Mariology vs Mariolatry

In Catholocism we have the following common attitudes toward Mary.

1. Mary is to be prayed to,

2. she is titled "Queen of Heaven",

3. Marian apparitions are sought after,

4. she is said to be the only human sinnless like Christ,

5. she is considered by many to be "co-redemptrix with Christ" for the human race,

6. she is so exaulted that the "immaculate conception" miracle - (having a sinnless child) is attributed in Catholic tradition to HER mother giving birth to HER.

So is this simply mariology - or is it mariolatry?

The question is asked on another thread - how does this differ from ancestor worship and praying to the dead?

In Christ,

Bob

[ October 26, 2002, 03:12 PM: Message edited by: BobRyan ]

Bob, I have heard all those things as well. What we must be careful about is the theology taught by the church or religion, and the concepts that followers have attributed to the church.

There are baptists who know no more than what they have heard in their assemblies, and sometimes when asked to explain they go into fields unworked and develop doctrines as strange to the Christian religion as one might think.

Cheers,

Jim

Mariology is an official line of study and belief in Catholocism. The web site below will provide far more interesting Marian beliefs from the pro-Catholic position. Catholic University level research and support for this teaching is "official" - as much as it may be PC to assume that the "official" position is non-descript, in fact EVEN the Papal encyclicals address mariology.

http://www.udayton.edu/mary/

It would be a huge mistake to suppose that it is just a "few misguided church members" that are behind Mariology.

In Christ,

Bob

[ October 26, 2002, 04:45 PM: Message edited by: BobRyan ]

I agree, Brother Jim, we should not go by hearsay. That is the beauty of the internet, we can go right to the source from our desk chairs.

Here is a link to the Catholic Encyclopedia. I am starting the reader out at the alphabetical index on "M". Scroll down about 1/3 of the way and you will see the many entries for "Mary."

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/m.htm

Of course sources should be credible, so here is a link explaining the nature of the first publication to bear this name in 1917:

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/00001a.htm

Any of you who have never seen or read this literature may be quite surprised at the Catholic traditions surrounding Mary. A good place to start that touches on many of the points cited by Bob is at the link entitled Mary, Devotion to the Virgin. A look at the actual Catholic source regarding Mary will give the reader an idea of how easy it is for some to dismiss other Catholic doctrines.

Exodus 20
4"You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 5You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, 6but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

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The Babylonians called Ishtar the Queen of Heaven and the Jews living in Egypt picked up on this habit. Here is what God through Jeremiah had to say about this:

Jeremiah 44
17 We will certainly do everything we said we would: We will burn incense to the Queen of Heaven and will pour out drink offerings to her just as we and our fathers, our kings and our officials did in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. At that time we had plenty of food and were well off and suffered no harm. 18 But ever since we stopped burning incense to the Queen of Heaven and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have had nothing and have been perishing by sword and famine."
19 The women added, "When we burned incense to the Queen of Heaven and poured out drink offerings to her, did not our husbands know that we were making cakes like her image and pouring out drink offerings to her?"

25 This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: You and your wives have shown by your actions what you promised when you said, 'We will certainly carry out the vows we made to burn incense and pour out drink offerings to the Queen of Heaven.' "Go ahead then, do what you promised! Keep your vows!

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Jeremiah 44 tells us the fate of those Jews.

[ October 26, 2002, 11:25 PM: Message edited by: Clint Kritzer ]

I quite agree that the Catholic Church can hang itself in its own writings. I am just cautioning that we state church doctrine as opposed to street beliefs.

Cheers,

Jim

Hi Bob, as a Catholic I have a special place in my heart for Mary. I however do not worship her. Can you show me Catholic dotrine which says we are to worship her? Remember praying is not worshiping it is how we talk to those who are in Heaven since we can not talk face to face. We honor Mary just as Jesus honored her as well. She was good enough for Jesus so she is good enough for me.

You mentioned making no grave an image, God commanded the Isrealites to place cheribs on the Arc of the coventant. This would be in direct contradiction to your interpretation, I think you missunderstand the scripture here. Besides any time someone paints a picture or scupts a statue they would be breaking God commandment.

