Hail, Holy Queen Prayer - difficulty as new Catholic

[friardchips]

Hello. I would just like to let you know that to be a true Catholic one is NOT required to believe in the salve regina which is the prayer you mentioned. Also one is NOT required to believe in teachings such as mary as mediatrix, or mary as co-redemptrix, no matter what anyone tells you. One is not even reqired to believe in the rosary. There are two very distict groups of people within the one true church, thay can be referred to as mariological minimalists, and maximalists. The minimalists are more in line with the spirit of original catholicism from the early church, which can be seen from the apostolic age and early church fathers. The maximalist views developed much later, as can be seen form a basic overview of church history, and it takes the role of the blessed virgin many to unscriptul excess, and sometimes, what could only compared to heresy. The blessed virgin mary prayes for us, just like all the saints, and her prayes are very effective, it is a beautiful thing, but balance is required, don’t put her on a pedastal.

Incorrect. The prayers are heavily rooted in Scripture. If one doesn’t believe in the prayers then they are not believing in its words. Its words are to be accepted by all Roman Catholics because the words express a faith in Church teaching and if anyone has a problem with the words then they need to speak to a priest.

As for devotion to Our Lady, that is considered a private matter. However, recent Popes as have the Saints, encouraged enthusiastic private devotion as well as believing in dogmas and those that appear in lines of prayer.

Stand strong in the minimalist position, and your doubts will disapear. And don’t let those who are in error cheat you of the joy of coming home to the wonderful Chuch of jesus founded on the rock of peter. I hope this helped.

• or just position oneself in Our Lady’s company kneeling at the foot of the Cross.

 

[friardchips]

And if you don’t think they still do, well, you need to get out more.

Again, verging on being offensive. Never-the-less:

 

[MacQ]

Quote:
Originally Posted by MacQ
“Everything about Mary should point to her Son”.

And who is the measure of this? Where do you hear or read of anyone saying: “Dear Mary you are God”. Is this not rather ‘condescending’? Don’t Catholics already know and see that Mary always points to her son?

We are not the ones that direct Our Lady’s attention towards Jesus. .

The “measure” is both in our intentions and in our actions.
A Church that removes the Crucifix and replaces it with a statue of Mary over the altar for example (which has happened)…would be a visible sign of not projecting the right perspective.
Prayers that don’t ask her specifically to pray for us to Him or even mention her relationship to Him would be misguided…only the person him/herself can know this of their prayers and devotions. No one inferred anyone else should “measure” it.

Likewise no one inferred that we direct Our Lady in any way.
Only that we be right minded in how we direct ourselves.

 

[RetroCatholic]

Incorrect. The prayers are heavily rooted in Scripture. If one doesn’t believe in the prayers then they are not believing in its words. Its words are to be accepted by all Roman Catholics because the words express a faith in Church teaching and if anyone has a problem with the words then they need to speak to a priest.

As for devotion to Our Lady, that is considered a private matter. However, recent Popes as have the Saints, encouraged enthusiastic private devotion as well as believing in dogmas and those that appear in lines of prayer.

No, I am not incorrect. The themes and titles in the salve regina is NOT official dogma, a catholic is NOT required to give assent to them and you know it, and 2, it is NOT rooted in scripture, no it is not. If one doesn’t believe in the the words of the salve regina, one is not rejecting the words of scripture. That is the truth. I have spoken to a priest. I’m sorry but you are spreading error.

 

[friardchips]

Yes, MacQ, but who is doing the measuring, as I said?

Who are you to say that even someone begging for help to Mary only, for example, isn’t doing that outward action because they are so desperate to get back into God’s good books that they are imploring their ‘mum’ to go and speak to ‘dad’, for them? Or even that they have a relationship with Our Lady as son/daughter to mum. Nothing wrong with that. Our Lady has her place in the order of salvation and who are we to deny her of that holy reality? That very relationship will draw the person into closer communion with her son.

God is the judge. God is our measure.

Prayers have been given to us as fruits of the Holy Spirit.

All statues are not to be prayed to.

I am trying to say that we can pray to Our Lady without reserve or playing a balancing act because she points to her son at all times, and He gave us Mary in the first place, on the Cross for this very reason.

For Jesus to tell us that we are to take Our Lady into our homes means to establish a ‘relationship with’. How else can she be Mother?

