Hello all. I’m a Protestant considering Catholicism. As such, my biggest hurdle thus far has been with the Blessed Virgin Mary.
I can accept the official Catholic dogma on Mary. I can accept prayers to her as the most holy Saint who can intercede for us, but sometimes I see stuff here on the forums or when reading about the Marian apparitions and those people who are particularly devoted to her, and I wonder, is it acceptable in Catholic faith to be devoted to Mary moreso than to Christ or to God the Father? Can you be a Catholic in good standing and never pray to Christ or God, only pray to/through Mary? Is it possible in Catholic thought to be too devoted to the BVM? And who can say definitively whether a person is too devoted to Mary above his/her devotion to Christ?
And on the other side of the coin, is it possible to be a good Catholic and not have a particular devotion to Mary or the saints in general?
What is essential is that you are able to assent to the dogmas. The rest is at your discretion.
There’s no requirement to accept any Marian apparition. The Church’s approbation is that an apparition is worthy of human credence.
If you choose to become Catholic, you will encounter individuals from time to time who have a piety that is very different from anything you might choose. Few are called to the ascetical life of a Saint Rose of Lima and few are called to the life of radical detachment and service of a Blessed Teresa of Calcutta.
That said, one also encounters some who are misguided. At times, one encounters people who are quite imbalanced or, sadly, whose mental health issues find some expression in a distorted piety. None of that, really, is a valid factor in assessing what the Church teaches.
Your questions are really questions properly asked to Mariology rather than individual Catholics who do not always faithfully represent the thought of that branch of theology.
To your specific questions:
- No, a Catholic properly cannot be more devoted to Mary than to Christ – they would not be faithful to the Church’s mind at all.
- No. In the Roman rite, rarely is Mary addressed in the liturgy directly. The liturgy is always directed to God. As private prayer should reflect the Church’s public prayer and be modeled on it, even if one had a profoundly Marian spirituality, it would be wrong to make Mary the sum focus of one’s prayer life. Devotion to Mary, when it is according to the mind of the Church, should lead to the adoration of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, to frequenting the sacraments, to participating in Mass, and so forth. Every day, one should be praying the prayer Jesus taught us, the Our Father. One could choose to pray the Hail Mary but that is a free choice.
- Yes, one can be “too” devoted to the Blessed Virgin in certain senses and the Church is cognizant of that problem. When I was a professor of Mariology, I would spend a lecture period on the Mariology of the High Scholastics. I dare say that their theological concepts would be quite alien to most people today as they would be beyond the mean of how Mariology today approaches and speaks of Mary or how the Church formulates her expressions of thought on Mary.
Remember, too, the cautions that the Council Fathers had about Marian piety and its expression when they addressed this topic in
Lumen Gentium, chapter 8, with
my emphases:
67. This most Holy Synod deliberately teaches this Catholic doctrine and at the same time admonishes all the sons of the Church that the cult, especially the liturgical cult, of the Blessed Virgin, be generously fostered, and the practices and exercises of piety, recommended by the magisterium of the Church toward her in the course of centuries be made of great moment, and those decrees, which have been given in the early days regarding the cult of images of Christ, the Blessed Virgin and the saints, be religiously observed.(22)
But it exhorts theologians and preachers of the divine word to abstain zealously both from all gross exaggerations as well as from petty narrow-mindedness in considering the singular dignity of the Mother of God.(23*) Following the study of Sacred Scripture, the Holy Fathers, the doctors and liturgy of the Church, and under the guidance of the Church’s magisterium, let them rightly illustrate the duties and privileges of the Blessed Virgin which always look to Christ, the source of all truth, sanctity and piety.
Let them assiduously keep away from whatever, either by word or deed, could lead separated brethren or any other into error regarding the true doctrine of the Church. Let the faithful remember moreover that true devotion consists neither in sterile or transitory affection, nor in a certain vain credulity, but proceeds from true faith, by which we are led to know the excellence of the Mother of God, and we are moved to a filial love toward our mother and to the imitation of her virtues. *
vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html
In other words, the Council Fathers found it necessary to issue a word of corrective that would re-orient and re-focus the place of Mary in the Church and in devotional life. That in part is why the Fathers voted not to issue a stand alone document on her but rather to fold their teachings about her into the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church – in other words, the mystery of the Mother of Jesus was, and could only be, properly understood in the light of the mystery of Christ and His Church and not in isolation…and they take great pains to express that in what they teach in
Lumen Gentium.
No one is obliged to undertake any private devotion…be it the rosary or other expressions of piety. These are left to the discretion of each person to choose or not, as their personal tastes dictate.
)