Do Catholics have to pray to Mary?

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Vico said:
Worship as veneration also has three principal forms, whereby the angels and saints are honored for their sanctity, asked to intercede before the divine Majesty, and imitated in their love and service of God.
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It is worship as stated in the definition: “Worship as veneration also has three principal forms, whereby the angels and saints are honored for their sanctity, asked to intercede before the divine Majesty, and imitated in their love and service of God.”

Also we have in the Eucharist prayer, for example No. 1 (ordinary form):
In union with the whole Church we honor Mary, the ever-virgin mother of Jesus Christ our Lord and God. We honor Joseph, her husband, the apostles and martyrs Peter and Paul, Andrew, (James, John, Thomas, James, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Simon and Jude; we honor Linus, Cletus, Clement, Sixtus, Cornelius, Cyprian, Lawrence, Chrysogonus, John and Paul, Cosmas and Damian) and all the saints. May their merits and prayers grant us your constant help and protection.
(Through Christ our Lord. Amen.)
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In the Byzantine Catholic Divine Liturgy:
It is truly proper to glorify you, O
Theotokos, the ever-blessed,
immaculate, and the mother of our
God. More honorable than the
cherubim, and beyond compare
more glorious than the seraphim;
who, a virgin, gave birth to God
the Word, you, truly the
Theotokos, we magnify.
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“Ideo precor beatam Mariam, etc…”

Therefore I beseech/pray to the Blessed Mary, etc…

Yes, we pray to Mary in the liturgy.
 
I am going to try one more time.
If you don’t get it by now, you just don’t want to and want to argue.

This is not about invoking Mary in the context of the litugical celebrations of the church.

It is about having a special devotion to Mary. Whether that be the Rosary, Consecration, saying the Hail Mary, in your private, personal prayer life. It is not now, not has it even been “required”, and one can have a spiritually fulfilled life without ever engaging in one of these activities.

No one is saying that they are not good, laudable practices that bring much grace to those who practice them. The Church and many Saints even encourage them. That’s great. And for those who want or need that relationship with Mary, have at it and I wish you peace on your journey.

Why can’t some of you do the same for those of us who, at this time in our lives do not have a need for this particular devotion. We are not lacking we are not dishonoring her, we ascent to the Marian Dogmas. What more do you want?
 
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I suppose that one can completely ignore his or her mother and never speak to her, or to Jesus’ mother either. But it might seem a little rude.
 
No, actually there are people on this thread who have gone so far as to say they refuse to pray the Confiteor at Mass, instead substituting their own prayer to God alone, and other such practices that reflect a self-described “problem” praying to Mary.

And that is what is problematic from a Catholic viewpoint.
 
To me it would be like going to visit your best friend and mentor, and refusing to acknowledge his mother.
 
Perfect. In plain language, we ask Mary and the other saints to pray for us… pretty simple and easy. I agree with that …
 
I think we should respect and honour Mary as our mother in our thoughts and with Hail Marys.

I would never question a hail mary.
 
Absolutely, all parts of the Supper of the Lamb. I don’t know that we meant to debate what happens at Mass… though you offered some nice additions to the conversation along those lines.

Extracurricular devotions has been the main focus. With some arguing that they are required and others arguing the opposite. I’d have to throw my lot in with the latter… not because of some callous biased against those extras, but because it is the truth
 
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godisgood77 said:
Absolutely, all parts of the Supper of the Lamb. I don’t know that we meant to debate what happens at Mass… though you offered some nice additions to the conversation along those lines.

Extracurricular devotions has been the main focus. With some arguing that they are required and others arguing the opposite. I’d have to throw my lot in with the latter… not because of some callous biased against those extras, but because it is the truth
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What do you mean by extracurricular devotions?

It started our with this question unqualified by in the Mass or recited in a church or public oratory or in a family group, a religious community or pious association, or otherwise: “but do Catholics have to pray to Mary?”
 
KMG said:
Not a mere opinion…sound Catholic teaching.
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lonegreywolf20 said:
Yet it’s not sound. You keep saying that we must, but the Catholic church says that we don’t have to.
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Can you point me to the document to that bolded claim above, because I’m having trouble locating it. But I had no trouble finding the following from the CCC, particularly the bolded below;
II. DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN

971 “All generations will call me blessed”: "The Church’s devotion to the Blessed Virgin is intrinsic to Christian worship."515 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."516 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.
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in·trin·sic
/inˈtrinzik,inˈtrinsik/
adjective
belonging naturally; essential. Belonging to a thing by its very nature.
 
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So, if that means it’s a requirement then I’m going to leave Catholicism and need to know how to go about officially leaving the church as I will only pray to God and Jesus, never to Mary or any of the saints.

How would I go about doing that?
 
Nah, it really doesn’t. I don’t go to Mass and was given permission not to attend mass because of my 5 and 2 year old mother, my ex-wife and her forbidding them stepping foot into the church.

The church also doesn’t need someone who doesn’t pray to Mary like a good Catholic supposedly does.
 
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Why would you not want to do so? What’s wrong with it? I doubt you believe that it would grant her some power that only God could have.
 
Because, no where is it said that we are required to pray to Mary. When asked how to pray, did Jesus say pray to Mary?

Prayer is to God and Jesus. We have one mediator and that’s Jesus. It is Jesus who sits at the right hand of God.
 
If that’s the case, then we are not allowed to pray anything except the Lord’s Prayer, because that’s what Jesus said when asked. On top of that, we should only be praying in our closets.

By that token, I could also throw the same question back at you. Did Jesus say we shouldn’t make requests of His Mother? That we couldn’t ask her to intercede with Him on our behalves?
 
He never said we should or shouldn’t. It is left up to our discretion. It is not a requirement.

As for only saying the Lord’s prayer, my point was that prayers are to God/Jesus as he is also God, not to Mary.
 
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I agree that prayers are for God alone, but what we do with Mary is not the same thing that we do with God. In Mary’s case, we ask her to pray for us. We don’t believe that she can take the place of God or that praying to her is sidestepping Jesus. It all goes back to God. Look at the wedding of Cana, for example. When the wedding was about to go south, Mary asked Jesus for help. Not the other way around.
 
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