Consequences of not asking Virgin Mary for intercession

[Eilish_Maura]

I guess I take it a Yes.

??

 

[water]

There are no ‘consequences’ for not asking Mary for intercession.

If you believe otherwise then please show where the Church OFFICIALLY teaches this and explain why the Church has not made it mandatory.

Eilish, my question was simply “Isn’t Blessed Virgin Mary this person regarding? What do you think?”

Take my question easy. If you don’t believe so, just say no. If you do, then say Yes. If you are not sure, then you are not sure.

 

[Eilish_Maura]

Eilish, my question was simply “Isn’t Blessed Virgin Mary this person regarding? What do you think?”

The thread is about consequences of not asking Mary for intercession - can we bring things back on track?

 

[water]

The thread is about consequences of not asking Mary for intercession - can we bring things back on track?

Sure, let’s get back to the point where you thought of Her as a goalie. wasn’t this what you refer Her to?

 

[Eilish_Maura]

There are no ‘consequences’ for not asking Mary for intercession.

 

[water]

why would you think of Her as a goalie? If you don’t want to answer that, then I am not going to ask again.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

Consequences? As in “The Lord will smite thee if thou dost not ask the Virgin for intercession?”

Certainly there are no such ‘punitive’ smitings in such a case.

Ah. . .but are there ‘consequences’ which may not be ‘punitive’ per se?

Of course.

One ‘consequence’ of not asking the Virgin for intercession **could be ** a false pride, for example, “I go right to God. . .I don’t NEED anybody else to pray with me and I don’t want them to. God hears MY prayers. I’m ‘good enough’ not to need anybody else.”

Another consequence is a false sense of being ‘better’ than somebody else. “Look at the person blathering about the Virgin. Don’t they KNOW that they should only be talking about GOD (like me). Don’t they know how foolish they look? How other people are ‘led astray’? Not like with ME. I know better.”

Another consequence is missing out on the ‘family’ of God. Mary IS our Mother. “Dismissing” her from prayer (which is communication, not solely directed ‘to God alone’) and devotion is dismissing a vital part of Jesus --His Humanity–and neglect of acknowledgement, at the least, of the Virgin’s virtues and her role in Salvation history makes our knowledge of “God alone” imperfect. . .shouldn’t we be striving for perfection, as God Himself tells us to do?

Just some possibilities to ponder.

 

[Eilish_Maura]

Consequences? As in “The Lord will smite thee if thou dost not ask the Virgin for intercession?”

Certainly there are no such ‘punitive’ smitings in such a case.

Ah. . .but are there ‘consequences’ which may not be ‘punitive’ per se?

Of course.

One ‘consequence’ of not asking the Virgin for intercession **could be ** a false pride, for example, “I go right to God. . .I don’t NEED anybody else to pray with me and I don’t want them to. God hears MY prayers. I’m ‘good enough’ not to need anybody else.”

Another consequence is a false sense of being ‘better’ than somebody else. “Look at the person blathering about the Virgin. Don’t they KNOW that they should only be talking about GOD (like me). Don’t they know how foolish they look? How other people are ‘led astray’? Not like with ME. I know better.”

Another consequence is missing out on the ‘family’ of God. Mary IS our Mother. “Dismissing” her from prayer (which is communication, not solely directed ‘to God alone’) and devotion is dismissing a vital part of Jesus --His Humanity–and neglect of acknowledgement, at the least, of the Virgin’s virtues and her role in Salvation history makes our knowledge of “God alone” imperfect. . .shouldn’t we be striving for perfection, as God Himself tells us to do?

Just some possibilities to ponder.

Some of these can also be a danger for those who do ask for Mary’s intercession - especially in these kinds of exchanges - another possibility to ponder.

 

[ElizabethPH]

We all know how Eilisha feels about praying for Mary’s intercession. So don’t do it. The consequences for you is that you are missing out; period. Of course you no doubt don’t think so. Praying for Mary’s intercession is a powerful thing, speaking from my own experience. And I don’t have to have the Church spell it out for me in some official document.

 

[Eilish_Maura]

We all know how Eilisha feels about praying for Mary’s intercession. So don’t do it. The consequences for you is that you are missing out; period. Of course you no doubt don’t think so. Praying for Mary’s intercession is a powerful thing, speaking from my own experience. And I don’t have to have the Church spell it out for me in some official document.

We do NOT ‘miss out’ on anything or the Church would have insisted we pray for her intercession rather than leaving it optional.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

We do NOT ‘miss out’ on anything or the Church would have insisted we pray for her intercession rather than leaving it optional.

Not quite.

This is the kind of false dichotomy that causes a lot of dissention that really should not be here.

