Jesus is not God in the Gospel of Mark

What?!?Let me see if I understand, you claim that Mark shows us a Christ that did miracles, was the Messiah/Christ, was sent by God, and had a unique relationship with God, but was not God? Then to support your claim that being called the son of God is no big deal you appeal to the Catholic Catechism? If I understood you then I simply have to say . . . what!?! If it looks like duck, acts like a duck, and talks like a duck, you better have a damn good reason for claiming it is not a duck. So far, all you’re claiming is that being called the son of God is no big deal and somehow the virgin birth story is essential for divinity. Neither are good reasons. Again even if I grant you those you still have a lot more examples of Christ’s divinity to deal with. Christ forgave sins (which was, and still is, regarded as strictly the provision of God). Christ spoke and acted on his own authority never once claiming it from another source. Christ identified with the "I am" statements of God (6:50, 13:6) The high priest and Jewish leaders recognized his claim to divinity. See the Packer quote below. These point to another problem, nothing in Mark makes much sense if you remove the claim that Christ is divine. For example, you grant that Mark claims that Christ is the Messiah. But first century Judaism’s expectation of the Messiah was that he would overthrow the Romans, not someone who would be executed by them. Yet Mark claims this crucified man who did nothing politically or militarily is the Messiah. Absent a claim to divinity, a claim that Christ is Messiah makes no sense it light of first century Judaism. NT Scholar Craig Evens says “Jesus' willingness to suffer and die stands in marked contrast to the widespread expectation of a coming Messiah who would slay His enemies.”Catechism and Son of God You heavily quote mine that Catechism as it continues on to say, 442 Such is not the case for Simon Peter when he confesses Jesus as "the Christ, the Son of the living God", . . . [Paul] proclaimed Jesus, saying, 'He is the Son of God.'" From the beginning this acknowledgment of Christ's divine sonship will be the center of the apostolic faith, first professed by Peter as the Church's foundation. . . To his accusers' question before the Sanhedrin, "Are you the Son of God, then?" Jesus answered, "You say that I am." . . . Jesus referred to himself as "the Son" who knows the Father, as distinct from the "servants" God had earlier sent to his people; . . . He distinguished his sonship from that of his disciples by never saying "our Father", except to command them: "You, then, pray like this: 'Our Father'", and heemphasized this distinction, saying "my Father and your Father". . . the voice of the Father designates Jesus his "beloved Son". Jesus calls himself the "only Son of God", and by this title affirms his eternal pre-existence. He asks for faith in "the name of the only Son of God". In the centurion's exclamation before the crucified Christ, "Truly this man was the Son of God", that Christian confession is already heard. And in the notes it says, 454 The title "Son of God" signifies the unique and eternal relationship of Jesus Christ to God his Father: he is the only Son of the Father . . . he is God himself. The catechism says the opposite of what you are claiming. I don’t' want to be disrespectful or pejorative, but it looks like you didn’t bother to closely read what you are citing. Likewise it is simply false that there is universal scholarly assent that being called the son of God is no big deal. I cited scholars who say otherwise in my opening argument and here is another one. The NT uniformly defines the identity of Jesus in terms of his relation to the one God of OT monotheism. The basic definition is that Jesus is God’s Son. This identification is rooted in Jesus’ own thought and teaching. His sense of being “the Son” in a unique sense . . . was confirmed to him by his Father’s voice from heaven at his baptism: ‘Thou art my beloved son’ (Mk 1:11,3:17) agapetos carries the implication of ‘only beloved’: so again in the parable, MK 12:6. (J. I. Packer, New Bible Dictionary pg 503) Packer continues, . . . Mark and Luke report Jesus as making an affirmative reply which was in effect a claim to personal deity (Mk 14:62; Lk 22:70) the emphatic ‘I am’ were words that no Jew would take on his lips, for they expressed self-identification with God (Ex 3:14). Jesus, who according to Mark had used these words before . . . (Mk 6:50; 13:6) evidently wished to make it perfectly clear that this divine Sonship to which he laid claim was nothing less than personal deity. It was for this ‘blasphemy’ that he was condemned. Perhaps Packer is wrong, but the onus is on you to show so. You don’t get out of it by just claiming there is universal assent.Birth narrative I don't see why you are claiming that no birth narrative equals evidence for no divinity. If I am missing something you are trying to explain, my apologies. Can you lay that out in a structured, clear way so I can see your premises and the logical structure of your argument? As the absence of evidence is not necessarily evidence of absence, the absence of a birth narrative in Mark is not necessarily evidence on Christ’s divine status. Sure a virgin birth narrative is evidence for Christ’s divinity, but it’s not like a virgin birth narrative is a necessary for divinity in the same way that ingredients like flour, sugar, and eggs are necessary for baking a cake.Mark 1:1 You haven’t demonstrated that Son of God doesn’t belong in Mark 1:1, you’ve demonstrated there is dispute. Some good manuscripts don’t have it, some other ones do. Some scholars argue that it belongs there as the title is used elsewhere in Mark, and some others argue that is false. You have shown that there is legitimate dispute among scholars here. Showing there is a dispute does not prove the issue one way or another. That’s like saying that as one historian thinks there were 200,000 Persians at the battle of Thermopylae and another historian thinks there were one million Persians there, therefore there were 200,000 Persian there. Of course that is ridiculous, but it exactly what you seem to be claiming about Mark 1:1.Miracles You are still missing Mark’s point about Christ's miracles. Moses did miracles in the name of God and always pointed back to God. The one time he didn’t give God credit (Ex 17 ) God punished him for it. Christ always does miracles in his own name and by his own authority. He sacts by his own authority and under the power of his own name. Anyone doing that in first century Judaism was in effect acting as God.OT examples 2 Sm 7:12 doesn't say or imply anything like son or sons of God. Did you mean to cite something else? Psalmm 2:7 implies someone there is a son of God, but God is doing the speaking there. The scholar I cited above said “No one individual in the Hebrew Bible ever address God” so the point stands. You are missing the point about Christ’s use of Father. As Isiah 63:16 shows OT individuals and many other people would often address God as “our Father” (plural), Christ only addressed God as Father or my Father (singular). I wish there was space to explain how the theme of secrecy in Mark makes easy sense of most of your other misunderstandings like those relating to the demons and the centurion. There is way too much material here to cover in 8,000 characters so I tried to focus on what seemed to be the most important.Conclusion To conclude, you have established that there is dispute about Mark 1:1, nothing else. You haven’t explained why a virgin birth is necessary for divinity, the source you cite for minimizing the son of God actually argues against you, you have cited no NT scholars or experts on son of God, you have failed counter the references I cite for the divinity of Christ, and the examples of OT passages you cite only show that you have missed the point of those references.