The reasoning behind Mary

[roseproject]

So, as of late, the reasoning of our devotion to Mary as an intercessor has been kind of tricky point for me. Like, I know the Church encourages us to go to her for help, for her to lead us to her Son, teach us about her Son, teach us what are good things to pray for, etc.

To me at least, with the information I’ve gathered, it feels like an extra step. Can’t I ask her Son to lead me more and more to Himself? Teach me new things about Himself? Ask Him what I should pray for? And so on?

Yes, I do pray to the saints for their intersession for certain things (St. Michael has been a big one in our family lately). But the difference between the other saints and the Blessed Virgin is that we pray to them to intercede for specific needs, whereas in Mary’s case, not only are we encouraged to pray to her to intercede for specific needs for certain areas in our life, but is one who is meant to “leads us to her son”… which seems like something that He can do Himself… This is where I get confused.

On a related note, I came to an interesting conclusion about her the other day which I want to confirm or correct…

If we are, as the Church, and particularly through the Eucharist, joined together as one body in Christ, does it then follow that since Mary gave birth to Christ, did she in a sense carry US in her womb and gave birth to us in a spiritual sense?

Any help is appreciated. I sometimes ask Jesus to help me understand His mother, because all I want is to become closer to Him in anyway I can. This has just been a stumper for me lately.

God Bless <3

 

[Zach]

You don’t have to pray to and ask Mary to to lead you to her son. It’s perfectly fine to ask Jesus without her intercession. She does help many people get closer to her son.

I don’t have the knowledge about the carrying us in her womb. But she is the spiritual mother of us all.

 

[HopkinsReb]

To me at least, with the information I’ve gathered, it feels like an extra step. Can’t I ask her Son to lead me more and more to Himself? Teach me new things about Himself? Ask Him what I should pray for? And so on?

Yes, you can. Absolutely.

But the difference between the other saints and the Blessed Virgin is that we pray to them to intercede for specific needs, whereas in Mary’s case, not only are we encouraged to pray to her to intercede for specific needs for certain areas in our life, but is one who is meant to “leads us to her son”… which seems like something that He can do Himself… This is where I get confused.

Part of this is that a focus on Mary helps to quash certain heresies that fail to properly account for Christ’s humanity.

If we are, as the Church, and particularly through the Eucharist, joined together as one body in Christ, does it then follow that since Mary gave birth to Christ, did she in a sense carry US in her womb and gave birth to us in a spiritual sense?

Yes. There’s a passage in Revelation that more or less states this. Maybe someone else will provide the link.

Any help is appreciated. I sometimes ask Jesus to help me understand His mother, because all I want is to become closer to Him in anyway I can. This has just been a stumper for me lately.

Check out Brant Pitre’s “Jesus and the Jewish Roots of Mary.” Great read.

And if Marian devotion gives you the willies…don’t do it. It’s not required.

 

[EZweber]

I find that saying God wills that it works that way is one explanation. You might also note that Christ only comes to us through Mary. I personally have found Marian devotion extremely beneficial in my spiritual life.

 

[Wesrock]

This may not be the point, but something that’s struck me about devotions to Mary is that, by empathizing with her as a mother of her son and our Lord through all stages of his life, death, and resurrection, it can draw me more intimately and personably to Jesus. Mary’s motherly wonderment about the Incarnation, her own pains as a mother watching her son crucified… It helps me to relate more personably to Jesus.

 

[TheLittleLady]

As a convert, I wish I’d read two books WAY earlier than I did (in this order).

Fulton Sheen’s “The World’s First Love”

Scott Hahn’s “Hail, Holy Queen”.

 

[Zaccheus]

To me at least, with the information I’ve gathered, it feels like an extra step. Can’t I ask her Son to lead me more and more to Himself? Teach me new things about Himself? Ask Him what I should pray for? And so on?

Of course you can, and you should. Mary can help you do that, and help you be closer to Christ. It’s not “Mary instead of Christ”: it’s “Mary helps us get nearer to Christ”.

