Did Mary Experience Pains of Child Birth?

In this Christmas season it is interesting to ponder this question. The pains of Child Birth are normally associated with EVE and her fall.

I am not sure at all contrary to Catholic to popular Catholic belief that this issue has been defined in all respects. For instance death is consequences of the fall. However if you are look at the Catholic Theology of the Assumption the fact that if Mary actually died or "fell asleep" has been a tad left open.

One gets a sense when looks at the childbirth of Jesus that the Church says at times such thoughts are uncouth to have and lets not go there. One can question if such an attitude was a product tof the age or/and a product of the age and out for not having to go into these questions.

Canterbury Tales has a interesting post Mary's Painless Delivery of Christ

There are three comments there in that post I think are interesting and should be highlighted

I just looked it up in my Bible. Genesis 3:16 says the following..."To the woman he said, "I will greatly multiply your pain in childbearing..."Note the word "multiply" or "increase" in some translations. It seems that there was always some sort of pain associated with child birth, but God increased that pain as punishment. Perhaps Our Lady also experienced pain but not as much as today's women.Food for thought...Revelation 12:2 refers to the "woman clothed in the sun". This woman is often seen as an allusion to Our Lady. In Rev., it says that "...she was with child and she cried out in her pangs of birth, in anguish for delivery." I have read that this child is Christ or children of the Church. Yet she cries out in pain whilst giving birth. Could there be some answer here?Andrew 12.24.08 - 8:04 pm #

and

In my college upper-level embryology class, the professor said that it was not understood why human females bled so much more than other mammals during childbirth; it really should not happen, if all went as designed. It is still miraculous how often the very complicated process (human development and childbirth) goes well for the majority of cases.KC Reader 12.24.08 - 5:07 pm #

and

Death was also the consequence of Original Sin and yet Our Lord experienced death (and so did Our Lady according to Orthodox tradition, the Catholic Church leaves the question of her death open). I think Our Blessed Mother DID experience pain in keeping with her co-redemptive mission. She re-sanctified child birth and turned the pain associated with it from punishment to a redemptive act of love. (at least that's what I think).Andrew 12.24.08 - 7:49 pm #

While I think the Catholic Tradition is much more weighted toward Mary falling asleep still as pointed out the question is still open. Be sure to read the whole post and all the comments