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Did all the Church Fathers believe Mary never sinned?

The Catholic Catechism teaches that Mary was free from all sin:

“Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, ‘full of grace’ through God, was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception confesses, as Pius IX proclaimed in 1854: ‘The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin’ ” (para. 491).

The Catholic Catechism continues,

“By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long” (para. 493).

One of the Church Fathers, Origen (d. 232), who is quoted nine times in the Catholic Catechism, is not quoted once regarding Mary’s sinless nature, because he believed that,

“It is impossible for a man thus to be without sin. And this we say, excepting, of course, the man understood to be in Christ Jesus, who ‘did no sin’ ” (Against Celsus, 3:62).

He also believed the following:

“God has not been able to prevent even in the case of a single individual, so that one man might be found from the very beginning of things who was born into the world untainted by sin. . . . For ‘in Adam’ (as the Scripture says) ‘all die,’ and were condemned in the likeness of Adam’s transgression, the word of God asserting this not so much of one particular individual as of the whole human race. For in the connected series of statements which appears to apply as to one particular individual, the curse pronounced upon Adam is regarded as common to all (the members of the race), and what was spoken with reference to the woman is spoken of every woman without exception” (Against Celsus, 4:40; italics added).

Origen clearly believed that “the whole human race” was under the same curse of sin, and that, therefore, Mary must be included along with “every woman without exception.”

Two other Church Fathers, Ambrose (d. 415), who is quoted twenty-one times in the Catholic Catechism, and Augustine (d. 430), who is quoted eighty-seven times in the Catholic Catechism, also believed that Mary was not sinless, as seen by Augustine’s quoting Ambrose:

“The same holy man (Ambrose) also, in his Exposition of Isaiah, speaking of Christ, says: ‘Therefore as man He was tried in all things, and in the likeness of men He endured all things; but as born of the Spirit, He was free from sin. For every man is a liar, and no one but God alone is without sin. It is therefore an observed and settled fact, that no man born of a man and a woman, that is, by means of their bodily union, is seen to be free from sin. Whosoever, indeed, is free from sin, is free also from a conception and birth of this kind.’ Moreover, when expounding the Gospel according to Luke, he says: ‘It was no cohabitation with a husband which opened the secrets of the Virgin’s womb; rather was it the Holy Ghost which infused immaculate seed into her unviolated womb. For the Lord Jesus alone of those who are born of woman is holy, inasmuch as He experienced not the contact of earthly corruption, by reason of the novelty of His immaculate birth; nay, He repelled it by His heavenly majesty.’ These words, however, of the man of God are contradicted by Pelagius, notwithstanding all his commendation of his author, when he himself declares that ‘we are procreated, as without virtue, so without vice.’ What remains, then, but that Pelagius should condemn and renounce this error of his; or else be sorry that he has quoted Ambrose in the way he has? Inasmuch, however, as the blessed Ambrose, catholic bishop as he is, has expressed himself in the above-quoted passages in accordance with the catholic faith” (On the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin, 2:47, 48; italics added).

Ambrose and Augustine believed it was an “observed and settled fact, that no man born of a man and a woman, that is, by means of their bodily union, is seen to be free from sin.” Ambrose further stated that “whosoever is free from sin was not conceived and born through the union of a man and a woman.” “Whosoever” refers to either man or woman and must therefore also include Mary. Ambrose also stated that of those born of a woman, which includes Mary, it is the Lord Jesus alone who is holy. It is interesting to note that Augustine also stated that this belief was in accordance with the catholic, or universal, Christian faith at the time.

These are just a few of the numerous topics in which the beliefs of some of the Church Fathers differ greatly from other Church Fathers and from what the Catholic Church teaches. The Church Fathers were definitely not one homogenous group whose beliefs were always in agreement with one another. I have presented the information above to show that although the Church Fathers are referred to by the Catholic Catechism as principle sources for the Catholic Catechism, not all the Church Fathers held the same beliefs and that their beliefs do not always agree with the Catholic Catechism. The Catholic Catechism quotes Church Fathers when they are in agreement with Catholic doctrine and avoids the very same Church Fathers when their beliefs differ from Catholic doctrine. Therefore, it would be more accurate to say that Catholic doctrine is based on selected teachings of the Church Fathers. So, although the Church Fathers do provide insight into the beliefs of those in the early church, we must use Scripture, the inerrant Word of God, as the final authority for any and all doctrine.