Does Mary’s Perpetual Virginity Matter?

DEFENSE

God is omnipotent and can do anything he chooses, but this doesn’t mean his choices are arbitrary.

This objection is a subcase of a broader one: Why should Mary be a virgin in the first place? Couldn’t God’s Son be born of a woman who wasn’t a virgin?

He could have. Being omnipotent, God could do that. He even could have had his Son born of a prostitute if he chose.

It isn’t intrinsically required that Mary be any special kind of woman to be Jesus’ mother—just that she be a woman. However, this doesn’t mean it wasn’t appropriate for God to give Mary certain qualities to make her a more fitting mother for his Son.

This applies, in the first place, to the virginal conception itself. The fact that Jesus was conceived without a human father is striking, arresting. It naturally raises the question: “What does this mean?”

One could say, “It makes a difference because God had prophesied in advance that his Son would be born of a virgin” (see Days 253 and 254). But this only raises the question: “Why did God prophesy that? What difference did it make that his Son be virgin-born?”

The answer is that, if Jesus doesn’t have a human father, his father must be looked for outside of the human realm. Jesus’ Father is not on earth but in heaven: His Father is God. This is the fundamental point underscored by the Virgin Birth.

It is also the fundamental reason for Mary’s perpetual virginity (see Day 188). Consider: If Joseph and Mary later had children, it would raise doubts about the Virgin Birth itself.

Jesus was conceived when Mary was already legally married to Joseph, but before their time of cohabitation began (Matt. 1:18; Luke 1:26–34). If the two had gone on to have other children, it would have been all the easier to say, “Jesus wasn’t literally the Son of God. His parents just had sex sooner than they let on.”

The fact that Mary remained a virgin even after Jesus’ birth thus underscores the fact that he is God’s Son, the same way the Virgin Birth itself does.