Defending faith when protestants say it is not okay to worship Mary

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So, I’m a Roman Catholic and for a half year I’ve been browsing a protestant forum just because I was afraid I might get possessed after watching a horror movie.
They just have bad opinions about Catholics. They say we worship Mary and that Jesus is the only mediator between us and God.
What can I do? Is it a biblical proof that worshiping Mary is okay?
 
No, worshiping Mary is not OK. We don’t worship her, we honor her.
 
Ask them if they think their grandparents are watching over them in heaven. Given an affirmative answer, it follows that their grandparents can also hear them from heaven. Hence, they can intercede for us because they know our frustrations. The same goes for Mary. Like the first responder implied, “prayer to” isn’t “worship of” 🙂
 
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I’m sorry, I skimmed over the part about the fear of possession. I hope you don’t continue to fear that
 
In simple terms I would say that Catholics want to imitate Christ and honor Mary (and imagine how perfectly Jesus would have followed the Commandment to “honor thy father and mother”; we can’t out-do him), to see her as our Mother, to ask her intercede on our behalf as she did for the wedding party at Cana and follow her directive to, “do whatever He tells you.”

No worship, just honor, veneration.

(Regarding the fear thing, Catholics are known to memorize prayers and some non-Catholic traditions practice spontaneous prayer and think repeating prayers is in vain. Memorizing prayer has the advantage of being at the forefront on your mind so if you are fearful, stressed or the right words aren’t coming to you, the perfect prayer can be on your lips in a moment.

Spontaneous prayer is very good too. Practice both if you don’t already.
 
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In the Magnificat or Cancticle of Mary in Luke, she says “Every generation will call me blessed.”
 
scope said:
So, I’m a Roman Catholic and for a half year I’ve been browsing a protestant forum just because I was afraid I might get possessed after watching a horror movie.
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I hope you realize how irrational this is. Talk to your pastor!
scope said:
What can I do?
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Stay off that forum and talk to your pastor.
scope said:
Is it a biblical proof that worshiping Mary is okay?
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Worshipping Mary would not be OK, as we give
worship (latria) only to God. We venerate Mary and the Saints (dulia).
 
Yes, Jesus is the mediator between man and God. Does that mean that we cannot pray for each other? If I pray for you or you pray for me, we are acting as mediators. Do protestants pray for each other?
 
It is interesting that some Protestants declare that Catholics worship Mary without any effort to see what Catholics actually do. If I wanted to learn what someone with another religion does, I would first ask them what they do. I wouldn’t try to tell them what they do without finding out from them.
Catholics honor Mary. Just as people honor their parents. Catholics no more worship Mary than others worship their parents. When someone has a picture of their mother on the wall it isn’t an idol, any more than images of Mary are idols.
The best defense against the devil are the sacraments, particularly the eucharist. You might consider going to daily mass and confession as well on occasion. The devil has no power over people who practice their faith.
 
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@scope

Ask them to quote for you the Catholic document that says that the Catholic Church teaches that Catholics worship Mary (or whatever). That usually stops them. I have often found that they are just repeating what they have heard from someone else and have not done their own research. Further, if they can point to a document, that document is usually is misunderstood or misquoted. If that is the case, you can gently correct them.
 
The protestant arguments against the veneration of Mary are quite ironic - Luther himself implored her intercession, the heretic he was.

At the same time look at all this confusion we have delved into! The nature of our humanity - we understand very little; our emotions trap us into much! Can’t we trust God enough that he would entrust the second person of Him to a most sinless and immaculate Virgin!?

For Protestants to deny the intercession of Mary is an absolute heresy. It is a sign of defiance towards the Lord, a sign of allegiant towards the self.
 
catholics don’t worship Mary; we honor Her & beg for her intercession (how many times does that need to be said )

it is mostly anti-catholic bigotry (the most permanent bigotry) that even permits this horse hockey to even be posted on an internet message board
 
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Ask them first, where Jesus taught bible alone. Ask them for chapter and verse, since that is their theological oxygen.

Tell them that it appears that they worship the bible, since it has replaced the Holy Eucharist in their “services.”

Speaking of which, you might also ask them where Jesus taught “worship services”

Oh, we worship nothing and no one other than Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Full story, bro’
 
We don’t “worship Mary”. I don’t mean to be harsh, but if you are a Roman Catholic you should know that. If you are asking for things like biblical support for “worshipping Mary”, then I am a little hesitant about you hanging out on some Protestant forum trying to argue with them, because if you do not already know we don’t worship Mary and furthermore don’t already know the basics behind our veneration of Mary, you are probably not ready to be out there defending the faith.

There are about 50 threads on this forum where we have already responded to Protestants coming on here making a fuss about Catholic devotion to Mary. There were at least two such threads just in the last week. Try using topic search and selecting “Latest topics” to find ones with Mary in the title and I’m sure they will pop up.

There are also about 10 articles that come up in a Google search on “protestant catholic mary” about how Catholics can talk to Protestants about Mary, as this misguided idea they have about Mary-worship comes up over and over and over. Feel free to read them.
 
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mdgspencer said:
It is interesting that some Protestants declare that Catholics worship Mary without any effort to see what Catholics actually do. If I wanted to learn what someone with another religion does, I would first ask them what they do. I wouldn’t try to tell them what they do without finding out from them.
Catholics honor Mary. Just as people honor their parents. Catholics no more worship Mary than others worship their parents. When someone has a picture of their mother on the wall it isn’t an idol, any more than images of Mary are idols.
The best defense against the devil are the sacraments, particularly the eucharist. You might consider going to daily mass and confession as well on occasion. The devil has no power over people who practice their faith.
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I agree that some Protestants no doubt believe some things about Catholics without ever asking a Catholic. In this case it appears that had a non-Catholic asked the op s (he) would have told them that Catholics do in fact worship Mary. I think it is obvious that some Catholics do erroneously worship Mary.
 
“Considering that when the Saints lived in this world, they were at liberty to roam the earth, do you really think that in Heaven, God would have them tied to a post?” St Thomas More.
 
We have to all be careful of the sin of idolatry. The lines between worshipping and honoring can be close. In pre-Vatican II, it was definitely hard to see if Mary was just being honored or if they indeed got into the realm of idolatry and worship of Mary instead of simply honoring her.

To pray to Mary is to pray to a friend. But to pray to her without regard to God is where you are in danger. It would be the same thing though if you worship your football game over going to mass.
 
Say “you are right. It would be the sin of idolatry to worship anyone but God!” That will make the blink.

Then, explain that there are somethings that are written in the language of love. There are innumerable poets, lovers, parents who have written of of their worship for the one they love. It is romance language.

When people have deep love for the Blessed Virgin Mary, they also may use the language of the romantics… St Louis de Montefort comes to mind. Reading his work without accounting for the romance of the words is like snooping through someone else’s love letters

“My darling, I worship the ground on which you walk!” would be moving in a letter from your beloved, but, might sound like heresy when taken literally.
 
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