Does Marian devotion detract from Evangelism?

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Hi,
I’m a fairly new convert to Catholicism and being Protestant
in the past am new to the concept of Marian veneration. How-
ever I have seen the POWER of Mary’s intercession!
That brings me to my question, does Marian devotion sideline our
focus on Evangelism?( I have heard of the story of Maximallian Kolbe
and how he encouraged consecration of everything to the Blessed
Mother, doesn’t that smack of idolizing her?)
 
People have been devoted to Mary for as long as it was known that she was called upon to bear Jesus. The bible mentions several specific incidents, such as the Archangel Gabriel addressing her by the title “Full of Grace”, Elizabeth proclaiming “Blessed are you among women”. Jesus Christ himself perfectly practiced the commandment to honor his mother, and placed her in the care of John the Evangelist, even though Jesus was near death…

Such practices of total devotion, which is what is meant by “consecration”, exist at the very command of our Lord and Savior. To ignore them is to missed out an ancient and holy practice; to call them idolatry is to accuse Jesus himself of worshiping his mother instead of God the Father!
 
GLam8833 said:
Hi,
I’m a fairly new convert to Catholicism and being Protestant
in the past am new to the concept of Marian veneration. How-
ever I have seen the POWER of Mary’s intercession!
That brings me to my question, does Marian devotion sideline our
focus on Evangelism?( I have heard of the story of Maximallian Kolbe
and how he encouraged consecration of everything to the Blessed
Mother, doesn’t that smack of idolizing her?)
Click to expand...
No, it reinforces it. To put another spin on things, does devotion to Christ detract from evangelizing nonChristians?
 
GLam8833 said:
Hi,
I’m a fairly new convert to Catholicism and being Protestant
in the past am new to the concept of Marian veneration. How-
ever I have seen the POWER of Mary’s intercession!
That brings me to my question, does Marian devotion sideline our
focus on Evangelism?( I have heard of the story of Maximallian Kolbe
and how he encouraged consecration of everything to the Blessed
Mother, doesn’t that smack of idolizing her?)
Click to expand...
It can - yes…

There are a great many things that can “sideline” or sidetrack evangelization efforts. It just depends.
The key to good evangelization is going to be:
  1. Living a good Christian life - blatant hypocrisy will not win souls.
  2. Keeping the message simple when speaking with others. As St Paul says they must be fed milk until they are mature enough for meat.
Of course the above can be complicated if the person you are speaking with is protestant and brings up the issue of Marion devotion and “idolatry” etc…But in my opinion such things should come as questions from them - not as “teaching” from you - especially in the early stages of evangelization.
Mother Mary and other largely private devotions are definitely more in the meat category.

Now - please let me be clear here. My comments above are not about whether to bring our Lady into the discussion or not…but rather when to bring in our Lady and the saints and prayers and devotions there-to…
First and foremost…evangelization needs to be about bringing people to Christ in His Church.

Just some thoughts…

Peace
James
 
runningdude said:
People have been devoted to Mary for as long as it was known that she was called upon to bear Jesus. The bible mentions several specific incidents, such as the Archangel Gabriel addressing her by the title “Full of Grace”, Elizabeth proclaiming “Blessed are you among women”. Jesus Christ himself perfectly practiced the commandment to honor his mother, and placed her in the care of John the Evangelist, even though Jesus was near death…

Such practices of total devotion, which is what is meant by “consecration”, exist at the very command of our Lord and Savior. To ignore them is to missed out an ancient and holy practice; to call them idolatry is to accuse Jesus himself of worshiping his mother instead of God the Father!
Click to expand...
My reading of Scripture tells me Jesus DOWNPLAYED devotion to Mary,
as when he was informed that His Mother and brothers are wanting to speak
with Him, he definitely did NOT acknowledge them. and in an enigmatic situ-
ation, when some woman said blessed is she who gave you birth and nursed
you, He said that those who hear God’s words and keeps them are to be blessed!
(Luke 11:27,28)
 
As one of St, Maximilian Kolbe’s Militia Immaculata I can tell you that it only reinforces it all the more. Consider this analogy. We are like poor farmers bringing all our gifts for the king and so we bring it to him through the Queen Mother who then takes those humble offerings and places them on beautiful platters and that enhance them far beyond our capacity and submits them to the king, who is all the more pleased because of that. 👍

Mary’s evangelism is exemplary anyway because she is the one who said it best in John 2:5.

