Beautiful post, Rebecca.
Hi Tommy, and am happy you will be going to your first Mass.
About the negative experience you had overseas, first you were most likely taught we worship Mary. I have seen the Watchtower Magazines and the writers must have angst when they cannot provide a picture like a person with the rosary praying before a statue like I saw in one…or an article proving how wrong the Church is.
What would happen to these congregations if there were no Catholic Church!!! How would they prove they are right?!
You also must note that the Protestants provided their own translations. The Geneva Bible is of Calvinist strain and the one written in the mid 1500’s uses wording, that referred to ‘vain repetitions’. That is the Bible quote from their bible they use to address the practice of the rosary.
So it is important for you to know that the Church uses the Septuagint interpretation of Scripture, called the Lord’s Scripture, that was followed and used by the Apostles and St. Paul. Some famous literature from the 1800’s English has had to be translated over 2000 times to get the right intent in reading. And the apostles warned not to change, delete or add one word of Scripture…because such a minor change causes tremendous upheaval to the Mystical Body of Christ, where we are constantly being called to communion, the contrary – divisions, not the fruit of Jesus Christ. Catholics consume the Word in Liturgy of Word and Eucharist, the fulfillment of taking from the Tree of Life, the good fruit Adam and Eve did not taste to grow in divine spirituality.
So back to your experience you had overseas, I have to be practical here. You speak of the placement of statues on the grounds. There were statues at the bottom, the mid section had one of Christ, and then up the hill, there was an large shrine of Mary with candles lit, giving the appearance that people were more active on focusing on her than on Christ. One would have to go back and study the history of the placement of statues and ask why Mary was placed up high, had more active devotion. That is the only way to find out. But it does not mean either that they were giving more honor to her.
Mary said ‘yes’, and followed by her Magnificat’, "My doth magnify the Lord, my Savior, Who has done great things to me.’
She didn’t say praise Him for being chosen to be His mother. She magnifies Him…like think of a magnifying glass that probes and ponders, and then comes to Him, and enlargens Him to all to see that is evident and resplendent in the Lord…that otherwise ordinary people could not see of Christ our Lord.
It has been said that the strongest Catholics are those who are devoted to Mary. She brings us into intimacy with Christ, she brings us closer and quicker to Him, she is Jacob’s Ladder, that shortens the climb…Recall Psalm 24… who is worthy to climb the mountain of the Lord. The Carmelite tradition considers the mountain a symbol of our sins. We have to overcome our own sinfulness and failings to reach the summit of Christ, the top of the hill so to speak in relating to your past experience of Mary.
Outwardly it may appear to you that the shrines put Mary on top, when on the contrary Mary magnifies the Lord. All the devotion and thanksgiving for her intercession, her being immediately defrays it from herself and directs it solely to Our Lord.
Mary brings us into deep and subtle reflections on the Lord. She is known for protecting people’s hearts and hope from breaking through her intercession.
As Rebecca shared, Mary Star of the Sea along with Mother of God because Jesus is God, are the most ancient titles given her. We are in this vale of darkness and our Blessed Mother illumines Christ and His will in our pilgrimage towards heaven.
Mary has great power over Satan. When Mary of Guadalupe appeared in Mexico, soon after the Turks were invading Europe and hoping to make it Islamic. The pope received a copy of the image, prayed the rosary, asked all the Catholics to pray with him, and the Battle of Lepanto was won with her intercession, and the Turks blown back out to sea. For some reason they did not return, but there were thousands upon thousands of military casualties.
So the shrine you saw may have been an expression for the great help Mary gave those people, but it is not to be perceived that this devotion to her is side lining Christ. Everything we extend to her she acknowledges it done in Christ’s name.
The devotion to Mary goes way back. just as we show veneration to American president’s mothers, so much more for Christ’s mother. In the catacomb of Priscilla in Rome, around the first part of the year 200, one can see the very first painting of her…painted on the wall. She is not alone, but has the Christ Child on her lap.
In this same image, 'at the left, the figure of a man pointing to a star, located above the Virgin with child: a prophet, probably Balaam, who announced that “a star shall come forth out of Jacob, and a scepter shall rise out of Israel” (Num 24:17). This is the whole expectation of the Old Covenant and the cry of a fallen humanity for a savior and redeemer.
This prophecy was fulfilled in the birth of Jesus, the incarnate Son of God, conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. Mary brought Him into the world and gave him to all mankind. For this reason she is the purest image of the Church’. Source: Catechism of the Catholic Church.
In this image we as Church likewise believe that in Christ we learn about who Mary is and in Mary we learn about who Christ is.
). I heard Mary mentioned a few times as in “pray for us” a few other times in passing but Jesus Christ was definitely the focal point of the Mass as He should be, especially during the Eucharist as others had rpeviously mentioned He would be.