Nihil Obstat: "A Latin phrase meaning that 'nothing stands in the way,' the nihil obstat is a designation that must be given before a book receives impramatur, the Church Permission for publication" [Alfred McBride, O.Praem, Catholic Beliefs From A to Z (Michigan: Servant Publications, 2001), p. 117].

Imprimatur: "From the Latin meaning 'let it be printed,' an imprimatur is given by a bishop for books on certain scriptural or religious topics. It is required for all Catholic versions of sacred Scripture and liturgical texts as well as religious books that will be used as textbooks or for public prayer. Otherwise, an imprimatur is not needed for every religious book" [ibid., p. 86].

"Not By Bread Alone didn't ever get an imprimatur, either. Sungenis said it was because of some technical issue, but that wouldn't have stopped him from getting one later."

Armstrong responded, "Sadly, the Imprimatur is not always a safeguard anymore. My books don't have them (except for The New Catholic Answer Bible, and my books are perfectly orthodox. And some that have them are not orthodox."

The same person then asked, "Yeah, imprimaturs don't mean what they used to. Did you submit and get turned down or just never submit them?" He then noted the Catholic Apologetics Study Bible by Sungenis was turned down, as was Not By Bread Alone.

Armstrong: "Sophia Institute Press, the publisher of my three main books, chose not to do it. It wasn't really in my hands. OSV did for the Bible: probably because that seems more 'serious': being a Bible and all."

Can. 827 §4. Books or other writings dealing with questions of religion or morals cannot be exhibited, sold, or distributed in churches or oratories unless they have been published with the permission of competent ecclesiastical authority or approved by it subsequently.

§2. Books which regard questions pertaining to sacred scripture, theology, canon law, ecclesiastical history, and religious or moral disciplines cannot be used as texts on which instruction is based in elementary, middle, or higher schools unless they have been published with the approval of competent ecclesiastical authority or have been approved by it subsequently.

§3. It is recommended that books dealing with the matters mentioned in §2, although not used as texts in instruction, as well as writings which especially concern religion or good morals are submitted to the judgment of the local ordinary.

Read this whole section of Canon Law here.

"Mary was 'full of grace'- a term that signifies and implies (though it does not explicitly prove) her Immaculate Conception and freedom from sin. Throughout the Old Testament, there are many people, places, and things that are "types' of prefigurements of greater and more prefect [sp.] things that would come in the New Testament... The New Testament fulfillment of any Old Testament type is always more perfect and more glorious than the type itself. There are no exceptions to this scriptural rule. As we will see, Mary's sinlessness, her Immaculate Conception, was the perfect fulfillment of several imperfect Old Testament types...The first of these types was the immaculately created cosmos (cf. Genesis 1:2). It was from this pristine organic material, as yet unblemished by sin or corruption, that God formed the body of the first Adam (cf. Genesis 2:7). Jesus Christ is the 'second Adam" (cf. Romans 5:14; 1 Corinthians 15:22). Christ, the second Adam was formed from the body of this Immaculate mother Mary" (p. 67-68).

10. For as by one man?s disobedience sin entered, and death obtained [a place] through sin; so also by the obedience of one man, righteousness having been introduced, shall cause life to fructify in those persons who in times past were dead. And as the protoplast himself Adam, had his substance from untilled and as yet virgin soil (?for God had not yet sent rain, and man had not tilled the ground?), and was formed by the hand of God, that is, by the Word of God, for ?all things were made by Him,? and the Lord took dust from the earth and formed man; so did He who is the Word, recapitulating Adam in Himself, rightly receive a birth, enabling Him to gather up Adam [into Himself], from Mary, who was as yet a virgin. If, then, the first Adam had a man for his father, and was born of human seed, it were reasonable to say that the second Adam was begotten of Joseph. But if the former was taken from the dust, and God was his Maker, it was incumbent that the latter also, making a recapitulation in Himself, should be formed as man by God, to have an analogy with the former as respects His origin. Why, then, did not God again take dust, but wrought so that the formation should be made of Mary? It was that there might not be another formation called into being, nor any other which should [require to] be saved, but that the very same formation should be summed up [in Christ as had existed in Adam], the analogy having been preserved [Against Heresies 3.21.10].

"Mary's Immaculate Conception is foreshadowed in Genesis 1, where God creates the universe in an immaculate state, free from any blemish or stain of sin or imperfection. This is borne out by the repeated mention in Genesis 1 of God beholding his creations and saying they were "very good." Out of pristine matter the Lord created Adam, the first immaculately created human being, forming him from the "womb" of the Earth. The immaculate elements from which the first Adam received his substance foreshadowed the immaculate mother from whom the second Adam (Romans 5:14) took his human substance."

"This is a rather unusual interpretation. Mary foreshadowed in Creation? There is no emphasis in the original Hebrew text on the 'immaculate' elements of the earth, or the idea that Adam was formed in the 'womb' of the immaculate earth. Don't misunderstand, I have no problem with the types that are directly presented to us in Scripture- Paul uses such an allegory in Galatians 4:2-31. But I also realize that there is no end to the types that one can find in Scripture, nor any controls on how far you can take such an interpretive method" (p. 204).