For many today, the Immaculate Conception is more than a puzzle. The teaching that the mother of Jesus was preserved free from sin from her conception is, well, a source of irritation. As someone who was embedded in evangelical Christianity for fifty years, I get it. Among the objections, three come to the fore, while others are more subtle. First, it is assumed by many that the teaching is not biblical. True enough that the Bible doesn’t express it in these words. At the same time, neither does the Bible articulate the doctrine of the Trinity or original sin, among other revered doctrines, in those exact words or phrases. And yet we trust the wisdom of the Church as it developed doctrines that have their roots in Scripture. The root Scripture of the Immaculate Conception? When the angel Gabriel announced that Mary was “full…