The Immaculate Conception Debate

3 Part Series on the Nature of the Theotokos' Conception in Orthodox/Catholic History

I recently had a Catholic who is honestly inquiring into Orthodoxy ask me about the Immaculate Conception and believed that most Orthodox responses that he read felt inadequate. I decided to create a 3 part series for him surveying both Western and Eastern sources (Church Fathers, Medieval Teachers, Modern Statements) to discuss where this discussion/debate began and where Roman Catholicism and the Orthodox Church landed on these questions.

Of course, both Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy reject the modern Protestant positions on the Blessed Virgin Mary. We believe she is Ever-Virgin; she is the Theotokos (God-bearer or Mother of God), and her soul AND body was received into heaven at her death (Dormition). We also both hold that she never committed a grievous, personal sin in this life through her cooperation with God’s grace. However, the topic of her conception in the womb of St. Anne and whether she inherited original/ancestral sin from Adam was hotly debated throughout the second millennium. Please find the first video below in the series with the next two to soon follow.