Yes, I do pray to the saints for their intersession for certain things (St. Michael has been a big one in our family lately). But the difference between the other saints and the Blessed Virgin is that we pray to them to intercede for specific needs, whereas in Mary’s case, not only are we encouraged to pray to her to intercede for specific needs for certain areas in our life, but is one who is meant to “leads us to her son”… which seems like something that He can do Himself… This is where I get confused.

But couldn’t you argue that He can do Himself anything you ask a saint to intercede for? Of course He can. But it is His will that the saints may have a role in our prayers, to intercede for us.

And if is His will that His mother Mary have a larger role. In no way does this detract from His role. He is the Savior, He is the King of Heaven.

He is the one who answers our prayers. Only He chooses sometimes to do it through his Blessed Mother and through the saints.

 

[QuillWriter]

Of course we can pray directly to Jesus and ask Him to draw us nearer to Him. There’s no requirement that we ever ask for Mary’s or any other saint’s intercession. But consider this: Mary is Jesus’s mother, which makes her the the Queen of Heaven.

Why is that important? Well, in Jewish tradition, the mother of the king was queen, not his wife. And as his mother, she had his ear for requests in a way that no one else did. Therefore, if you really wanted the king to consider your request, you approached his mother, the Queen, first.

For example, in 1 Kings 2:20, Solomon’s mother, Bathsheba approaches him with a small request and asks that not refuse her. Solomon replies by telling her to make her request, for he will not refuse it.

So, too, at the Wedding at Cana, we see again the intercessory power of the king’s mother, when Mary approaches Jesus about the newlyweds whose wine had run out at the reception. Wishing to spare them embarrassment, she intercedes for them and approaches her son about it. Jesus, unable to refuse her, performs His first public miracle, in obedience to her implicit request, even though it was not yet His appointed time to perform His first miracle.

Consider also that in approaching Jesus through Mary, it can be a means of approaching Him in humility. Rather than approach Him directly, we can go through His mother as a way to show reverence and awe for our King.

Plus, consider that Jesus Himself wished to come to us through His mother. If He had wanted to, I’m sure He could have come to us directly from heaven, without being born of a human woman, but He didn’t. And I think that has some significance. If Jesus humbled Himself to come to us through Mary, how appropriate in turn, if we humble ourselves to approach Him through Mary!

 

[fide]

God wants you to love God completely - with whole heart and mind and soul and strength,
and
God wants you to love your neighbor as yourself.
Why “neighbor”? Why not just love the Most Important Persons - GOD the Holy Trinity?

BTW, “Me and Jesus” does, it is true, summarize some zealous persons who confess Christ as Lord and Savior. But that is incomplete. But God’s will - God’s way - is different.

Intercession is fundamental to God’s way to our salvation. We cannot take “neighbor” out of the equation. Thus we must follow His way, and work with intercessors. We must become an intercessor, and love neighbors on their way to God, and we must allow neighbors (saints, and Mary especially) to love us on our way to Christ - we must welcome them to intercede for us. We must be an intercessor for some, and we must welcome some to be intercessor for us. This way we co-operate with God’s way: we must welcome neighbors into our communion of love with God the Holy Trinity.

Mary is all the above, and greater than all the above. She is given to be a saint for us, but more than a saint: she is our Mother in Christ. (Jn 19:27). She is an intercessor for us, and mother for us - the most important of intercessors, as mother. She is given to love us as neighbor, as the commandment requires all, but much more than neighbor: we are her children in Christ. (Jn 19:26)

There is much that can and ought to be said on the matter - but I wanted here only to try to make clearer our need for intercessors in general. The only goal is not union with Christ individually, but union with Christ in the fullness of HIs Truth and Love as well. Thus, we cannot neglect “neighbor” - neither the neighbors we owe because of the grace and mission given to us, nor the neighbors who owe us, because of the grace and mission given to them: Mary, our mother, queen of the saints, especially.

 

[VanitasVanitatum]

In the Bible you can see how others are able to obtain from God special favors that they were not able to obtain for themselves. Like when Abraham interceded for Sodom and Gomorrah, or Moses asking God to spare the people from His wrath.