I will continue to defend Mary the mother of Jesus and when I meet Jesus he was say "Well done my faithful servant"

I believe that both Luther and Calvin honored Mary as well. Why are you guys afraid of Mary, we know she is not God, just a loving mother who wants to bring us to her son.

God Bless You
Daniel

Originally posted by Daniel Vollmer:
...I have a special place in my heart for Mary. I however do not worship her. Can you show me Catholic dotrine which says we are to worship her? Remember praying is not worshiping it is how we talk to those who are in Heaven since we can not talk face to face.

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The word worship (Saxon weorthscipe, "honour"; from worth, meaning "value", "dignity", "price", and the termination, ship; Lat. cultus) in its most general sense is homage paid to a person or a thing.

.........................................

As the Blessed Virgin has a separate and absolutely supereminent rank among the saints, the worship paid to her is called hyperdulia (for the meaning and history of these terms see Suicer, Thesaurus ecclesiasticus, 1728).

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15710a.htm

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Prayer

An act of the virtue of religion which consists in asking proper gifts or graces from God. In a more general sense it is the application of the mind to Divine things, not merely to acquire a knowledge of them but to make use of such knowledge as a means of union with God. This may be done by acts of praise and thanksgiving, but petition is the principal act of prayer.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12345b.htm

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Idolatry

Idolatry etymologically denotes Divine worship given to an image, but its signification has been extended to all Divine worship given to anyone or anything but the true God.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07636a.htm

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You mentioned making no grave an image, God commanded the Isrealites to place cheribs on the Arc of the coventant.

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The Israelites did not worship the Ark. They personified God's presence as residing between the tips of the wings of the cherubim (Exodus 25:21). The Israelites realized, however, that the Ark and eventually the Temple could not house God (1Kings 8:27).

Originally posted by Daniel Vollmer:
Remember praying is not worshiping

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On the contrary, Prayer is the purest form of worship that we know.
DHK

Clint,

You are moderator of this forum, are you not?

This tread was started with a question by DHK. A Catholic responded, and DHK told them immediately that THEY were wrong...that what they believe is not what they believe, but what HE TOLD them they believed is what they believed.

Honestly, as moderator, how are you overlooking this? Because you disagree with the Catholics, you allow such a baited question such that when a Catholic responds, he is attacked? How can the person asking the questions tell the answerer that he is wrong unless he had no intent of hearing an answer?

God bless,

Grant

Oh, nevermind.

I'm taking a hiatus from the site. I'll probably read from time to time, but no posting for a while. The attitude here lately has become increasingly violent. Neither side is AT ALL interested in listening or discussing as much as making sure everyone else knows that THEY are right (I say that for both Catholics and non-Catholics).

Charity is gone, of which I'm a part.
Love is gone, of which I'm a part.
The Spirit of Christ is gone, of which I'm a part.

I pity the poor lost soul who comes to this board and sees Christian brother and sisters belitting one another, tearing each other apart with logic jargon, and condemning one another without (and this is obvious) really caring about the individual.

May God come back and fill us with the gifts of the Holy Spirit, which are not found in this board right now.

I suggest we all just read through some of these lengthy posts, whether we post in them or not, and look at the anger-filled attitude, and then ask why this is happening. This is not how Christ preached, talked, nor brought people unto Him.

Let us attune ourselves to His will, so that HIS will be done, and not our personal, selfish ideals.

God bless you all,

Grant

Originally posted by GraceSaves:

This tread was started with a question by DHK. A Catholic responded, and DHK told them immediately that THEY were wrong.

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Me? Previous to this I have made but one post.
DHK

Originally posted by DHK:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by GraceSaves:

This tread was started with a question by DHK. A Catholic responded, and DHK told them immediately that THEY were wrong.

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Me?

Previous to this I have made but one post.
DHK</font>[/QUOTE]DHK,

I do apologize. I thought I read you as the one who started this post, when it was BobRyan. My mistake.

Okay, that was seriously my last post for a while.

God bless,

Grant

Remember praying is not worshiping it is how we talk to those who are in Heaven since we can not talk face to face.

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How does anyone left here on earth know who is in heaven and who isn't?
Can we, as mere humans, judge?

