Mary as having authority as the "Queen Mother"?

[mpernot]

I know very well what the Catholic church teaches. I was a cradle Catholic for over three decades. I wasn’t a tongue in cheek Catholic. I practiced Catholicism devoutly at least for 15 years. I know what your church teaches.

I maintain that you don’t know what the Catholic Church teaches because your understanding of the Catholic Church as you have described it is contrary to Catholic teaching. Your arguments against Marian doctrines are an example of this: not because your arguments differ from Catholic teaching, but because your characterization of the Catholic teaching on these doctrines differs from Catholic teaching on them.

I have no business conjecturing on your level of devoutness when you were a Catholic. That being said, the number of years you were a practicing Catholic is irrelevant and doesn’t give you any more authority in this discussion than the fact that I am currently a practicing Catholic. I’ve been told many times by people that I must believe their reasons that the Catholic Church is wrong because they used to be Catholic, and every time it doesn’t make sense. Experience alone does not equate to understanding.

I know that there are many reasons Catholics leave the faith, and none of them are due to a failure of the faith. I personally never left the Catholic Church, but I spent my teenage years “going through the motions” and being content with about a 2nd grade understanding of the Church and God. If someone hit me over the head with your arguments when I was 18, I would have had no answer and possibly been pulled from the church. It would have been my own fault too, for not making the learning of my faith a high enough priority in my life. I know this isn’t the only way that people leave the church; I don’t know of I’m of your same generation of catechesis, so my generation may have different issues. Better teaching is definitely necessary, but the teachings themselves don’t need to change; indeed, they must not.

You may disagree with what I have to say regarding what I learned being Catholic but remember, that’s your opinion and you’re opinion only.

It is not my opinion that your characterizations of the Catholic Church are contrary to Catholic teaching; this is fact, verifiable to you and anyone else by looking them up in the Catechism. When I part ways with the Magisterium, then you can tell me that it is my opinion which is up for discussion. So I stand by my statement, unaltered: disagree with what the Catholic Church actually teaches, not what you think she does.

I admire and share your zeal for truth, but I don’t appreciate your mischaracterizations of the Catholic faith.