"You Don’t Really Believe in the Virgin Birth… Do You?” A Christmas Reflection
I’ve always loved Christmas. The music. Lights. The familiar sense of warmth.
This year feels a little different. It's my first official Christmas since my baptism in April, and it's surprisingly refreshing to experience this season through a new lens. Instead of simply soaking in the familiar atmosphere of Christmas, I’ve been sitting with the story beneath it all. Song lyrics land different. Decorations point to a deeper meaning. Traditions that I grew up with are speaking differently to me. I'm finding the spirit of God in it.
Even Santa Feels Different
Even Santa. Yes, he’s a fictional character, but his story is rooted in the real Saint Nicholas, a man known for his Christ-like generosity, compassion, and kindness. And honestly, sounds silly but Santa may have been my earliest taste of anything resembling “God” as a child.
I mean, I believed he was all-knowing, capable of seeing into my heart, keeping account of my good choices and bad choices. Looking back, that belief mirrors something much older and more universal: the idea that we are known, that our inner lives matter, and that believing in what we cannot see is sometimes the point.
Now, with a 3-year old, I try to preserve that sense of wonder for my son while also telling a truer story. Santa, I explain, gets his magic from the Almighty Creator. His “all-knowing” comes by permission from God Himself. And I point to the person Santa is really celebrating—Jesus.
Obviously, that’s not theology. It’s a motherly compromise. Some might disagree, but I’ve come to believe there’s room for those. Childhood doesn’t last forever. Let them enjoy it.
Wresting with the Virgin Birth
After finishing my Catholic courses in spring, I wanted something to keep me pressing forward in learning and growing. So I signed up for a monthly subscription reading program with She Reads Truth. Each month, they send a beautifully designed physical book with Scripture, historical context, and reflections around a biblical theme.
December, of course, brought Advent.
The season of waiting.
The quiet anticipation.
The celebration of Jesus’ birth.
As I moved through my Advent readings, a familiar question resurfaced — one that has always felt like a little bump in the road in my faith.
The virgin birth.
In Mass, we pray: “I believe in God… and in Jesus Christ… born of the Virgin Mary.” (The Creed)
I’m all in, yet when I reach that line, something in me dwindles.
Do you really believe that? my thoughts say.
It wasn’t that I believed Mary was lying. I even believed an angel visited her and told her who her child would be. I just wondered if, somewhere along the way, the story had taken on its own shape…
Maybe “virgin” was a mistranslation.
Perhaps more of a metaphor?
I embraced the miracles surrounding Jesus’s life, and yet, this one was hard to digest.
I suppose my biggest question was why.
Why couldn’t Jesus have a biological mother and a father?
Wouldn’t a divine purpose still be fulfilled if Jesus had two human parents?
Why bypass the very laws of nature God Himself created? God still made science.
Surely there was a dad…? I kept thinking.
The 1 AM Question
So one night, at 1 a.m., this question was on my mind. So I do what modern people contemplating life do.
I turn to my personal pastor: ChatGPT.
Question: Why couldn’t Jesus have a biological mother and father?
To be clear, I don’t believe ChatGPT is the ultimate authority on anything. It works from patterns in existing work, and it knows that I, Natalie, am asking the question.
Still, the answer was grounded in true Christian theology. It reframed the story in a way I had never considered, and suddenly, so much of the bigger picture settled into place.
So let’s take a Christmas theology journey, shall we?
In the Beginning
To understand any story, we have to go back to the beginning. Scripture presents Jesus as the new Adam — the restored and perfected human — sent to fulfill what the first Adam did not after the fall in the Garden of Eden.
Throughout the Bible, we see clear parallels between Adam and Jesus, especially in moments of temptation against Satan where Adam failed, and Jesus did not.
If Jesus had a human mother and father, He would belong fully to Adam’s bloodline. His lineage would trace back to Adam, inheriting the same sinful nature.
What exactly does sinful nature mean?
Sinful nature simply means that humans have a tendency toward sin. It’s not meant as an accusation or a guilt tool. It’s simply part of living in our human bodies.
It’s like saying: grazing nonstop is in a horse’s nature. Or, chasing squirrels is in a dog’s nature. It’s a default position, but not a very helpful one. Even children have to be taught to share, and not to lie, because we have sinful nature in us.
I explain this because I remember hearing this term growing up and thinking it sounded harsh, or accusatory, before I really understood Scripture.
The key here is this: what is the opposite of sin? Holiness. You can’t be perfectly holy and still carry sin at the same time. It’s like taking perfectly white paint and mixing in grey or brown. Once it’s mixed, the paint is no longer perfectly white.