It is not “either/or”, EM.

It is “both/and”.

I’m interested to know just why it is so necessary for you to focus on ‘you don’t HAVE to.’ I know you have had ‘trouble’ with Marian devotions, God bless you, but do you think you might be projecting your personal and temporal difficulties onto everybody else? (and I say ‘temporal’ because while you may have trouble ‘now’ you may not tomorrow, or next month, or next year.)

But all things considered, would you urge people to do ‘only’ the bare minimum required for salvation or would you urge them to do as much as they could?

Would you have them shoot for ‘more’ or just try to scrape by with as little as ‘needed’?

Are you concerned that people will fail through trying too hard, or do you think that anything beyond the least possible is too ‘much’ for people to offer?

 

[Eilish_Maura]

Not quite.

This is the kind of false dichotomy that causes a lot of dissention that really should not be here.

It is not “either/or”, EM.

It is “both/and”.

I’m interested to know just why it is so necessary for you to focus on ‘you don’t HAVE to.’ I know you have had ‘trouble’ with Marian devotions, God bless you, but do you think you might be projecting your personal and temporal difficulties onto everybody else? (and I say ‘temporal’ because while you may have trouble ‘now’ you may not tomorrow, or next month, or next year.)

But all things considered, would you urge people to do ‘only’ the bare minimum required for salvation or would you urge them to do as much as they could?

Would you have them shoot for ‘more’ or just try to scrape by with as little as ‘needed’?

Are you concerned that people will fail through trying too hard, or do you think that anything beyond the least possible is too ‘much’ for people to offer?

Some, in their zeal, misrepresent what the Church actually teaches.

Either we have the freedom to pick and choose from the various private devotional practices or we don’t.

The Church can be trusted to guide us or it can’t.

To say there are ‘consequences’ for not asking the BVM’s intercession without backup via official Church teaching implies we cannot trust the Church to guide us. Sticking with the Church is NOT doing the ‘bare minimum’.

 

[sobino]

Thanks for your answers. But i still do not see unifying opinion on the issue of not asking mary for intercession and its consequences in our lives. If Vrgin Mary is so central for Catholic Church , we should know why we do it,not just passively do the things we do not understand. My protestant friends,some of them, admire Mary for their life,but they do not see any reason for asking her for intercession, cos they say they can pray right to God. We have 2 things to analyze: 1. What is bad about praying to God without asking Mary and saints for intercession? - please support your statement with official teaching of RCC. 2. Why should we prefer asking Mary and saints for intercession?Do we get more from God?If not why are we doing it? - please RCC oficial support statements. Many catholics in my country become protestants because Catholic priest just did not give them satisfying answers for prayers to the Mary and saints.

 

[Eilish_Maura]

Thanks for your answers. But i still do not see unifying opinion on the issue of not asking mary for intercession and its consequences in our lives. If Vrgin Mary is so central for Catholic Church , we should know why we do it,not just passively do the things we do not understand. My protestant friends,some of them, admire Mary for their life,but they do not see any reason for asking her for intercession, cos they say they can pray right to God. We have 2 things to analyze: 1. What is bad about praying to God without asking Mary and saints for intercession? - please support your statement with official teaching of RCC. 2. Why should we prefer asking Mary and saints for intercession?Do we get more from God?If not why are we doing it? - please RCC oficial support statements. Many catholics in my country become protestants because Catholic priest just did not give them satisfying answers for prayers to the Mary and saints.

You don’t see a unifying opinion because there isn’t one.

Some point to the Wedding at Cana (as if it answers all things) and other to Jesus teaching us to pray. I am not sure (and I have not see anyone produce the quotes) that the Church comes down officially on this.

 

[FCEGM]

Thanks for your answers. But i still do not see unifying opinion on the issue of not asking mary for intercession and its consequences in our lives. If Vrgin Mary is so central for Catholic Church , we should know why we do it,not just passively do the things we do not understand. . . .[etc.].

