Is the Glories of Mary heretical?

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godisgood77 said:
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joeybaggz:
God obeys every man who is a priest when at Mass he consecrates simple bread and wine to become the actual Presence of the Second Person of the Trinity to come to us.
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I think that is backwards… the priest obeys God with each consecration… ‘do this in memory of me’…
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When was the last time you heard God say that he was not going to come upon the gifts we offer? That He was refusing the request of the priest? When was the last time a group of people gathered in Jesus’ name and He refused to participate?
 
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Here is St Louis De Montfort…
  1. With the whole Church I acknowledge that Mary, being a mere creature fashioned by the hands of God is, compared to his infinite majesty, less than an atom, or rather is simply nothing, since he alone can say, “I am he who is”. Consequently, this great Lord, who is ever independent and self-sufficient, never had and does not now have any absolute need of the Blessed Virgin for the accomplishment of his will and the manifestation of his glory. To do all things he has only to will them.
I find this debate to be pretty silly… God created Mary, God has given instruction throughout the ages, we are called good Catholics because we follow God’s commands… we don’t call God a good God because he follows our commands. To say so is as at best misleading… God made the rules, we follow his commands…

Don’t take my word for it… here is Blessed Cardinal Newman on the subject…
  1. After such explanation, and with such authorities, to clear my path, I put away from me, as you would wish, without any hesitation, as matters in which my heart and reason have no part, such sentences, and phrases, as these:
    …that God has resigned into her hands His omnipotence; that it is safer to seek her than to seek her Son; that the Blessed Virgin is superior to God; that our Lord is subject to her command.
 
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joeybaggz said:
When was the last time you heard God say that he was not going to come upon the gifts we offer? That He was refusing the request of the priest? When was the last time a group of people gathered in Jesus’ name and He refused to participate?
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Again, I believe you have this backward… when was the last time a priest celebrated a mass that was not commanded by God - ‘Do this is memory of me’, remember?

Jesus told us to invoke God in prayer, in gatherings, in all that we do… in doing so we are following his commands, not telling God what to do…

God is the starting place… not the command of Mary, other saints, a priest or otherwise. What you propose just seems backwards
 
godisgood77 said:
What you propose just seems backwards
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Fine, call it what you want. What amazes me is that Jesus said He is with us at all times. He said things that give me pause to believe that He honors our requests. Call it obey, respect, accommodate, whatever, when we call upon God, He responds. The God we should be on our knees before, who really owes us sinners nothing, always comes to us at our request.
 
Nobody said anything about boasting. I think you are getting confused.
 
Esther was able to save the Jews from being killed by the Persians.
 
It was not Esther who saved the Jews, but God. Esther appealed to God in good faith. God Wills that all men be saved.

However, saved from temporal destruction is different than eternal. Not all the Jews were saved. “Your fathers ate the Manna, and died”
 
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That’s what Mary does. She appeals to God with good faith and then God does it.
 
rcwitness said:
But maybe the typology should be understood that Mary may ask something and be denied, not on account of her fault, but its just not the Will of the Father.
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A type is always lesser, a shadow the person or thing it prefigures. Scott Hahn: “In the Scriptures, a type is itself a historical reality, but it is also representative of something greater.” And as Steve Ray, from the article, put it, “What Solomon and his mother failed to do; Jesus and his mother do perfectly.” The typology is one of contrast. Solomon failed to do what Christ came to fulfill; so Bathsheba failed what Mary fulfilled. Likewise, Adam and Eve, who fell, were king and queen of creation.
I understand it’s not particularly straightforward, and hardly any one would catch on to this (I certainly wouldn’t) if it wasn’t for the Church to guide us, to see how the Saints understand our Blessed Mother, and what confidence they have in her intercession.

The Saints recognize that Mary is greater than even the angels can fathom. And if the will of Jesus and Mary are one, then she does not will something if He does not. Therefore everything she wills is what God wills. She is perfect in the completest sense.

“Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy help, or sought thine intercession was left unaided.”
The Memorare

“The light of the sun so greatly surpasses that of the stars that in it they are no longer visible. It so overwhelms them that it is as if they never existed. So does the great Virgin Mother surpass in holiness the merits of the whole heavenly court.”
St. Peter Damian (Doctor of the Church)

“…Theologians commonly hold that Mary’s initial grace was greater than the final grace of the highest of Angels and men. This is the teaching, for example, of St. John Damascene, [14] Suarez, [15] Justin of Miechow, O.P., [16] Contenson, [17] St. Alphonsus, [18] Fathers Terrien, [19] Godts, Hugon, Merkelbach, etc. Today, all textbooks of Mariology are unanimous in considering this teaching certain. It can even be found expressed by Pius IX in the Bull Ineffabilis Deus in the passage we have quoted already. The principal argument in favor of this teaching is arrived at from a consideration of the Divine maternity, which is the reason for all the privileges conferred on Mary.”
Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O. P. (The two Saints he cited are both Doctors of the Church)
http://www.catholictradition.org/Mary/mother-savior12.htm
 
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SammyRose said:
That’s what Mary does. She appeals to God with good faith and then God does it.
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Yes. Good faith does not make demands or commands to God, but intercedes with good faith that His will may be different. Good faith is ready to accept the Lord’s will.

That is what Mary does, not commanding God and always getting what she tells God.

Any Commandment comes from God.

Mary said “Do whatever He tells you”

If we ask for Mary’s intercession, we must open our eyes to see if God’s will was for something different than what we want.
 
godisgood77 said:
Here is St Louis De Montfort…
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That is entirely correct.
And the same St. Louis said:
"Her prayers and requests are so powerful with him that he accepts them as commands in the sense that he never resists his dear mother’s prayer because it is always humble and conformed to his will."
(That should be a sufficient explanation also of what St. Alphonsus meant.)

And:
“She is so full of love that no one who asks for her intercession is rejected, no matter how sinful he may be. The saints say that it has never been known since the world began that anyone had recourse to our Blessed Lady, with trust and perseverance, and was rejected. Her power is so great that her prayers are never refused. She has but to appear in prayer before her Son and he at once welcomes her and grants her requests. He is always lovingly conquered by the prayers of the dear Mother who bore him and nourished him.”
(True Devotion 27, 85)

The quote you gave and these two quotes do not contradict.

When people praise the greatness of Mary, they are not implying that she is greater than or equal to God, nor are they implying that she is the origin of her own greatness. We don’t need to diminish her every time we say something good (and true) about her.
Rather, she is so great as to be completely beyond our comprehension, that if any one of us knew even a fraction of her greatness, if it wasn’t for the Church teaching us that she is not herself God, we would probably mistake her for being God.
Compared to her, we are nothing; but compared to God, she is nothing.

Also, concerning jealousy toward Mary, if that applies to anyone.
It is not simply because God was super nice to her that she is greater than all creation combined. She was entrusted with bearing the Son of God. No one has ever been given a task more important or more difficult. She isn’t called Mother of Sorrows for nothing!

“Yet, if I were to see thee now, in majesty stupendous,
Surpassing all the crowned saints in highest heaven above,
Scarce could I dream I am thy child, (O truth sublime, tremendous!),
For I should think myself to be unworthy of thy love.
The mother, who desires to be her child’s best earthly treasure,
Must ever share its grief with it, must understand its pain.
Queen of my heart! how many years, thy sorrows had no measure;
What bitter tears thine eyes have shed, my worthless heart to gain!
So, musing on thy earthly life, in Scripture’s sacred story,
I dare to look upon thy face, and unto thee draw nigh;
For when I see thee suffering, — concealed thy marvelous glory —
It is not hard, then, to believe thy little child am I.”
St. Therese of Lisieux (Doctor of the Church), Why I Love Thee Mary
 
Good… very good! I think that it is clear that there are many types of Catholic devotion and beliefs in how things work… One is free to believe how St Alphonsus or St De Montfort… or not.

