Why virginity matters — the resurrection life, the new creation, and Mary as icon of the Church

The chapter opens with The Da Vinci Code and the question whether Jesus was married; it matters because a married Jesus 'makes him more this-worldly,' and because Jesus taught that in the resurrection people 'neither marry nor are given in marriage.' Disciples who embrace virginity now 'begin to live out the future life of the resurrection in the present.' At the close Pitre gives three reasons the perpetual virginity matters: it makes the best sense of the most evidence, rival theories having 'gaping holes'; if Mary is the New Eve of the new creation, it fits that she lives 'the virginal life of the resurrection'; and as ever-virgin she becomes 'a symbol of the Church, who is both the virgin bride of Christ and the fruitful mother of all Christians' — Ambrose: 'A Virgin conceived us of the Spirit, a Virgin brings us forth without travail.'

• Luke 20:34 — no marriage in the resurrection; 'equal unto the angels.'
• Matthew 19:12 — 'eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake.'
• Isaiah 66:7 — 'without travail' — Ambrose's phrase, the cliffhanger into chapter 6.

Perpetual virginity is not a claim about deficiency but about destination: Mary lives now the life all the redeemed will live, and in doing so she is what the Church is.

• Ambrose of Milan — On Luke 2.6–7 (p 115) · read