The Virgin Mary, Sightings etc

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tigerlily

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hi there,

i recently watched the song of bernadette for the first time and cried through most of it! :o

it got me thinking…
  • do only catholics have sightings (not sure what the correct word is here) of the virgin mary?
  • does mary appear because jesus cannot (for obvious second coming reasons)?
  • would mary every appear to those of other faiths? (i’m thinking it would solve all the current strife between islam and christianity)
i’m not catholic but i have a great respect for her, she’s the ultimate mum.

BUT the thing i can’t seem to get my brain round is that if i was me and jesus was my son, i just couldn’t have let him suffer like that. i just don’t know how she managed to watch him die. i am a mother and i would do anything to protect my child. i’m not criticising mary, far from it, she obviously knew the world had to be saved.

i’d really like to hear some views etc. it would be appreciated very much. 🙂
 
Tiger Lily,

I once listened to a Baptist gentleman describe to me an apparition he had had. He said it was an angel that appeared to him; had he been Catholic, quite likely he would have said that Mary had appeared to him.

I draw a distinction between approved apparitions (and that is perhaps the word that you are looking for), unapproved apparitions, and “apparitions” that have been declared false. Lourdes, Fatima, and Guadeloupe have been approved: the Church has thoroughly investigated what happened and has concluded that most likely it was the Virgin Mary who appeared to the visionaries. By far most apparitions are unapproved, meaning that the Church simply has not looked into them yet. (With many apparitions, the Church will never look into them; the person for whom the message was intended will receive the grace, everybody concerned will get on with his life, and nobody will think much about it any more.) “Apparitions” that have been condemned, such as one to a supposed visionary in Denver a decade or two ago, did not involve Mary at all but were either demonic or involved only the imaginings of the supposed visionary.

The statement that “Mary appears because Jesus cannot” is incorrect. (I realize you phrased it as a question; I am just trying to speak clearly.) Jesus has appeared to many visionaries such as St. Faustina.

I agree with you totally, Mary is the “ultimate mum.”
  • Liberian
 
Liberian said:
Tiger Lily,

I once listened to a Baptist gentleman describe to me an apparition he had had. He said it was an angel that appeared to him; had he been Catholic, quite likely he would have said that Mary had appeared to him.

I draw a distinction between approved apparitions (and that is perhaps the word that you are looking for), unapproved apparitions, and “apparitions” that have been declared false. Lourdes, Fatima, and Guadeloupe have been approved: the Church has thoroughly investigated what happened and has concluded that most likely it was the Virgin Mary who appeared to the visionaries. By far most apparitions are unapproved, meaning that the Church simply has not looked into them yet. (With many apparitions, the Church will never look into them; the person for whom the message was intended will receive the grace, everybody concerned will get on with his life, and nobody will think much about it any more.) “Apparitions” that have been condemned, such as one to a supposed visionary in Denver a decade or two ago, did not involve Mary at all but were either demonic or involved only the imaginings of the supposed visionary.

The statement that “Mary appears because Jesus cannot” is incorrect. (I realize you phrased it as a question; I am just trying to speak clearly.) Jesus has appeared to many visionaries such as St. Faustina.

I agree with you totally, Mary is the “ultimate mum.”
  • Liberian
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thanks liberian, that was very interesting. so that means mary IS appearing to other faiths. that’s heartwarming.

i must look up the jesus apparitions, i’m not clear why he’s appearing? isn’t he waiting til the second coming?

maybe its because we’re making such a mess of things down here…
 
ps forgot to say i found a book on ebay last night, its called ‘hail holy queen’ by scott hahn. its coming from america so i’ll just have to bite my nails til it arrives!(!) 😉
 
Tigerlily,
When I was a child and we first got cable TV, I watched “The Song of Bernadette” on HBO. My Mom came in (a devout Mormon) and told me to quit watching that filth.
So, like the disobedient child that I was, I waited until it was on late at night and hid myself in the living room with myself and the TV under a blanket and the sound turned down low and watched the entire thing again.
That has stuck with me through my born again experience and into my own journey into the Catholic church. It was a beautiful thing! I didn’t understand the whole concept as a child, but I do now and I can tell you that my love for Mary is something that I can’t explain and I’m still a little wary of it… as an Evangelical, it was sort of a given that we just say, “well, she was a wonderful obedient Jewess and we thank her for saying Yes, but that’s it.” and now, even though I can’t wrap my mind around what the RCC teaches about her, I am growing in my love for her.

in Christ
Steph
 
I speculate that that particular Lady has appeared to many of her children quietly and in a manner not to draw attention to either herself or to them. She is humble and discrete by nature and wants all the attention to go to her Son Jesus. If your Mother had a private conversation with you, part of that might be not to let the whole world know, because it was private, and also because the kinds of things she might say to you might not be the sort of thing you want discussed by strangers. I talk to my mom, and she may tell me I need to take my vitamins. Should I go tell the newspaper this astounding news? So, I suspect, it is with that Lady. Tell people you have visions of Mary and they probably will look at you funny. Keep it quiet. Tell your pastor, maybe. That probably is what people do. So I don’t think we can determine what she is doing all that well.

