All Grace comes from God and we can approach him and ask him for his Grace just as we do in mass, in the Divine office, the Scriptures record, etc…Reading many saints’ writings, such as St. Alphonsus Liguori, St. Bernard, St. Louis de Montfort, etc, it is very strongly stated that we should and can go to mary because of our own unworthiness before God, all graces come through her, etc. So why do we, in the mass, breviary, etc, etc, ask Jesus, God the father, for his mercy, etc. I can’t make this jive in my head.
Mary cannot and will not be part of the God head…ever. The church is clear that there is one God, in three persons, Father son and Holy Spirit…this is our first and most basic DOGMA.I read that the Virgin Mary is a cult within the Catholic Church. She abounds in grace, yet she is relatively absent in the Mass itself. I often wonder what the spiritual implications are to keep her from becoming a part of the Godhead. In Judaism, God is thought to have masculine and feminine attributes, and I often think of the Virgin Mary as one day being viewed as a part of the feminine attributes of God by the Church. Some of her titles, such as her being co-Redeemer, makes me wonder how long it will be before she is declared Divine. Perhaps not in this life, but maybe in the Hereafter. After all, the Church teaches that wherever Mary is, there too is Christ.
When you get to Heaven, things are not going to be the way they are here. My personal belief is that the Godhead will contain both masculine and feminine attributes.Mary cannot and will not be part of the God head…ever. The church is clear that there is one God, in three persons, Father son and Holy Spirit…this is our first and most basic DOGMA.
Mary is a creature…always was and always will be. To worship her as God is idolatry.
Of course it will. It doesn’t need Mary to do that.When you get to Heaven, things are not going to be the way they are here. My personal belief is that the Godhead will contain both masculine and feminine attributes.
Why do you think we are unworthy to approach God?robert’s heresy aside…
Jon, I don’t think you realize maybe how intensely adamant these saints are about stressing the need for Mary’s intercession. We are not worthy to approach God, so we are in need of Mary. I need to talk to my spiritual director about this on Friday…just looking to bounce this off of you kind folks
In an objective sense yes, post fall from grace man was unworthy. Christ changed that by God becoming man. So the reality is God has created paths for us to approach him despite our unworthiness.Saint’s words certainly could be inspired. but that’s not the point. You are kind of restating my original issue, that is what I am grappling with. I will be bringing this to my spiritual director tomorrow. But I mean, we truly ARE unworthy to approach God.
The Virgin Mary, we all know, is not God. But if there was ever some one who is extremely intimate with the Godhead, it’s her. She is the Mother of God, Seat of Wisdom and Spouse of the Holy Spirit.robert’s heresy aside…
Suffice it to say that she has a mysterious and unique relationship with the Trinity.Robert: Definitely intimate and mysterious. But in no way could she be considered to be a feminine “side” of God. She is the spouse of the Holy Spirit, though!
God is the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Virgin Mary is a creature created by God like the rest of us. There is an infinite distance between God and a creature. That God is the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is a truth revealed by God and a dogma of the Catholic Church and there is only one God. You don’t have to worry about Mary being raised into the Godhead. Trust me, our blessed Lady would cringe at the thought.I read that the Virgin Mary is a cult within the Catholic Church. She abounds in grace, yet she is relatively absent in the Mass itself. I often wonder what the spiritual implications are to keep her from becoming a part of the Godhead. In Judaism, God is thought to have masculine and feminine attributes, and I often think of the Virgin Mary as one day being viewed as a part of the feminine attributes of God by the Church. Some of her titles, such as her being co-Redeemer, makes me wonder how long it will be before she is declared Divine. Perhaps not in this life, but maybe in the Hereafter. After all, the Church teaches that wherever Mary is, there too is Christ.
I think they are similar and one can be applied to the other. However, just off the top of my head, I think co-redemptrix refers to the redemption which Jesus Christ wrought by his sacrifice on the cross for the salvation of the world. By his sacrifice on the cross and his suffering and death, Jesus redeemed us, he paid to God the penalty that was our due because of our sins as the prophet Isaiah says:What is the difference between mediatrix and co-redemptrix?
(continued)I think they are similar and one can be applied to the other. However, just off the top of my head, I think co-redemptrix refers to the redemption which Jesus Christ wrought by his sacrifice on the cross for the salvation of the world. By his sacrifice on the cross and his suffering and death, Jesus redeemed us, he paid to God the penalty that was our due because of our sins as the prophet Isaiah says:
Yet it was our pain that he bore,
our sufferings he endured.
We thought of him as stricken,
struck down by God* and afflicted,
But he was pierced for our sins,
crushed for our iniquity.
He bore the punishment that makes us whole,
by his wounds we were healed. (53: 4-5)
Our Blessed Lady stood beneath the cross offering to the Father, her son, for the salvation of the world.
So, by the redemption, Jesus won for us or merited all the graces we need to get to heaven. Jesus united the sufferings of his mother Mary with his for the salvation of the world. Just as Eve played a part in the fall of mankind, so Mary, the new Eve, played a part in the redemption of mankind. Consequently, Mary has the title of co-redemptrix.
Mary, mediatrix of all graces, refers to the dispensing of the graces merited by the redemption of Jesus Christ of which Mary, as co-redemptrix played a subordinate part. All the graces we receive from God pass through her hands for she is our mother in the order of divine grace. She dispenses the graces merited by her son Jesus when she wills, as much as she wills, and to whom she wills. Since our Lady’s will is wholly united to God’s will, she does all according to God’s will.