Mystical Christianity: Lesson 8 (assignment)

1. How do you view Mary of Nazareth? For me, Mary of Nazareth is a completely distinct figure from the Virgin Mary of the Church, in a similar way that the historical Jesus is a different figure from the Christ of faith.  I think that in all likelihood Mary became pregnant under normal conditions and went on to have other children.  It is also possible that a historical Mary did not even exist (as it is possible that a historical Jesus might not have existed) – but I think this point is irrelevant because her archetypal essence is what's important for us today. 2. What does it mean to call Mary "the maternal face of God"? In what ways is she  the White Virgin? For many Christians, especially Catholic and Orthodox Christians, Mary represents the only feminine image of divinity.  Even if traditional theology stresses that Mary is not to be equated with God or worshiped as a sort of fourth person of the Trinity, church iconography and popular devotion often gives a different impression.  She embodies the White Virgin as she is considered pure, maternal and heavenly ("Queen of Heaven"), devoid of sexuality, sensuality and earthiness – and thus rather distant from the Dark Goddess imagery. 3. Is it fair to maintain that the Mary of the Church is a projection of a celibate, male  priesthood created for political purposes?' I would say that the Mary of the Church is not so much a projection of the celibate male priesthood as much as she is the result of attempts to contain and restrain a power feminine archetype.  That is to say, the Church Fathers had no intention of elevating Mary to such an exalted position, but popular faith in the ancient Mother Goddess (worshiped most frequently as Isis in the Mediterranean world) could not be suppressed -- the Goddess consistently manifested herself. As the Church often did with other pagan beliefs and ancient holidays (Christmas trees [and many other Christmas symbols and imagery], Halloween, Easter eggs [and bunnies, etc.] were all Christian adaptations of pagan customs), the Church gave up trying to eradicate the Mother Goddess and instead elected to bring her under Church authority.  Therefore, by raising Mary to an exalted position – to a position as near to God as possible without actually being God – while denying her sexuality and absolute divinity, the Church was able to "regulate" this "problematic" force (or so they thought). 4. Riane Eisler states that "Religion supports and perpetuates the social    organization it reflects." What ways can you work to shift our culture away   from a dominator mentality and more to partnership with each other? We need to place less emphasis on competition. Competition is a primary force in the dominator mentality – and it is the driving force of the modern dog-eat-dog capitalist economy. Competition is viewed as stimulating development and advancement – but in truth, in the form it exists today, it creates waste and environmental destruction. We must move away from competition and towards a more cooperative model for the economy and society – one that strikes a balance between the extremes of wasteful hyper-individualistic capitalism and repressive totalitarian communism. J.P.A.