The BVM: What's in a Name?

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I am a life-long Catholic. Catholics have their favorite forms of spirituality, what resonates with them. But, I “lose it” a bit when I read about people getting passionate about Fatima or Guadalupe or Medjugorje.

All of those purported apparitions (and many others) are of one person, who, generally we refer to as the Blessed Virgin Mary. All of those “titles of Mary” are man-made, are they not? Theologically, there is only one Mary. All the prayers to Mary under any title are still to one sainted person. I feel that some fervent people lose track of this, especially with so many different feasts on the liturgical calendar. The feast of OLO Guadalupe is the day after the feast of the Immaculate Conception (as I recall) – lunacy to me. I suppose there’d be no point in having more than 366 titles – we’d run out of days in the year.

I get suspicious of some hidden motives behind all these different titles. When will we have enough titles for Mary?
 
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c1949 said:
I am a life-long Catholic. Catholics have their favorite forms of spirituality, what resonates with them. But, I “lose it” a bit when I read about people getting passionate about Fatima or Guadalupe or Medjugorje.

All of those purported apparitions (and many others) are of one person, who, generally we refer to as the Blessed Virgin Mary. All of those “titles of Mary” are man-made, are they not? Theologically, there is only one Mary. All the prayers to Mary under any title are still to one sainted person. I feel that some fervent people lose track of this, especially with so many different feasts on the liturgical calendar.

I get suspicious of some hidden motives behind all these different titles. When will we have enough titles for Mary?
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The titles are not what you should worry about. They just point specifically to one aspect or event in the mystery of our Lady. And very often, those titles not specifically associated with her apparitions, especially the most ancient ones (e.g. Mother of God, Panagia) are actually Christological defenses, less about her than they are about Christ.

What I would always be leery of are the purported “warnings,” “secrets,” , “prophecies”, etc. that a lot of Catholics spend so much energy over. Even if an apparition is deemed “worthy of belief” it merely reinforces what the Church already teaches. If only all Catholics spent that kind of energy studying and sharing God’s Word and the Church’s teachings…

I draw the line, however, at calling the arrangement of the liturgical calendar “lunacy”. The Liturgy is the prime expression of the faith of the Church, and perhaps instead of starting with “lunacy”, we start with “Why did the Church do this?” and especially “…because I’m not as wise as I think I am and I am not especially qualified to call this lunacy.” Perhaps some humility would be a good start.

Our Lady of Guadalupe is celebrated when it is because of the historic date. The Immaculate Conception is celebrated when it is because of its placement in the calendar year, relative to September 8th. Our Lady of Guadalupe is dear to the Americas because of the conversions to the Christian faith. The Immaculate Conception commemorates…well guess what. And further, if you knew the Litany, you’ll realize that the vast majority of those titles are NOT in the liturgical calendar, just as not all of the thousands of saints are in the calendar. The Church is very selective of celebrations, and makes sure that ferias are preserved.

“Lunacy” indeed. I lose it when people take jabs at the liturgy of the Catholic Church. Try reflecting first before drawing such a judgment.
 
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The key is to respect each other’s spirituality. You don’t have to participate if you don’t want to. Mary is first among saints and can help us, but you don’t have to ask for her help.
 
Our Lord Jesus also has several titles, but no one objects to that. For example, there are 150 titles of Jesus from Holy Scripture. In addition, He has various titles as “The Infant of Prague,” the “Santo Niño de Atocha,” “The Black Nazarene” (Philippines), etc.

If Christ could have many titles, why be uneasy of Mary having many titles?
 
Mary’s got at least 142 Christian titles according to this Wiki article (I counted them up) - and that’s not counting her Islamic titles.

en.wikipedia.org

Titles of Mary - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

I think it’s great, I love the many titles of Mary.

OP, it sounds like you are just another one of those people with a hangup about honoring Mary. Since no one is required to believe in Marian apparitions, I don’t understand why people can’t just live and let live. If you don’t want to believe in Fatima then just…don’t. No one is forcing you to believe it.

The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe is set on the day the miracle is said to have occurred resulting in the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe on St. Juan Diego’s tilma. It’s been set on that day since the 1600s.
The Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception is set on Dec 8 because that’s 9 months prior to the birthday of Mary which is celebrated on Sept. 8. The birthday of Mary being celebrated on Sept. 8 was set in Constantinople in the 5th or 6th century and by the 7th century, had been adopted by the Western Church as well.