Then please read the Catechism of the Catholic Church in her regard; it is quite clear [emph. mine]:

964 Mary’s role in the Church is inseparable from her union with Christ and flows directly from it. “This union of the mother with the Son in the work of salvation is made manifest from the time of Christ’s virginal conception up to his death”;502 it is made manifest above all at the hour of his Passion:

Thus the Blessed Virgin advanced in her pilgrimage of faith, and faithfully persevered in her union with her Son unto the cross. There she stood, in keeping with the divine plan, enduring with her only begotten Son the intensity of his suffering, joining herself with his sacrifice in her mother’s heart, and lovingly consenting to the immolation of this victim, born of her: to be given, by the same Christ Jesus dying on the cross, as a mother to his disciple, with these words: "Woman, behold your son."503

965 After her Son’s Ascension, Mary "aided the beginnings of the Church by her prayers."504 In her association with the apostles and several women, "we also see Mary by her prayers imploring the gift of the Spirit, who had already overshadowed her in the Annunciation."505

. . . also in her Assumption

966 "Finally the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all stain of original sin, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory, and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things, so that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of lords and conqueror of sin and death."506 The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin is a singular participation in her Son’s Resurrection and an anticipation of the resurrection of other Christians:

In giving birth you kept your virginity; in your Dormition you did not leave the world, O Mother of God, but were joined to the source of Life. You conceived the living God and, by your prayers, will deliver our souls from death.507

. . . she is our Mother in the order of grace

967 By her complete adherence to the Father’s will, to his Son’s redemptive work, and to every prompting of the Holy Spirit, the Virgin Mary is the Church’s model of faith and charity. Thus she is a “preeminent and . . . wholly unique member of the Church”; indeed, she is the “exemplary realization” (typus)508 of the Church.

968 Her role in relation to the Church and to all humanity goes still further. "In a wholly singular way she cooperated by her obedience, faith, hope, and burning charity in the Savior’s work of restoring supernatural life to souls. For this reason she is a mother to us in the order of grace."509

969 "This motherhood of Mary in the order of grace continues uninterruptedly from the consent which she loyally gave at the Annunciation and which she sustained without wavering beneath the cross, until the eternal fulfillment of all the elect. Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this saving office but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation .… Therefore the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix."510

. . .

971 “All generations will call me blessed”: "The Church’s devotion to the Blessed Virgin is intrinsic to Christian worship."513 **The Church rightly honors "the Blessed Virgin with special devotion. From the most ancient times the Blessed Virgin has been honored with the title of ‘Mother of God,’ to whose protection the faithful fly in all their dangers and needs. . . . **This very special devotion . . . differs essentially from the adoration which is given to the incarnate Word and equally to the Father and the Holy Spirit, and greatly fosters this adoration."514 The liturgical feasts dedicated to the Mother of God and Marian prayer, such as the rosary, an “epitome of the whole Gospel,” express this devotion to the Virgin Mary.515

It is a poor child that ignores his Mother.

 

[Eilish_Maura]

Then please read the Catechism of the Catholic Church in her regard; it is quite clear [emph. mine]:

It is a poor child that ignores his Mother.

Do you know of any quotes from the Catechism that shows there is some consequence/downside to not asking for Mary’s intercession?

 

[FCEGM]

Do you know of any quotes from the Catechism that shows there is some consequence/downside to not asking for Mary’s intercession?

This is actually a silly question, Eilish, since the CCC wasn’t written to “prove a negative,” which cannot be done; rather, it merely supports what the Church does do, and does believe, and the Catholic Church clearly teaches that asking for Mary’s intercession is good, helpful, and recommended. This is all the CCC can do.

But, since the Church teaches that Mary is our Mother, then it follows that lack of advertence to her inhibits one’s spiritual growth - as Catholic Saints and theologians teach; this is not unlike one’s lack of attention to and affection for one’s earthly mother inhibits one’s psychological growth.

Further, one should be able to take the clue from the place in the liturgy of the Church of Mary whom, needless to say, the Church has always invoked and asked for the intercession of in all the the liturgies of the ancient Church, both East and West. Here, it should be noted that being part of the Liturgy held the force of dogma for the ancient Church, especially when an element was universal in nature. There is no Liturgy of the ancient Church that does not invoke the prayers of Mary. The earliest documented example that we have for this is the so-called Sub Tuum Praesidium, dated to about 250 A.D. i.e., while the Church was still a persecuted, underground organization, which was discovered on a papyrus fragment in Egypt. It records the words of an early Christian Liturgy which invoked the protection of Mary during the imperial Roman persecutions, and it reads:

“We fly to your patronage,
O holy Mother of God,
despise not our petitions
in our necessities,
but deliver us from all dangers.
O ever glorious and blessed Virgin.”

So, prayer to Mary and asking for her intercession and protection has always been a part of the public life and practice of the Church, especially in the East; and especially among the Syrian fathers, who were Semitic Aramaic speakers, and thus the closest in culture to the original Jewish Christians. For example, there are numerous poetic prayers written by St. Ephraem the Syrian (prior to A.D. 350), which address Mary directly, such as …

“My Lady, Most Holy, All-Pure, All-Immaculate,
All-Stainless, All-Undefiled, All-Incorrupt, All-Inviolate
…Spotless Robe of Him Who clothes Himself with light as
with a garment …Flower unfading, purple woven by God,
alone Most Immaculate.” (Poem to Christ).

and …

“Thou, and Thy Mother are alone in this. You are wholly
beautiful in every respect. There is in Thee, Lord, no
stain, nor any spot in Thy Mother.” (Ibid).