***"…Do whatever he tells you." ***
 
GLam8833 said:
My reading of Scripture tells me Jesus DOWNPLAYED devotion to Mary,
as when he was informed that His Mother and brothers are wanting to speak
with Him, he definitely did NOT acknowledge them. and in an enigmatic situ-
ation, when some woman said blessed is she who gave you birth and nursed
you, He said that those who hear God’s words and keeps them are to be blessed!
(Luke 11:27,28)
Click to expand...
You are so wrong, if Jesus being God “downplayed” his mom he went against the 10 commandments. He gave us the 10 commandments, if he downplayed his mom he went against his own rules.
 
GLam8833 said:
Hi,
I’m a fairly new convert to Catholicism and being Protestant
in the past am new to the concept of Marian veneration. How-
ever I have seen the POWER of Mary’s intercession!
That brings me to my question, does Marian devotion sideline our
focus on Evangelism?
Click to expand...
I understand your problem, because I was there myself. When I came into the Church in 2004, I had no problem with the Marian Dogmas that one has to accept as a Catholic. The problem I discovered over time was that Mary wasn’t a dogma, she is a person. That means the dogmas are just a starting point

In my Prot background, at best Mary was the womb that housed Jesus for 9 months. That was pretty much it. The scriptures about her were used as justification to downplay her role in Jesus’ life. In actuality, when Jesus tells the crowds, “those who believe are my mother, and my brothers and my sisters” and “more blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it,” (my translations off the top of my head), he is actually praising her for believing in him as her Lord and Savior. He is holding her up as the model disciple, not putting her down. Remember, at that time, no one would have had any thought about Marian devotion. Marian devotion didn’t exist as she was still alive and “just Jesus’ mom” the way Jesus was 'just the son of Joseph the carpenter" like the people of Nazareth say about him.

Does devotion to Mary cause problems with evangelization? No. The more you get to know your Blessed Mother as a person, and not just a dogma, the deeper you find yourself loving Jesus. It’s weird, but that’s the way it is. When we ask her to reveal herself to us and are truly devoted to her as she is, when one wants to know her, have her live in their heart, not as Lord and Savior but as she is: Queen of Heaven and Earth, it is impossible for our devotion to be improper or for her to take the place of Jesus in our lives. As a very wise priest told me, “she won’t stand for it”. Her job is to present us to her son.

My advice, if you want to know how Mary fits in the life of a Catholic Christian, ask her to show you. Ask her to reveal herself to you. If you can, sit in front of the Blessed Sacrament and ask Jesus to help you know his mother. He will. For many Catholics, consecration to Mary is put in the words of St. Louis de Montfort: To Jesus through Mary. For Protestant converts like us, consecration to Mary is more a case of To Mary through Jesus.
Kris
 
I THANK GOD
for your contributions, Of note is kris’ comments,
but I acknowledge those who disagree
I have to learn more about Mary!
and also for your insights, JRKH!👍
One problem I had with your post Church Militant
if we NEED to go to Jesus thru Mary, why
did Jesus say “Come unto ME, all you who are
weary and heavy laden”?(Matt. 11:28)
 
GLam8833 said:
I THANK GOD
for your contributions, Of note is kris’ comments,
but I acknowledge those who disagree
I have to learn more about Mary!
and also for your insights, JRKH!👍
One problem I had with your post Church Militant
if we NEED to go to Jesus thru Mary, why
did Jesus say “Come unto ME, all you who are
weary and heavy laden”?(Matt. 11:28)
Click to expand...
Hope you don’t mind my commenting here re: the bolded.

