3-098-922 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

The Immaculate Conception, c1680. The Virgin Mary is bathed in rays of light from the Holy Ghost and surrounded by cherubs holding garlands of flowers, olive branches, palm fronds, roses and lilies. She stands on a crescent moon, with the serpent below. The Immaculate Conception is the doctrine that the Virgin Mary was free of original sin from the moment of her conception. (In Christian theology, original sin is the condition of sinfulness that all humans share, which they inherit from the Fall of Adam and Eve, involving the loss of original righteousness and the distortion of the Image of God). The dogma of the Immaculate Conception is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Debated by medieval theologians, it was not defined as a dogma until 1854.