Also, St. Sophronius of Jerusalem, another Syrian father, was well known for his poetic invocations of the Mother of God. For example:

“Many saints appeared before thee (Mary) but none was filled with grace as thou …no one has been purified in advance as
thou has been …Thou dost surpass all that is most
excellent in man.” (Prayer to Mary).

And St. John Damascene (although I don’t have any quotes from him handy) was part of this same Syrian tradition of praising and directly petitioning Mary for all the Church’s wants and needs.

And the Greek and Latin fathers were of course known for this as well. For example, in the Greek liturgies of St. Basil the Great and St. John Chrysostom, Mary is hailed as the “Panagia” (“All Holy One”) and the “Panagiota” (“All Sinless One”) and she is asked to intercede with her Son on behalf of us sinners.

Also, in his Confessions, St. Augustine records that His mother St. Monica asks for the intercession of the Virgin during her many years of prayer for Augustine’s conversion to the Catholic Faith.

So, there is a ton of historical evidence that Marian devotion has always been part of the Church. In fact, its origins are rooted in Scripture. For, in John 2:5, Jesus performs His first public miracle at the request of His mother; and this passage also shows us that Mary is very concerned for the needs of others, thus leading the early Church to trust in her human sympathy and her caring,
maternal character. Jesus performs His first public miracle at the request of His mother; and this passage also shows us that Mary is very concerned for the needs of others, thus leading the early Church to trust in her human sympathy and her caring, maternal character.

Likewise, in Luke 11:27-28, we see that, even during His public ministry, a woman in the crowd praises Jesus’ mother. Now, it is true that Jesus “corrects”, i.e., “refines” the woman’s praise. But, as Luke 1:41-42 and 48-49 show us, Jesus is not denying His mother’s blessedness but clarifying WHY His mother, or anyone else in the Church, should be regarded as blessed. Indeed, Jesus is merely asking this woman’s praise for His mother to be based
on the same realization that St. Elizabeth herself possessed
when she expresses praise for Mary as her Queen (Queen
Mother) and as the most blessed among women in Luke 1:42-45,
i.e., because of Mary’s superior belief and grace, as expressed in Luke 1:28 and 1:38.

This is why (and the only real reason) we should give assent
of faith to Marian doctrine, and why we should also follow through with this assent in personal devotion to the Blessed Virgin today. She is our Queen and our model, as the first Christian - the first to accept Christ (Luke 1:38) and the very image of the Church itself (see Rev 12:1-3).

 

[Eilish_Maura]

This is actually a silly question, Eilish, since the CCC wasn’t written to “prove a negative,” which cannot be done; rather, it merely supports what the Church does do, and does believe, and the Catholic Church clearly teaches that asking for Mary’s intercession is good, helpful, and recommended. This is all the CCC can do.

No - mine is not a silly question. The CCC can and does instruct us and if something is ‘bad’ for us (has consequences/downsides) it can and would tell us and provide explantion(s).

This is why (and the only real reason) we should give assent
of faith to Marian doctrine, and why we should also follow through with this assent in personal devotion to the Blessed Virgin today. She is our Queen and our model, as the first Christian - the first to accept Christ (Luke 1:38) and the very image of the Church itself (see Rev 12:1-3).

Neither the OP nor I have denied or failed to give assent to Marian Doctrine nor anything regarding the liturgy or history of the Church.

Nothing is demanded regarding personal devotion by the Church. Personal devotion may or may not follow giving assent to this doctrine.

 

[Johndigger]

The Holy Catholic Church does not “mandate” that I do my schoolwork.

That doesn’t mean that I won’t lose out if I don’t do it.

The Blessed Virgin Mary is a gift to help us get to God, as indeed, are all the Saints.

Refuse a gift from God at your own peril.

Mystical Rose,
Pray for us!

JD

 

[Eilish_Maura]

The Holy Catholic Church does not “mandate” that I do my schoolwork.

That doesn’t mean that I won’t lose out if I don’t do it.

The Blessed Virgin Mary is a gift to help us get to God, as indeed, are all the Saints.

Refuse a gift from God at your own peril.

Mystical Rose,
Pray for us!

JD

The Church does not teach that there is any ‘peril’ involved in what has been discussed (unlike say missing Mass). There is NOTHING that supports this ‘refuse at your own peril’ position.