 

[Lavenderson]

Why is that important? Well, in Jewish tradition, the mother of the king was queen, not his wife. And as his mother, she had his ear for requests in a way that no one else did. Therefore, if you really wanted the king to consider your request, you approached his mother, the Queen, first.

I’m highlighting this to emphasize it’s importance.

 

[CRV]

Mary intercedes for us as she did at the wedding at Canna - John 2:3 - when she turned to Jesus and told him “they have no wine”. So we in our turn, turn to Mary to intercede for us with her Son. And Jesus gave Mary His mother to be our Mother whilst on the Cross. So as Jesus answered her plea at the wedding in cana, so we can be assured that Jesus hears and answers our prayers through Mary when we pray asking for her intercession.

She is the Mother of Jesus, beloved daughter of God the Father, and a temple of the Holy Spirit.

Human mothers teach their children the Faith, about Jesus and lead them to God. So Mary as our mother also leads us to Jesus. Mary also gives us the example to follow by the example her life set. Always ready to obey God, to praise and give glory to God, to put His Will before her own.

Our Sunday Visitor - 11 questions answered about Mary, has just this question of yours -
" Q: Why do Catholics pray to Mary when we can appeal directly to God?

A: Catholics, of course, can pray directly to God, the Holy Trinity. Vatican II, though, recognized the “close and indissoluble tie” that unites Mary to her divine son ( Lumen Gentium , No. 53). Mary is intimately united to her divine son, and she is “our mother in the order of grace” ( Lumen Gentium , No. 61).

Prayers to Mary are especially effective in uniting us more closely to Jesus. As St. Louis de Montfort teaches in “True Devotion to Mary,” Mary is “the safest, easiest, shortest, and most perfect way of approaching Jesus.” Jesuit Father Francisco Suárez explained that we should pray to Mary “so that the dignity of the intercessor may make up for our deficiency.”"

 

[Dan_Defender]

Mary is first among saints and a most wonderful intercessor, and she can help us. Of course Jesus could do it all, but it pleases him to give us gifts and graces through intercession. I do not question God but humbly request all the help I can get from Mary and the saints.

 

[Vico]

…

Catechism

969 “This motherhood of Mary in the order of grace continues uninterruptedly from the consent which she loyally gave at the Annunciation and which she sustained without wavering beneath the cross, until the eternal fulfillment of all the elect. Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this saving office but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation … Therefore the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix.”[512]

970 “Mary’s function as mother of men in no way obscures or diminishes this unique mediation of Christ, but rather shows its power. But the Blessed Virgin’s salutary influence on men … flows forth from the superabundance of the merits of Christ, rests on his mediation, depends entirely on it, and draws all its power from it.”[513] “No creature could ever be counted along with the Incarnate Word and Redeemer; but just as the priesthood of Christ is shared in various ways both by his ministers and the faithful, and as the one goodness of God is radiated in different ways among his creatures, so also the unique mediation of the Redeemer does not exclude but rather gives rise to a manifold cooperation which is but a sharing in this one source.”[514]

 

[John10]

Any help is appreciated. I sometimes ask Jesus to help me understand His mother, because all I want is to become closer to Him in anyway I can.

I read it in a book about Mary, that if God decided to come to us through Her, and God only does things in the most perfect and flawless way. It can only be reasoned that the best and surest path for us to go straight to Christ is unsurprisingly through Mary.

It also very important to mention that to no other earthly creature did Christ Himself became so united as He did with Mary and Mary alone.

As Saint Louis de Montfort in his book" Treatise on True Devotions" explains:

I declare with the saints: Mary is the earthly paradise of Jesus Christ the new Adam, where he became man by the power of the Holy Spirit, in order to accomplish in her wonders beyond our understanding. She is the vast and divine world of God where unutterable marvels and beauties are to be found. She is the magnificence of the Almighty where he hid his only Son, as in his own bosom, and with him everything that is most excellent and precious. What great and hidden things the all-powerful God has done for this wonderful creature, as she herself had to confess in spite of her great humility, “The Almighty has done great things for me.” The world does not know these things because it is incapable and unworthy of knowing them.