People can be pretty hard to judge sometimes

I see you like to quote the Catholic dictionary while rejecting everything else about it. What you failed to show is that the so called worship given to Mary is NOT the same worship given to God, its two steps down from god.

I am curious as to what you think the nature and presonality of Jesus is. Do you think Jesus would condem someone who pays respect to his earthly mother who nurished him and took care of him who cared him in her womb. Personaly I think of Jesus as the God of infinite mercy in love, he is not jealous of the attention paid to his mother. Mary is but a conduit to Jesus, she only wants us to know her son. Take a look at the apparitions of Mary and her messages, they all deal with bring us closer to Jesus.

God Bless you all

Daniel

1. Mary is to be prayed to,

Absolutely.

2. she is titled "Queen of Heaven",

She's nothing less than your queen.

3. Marian apparitions are sought after

They exist, and should be taken seriously into account. Whoever denies this should do some serious investigation on the matter.

For instance, on October 13th, 1917, Fatima was confirmed by an unprecedented public miracle, the Miracle of the Sun, which occurred at precisely the moment the peasant visionary Lucia said it would. More than 70,000 people, including Masons, communists and atheists, saw the sun, contrary to all cosmic laws, twirl in the sky, throw off colors and descend to earth. The event was reported in newspapers around the world, including the New York Times.

4. she is said to be the only human sinnless like Christ

You're correct. She's our Immaculate Mother, the sinless New Eve.

5. she is considered by many to be "co-redemptrix with Christ" for the human race

Her mission as Mother of the Messiah was no less than Coredemptrix. Of course, it must be rightly understood. This title is only proper once it is understood that she participates under the only Redeemer such as we mediate through participation under the only Mediator when we pray for others. Such as how we participate under the only Son of God when we become children of God.

6. she is so exaulted that the "immaculate conception" miracle - (having a sinnless child) is attributed in Catholic tradition to HER mother giving birth to HER.

The Immaculate Conception is not attributed to Anne. It is attributed to God preparing the Mother of the Messiah for her exalted work of Mother, Coredemptrix, Advocate, and Mediatrix.

So is this simply mariology - or is it mariolatry?

Well Mariology means "Study of Mary", so if you're studying the truths about Mary, then it would be Mariology. If you are worshipping Mary by giving her the adoration that is due to God alone (latria), then it would be mariolatry.

Considering that you haven't mentioned giving the adoration that is due to God alone above, we cannot impute the gravity of mariolatry in these instances.

The question is asked on another thread - how does this differ from ancestor worship and praying to the dead?

Well, Mary isn't given the adoration due to God alone, so we can't say that idolatry is being comitted, and Mary isn't dead. She's alive with the living God in heaven, interceding for you, her child.

We fly to your patronage, O Holy Mother of God:
despise not our petitions in our necessities,
but deliver us always from all dangers,
O Glorious and Blessed Virgin.

(The most ancient Marian prayer we have; 3rd century)

Mary, how sweet is your name, pray for us, your meek children, and show unto us the fruit of your womb, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ and echo your Fiat through our humble lives in imitation and service of your son.

God bless,

Carson

Originally posted by Clint Kritzer:
The Israelites did not worship the Ark. They personified God's presence as residing between the tips of the wings of the cherubim (Exodus 25:21). The Israelites realized, however, that the Ark and eventually the Temple could not house God (1Kings 8:27).

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Wait a minute, Clint. You appear to be a bit inconsistent and selective here.

Exodus 20 says,
"You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth."

Why do you defend violating this commmand from God?

Ron

Ron - God Himself gave the command to build the Ark and all the articles within the Tabernacle.

Exodus 25:10-22

The Tabernacle and its furnishings were not idols to be worshipped nor were they served or worshipped. They served as symbols of the Siniatic Covenant.

When the Israelites DID try to put faith in the Ark as opposed to God, they were defeated by the Phillistines and the Ark was captured.

1Samuel 4:10-11

Carson - Thank you for not dancing around the issue.

