Saturday, December 8, 2012

Feast of the Immaculate Conception

It's strange, but I have yet to find a mention of Duns Scotus on the catholic blogosphere today, the feast of the immaculate conception. At mass the priest read a long quote from Garrigou-lagrange without ever mentioning Scotus (though my old hand missal mentioned Scotus briefly in its blurb about the history of the doctrine).  All I can find online is Mark Shea's post from a few weeks ago that contained the comment I complained about in the previous post. Scotus really has been cast out of catholic thought these days. He not good for much save a prologue to bashing protestants or condoms.

8 comments:

Credo In Unum Deum said...

At Mass I heard none of Scotus' reasoning for the Doctrine. Instead I got the old "DNA" argument... as if that was the primary reason God saved Mary from Original Sin.

Lee Faber said...

I don't think I've heard that one before.

Credo In Unum Deum said...

I'm sure you've heard it... God cannot possibly have sinful flesh, therefore, Mary must be conceived immaculately since Jesus would received his flesh from her. I call it the DNA argument. Thomists just can't seem to bring themselves to give credit where credit is due here and construct odd alternatives.

Fripod said...

Well, Garrigou-Lagrange does have the following to say (in Mother of the Saviour, p. 42):

"It is Scotus's glory (Thomists should consider it a point of honour to admit that their adversary was right in this matter) to have shown the supreme becomingness of this privilege in answer to the... difficulty which St. Thomas and many other theologians put forward[.]"

I'd say that's giving credit where credit is due.

Anonymous said...

Take heart...I present Scotus when I teach the Immaculate Conception to my high schoolers in the spring. I also give him the nod when we finish St. Anselm's Cur Deus Homo. It's not the blogosphere, but at least it's potential internet users!

Rob

Anonymous said...

Thanks Fripod. None of that was mentioned at my parish.

That's good news, Rob!

Anonymous said...

I talked about Blessed John Duns Scotus in my blog post on the Immaculate Conception.

Lee Faber said...

Good to hear. I see one or two more have popped up, now that the catholic blog search is online. But there mostly just honorable mentions.

Maybe in 50 years when I get around to editing Peter Thomae's treatise on the immaculate conception I will do a post explaining Scotus' arguments on the matter.