 

[friardchips]

Dear RetroCatholic (referring to post #56):

Indeed, and so does this prayer. I did an analysis of Scripture a while back, and came up with the Biblical basis, line by line, for this prayer:

Hail Holy Queen
Hail! Holy Queen (Luke 1:28,42, Revelation 12),
Mother of Mercy (Psalm 103:8, Luke 1:43, John 10:30, James 3:17),
our life, our sweetness, and our hope (Romans 12:5, John 14:6, 1 Timothy 1:1).
To you do we cry, poor banished children of Eve (Genesis 3:20-24) .
To you do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears (Psalm 84:6) .
Turn then, O most gracious advocate, your eyes of mercy toward us (John 2:1-11, 2 Timothy 1:2-3);
and after this our exile (Hebrews 11:13),
show unto us the blessed fruit of your womb, Jesus (Luke 1:42).
O clement! O loving! O sweet Virgin Mary (Luke 1:48, Matthew 1:24-25)!
Pray for us (1 Timothy 2:1, Revelation 5:8 & 8:3-4) ,
O Holy Mother of God (Song of Solomon 6:9-10, Luke 1:43, Revelation 12),
That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ (2 Thessalonians 1:5).

** Additional related verses: Matthew 8:13, 15:28, 17:3, & 17:15–18, Mark 9:17–29, Luke 8:49–55, John 19:26-27, Romans 15:30–32, Ephesians 6:18–20, Colossians 4:3, 1 Thessalonians 5:25, 2 Thessalonians 3:1, James 5:16–18, Hebrews 12:22-23. **

Not that, as noted, some of these verses need to be pieced together, or taken in conjunction with others. So looking at the “Mother of Mercy” line, we see Mary as the mother of Christ, the Trinity as one from John 10:30, and mercy as a characteristic of Wisdom - the Holy Spirit.

Hope this helps.

There are some very good posts in this thread from the beginning.

I have spoken with many priests about faith and the Church but will check with a priest too
after what you have accused me of and get back to you. I want you to know that this accusation is something I am taking seriously.

Reason alone dictates that to not say lines of a prayer with faith is to not believe in their words. Priests as a rule normally have enlightened common sense. If I am guilty of anything it is to spread love and affection for Our Lady in line with Church teaching and so I accept your insults with gratitude. As I said, I will get back to you in this thread when I have spoken with an authority on the matter.

 

[RetroCatholic]

Dear RetroCatholic (referring to post #56):

There are some very good posts in this thread from the beginning.

I have spoken with many priests about faith and the Church but will check with a priest too
after what you have accused me of and get back to you. I want you to know that this accusation is something I am taking seriously.

Reason alone dictates that to not say lines of a prayer with faith is to not believe in their words. Priests as a rule normally have enlightened common sense. If I am guilty of anything it is to spread love and affection for Our Lady in line with Church teaching and so I accept your insults with gratitude. As I said, I will get back to you in this thread when I have spoken with an authority on the matter.

Im sorry, but none of those scriptures say anything remotely like the salve regina, anyone can See that. That is probably the best example pf reading things into a text. Yes, I hope you do ask a priest whether the contents of the salve regina is official Catholic dogma that a catholic is required to assent to. I never insulted you, I accused you of spreading error, there is a difference.

 

[RetroCatholic]

Dear RetroCatholic (referring to post #56):

There are some very good posts in this thread from the beginning.

I have spoken with many priests about faith and the Church but will check with a priest too
after what you have accused me of and get back to you. I want you to know that this accusation is something I am taking seriously.

Reason alone dictates that to not say lines of a prayer with faith is to not believe in their words. Priests as a rule normally have enlightened common sense. If I am guilty of anything it is to spread love and affection for Our Lady in line with Church teaching and so I accept your insults with gratitude. As I said, I will get back to you in this thread when I have spoken with an authority on the matter.

Aside from the doctrine of the virgin mother of God, nothing in the salve regina is official dogma. To claim that one is required to believe teachings that are not required dogma is to spread error.

 

[friardchips]

Im sorry, but none of those scriptures say anything remotely like the salve regina, anyone can See that. That is probably the best example pf reading things into a text. Yes, I hope you do ask a priest whether the contents of the salve regina is official Catholic dogma that a catholic is required to assent to. I never insulted you, I accused you of spreading error, there is a difference.

It is my fault because I started off saying: ‘Incorrect’. Without going through your post sectioning off areas and being specific.

I will check with a priest but not to cause trouble and will get back one way or the other but all in the spirit of good will.