 

[Dovekin]

If we are, as the Church, and particularly through the Eucharist, joined together as one body in Christ, does it then follow that since Mary gave birth to Christ, did she in a sense carry US in her womb and gave birth to us in a spiritual sense?

St Paul Vi acknowledged, affirmed the title Mother of the Church for May. Pope Francis just named the day after Pentecost as the date when the whole Church will honor her with that title.

The beat way to understand MRy is by studying the words she spoke, according to Luke, to her cousin Elizabeth:

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,
My spirit rejoices in God my savior…Luke 1:46ff

 

[Thom18]

We are encouraged to seek Mary’s intercession in particular because she is a type of the Church. She was conceived sinless and lived sinless, making her the model disciple. She is the Christian most worthy of imitation.

 

[Margaret_Ann]

St. Louis Marie Grignon de Montfort answered all the objections 200+ years ago. This is True Devotion to Mary:

https://www.tanbooks.com/index.php/...-with-preparation-for-total-consecration.html

It is the BEST book on devotion to Our Lady. (Yes, I have it in my bookcase too )

 

[roseproject]

Thank you all for the insight

Some of you mentioned St. Louis De Montfort…
I have read some of True Devotion and, while it is beautiful overall, there are things that trouble me…

Like, the example he makes of offering our petitions to God through Mary; comparing our petition to an apple, and giving it to Mary who puts it on a golden platter to make it more presentable to the King. Or, more troubling to me still is the part where he asserts that we altogether shouldn’t go to Jesus without going through Mary because it is more humble to do so that way.

While I see where they’re getting at, wasn’t it Christ who invited us in our imperfect, fallen state to approach Him with confidence? Like how the harlot approached Jesus with boldness of love and contrition; bathing His feet with her tears. Her confidence in His mercy charmed Him. This is the kind of thing that kind of turns me off when people talk about Marian devotion and makes me fearful to pursue it at a distance closer than a 10 foot pole, to be honest. I want that intimacy with Christ where I know I can go to Him without being rejected, as unworthy as I am. So, to see someone suggest I shouldn’t go directly to Him at all scares me off. Even if I feel that I might be warming up to the idea of Marian devotion a bit, these sentiments come to mind and I gotta start over… Though I can’t help but feel that I just keep coming back to it…

Or, some of the ways people address Mary, Source of our Joy is one in particular that puzzles me. Like, didn’t she give birth to the true source or our joy? Not become that joy?

Or the Hail Holy Queen prayer…

Hail Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, our life, our sweetness, and our hope to thee do we cry… Turn then, most gracious advocate thine eyes of mercy towards us…

These seem like more appropriate ways to address our Lord than His mother in my mind.

 

[CRV]

Like, the example he makes of offering our petitions to God through Mary; comparing our petition to an apple, and giving it to Mary who puts it on a golden platter to make it more presentable to the King.

We are imperfect - Mary is perfect. She was born without the stain of original sin and was sinless in her earthly life. The trouble is when we pray there isn’t always purity of intention - it’s usually mixed up with self love somewhere, or was offered in an imperfect way, or even though prayers should always be asked with that it be according to God’s Will and not ours, this is not always so.

And Mary is already in heaven - the closest creature to Jesus - while we are not.

I know I can go to Him without being rejected, as unworthy as I am.

We can and we do.

Another angle is why do we ask others to pray for us? We ask for their intercession because their prayer for our intentions doesn’t include any self-love. The same as we may ask a friend to speak to a mutual friend on our behalf - because either we think they have a better chance of being heard and their intercession successful. So we ask Mary to intercede for us. Being the one who brought Jesus into this world, therefore is closest to Him of all creatures, who better to ask to intercede for us.

Source of our Joy

She is! Because she was the one who brought Jesus - true man and true God into the world, into mankind, into history, to us. She is also the source of our joy, because we can rely on her for intercession with her Son, Jesus. She is also the source of joy/refreshment to the holy souls in purgatory.

She is our model, our mother, the Help of Christians and watches over us - her children - with motherly care.

Maybe reading this will help - Cause of our joy