Did you actually look up the reasons for the dates before you just decided the liturgical calendar was “lunacy” because you personally don’t like the idea of two Marian feasts close to each other? Also, only the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception is a holyday of obligation in the USA (and the only people who tend to celebrate Our Lady of Guadalupe are Mary devotees and Mexican-Americans) so you are free to simply skip over that day if it bothers you so much, though I can’t understand why it does.

I don’t like conspiracy nuts going on and on about the purported Third Secret or fussing about the consecration of Russia either, but that’s because they are missing the main message of Fatima which is prayer and penance in reparation for man’s sins. Which is the same message Our Lady always delivers in every apparition. Prayer and penance in reparation for man’s sins is also a teaching of the Church, so I don’t see why anyone would have a problem with it.

My advice to you is to stop “losing it” over other people’s spirituality and focus on your own.
 
c1949 said:
. When will we have enough titles for Mary?
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Well since God is infinite , and since God’s love for Mary is infinite , as is God’s love for all of us , I can’t see there ever being an end to titles for Mary .

That may be poor theology , but is my gut reaction .

In fact I’ve just come up with another title .

Blessed be Mary , Lover and Mother of @c1949 😄
 
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I kind of understand what the OP means. The apparitions are one thing, but let’s say I’m lost at sea. Should I pray to our lady help of christians because I’m a christian in need of help, or to our lady star of the sea because I’m at sea?
 
Flopfoot said:
The apparitions are one thing, but let’s say I’m lost at sea. Should I pray to our lady help of christians because I’m a christian in need of help, or to our lady star of the sea because I’m at sea?
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Why would this matter? Why would you even wonder which name to use in the prayer?
The prayers all end up in the same place.
 
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What does she want the titles for if we don’t use them when praying to her?

Except when you do the litany that takes 15 minutes because you have to list every one of her titles. If there were fewer titles you might pay more attention to what they mean
 
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We, humans, create the titles for her, in order to deepen our own devotion. We can pick and choose the ones we want to use. Some saints have had a great devotion to Mary under one or another title, such as St. John Bosco who was devoted to Our Lady Help of Christians. If he were on the ship lost at sea, he would have prayed to Our Lady Help of Christians like he did every day.
Pope Francis has a devotion to Our Lady Undoer of Knots. He probably prays to her under that title.
Etc.

There are very few titles Mary gives herself. She referred to herself as “the Immaculate Conception” at Lourdes, but the Church had already established that, and her use of the term was basically to show the priests who were questioning St. Bernadette about her identity that she was the BVM. Bernadette was not educated enough to know what the Immaculate Conception was, so when she repeated the words to the priest he knew he was dealing with the real thing here.

In any event, it’s not like Mary is going to say to the person lost at sea, “Oh, you prayed to me using the wrong title for me! I’m just going to ignore your prayer for help.” The titles are not magic spells. They’re just nicknames we have for Our Holy Mother.

Mary is very humble. She will happily respond to a sincere prayer to “Mary” just as much as she will respond to an entire litany of all the names man has made up for her.
 
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My mother did not like the abbreviation “BVM” because it was too much like the abbreviation “BVD” which in USA was an abbreviation for a type of men’s underwear.
 
rom said:
Our Lord Jesus also has several titles, but no one objects to that. For example, there are 150 titles of Jesus from Holy Scripture. In addition, He has various titles as “The Infant of Prague,” the “Santo Niño de Atocha,” “The Black Nazarene” (Philippines), etc.

If Christ could have many titles, why be uneasy of Mary having many titles?
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He’s God… He and Mary are not comparable… at all
 
OP, there is a good lesson to be learned here. And it’s quite simple. Never, ever come on CAF and start a thread dissing Our Lady, and those who are crazy in love with her! It won’t go over well at all!!! Just look at some of the responses you’re getting…and this thread is just getting started. Those who love her will defend her with their very lives if need be.
 
The titles are simply based on which miracle we are celebrating. Nobody thinks that OLO Guadeloupe is a different person than OLO Fátima. Personally I love that the BVM has titles based on the miracles. I am not Hispanic but still, the miracle at Guadeloupe helped to bring me into the church. People hearing about “OLO ——-“ has brought a countless amount of people into the Church. Which was God’s intention, I’m sure.
 
Why would anyone want to diss the Holy Mother of God?

Also, if we’re picking teams, do I want to be on
Team Blessed Mother of God, or
Team Stranger on the Internet with a Negative Opinion of Her?

Pretty easy choice!
 
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