I just want to make something clear: in all my posts I have said that devotion is strongly advised. I believe it is good to inspire devotion rather than advise to ‘be careful.’ I have no where said that to reject this prayer is to reject Catholicism. However, I do hold that to reject some part of God’s love for us is in some way to reject the whole. But this is not official, or if it is, then I hope someone will clarify this with up-to-date R.C Church teaching.

There are certain dogmas that are in line with this prayer. Our Lady’s Perpetual virginity, Our Lady being the Mother of God, her Immaculate Conception…

The first three dogmas can be found in the ‘Salve Regina’ as honouring those certified truths: Perpetual virginity; Mother of God; Immaculate Conception can all be found with ease in this prayer.

I am saying not that this is why the prayer was written; however, they are there.

This is where you began making accusations that I was spreading false teaching and I strongly disagree:

The prayer says: Mother of Mercy (Jesus)! - first dogma - our Lady is the Mother of Jesus -of mercy incarnate - in Scripture; and ‘show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus’.
So you wish to deny again that Our Lady is the Mother of Christ? This is dogma!

‘O Clement, O loving, O sweet virgin Mary’. Our lady’s perpetual virginity is a dogma!
She is a virgin! This is dogma!

So to not say these words with faith, you think you are not in some way rejecting Scripture? So you think that prayers are lies? Full of false notions and is something separate to Scripture?

In terms of the rest of what you said in your original post I am not really interested in and have not shown interest apart from to add to something you said.

 

[friardchips]

Aside from the doctrine of the virgin mother of God, nothing in the salve regina is official dogma. To claim that one is required to believe teachings that are not required dogma is to spread error.

Exactly. As if that dogma is not enough.

Be more careful with your wild accusations in future please and keep it objective.

 

[friardchips]

…also, I forgot to add the other dogma that can be found in here: Our Lady’s Immaculate Conception. This however, was born of Scripture through thorough reasoning, in the Tradition of the R.C Church and in our Lady’s accepted apparition. Where the line of the ‘Salve Regina’ prayer says: ‘To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve’. This prayer is not written by someone with no knowledge of Scripture. It is an obvious - to those who are open to it - acknowledgement to Our Lady being born without original sin.

I appreciate that we are all learning and sometimes I back-peddle and am humbled in this forum but in this instance I believe that to contradict these affirmations of Our Lady’s life is bad teaching and it is not me that did that.

I have to affirm that a fifth dogma would have to be in place to say our Lady is co-mediatrix etc…but I did not comment on that part of your post. I should have made it clear what I was referring to.

Her advocacy is accepted. I don’t know about it being doctrine. But reason would say that Jesus gave the Beloved Disciple, Our Lady, as our advocate to Him. And he interecedes at the right-hand of the Father. There is nothing in Scripture that is there without meaning.

 

[sandy3333]

I have seen different variations of this prayer, but at first I thought the words, “Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope” was referring to Jesus who is “our life, our sweetness and our hope”; but in other versions of this prayer, it is clearly referring to Mary. Can someone please help me to understand this better as to how we refer to Mother Mary as our life, our sweetness and our hope?

Also, the part that troubles me most is where she is referred to as our “most gracious Advocate”. Is this “most” to be understood as “very” gracious? It troubles me because it seems to hold her as being a more gracious advocate than that which Jesus Christ is for us.

I do love Our Mother, and I want to get rid of these doubts and fears that still plague me from being raised in a very anti-Catholic, Protestant background.

Thank you!

I’m no longer a catholic, because i feel the same as you said, they put her above Christ, when I started reading the bible, and God opened my eyes to the truth, I left the Catholic Church.

 

[sandy3333]

It is against everything the bible teaches, the bible says we are not to pray to anyone but the father, the only way tot the father is through Jesus Christ!

 

[sandy3333]

I can understand but do not share your concerns about Mary. This beautiful prayer does nothing to take away the salvation promised to us through Christ alone. Mary is His mother and justly deserves our praise and thanks for her fiat and for her continuing intercession found in its bilical roots at the marriage feast at Cana.
She is a great advocate but cannot, being human, be compared to God or in any sense to Jesus our redeemer.
But do not fear the great Catholic devotion to Mary. She is not some goddess to us as you know. Rid yourself of your protestant fear and pray as you feel comfortable; to Christ only if you prefer. They all get to Him as the salvation of the world.

where in the bible, does it say she deserves our prays, she was Jesus mother, she was still a sinner, and human,Even Jesus said who is my mother, who is my brother, he was saying no one person is special to him, please read your bible for yourself

 

[friardchips]

RetroCatholic, I need to add that I have structured my arguments badly and it is confusing.