I personally like Blessed Cardinal Newman’s path…and firmly belief that Mary would only feel love and tenderness from those who employ it… certainly no offense

He had some pretty strong words that I did not previously quote…

Sentiments such as these I freely surrender to your animadversion; I never knew of them till I read your book, nor, as I think, do the vast majority of English Catholics know them. They seem to me like a bad dream. I could not have conceived them to be said. I know not to what authority to go for them, to Scripture, or to the Fathers, or to the decrees of Councils, or to the consent of schools, or to the tradition of the faithful, or to the Holy See, or to Reason. They defy all the loci theologici. There is nothing of them in the Missal, in the Roman Catechism, in the Roman Raccolta, in the Imitation of Christ, in Gother, Challoner, Milner or Wiseman, as far as I am aware. They do but scare and confuse me. I should not be holier, more spiritual, more sure of perseverance, if I twisted my moral being {115} into the reception of them; I should but be guilty of fulsome frigid flattery towards the most upright and noble of God’s creatures, if I professed them,—and of stupid flattery too; for it would be like the compliment of painting up a young and beautiful princess with the brow of a Plato and the muscle of an Achilles. And I should expect her to tell one of her people in waiting to turn me off her service without warning. Whether thus to feel be the scandalum parvulorum in my case, or the scandalum Pharisæorum, I leave others to decide; but I will say plainly that I had rather believe (which is impossible) that there is no God at all, than that Mary is greater than God. I will have nothing to do with statements, which can only be explained, by being explained away.
 
After reading the paragraphs before and after that quote from Bl. Newman, I did not find myself disagreeing with what he said. I think they were speaking in a different sense.

It isn’t terribly uncommon, somewhat unfortunately, that the Saints sometimes appear to contradict each other, when in fact they are not. Sometimes they actually do contradict each other, but I don’t think that is the case here.
You might read one talking about the evils of self-love, and then another one talking about developing healthy self-love in order to love God. Clearly they are speaking about different things, though using the same word: The one is talking about egoism or prioritizing oneself above God; and the other is pointing out that if I love God I must necessarily love myself, since God loves me, and I should love whatever He loves, and one cannot will themselves any greater good than to serve God.

What Bl. Newman seems to be responding to are various accusations from non-Catholics, one being that Catholics believe that Mary stands above God commanding and ordering Him, and He is required to obey her. We don’t want anything to do with that.
Whereas when Sts. Alphonsus and Louis talk about her “commands”, I don’t think I can be said more clearly than St. Louis: “he accepts them as commands in the sense that he never resists his dear mother’s prayer because it is always humble and conformed to his will.” This is something very mysterious, which we shouldn’t be quick to dismiss. It doesn’t only show how great Mary is, but it shows how God in His infinite humility is great in ways that defy our expectations.
 
NJada said:
“Her prayers and requests are so powerful with him that he accepts them as commands in the sense that he never resists his dear mother’s prayer because it is always humble and conformed to his will.”
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Got it… so Mary’s prayers, requests, etc shouldn’t be a stumbling block for anyone because she is simply asking Him for something He’s going to do anyway… 😉
NJada said:
What Bl. Newman seems to be responding to are various accusations from non-Catholics,
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Actually, he acknowledging and agreeing that some of the critics of some distortions in Marian devotion of some Catholics… which I think we too have to agree with as there are some well documented problems that have crept up particularly on the last 300-400 years.
 
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Which Saint said you need to love yourself in order to love God? I am a bit curious.
 
Yes, I think you could say not only is He already going to do it, but He plans to do it by her intercession in the first place. He initiates her prayer, since He is her Creator, and she receives it perfectly. Think of how God prompted Abraham to intercede for whatever just people might have lived in Sodom and Gomorrah. It is sometimes said that when we pray, God is praying in us. It is He who gives us the grace to make the prayer in the first place, and we may or may not cooperate. But she always cooperates: she is Mediatrix of All Graces.
 
Hm, I’m not sure who it was. I’ll see if I can remember.
But I do remember once I was reading two books at once, and both used the word “self-love” in different ways, and I had to kind of think about that issue for a bit haha. But that’s just an example.
 
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