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Holy Ground: Why Mary Had NO Other Children (Ezek 44:2)

Holy Ground: Why Mary Had NO Other Children (Ezek 44:2)

Last updated on: September 4, 2026 at 2:35 pm by Dave Armstrong

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Holy Ground: Why Mary Had NO Other Children (Ezek 44:2) 2026-09-04T14:35:11-04:00 Dave Armstrong

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This is my initial transcript of the video, “Why Mary Had NO Other Children: Her Womb Was Holy Ground [Ezekiel 44:2]” (Catholic Bible Highlights with Kenny Burchard, 9-4-26). The video can be viewed below as well.

Does the Catholic Church pretend that Mary was always a virgin simply because it hates sex so much? Or is it perhaps that Protestants place too much emphasis on sex, by insisting that Mary had other children besides Jesus? And are there any solid biblical reasons for believing in Mary’s perpetual virginity?

Today we’re gonna challenge those who disbelieve in this doctrine that was held almost universally by the early Church, by the Orthodox, and even all of the earliest Protestant reformers and Protestantism as a whole until the mid-1700s, when anti-traditional theological liberalism started eating away at classical Reformational theology.

All we ask for is fair, open-minded consideration, and a willingness to go wherever the Bible leads.

Let’s cut right to the quick. What is “holy ground” according to the Bible? Well, basically, it’s anywhere that God is extraordinarily present, in a way that goes beyond His omnipresence (being everywhere), A well-known example is the burning bush that Moses encountered on Mt. Sinai. The Bible informs us that God “appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush” (Ex 3:2) and said, “Do not come near; put off your shoes from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground” (Ex 3:5). It’s an awe-inspiring thing to encounter God – or angels — in this way.

A bit later, just before the Hebrews were to receive the Ten Commandments, written by the finger of God and delivered by Moses, the Lord made a spectacular appearance on Mt. Sinai (Ex 19-20), accompanied, as usual in Scripture, by fire and “smoke” (19:18). He warned the people not to even touch the mountain, or its “border,” under penalty of death (19:12-13).

Moral of the story: God is perfectly holy and totally other (or to use a big word, transcendent). He’s the Creator of the universe. And although He is a loving God, we don’t mess with Him or take any meeting of this sort with Him lightly. It’s blasphemy to act otherwise, and God at first enforced these rules with a death penalty.

In the Law that God gave to Moses on Mt. Sinai, there were instructions to build the ark of the covenant (remember the movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark?): a sort of portable wooden cabinet that was holy. On top was what was called “the mercy seat” — between two carved cherubim (a type of angel). God said about this seat, “There I will meet with you, . . . I will speak with you” (Ex 25:22; cf. 30:6; Num 7:89) and said that He would “appear” in a “cloud” above the seat (Lev 16:2), and was even said to be “enthroned” there (1 Sam 4:4; 2 Sam 6:2; 1 Chr 13:6; Ps 80:1; 99:1; Is 37:16).

The ark of the covenant, like Mt. Sinai, was, therefore, holy, because God was present there in a profound way. Only certain people – the tribe of Levites — could carry it or be around it (Num 1:50-51, 53). God said, “if any one else comes near, he shall be put to death” (Num 1:51; cf. 4:15). Even the ones who took care of the ark and other items in the tabernacle, that housed it, could not “look upon” the ark “even for a moment, lest they die” (Num 4:20).

One time these men were carrying the ark along, with poles that went through rings on the outside of the ark (Ex 25:13-15), and the Bible says that “Uzzah put out his hand to the ark of God and took hold of it, for the oxen stumbled. And the anger of the LORD was kindled against Uzzah; and God smote him there because he put forth his hand to the ark; and he died there beside the ark of God” (2 Sam 6:6-7; cf. 1 Chr 13:7-10). God also put to death some men “because they looked into the ark” (1 Sam 6:19).

