Perpetual virginity of Mary

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The perpetual virginity of Mary is a Christian doctrine that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was a virgin "before, during and after" the birth of Christ. In Western Christianity, the Catholic Church adheres to the doctrine, as do many Anglicans, some Lutherans, Reformed, and other Protestants. In Eastern Christianity, the Oriental Orthodox Churches and the Church of the East both adhere to this doctrine as part of their ongoing tradition, and Eastern Orthodox churches recognize Mary as Aeiparthenos, meaning "ever-virgin". It is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Most modern nonconformist Protestants, together with many nondenominational Christians, reject the doctrine. The extant written tradition of the perpetual virginity of Mary first appears in a late 2nd-century text called the Protoevangelium of James. The Second Council of Constantinople in 553 gave her the title "Aeiparthenos", meaning Perpetual Virgin, and at the Lateran Synod of 649 Pope Martin I emphasized the threefold...

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