I just reviewed CM’s post and did not see where he said we NEED to come to Jesus through Mary…Rather, his post seemed to be saying why he believed is was good to do so.

That said - this is why I expressed the opinion that, in evangelization, it is best to keep things simple direct and Christ focused.
CM referred to the devotions to our Lay of St Maximilian Kolbe - another with such devotion is St Louis DeMontfort. These are deep and profound devotions to our Lady that should not be introduced to the uninitiated. In other words… they should not be used in early evangelization efforts with non-Catholics.

To me - your reference to Mt 11:28 is a good one. For myself, I see the combination of Mary’s last recorded comment, “Do whatever He tells you” coupled with Jesus reply to the question “how should we pray” (Luke 11:1) with the instruction to pray to “Our Father” as a very potent combination.
Thus - when evangelizing this should be the place that we begin and we should keep everything else properly focused towards this.
For this is Mary’s most ardent desire, that we are properly focused toward her Son and toward the Father.

I will make one more comment on this matter if I may…
There is, among some Catholic devotions, the idea of coming to Jesus through Mary. That is, to come to know Jesus better by seeing Him through the eyes of His mother. I would suggest that, this can work very well working in the other direction as well.

Suppose you are evangelizing a protestant who already has a good relationship with Jesus. This is great and certainly your desire is to not interfere with that relationship. Now the person begins to ask questions about Mary and how Catholics view her. Your desire is that He come to know Mary as you do. My suggestion to that person would be for them to ask Jesus to show them Mary. Let Jesus introduce His mother to them.
In this way the person does not feel threatened because it is Jesus who is helping them to see Mary in a light that is proper to their spiritual needs and maturity. It is not forced nor will it seem in any way idolatrous because it is Jesus who is leading them (with your help - answering questions etc.)

Sorry - didn’t mean this to be so long…but I hope it helps a bit.

Peace
James
 
GLam8833 said:
One problem I had with your post Church Militant
if we NEED to go to Jesus thru Mary, why
did Jesus say “Come unto ME, all you who are
weary and heavy laden”?(Matt. 11:28)
Click to expand...
Nowhere did I, nor has any of the other Catholic stated that.

You need to take note of the very scriptural fact that as mother of the messiah, Mary is automatically the “Giberah” or Queen Mother of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and as such, she, as with all Queens of Israeli kings beginning with Solomon, hold a position of special intercessor to the King, as demonstrated in John 2 at the wedding feast in Cana. So it is quite scriptural to ask for her intercession and to offer our gifts to the king through her.

You might want to get a copy of Fr, Michael Gaitley’s book 33 Days to Morning Glory which will offer you a lot of very good insights that may also help.
 
GLam8833 said:
My reading of Scripture tells me Jesus DOWNPLAYED devotion to Mary,
as when he was informed that His Mother and brothers are wanting to speak
with Him, he definitely did NOT acknowledge them. and in an enigmatic situ-
ation, when some woman said blessed is she who gave you birth and nursed
you, He said that** those who hear God’s words **and keeps them are to be blessed!
(Luke 11:27,28)
Click to expand...
You must read accepting all parts of scripture. Mary is not to be devoted because she nursed her son… this is something all women could do; rather she is to be devoted because Mary kept God’s words at heart, such as those related to her by Saint Gabriel.

Luke 1:38: Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according** to your word.**”…

Saint Luke is referring back to his own portrayal of Mary hearing and accepting God’s word as the basis of devotion to Mary!
 
First, forgive me for my belated reply,😊
Secondly, thank you for correcting me on this very interesting
and vital issue in the New Evangelism, “Interesting”, because
the role of Mothers has been eroded down to Baby Carrier,
and not the vital supportive, nurturing role they once had.
“Vital”, because most Christians in Protestantism have NO
IDEA they are missing HALF of the Gospel in it’s entirety!!!
 
Let me retract that last statement to say:
They have NO IDEA they are missing
a vital PART of the Gospel in it’s entirety!👍
 
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