How much is too much Marian devotion?

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Carmelite1983 said:
After reading St Louis de Montfort, I think it’s be very hard to give her TOO MUCH devotion
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I believe that if you read Monfort well, he explained that one can have a false devotion, or a bad Marian devotion.
When Mary is practically replaced by God in our devotion then we have a very bad Marian devotion
 
When it gets in the way - rather than fuels - our apostolate and acts of charity for our bride and family.

St Josemaria said that our devotions should “few, constant, strong, and not get in the way of the apostolate”.
 
Jesus was birthed through Mary. The more time I spend with Mary, the closer I feel to Our Lord Jesus.
 
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Exactly. No one should be replacing God. That’s not the point of Marian Devotion.
 
Mboo said:
After reading St Louis de Montfort, I think it’s be very hard to give her TOO MUCH devotion
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Carmelite1983 said:
Exactly. No one should be replacing God. That’s not the point of Marian Devotion.
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It would be one , @Mboo it clearly shows your falsely claiming and misquoting what St Louis de Montfort, said, its a blatant lie here is the Extracts from TREATISE ON TRUE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN St. Louis de Montfort 95. The Church, with the Holy Spirit, blesses our Lady first, then Jesus, ;Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.; Not that Mary is greater than Jesus, or even equal to him - that would be an intolerable heresy. But in order to bless Jesus more perfectly we should first bless Mary. Let us say with all those truly devoted to her, despite these false and scrupulous devotees: "O Mary, blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.;

Superficial devotees
  1. Superficial devotees are people whose entire devotion to our Lady consists in exterior practices. Only the externals of devotion appeal to them because they have no interior spirit. They say many rosaries with great haste and assist at many Masses distractedly. They take part in processions of our Lady without inner fervour. They join her confraternities without reforming their lives or restraining their passions or imitating Mary’s virtues. All that appeals to them is the emotional aspect of this devotion, but the substance of it has no appeal at all. If they do not feel a warmth in their devotions, they think they are doing nothing; they become upset, and give up everything, or else do things only when they feel like it. The world is full of these shallow devotees, and there are none more critical of men of prayer who regard the interior devotion as the essential aspect and strive to acquire it without, however, neglecting a reasonable external expression which always accompanies true devotion.
https://www.ewtn.com/library/Montfort/TRUEDEVO.HTM
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I thought Mboo meant that when Mary replaces God the devotion is a bad one.
I had the impression that he just worded it a little backwards, and that maybe English is not Mboo’s native language (forgive me if I’m wrong there).
 
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I have a question it is hard to ask. Do you think we ever ascribe to our Lady, functions that are really those of the Holy Spirit? I ask our Lady to pray for me, sure, but it is the HS that makes Jesus seem so present to me. Isn’t it more accurate to say to Jesus by the Holy Spirit? The Eucharist is just shouting “God is in you” at us. I’m glad for her prayers, but I couldn’t be closer to Jesus than the sacraments and my own faith are bringing me, except when I’m in mortal sin, and of course acknowledging my need to grow in faith.
 
Mary is the spouse of the Holy Spirit, as Jesus was incarnate of the Holy Spirit. St. Maximilian Kolbe reasoned that this made her the “quasi-incarnation of the Holy Spirit” because two spouses become one. He went through a whole analysis of what Mary does as a human and what the Holy Spirit does as God.

Some people including Taylor Marshall feel uncomfortable with the idea of Mary as “quasi-incarnation of the Holy Spirit”, although Taylor finds St. Maximilian’s approach to be helpful other than that term. But it is safe to say that Mary and the Holy Spirit are very close. As long as you realize that Mary is human and the Holy Spirit is God and one only adores/ worships God, you should be fine.
 
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Actually someone on this forum mentioned a friend who did believe he received her in the Eucharist… so that exists.
I think we could say that as Mother of the Eucharist, she plays a role in the miracle that happens at Mass, but it is her son we receive.
 
Thanks Bearself, I’m going to chew on that a while. I appreciate the perspective. BTW, I have the same concern in the way some Evangelicals talk about the Bible…
 
Mary is more perfect than us and it is easier for her to obtain graces from God because of that.
 
St. Maximilian’s theology of Mary is a pretty advanced read, at least I thought so. I did his 9 day Marian consecration - I have to admit I was drawn to the fact that his way gets you consecrated in just 9 days rather than taking 33 like the de Montfort/ Morning Glory way - and I had to read some of those readings on Mary over about 3 times to get them into my head.

I think the heroic way he died gives a lot of credence to his deep thoughts on Mary, as well as publicizing them to the world. If he had just been some priest somewhere, then maybe some scholars would read and debate his work, but dying like he did at Auschwitz and being canonized in a pretty short time means people all over the world will read it and pay attention. It’s hard not to see the hand of God in that.
 
MikeInVA said:
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Thom18:
If you spend more time with Mary than you spend with Jesus, it’s too much.
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How can you be with the Mother without being with her Son?
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There are people who take it too far. I was in this spot about two years ago. I didn’t believe anything about Mary that the Church doesn’t teach, but ended up neglecting God because of how much time I spent with her.
 
There is no limit to Marian devotion. The misconception is thinking that there is a limit and that thinking that true Marian devotion is going to lead one away from Jesus or God. It can only lead to Jesus and to God since Mary is wholly the possession of Jesus and God. Mary is not the end of devotion to her though as if she is God. The end of Marian devotion is Jesus and God as God is the end of every human being. Just as Jesus is our mediator with the Father so Mary is our mediatress with Jesus. The nature of love is that there isn’t really a limit to it, it involves the whole self, a complete gift of self. I mean, does a husband tell his wife within the confines of the Divine Law that he only loves her to a certain limit? True love is a complete giving of oneself to the other and this is what marriage is all about. We will never love Mary as much as she loves us that’s for certain. The Church has had many great saints who were totally consecrated to Mary and total consecration means to give to her everything, soul, body, possessions, in a word, everything and our entire self. Anything less is not true love. There doesn’t seem to be a limit even to the point of death to a mother’s love for her children. Even among animals we see that mother’s will sacrifice their lives for their offspring. This is love, the gift of self. Mary is our spiritual mother and the best and most loving of all mothers. Her degree of charity far surpasses any other pure creature.

St Maximilian Kolbe was a great Marian Saint and a great example of what total consecration to Mary means and looks like. What he taught over and over again is a limitless devotion and consecration and to grow in this limitless devotion more everyday. The point he was trying to make and which is relevant to the title of the thread and which is asked by many people, by many of his own brothers in his order, is not to think in terms of ‘is there a limit or to much’ which contracts the spirit. On the contrary, he taught of a limitless devotion and consecration which opens ourselves to love with our whole being without restrictions and not worry about whether we are taking anything away from Christ or God because this is a false notion which the devil can put in our minds about Mary.

Total consecration to Mary doesn’t mean we can’t pray to Jesus or the Father or the Holy Spirit or the saints in heaven. It involves imitating Mary and her virtues. Mary obviously had greater charity and love of God more than any other creature and obviously thought about God a lot. So we ought to as well. The point is let the Spirit or Mary lead one to whatsoever He or she leads one too and not feel restricted which is contrary to the action of the Holy Spirit or Mary in the soul.
 
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Really there is no such thing as too much Marian devotion, it only becomes a problem when it is misguided or misdirection to its true end, but that’s not dependant on how much devotion there is.
 
Exactly, I communicate by an automatic translator, and I ask everyone to be forgiving and correct me when certain expressions are badly translated.
Thank you.
 
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