Karlo Broussard carefully lays out the distinction between Mary’s Immaculate Conception, which preserved her from falling into Original Sin, and her lack of the Beatific Vision, which still allowed for the hypothetical possibility of her falling into personal sin.
Transcript:
Host: Go to Joe in Newport, Kentucky, listening on Sacred Heart Radio. Joe, you are on with Karlo Broussard.
Caller: Good evening gentlemen, thank you. I have a question that was posed to me by a Protestant brother concerning the Immaculate Conception. It’s a hypothetical question. Strangest question I think I’ve ever heard, but he said, “What if our Blessed Mother had said, ‘No, do not let it be done to me according to thy word;’” was she still Immaculately conceived?
Karlo: Yeah, it’s a great question, Joe. And technically, the answer could be…yes. Because think about this, Joe: there’s a difference between Mary being Immaculately Conceived, and Mary remaining sinless throughout the rest of her life. So, hypothetically, it would be possible that Mary could be created and preserved free from the stain of Original Sin, but eventually fall into personal sin. I mean, that’s hypothetically possible, because Mary didn’t have the Beatific Vision, like the souls do in Heaven right now where they can’t sin. They still have free will; but because of their perfected wills and perfected in virtue, they’re entirely repulsed by evil and can in no way choose evil.
That was not the case with Mary. Mary didn’t have the Beatific Vision, so it was theoretically possible for Mary to fall. But by God’s grace, she cooperated with that grace and remained sinless throughout the rest of her life. And we could look at that Biblically, Joe, because she’s the new Eve. I mean, think about it: she’s Immaculately Conceived as the new Eve, just as the first Eve was Immaculately conceived. But what makes Mary superior to the first Eve? Namely, she remains sinless. The first Eve was created free from Original Sin, but fell into personal sin. The new Eve, Mary, is created free from Original Sin—like the first Eve—but unlike the first Eve, she doesn’t fall into personal sin.
So in light of that Biblical typology, that’s one of the arguments that we can use, Biblically speaking, in order to put forward the Catholic belief that has Mary being sinless throughout the rest of her life. Not only free from Original Sin in her conception, but remaining free from personal sin throughout the entirety of her life. How’s that, Joe?
Caller: That’s a great answer, and you know, that’s the biggest stumbling block that I’ve encountered with my Protestant brothers and sisters, they can’t wrap their minds around the Marian doctrines. I understand that they don’t—they’ve never really studied into it a lot.
Karlo: Right. And a good resource for that, Joe, is our very own Tim Staples’ book “Behold Your Mother.” It’s an exhaustive—and I use that term in a good sense—
Host: Not exhausting.
Karlo: It’s an exhaustive explanation of the Biblical, historical, and doctrinal data of the Catholic teaching on Mary, and he responds to every single objection to Mary that you can think of.