The Pope had already examined the doctrine of Nestorius and condemned it in a local Council held in Rome. It only remained for Cyril to read the letter with which he had been furnished by the Vicar of Jesus Christ and to proceed with the formal deprivation and excommunication of the heretic.
"Nestorius, having refused to obey our citation or to receive the Bishops whom we sent to him, we have been obliged to enter upon the examination of his impieties. He has been proved by his letters, his writings, his discourses.to have taught doctrines which are scandalous and heretical. Constrained by the Sacred Canons, and by the Letter of our Holy Father Celestine, Bishop of Rome, we have been compelled, shedding tears of sorrow, to pronounce against him this judgment : 'Our Lord Jesus Christ, whom he has blasphemed, has ordered, by His Council, that he be deprived of all ecclesiastical dignities, and be cut off from the Communion of the Church.' "
Thus was the true Faith vindicated together with the surpassing dignity of the Mother of God. The Council finally gave the solemn warning :
"Should any man not acknowledge that Mary is Mother of God, let him know that he is cut off from the Divinity."
As they left the Church, at the conclusion of the Closing of Council, the Bishops were met with the Council, acclamations and shouts of joy. They were conducted back to their lodgings escorted by guards of honour bearing lighted torches; men Joy of the kissed the hem of their garments, the people. town was illuminated and late into the night rang with the glad shouts of the grateful people, " We hail thee, O Mother of God."
I have dwelt at some length on this episode, and with the connection of Mary with the city of Ephesus in Ionia—now little more than a memory—because it seems to me to be significant of so much that is not only past, but still lives. The conflict between Paganism and Christianity is not a dead issue. The opposite ideals still appeal to men as in the days when our Lady looked upon the Temple of Diana of the Ephesians, in its wanton splendour. The Council of Ephesus reminds us that the victory of Christianity must ever be identified with the glory of Mary Most Holy, the Blessed Mother of our God. In her divine Motherhood is to be found not only the sole security for the purity and integrity of the Faith but also the one hope for fallen men. It still remains true that there is no other Name whereby we can be saved but the Name of Jesus, the Saviour of the world. Were Mary not the Mother of God, her Son would be, as all other men, powerless to save either Himself or others. His power to help us in our needs is derived from this, that He is both the Son of God and the Son of Man—the Son of Mary ever-Virgin.