God alone is completely holy. There is no sin in him.
(And thank God… because who would want a sinful God?)
Jesus: The “New” Adam
Now, back to Jesus. Jesus could not be the “new Adam” if his bloodline came entirely from Adam. It would have been a continuation of the same broken lineage. And yet, He had to be fully human, because only a human could be the final sacrifice.
So God did something new, and breathtaking.
He used Mary’s body to give Jesus full humanity. And He placed within her divinely created life that did not trace back to any man on earth.
This made Jesus:
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Fully human through His mother
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Fully divine by God’s design
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Free from a broken lineage
In other words, He was uniquely crafted to be the perfect Lamb for the ultimate sacrifice.
Why sacrifice? That deserves a whole separate reflection best left for another time.
But here is where revelation hit me most:
His DNA would, literally, reflect Him as the only Son of God.
Of course, we don’t know and can never know what Jesus’ DNA actually looked like.
But here is the best guess from Christian theologians:
His chromosomes would be fully human, yet His paternal line would read “unknown.” Not because it was missing, but because it did not trace back to any man on earth.
This stopped me in my tracks.
I sat there, stunned by the beauty of it. I felt something settle in my spirit.
Seeing Jesus in a New Light
This explains why He was free of sin.
Why, as John writes, not enough books could be written to contain His miracles.
Why He could heal the sick, give sight to the blind, heal the paralyzed, and restore the oppressed.
Before Jesus, there is no biblical record of any prophet or leader commanding deliverance in the way Jesus did. His authority was astonishing.
And there is no explaining away why a veil, far larger and heavier than any theatre stage curtain, was supernaturally torn from top to bottom in the moments after His death.
Jesus didn’t just learn miracles.
Miracles were His identity.
His nature.
His very being.
But are these just stories?
We can never fully know the historical reality of Adam and Eve... Was the story inspired by God, to help our human minds understand our nature and our relationship with Him? I personally believe it's a spiritual metaphor. It reaches back so far into history that we simply cannot know for certain.
But Jesus is different.
The New Testament was written by people who knew Jesus, eyewitnesses and those living within the same generation as Him. His story is not a fable passed down over centuries. These writings emerged within Jesus' lifetime.
It’s true humans love to tell stories. But very few are willing to suffer, lose everything, and die for a lie. We have strong evidence this was the reality of many people in His lifetime, and generations after.
The Love Story Beneath It All
The birth of Jesus is the thread running through a great love story. The gospel, at its core, is the story of God pursuing His people — all people — back to Himself.
And it began long before Christmas.
It stretches back to Genesis, to Abraham, who was asked to sacrifice his son Isaac, only for a lamb to take Isaac’s place.
Because God would never ultimately ask that of His children.
But God Himself would one day do it for us.
It’s a story of insane love.
Faith that is Rooted
Once I understood why the virgin birth mattered, I could finally believe how it happened.
It wasn’t mystical for the sake of mystery.
It wasn’t God suggesting sex is bad — a ridiculous theory that always shows up somewhere by someone.
It wasn’t God ignoring biology.
It was purposeful.
Necessary.
Beautiful.
Part of the plan from the very beginning.
In math, you can be told the answer and remember what's correct. But when you know the formula, the answer becomes yours.
Rooted. Clear. And now, so is this part of my faith: Born of the 'Virgin Mary.'
Evidence meets Humility
Don’t get me wrong. As far as faith goes, the virgin birth is a big ask. I know that. But faith, by definition, leaves room for mystery. While we are in these finite bodies, we will never fully comprehend the entirety of who God is. Ever. No amount of lifetimes would be enough.
Instead, God leaves breadcrumbs. He creates a path that invites us to seek, to ask, and to keep discovering who He is.
We are too limited to grasp everything. And this is where faith meets us. Not blindly, but in embracing the evidence available, while humbling ourselves to His vast magnificence.
The Christmas Story is for Everyone
And it's possible to get so caught up in the facts that the greater message gets lost.
Because no matter where you stand on the Christmas miracle, the heart of the story remains.
It tells of a God who draws close.
Not just in palaces, but in a humble stable.
Not with fear or force, but with gentleness and love.
Not demanding belief, but inviting hearts.
He is Immanuel.
God with us.
That, at least, feels worth believing in.
And maybe that’s what Christmas has always been asking of us.
Merry Christmas, friends.
Wishing you a season full of warmth, rest and wonder.
May the light of Christ meet you wherever you are.
With love,
Natalie
Isaiah 7:14 (Old Testament prophecy, written over 700 years before Jesus)
“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign:
The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son,
and will call him Immanuel (God with us).”
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