One dogma, can be found in Scripture that is obvious. But three dogmas can be found in that prayer! Dogmas born from thorough exegesis of the Bible and enlightened thinking. So in truth they are also stem from Scripture.

God bless.

---

sandy3333, maybe you could read some of the posts in this thread, and forum. And there are a host of great books that give knowledgeable insights too. Sad that you left the Church, and for this reason.

All the best to you.

:takeoff:

 

[adf417]

I’m no longer a catholic, because i feel the same as you said, they put her above Christ, when I started reading the bible, and God opened my eyes to the truth, I left the Catholic Church.

How do you know “they” were not putting God above where you put God?

Peace!!!

 

[Millie123]

It is against everything the bible teaches, the bible says we are not to pray to anyone but the father, the only way tot the father is through Jesus Christ!

I often see this argument by many non-Catholics, and Catholic’s who have left the church. But, to me every time I see this type of comments about prayer, it always leaves me thinking that they truly don’t understand what prayer means. I would like to point out to you that to pray, is an old word that simply means to ask. And there are people in the bible who prayed to others when they had a request. I’ll use the King James Bible to show you my point.

1. Genesis 27:21
   And Isaac said unto Jacob, Come near, I PRAY THEE, that I may feel thee, my son, whether thou be my very son Esau or not.

—Isaac prayed to Jacob

1. Exodus: 4:18
   And Moses went and returned to Jethro his father in law, and said unto him, Let me go, I PRAY THEE, and return unto my brethren which are in Egypt, and see whether they be yet alive. And Jethro said to Moses, Go in peace.

—Moses prayed to his Father in law Jethro to allow him to leave, and moreover Jethro answered his prayer…Jethro told him to go in peace.

1. Here is an interesting one, here is one where Jesus prayed to Simon
   Luke 5:3
   And he entered into one of the ships, which was Simon’s, and PRAYED HIM that he would thrust out a little from the land. And he sat down, and taught the people out of the ship

Yes, Christ prayed to Simon to launch out his ship from the land.
In all of these instances to pray, is to make a request…Which is what Catholics do when we pray to Saints, we make a request of them for their prayers. In the Hail Mary for example:
“Holy Mary, Mother of God Pray for Us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen” We are praying to Our Mother, requesting her continued prayers for us during our earthly life and into our death…

If praying to others is wrong (Making requests), then how is it that…Isaac prayed to Jacob (Made a request). Moses prayed to Jethro (He made a request). And Jesus prayed to Simon (He made a request). Surely you don’t believe that Jesus himself sinned by praying to Simon do you?

 

[MacQ]

I’m no longer a catholic, because i feel the same as you said, they put her above Christ, when I started reading the bible, and God opened my eyes to the truth, I left the Catholic Church.

Why do you list yourself as Catholic then? Just curious.

 

[MarianCatholic]

Why do you list yourself as Catholic then? Just curious.

In order to deceive others is my guess!

 

[MacQ]

Yes, MacQ, but who is doing the measuring, as I said?

Who are you to say that even someone begging for help to Mary only, for example, isn’t doing that outward action because they are so desperate to get back into God’s good books that they are imploring their ‘mum’ to go and speak to ‘dad’, for them? Or even that they have a relationship with Our Lady as son/daughter to mum. Nothing wrong with that. Our Lady has her place in the order of salvation and who are we to deny her of that holy reality? That very relationship will draw the person into closer communion with her son.

God is the judge. God is our measure.

Prayers have been given to us as fruits of the Holy Spirit.

All statues are not to be prayed to.

I am trying to say that we can pray to Our Lady without reserve or playing a balancing act because she points to her son at all times, and He gave us Mary in the first place, on the Cross for this very reason.

For Jesus to tell us that we are to take Our Lady into our homes means to establish a ‘relationship with’. How else can she be Mother?

Who am I to judge you ask? Well dang me, fried one…I can’t find anywhere that I even implied I was.

In fact, re-reading this conversation… lo! All I laid out what the Church has taught us about how WE should go about things.
And lo! All that “fear”, “control”, “judging” and “measuring” stuff came from… you!

I would much prefer that you take things I posted at face value (or at least ask for clarification), instead of making such leaps and accusations.

I do not disagree with any of your sermonizing on the subject, although it was unnecessary (due to the leaps and assumptions you made) and not a little condescending.