Now, why do we go into such depth about these matters? It’s to show how God regards holy things and our relationship to them. Cruel as it may seem from our vantage point, the severity of death as the consequence of disrespect or disobedience, was necessary to make absolutely clear how awesome and majestic God’s holiness is.

He had to get through to stubborn, sinful men, the notion that some things are sanctified or holy: so much so that they have to be approached with the utmost reverence and solemnity, and are not even to be touched. It’s a bit like the child touching the hot oven. They learn not to, when they get hurt by it. Once a few Israelites were killed by touching holy things, the people learned very quickly.

Note that God wasn’t always present on Mt. Sinai. Hence the Bible says that “the LORD descended upon it in fire” (Ex 19:18) and “came down upon Mount Sinai” (19:20) and “The glory of the LORD settled on Mount Sinai” (Ex 24:16; cf. Neh 9:13). He may not have always been specially present in the ark, either, though that is less certain.

When the temple was built during King Solomon’s reign, it became the new “holiest place” for the Israelites (1 Chr 29:3; Ps 5:7; Is 11:9; 56:7; 62:9; 64:10; Ezek 42:13; 46:19; Mt 21:13; Mk 11:17; Lk 19:46), and the city of Jerusalem was likewise holy (Neh 11:1, 18; Is 48:2). The ark was kept in the inner sanctum, called the “Holy of Holies.” Only the high priest could enter it and only one day of the year, on Yom Kippur, or the Day of Atonement, under penalty of death (Lev 16:2), and he had to make the offerings in a certain specified way, “lest he die” (Lev 16:13).

So far we’re mostly in the Old Testament, but these themes carry into the New Testament as well. The ark is referred to in Hebrews 9:4 and again in Revelation 11:19, where it says that “God’s temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple.” The New Testament continues to refer to Jerusalem as the “holy city” (Mt 4:5; 27:53), and Jesus spoke of the Holy of Holies as “the holy place” (Mt 24:15; cf. Heb 9:2, 12, 25). St. Peter calls the Mount of Transfiguration “the holy mountain” (2 Pet 1:17-18; cf. Mt 17:1-6).

Although they often deny it when directly confronted, I submit that Protestants — down deep — agree with the existence of holy places and things. Would any Protestant, for instance, consider for a second bulldozing the spot where Jesus was crucified or where He was born, and putting up a fast food restaurant or a factory? Most would be outraged by the very notion, and would consider it an insulting or ridiculous question. Why? Well, I say it’s because they do believe in holy places, after all. Hence, to this day they call Israel “the holy land” just as Catholics do.

So this is where we now start to ponder the virgin birth and whether Mary was always a virgin. Why have the great majority of Christians all through history believed both things? Besides all the arguments about the so-called “brothers” of Jesus that we’ve dealt with in a few videos and that I’ve written a ton about on my blog, there is another quite different argument to be made from the notion of “holy ground.”

I would ask Protestants how Mary’s womb could not be regarded as “holy ground” on the basis of what we have surveyed in Scripture about holy things? Remember how Kenny mentioned that God wasn’t always present on Mt. Sinai? We brought that up because God the incarnate Son Jesus wasn’t always present in Mary’s womb, either.

But He was there for nine months, and not only that, His presence there included flesh and bones, unlike the earlier Old Testament appearances of God. Her womb, therefore, remained “holy ground” so to speak, just as Mt. Sinai did, even though God wasn’t always present in a special way. It’s where He was profoundly present.

So God took on flesh and developed for nine months inside of a human being, yet we’re supposed to believe that that person and her womb were not “holy”? How could that be? It goes against all that we have demonstrated, which was quite a bit. But those who disagree might very well be wondering at this point: “how does all this prove that she never had other children? Isn’t it the Catholic Church making sex dirty and sinful again?”

Well, no, not at all, because this is a completely different way of approaching the topic. Why is it, I would ask in reply, that Joseph didn’t “know” Mary during the nine months of her pregnancy? We all agree with that, based on Matthew 1:25: “[he] knew her not until she had borne a son.” Protestants argue that they then started having marital relations, and that at least four siblings resulted. But the word “until” in Greek doesn’t require that interpretation, as we demonstrated in other videos.

