary was asking about immediate timing."
Some respondents argued that Gabriel's announcement implied an immediate conception before consummation of the marriage.
This is perhaps the closest anyone came to engaging the actual issue.
However, it creates its own difficulty.
If Mary's concern was merely that conception would occur before marital relations, Gabriel's answer should clarify timing.
Instead, Gabriel explains mechanism.
Mary asks how.
Gabriel answers how.
He does not say, "Joseph will marry you sooner than expected," or, "The conception will occur later."
He explains that the Holy Spirit will bring it about and then points to Elizabeth as evidence that God accomplishes what would otherwise be impossible.
The response still leaves unexplained why impossibility becomes the focus of the conversation.
3. "Mary somehow understood a virginal conception was being predicted."
Several replies suggested Mary already understood that a virginal conception was being predicted.
Yet Gabriel has not explained the means of conception until after Mary asks Her question, making it unclear how She would already possess that information.
This explanation appears to assume the very conclusion that Gabriel's answer is intended to establish.
4. "Mary expected a normal marriage."
This was often asserted rather than demonstrated.
Yet this assertion is precisely what the challenge calls into question.
If Mary expected ordinary marital relations leading to ordinary conception, then Her question becomes difficult to explain.
Simply repeating that She expected a normal marriage does not resolve the difficulty. It assumes the very point under dispute.
5. "Luke 1:34-37 is not about perpetual virginity."
Some argued that the passage should not be read as evidence for perpetual virginity because that is not Luke's purpose.
Even if that were granted, the textual question would remain.
The issue is not what Luke's ultimate purpose may have been.
The issue is why Mary asks
how conception will occur and why Gabriel answers in terms of miraculous conception, impossibility, and divine intervention.
Contradictions Between the Responses
One striking feature of the discussion is that respondents frequently contradicted one another while arriving at the same conclusion.
For example:
- Some argued Mary was confused because conception would happen immediately.
- Others argued Mary already knew a virginal conception was being predicted.
- Still others argued She was simply stating Her present condition without expressing any difficulty at all.
These explanations are not merely different emphases. They are competing explanations of the same question.
Mary cannot simultaneously be puzzled because conception is immediate, already know that a virginal conception is being predicted, and merely be stating a present fact without expressing any difficulty.
The participants were united in defending the conclusion that Mary and Joseph later had marital relations, but there was no comparable unity regarding how Luke 1:34-37 should actually be explained.
The Central Issue Remains
After ten pages, the fundamental challenge remains exactly where it began.
Mary is told She will conceive and bear a son.
Instead of asking
when, She asks
how.
Instead of discussing timing, Gabriel explains miraculous conception.
Instead of pointing to future marital relations with Joseph, Gabriel points to another naturally impossible but divinely enabled conception.
As
@TiberiusMaximus has pointed out, there is also an additional consideration. Gabriel's announcement is a prophecy about a future conception, while Mary's response is a present-tense statement:
"I know not man." This may naturally carry future significance, since Mary is responding to something that Gabriel says
will happen. Whether one accepts that argument or not, however, the larger narrative problem remains unchanged.
Gabriel still answers Mary's question by describing a miraculous, non-sexual conception and by appealing to divine intervention overcoming what would otherwise be impossible. He does not point Mary to future marital relations with Joseph as the explanation. Instead, he explains supernatural conception and reinforces it by citing Elizabeth's own naturally impossible but divinely enabled conception, concluding that
"nothing will be impossible with God." If Mary's conception was expected to occur through ordinary marital relations with Joseph, it remains unclear why Gabriel answers in terms of miracle, impossibility, and divine intervention rather than future marital relations.
The discussion repeatedly moved away from these details and onto questions of doctrine, church tradition, Mary's later life, Jesus' brothers, Matthew 1:25, and various broader theological disputes.
But the textual question itself was never directly answered.
Every response has either shifted to a different passage, appealed to a different doctrine, assumed the conclusion under debate, or reframed the argument into something other than the challenge that was actually presented.
For that reason, after ten pages of discussion, the original textual problem remains standing exactly as it was posed:
Why do both Mary and Gabriel speak as though conception requires a miraculous explanation if ordinary future marital relations with Joseph were already expected to provide the answer?