Daniel - I do not "like" quoting the Catholic Encyclopedia at all, but it is a source that (most) Catholics would view as credible, that is why I used it. Please note that I cited the sources for each quote and have encouraged everyone to read the articles. It gives us a definition of terms, something that the "Mary debates" have always lacked in this forum. From this we may have a progressive, educational discussion rather than the "you do so/we do not" pointless contradictions that we have witnessed in the past.
As Jim noted, there is often a type of "folklore" that develops in ANY denomination when people are asked about doctrine they do not fully understand.

Dear Glorious,

We can attest that those who "have the Son have life"; and those who do not have the Son do not have life. That ''life'' begins when one believes (accepts) Christ. From that point on, assurance as to his/her salvation is secured. There is nothing wrong with saying "I am saved". The 3,000 who ''believed'' from Acts 2:41 were said to be added to the kingdom that day.

Romans 10:9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.

God Bless

Originally posted by Carson Weber:

Well, Mary isn't given the adoration due to God alone, so we can't say that idolatry is being comitted, and Mary isn't dead. She's alive with the living God in heaven, interceding for you, her child.

We fly to your patronage, O Holy Mother of God:
despise not our petitions in our necessities,
but deliver us always from all dangers,
O Glorious and Blessed Virgin.

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The Lieutenant-governor of Quebec prays to her deceased grandmother (if she is still the same Lt.-gov.), as a few years ago. That is Spiritism, the paranormal, the occult, praying to the dead.
It is forbidden in Scripture. I see no difference between her doing that and a Catholic praying to Mary. To her, her grandmother may be "alive" in Heaven. She is dead, just as Mary is dead. The resurrection has not yet occurred. We are forbidden to pray to the dead. We are forbidden to pray (worship) anyone but God alone. Again, prayer, is the purest form of worship one can know. It is the way that a believer can enter right into the very presence of God. The example of prayer of given above is worship. It is due to God alone. You give it to Mary. That is idolatry, Mariolotry. You try to escape this dilemma by creating a dichotomy in worship in using the words latria and dulia. The Bible makes no such differentiation however. Prayer is worship. It is adoration. When addressed to another, such as Mary, it is idolatry.
DHK

Originally posted by DHK:
The example of prayer of given above is worship. It is due to God alone. You give it to Mary. That is idolatry, Mariolotry. You try to escape this dilemma by creating a dichotomy in worship in using the words latria and dulia. The Bible makes no such differentiation however. Prayer is worship. It is adoration. When addressed to another, such as Mary, it is idolatry.

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You are quite correct, DHK.

In researching this subject a little bit I found an article by another ex-catholic, a nun to boot, named Mary Ann Collins. She wrote a very easy to read essay on Mariolotry which can be found at this link: Mary Worship?

She has provided specific chatechisms to examine on this issue in her essay. It looks like I may have some time on my hands tomorrow so I'll see what I can find. Her contention is that the worship of Mary is NOT a historical concept within the RCC but came into being because of Catholics putting the same amount of emphasis on the Church's traditions as they do on the Scriptures.

The whole article is quite personal and to the point. Among the quotes that really stood out to me is this one:

After years of no longer being a Catholic, I attended a Catholic funeral. When I went into the church something hit me hard. It had always been there, but I had never noticed it before because I was used to it. There were statues of Mary and the saints. They looked solid, real, as if they represented people of power. Jesus only appeared as a helpless baby in Mary's arms, as a dead man nailed to a cross, and as little wafers of bread hidden inside a fancy box. Visually and emotionally the message was very clear - if you want real power, if you want someone who can do something for you, then go to Mary and the Saints.

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If you do not wish to read the whole article but are interested in speaking with former Catholics who became enlightened to this, among other idolatries, they provide a website, mailing address and email.

Good News for Catholics
P.O. Box 595
Cupertino, CA 95015
E-mail: gnfc@gnfc.org
Web Site: http://www.gnfc.org

For Catholics who are reading this, please try to overcome your familiarity with this text and really look at the words. Doesn't this sound like worship?

"Hail, holy Queen, Mother of Mercy! Our life, our sweetness and our hope! To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve. To thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping, in this valley of tears. Turn, then, most gracious Advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us; and after this our exile show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary."

Salve Regina (Hail Holy Queen)

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