In any event, our present argument highlights the fact that Joseph abstained for those nine months. What was the purpose? If they engaged in sexual activity after Jesus’ birth, why not during Mary’s pregnancy? This wasn’t a requirement of Jewish Law. Could it be because Mary’s womb was ”holy ground” and so such activity would be at the very least improper?

Catholics would also point out that part of the reason that Mary was ever-virgin was so no doubt could be cast upon how Jesus was born: “conceived . . . of the Holy Spirit” (Mt 1:20). If she had had other children, then lots of people would deny the deity of Christ and think that He was conceived in the usual manner; and so there goes the virgin birth, that Protestants strongly hold to. Catholic Mariology always upholds Christology. That’s one reason why we believe in it.

So let’s bring this to its conclusion. This is a deep and involved argument, so there were certain things we had to go over for it to be understood. The Church fathers – notably St. Augustine, St. Jerome, St. Ambrose, and many eastern fathers — thought that three verses from the Old Testament addressed our present issue:

Ezekiel 43:4 . . . the glory of the LORD entered the temple by the gate facing east,

Ezekiel 44:1-2 Then he brought me back to the outer gate of the sanctuary, which faces east; and it was shut.
[2] And he said to me, “This gate shall remain shut; it shall not be opened, and no one shall enter by it; for the LORD, the God of Israel, has entered by it; therefore it shall remain shut.”

They applied this to Mary’s womb and to Jesus. God the Holy Spirit entered it so that Mary became pregnant with the incarnate Son of God, Who then developed inside of her for nine months. God simultaneously became a man and was as close as God ever got to any created human being: even sharing Mary’s genes and DNA and bloodstream.

God Himself told the prophet Ezekiel that a certain gate in the temple was not to be used by anyone because He had entered it; “therefore” it would remain unopened. Would that not apply to Mary as well? Would it not be improper and indeed unholy to enter this womb that contained the God of the universe? It’s holy ground! And is this not spiritually and intuitively self-evident? Sadly, for many Protestants it is not.

The Blessed Virgin Mary became, in effect, the New Holy of Holies, where God specially resides. Mary was perpetually a virgin not because normative married life is “bad” but rather, because it’s improper, unseemly, and not fitting for the womb that carried God Himself to be involved in any other sexual activity.

Someone stated in a Facebook discussion that Catholic beliefs about Mary would mean she wasn’t a “normal wife.” I replied that Mary was anything but a “normal” Jewish wife in the first place. She was, after all, suddenly “with child” miraculously by the Holy Spirit, and gave birth to Jesus: God the Son. No one else has ever done anything remotely like that.

We can’t repeat it enough: this is not about sex being supposedly “bad.” It’s about the incarnation being absolutely unique and holy, so that the scenarios surrounding the holiest places and things in the Old Testament that were still held and believed in the New Testament apply even more so to Mary’s bearing of Jesus. Some actions are improper at certain places and times. This is one of them. It has nothing to do with sexuality in general. This was an absolutely unique situation, that happened only once in history.

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Summary: Was Mary a virgin her whole life? We make a biblical case based on the concept of “holy ground”. It starts at the burning bush and ends at a locked gate in the book of Ezekiel.

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Practical Matters: This is the most comprehensive and multi-faceted Catholic apologetics blog: rated #1 for Christian sites by leading AI tool, ChatGPT. I offer more than 5,000 free online articles, fifty-nine books, and many scores of videos at the Catholic Bible Highlights YouTube channel (please subscribe!). If you believe my full-time apostolate is worth supporting, please seriously consider financially supporting it. PayPal donations are the easiest: just send to my email address: [email protected]. You’ll see the term “Dave Armstrong Bookstore”. To learn about the different methods of contributing (including Zelle and 100% tax-deductible donations if desired), see my page: About Catholic Apologist Dave Armstrong / Donation Information. Thanks a million!

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