Yep. True story. Long ago I was a member in good standing of the oldest Christian Church in the West. I was baptized as an infant at Holy Rosary Catholic Church in Woodland. A small town just north of Sacramento California. I attended the parish school from kindergarten through sixth grade.
I won’t go into all the weeds but let’s just say that by fifth grade, I had decided God wasn’t real. I purposely wrote God with a lower case “g” and was sour on the idea of his existence. I butted heads with the nuns from the on-campus convent. I drive Sister Ilene up the wall, and my behavior prompted more than one parent-teacher conference.
I came across someone of a different faith that got me to read the Bible. I found stuff in the Bible that was contrary to what the church taught. I brought some of these things to the nuns at the school. They had no response to my Bible based questions except to say that I wasn’t capable of reading the Bible on my own. I needed the priests and bishops to tell me what it said. I was warned that if I continued reading the Bible on my own that I might become a heretic just like Martin Luther. (Oh, FYI it was the first time that I ever heard of Martin Luther.)
I became hungry for some answers to my questions.
Oh, the passage that gave the nuns fits was that Jesus had brothers and sisters. Yep. Jesus was the oldest but clearly, he had siblings. Roman Catholics reject these scriptures or try to weasel out of them, but they are unambiguous.
Here is what Logos found via an A.I. search.
The Gospels identify Jesus with specific family relationships: he is called “the carpenter’s son” with brothers named James, Joses, Simon, and Judas (Matt 13:55–56), and sisters are mentioned but remain unnamed (Matt 13:55–56). Mark’s account similarly refers to him as “the carpenter, the son of Mary” (Mark 6:3), and after the resurrection, his brothers appear with Mary in prayer (Acts 1:14). Paul identifies James as “the Lord’s brother” (Gal 1:19), and James eventually became a pillar of the Jerusalem church.
Source R. Alan Culpepper, Mark, ed. Leslie Andres and R. Alan Culpepper, Smyth & Helwys Bible Commentary (Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys Publishing, Incorporated, 2007), 190.
The Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches claim that said brothers and sisters can’t really be that due to claims of Mary’s perpetual virginity. This doctrine is nonsense. The Bible says so.
23 Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us. [quote from Isaiah 7:14] 24 Then Joseph being raised from sleep did as the angel of the Lord had bidden him, and took unto him his wife: 25 And knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn son: and he called his name JESUS.
Matthew 1:23–25.
It says Joseph didn’t have sex with Mary until Jesus was born, not that he never had sex with her. Folks, sex is part of being married. In fact, it’s not really a valid marriage if the couple doesn’t have sex. That is why having sex is called “consummating the marriage”.
Oh, for doubters of my claim, here is a portion of an article on consummating a marriage that I grabbed from my friendly Internet search engine.
In canon law and many religious traditions, consummation is considered essential for a marriage to be fully valid, often linked to the potential for procreation. Some doctrines even specify that intercourse with contraception may not count as consummation. Historically, consummation was sometimes verified through rituals or inspections, though such practices have largely disappeared.
Here are some Bible verses concerning, Mary, Joseph, and Jesus’ siblings.
55 Is not this the carpenter’s son? is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren, James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas? 56 And his sisters, are they not all with us? Whence then hath this man all these things?
Matthew 13:55–56.
3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us? And they were offended at him.
Mark 6:3.
22 … And they said, Is not this Joseph’s son?
Luke 4:22b.
42 And they said, Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?
John 6:42a.
14 These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.
Acts 1:14.
19 But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord’s brother.
Galatians 1:19.
By the end of seventh grade, I knew about Jesus, but I was confronted with the fact that I didn’t know him. I was missing a relationship with him. Frankly, I didn’t know there was such a thing. Knowing about someone and knowing them are two different propositions. I learned that this was a spiritual truth as well. Yes, I slowly decided that God was real, but I was missing him in the Roman Catholic Church.
During this time in my life, my mom ended up watching Bill Graham on television. She prayed along with Graham and gave her life to Christ. (More on this shortly.) She started taking us to a Baptist church in town. I liked that they had a youth program and was excited to have adults around me that were open to answering any questions that I could hurl at them. I got answers not deferrals to higher authorities.
As summer approached, mom signed all three of her children up to attend the summer church camp. At camp, I was told that Jesus died for my sins and I could have a personal relationship with him. He would forgive my sins and come into my life. I had only to ask him. As a first step to show my desire to know Christ in an intimate way, I was asked at the end of the chapel service to come forward and pray. I did so.
Folks, the act of walking down the aisle does not save anyone but for me it was a first step in knowing Christ as opposed to knowing about him. That camp experience really changed me. For others it was a flash in the pan that never really took, but it was transformative for me.
My life changed as a result of that encounter with God. My relationship with God has changed over the years because I have gotten deeper into the Bible than many others that I know. I have changed my views of somethings, but God is more real to me now than He was that summer. That was fifty years ago.
If you have a desire to know God more intimately, then ask Jesus to save you from your sin, redeem you, and make you a new person. Then, start reading your Bible. Many folks say to start with the Gospels. On one level, the Gospel of John is an easy read but if you grew up with “a Charlie Brown Christmas” then start with Luke. It will sound familiar.
Over time, God expects you to deepen your walk with Him. Yep, you will mess up. Ask forgiveness and keep going. Perseverance is an important part of living out your faith. Oh, exercising your faith in a community of believers is the biblical norm. This might take some trial and error to figure out. For me, the Roman Catholic Church was not the place where I got fed a lot in a spiritual sense.
Knowing God is possible if you seek after Christ. I may say that I’m really right but I know that only God truly is.