I think if people actually knew her they wouldn’t have a problem with her or Mariology. They would be cheering instead.
 
tundramom, you made me laugh! but your post made me think again why can’t folk just let others be? where’s the harm in watching a film?

i’m quite liberal when it comes to faith, i have it yes but i don’t mind what others do. its their conscience and its better to have any faith of whatever denomination than none at all. no one has to right to tell anyone what to do. after all, action has to come from the heart.

anyway i’m waffling away. the way i see mary is as an example of perfect womanhood, if i’m going to be a good mum then she is the one to aspire to. 🙂

truthstalker, that makes sense, yes why should she make a big show of each appearance? the message would get lost in all the hype and we know what the media is like! i never thought of it that way. thank you.
 
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tigerlily:
BUT the thing i can’t seem to get my brain round is that if i was me and jesus was my son, i just couldn’t have let him suffer like that. i just don’t know how she managed to watch him die. i am a mother and i would do anything to protect my child. i’m not criticising mary, far from it, she obviously knew the world had to be saved.
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Yes, this is the thing that finally helped me see Mary’s true place within the life of Christ’s people (the Church). I saw that she stood subservient to God’s will even in the very teeth of every motherly instinct inside her. There was another mother in the book of Maccabees who saw all 7 of her sons killed for their faith, so Mary had OT saints to look to for strength. But, Mary knew that her Son was the very Son of God, so the pain must have been intensified for her. Among the verses the Church cites for feasts of Mary is: “O all ye that pass by the way, attend, and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow” (Lam. 1:12). Only Mary knew the sorrow of seeing her own flesh and blood, the Son of God, die for sinful men. I too cannot get my brain around it, but Mary’s steadfastness against all reason is one of the reasons the Church exalts her name and continues to call her “blessed.”
 
Thursday was the feast of the Triumph of the Cross, Friday was the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows.

Our priest gave a great sermon both days. The reading we read was Simeon’s prophecy that her heart shall be pierced by the sword, but he focused a lot on the other optional reading, “he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.”/Then he said to the disciple,/“Behold, your mother.””

He mused on how it was probably Mary who kept his beloved disciple at the foot of the cross, gazing up into His eyes. And how Christ gives those he loves Mary, his mother, to be our mother, to keep us at the foot of the cross.

I recall something Fulton Sheen wrote about how her agony at the foot of the cross, as she bears the church as the mother of all the faithful is a fulfillment of our mother Eve’s title, “mother of all the living.” And God’s prophecy after the fall, “in pain shall you bring forth children.”

Pray for us O Holy Mother of God.
 
tigerlily said:
BUT the thing i can’t seem to get my brain round is that if i was me and jesus was my son, i just couldn’t have let him suffer like that. i just don’t know how she managed to watch him die. i am a mother and i would do anything to protect my child. i’m not criticising mary, far from it, she obviously knew the world had to be saved./quote]
Every time I contemplate Mary’s faith, I’m moved. Not only did she stay at the cross to the bitter end but have you ever asked why she was not one of the women who went to anoint the body on Sunday morning? You can’t tell me that she helped take the body down from the cross but was too anguished to go to the tomb on Sunday. She didn’t go because she knew He would not be there! Her faith and submission to God’s will never wavered - even for a moment.
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With all respect for the Blessed Mother I’m not sure she knew that Jesus would rise again.

She may not have gone to the tomb for lots of reasons - perhaps preparing a dead body wasn’t something the mother did in that society? Perhaps she was TOO griefstricken?
 
In grief some things get distorted, others forgotten: this, her Son, had been betrayed, tortured, had died on a cross, had asked God why He had been forsaken: this, the promised Messiah, was dead, but more closely, her beloved Son was dead, had asked why God had forsaken Him. I wonder if for those days the heavens were brass and the idea that life would go on with Him missing was almost unendurable - first Joseph, now Jesus, dead and buried, and how they had tortured Him, innocent as a lamb, yet this had happened -

For anyone to maintain Mary was serenely walking along the path, calmly trusting in the promise of God to raise her son, I would say that they have never experienced a strong emotion. Did she doubt? I wonder if there was room for doubt with all the grief of a dead son. No one ever should have to bury her child, let alone watch him die. Yet she did both, watching her innocent lamb die the disgracing death of a common criminal, watching clothing that perhaps she had made, or she had found for Him, stripped from him, having watched his naked bleeding body thrust between earth and heaven as a grisly public display.

Could any mother endure it with equanimity? Is it rational to expect any human being to be unmoved in such circumstances, let alone this mother?

I think there was a gale in her soul, a billowing tempest. She had long practiced trusting God, yielding to Him, being His maidservant. But we do not know what passed through her soul and how hard she had to resist the temptation to doubt, to disbelieve, to question. Where was the payoff for years of sacrifice and self-denial? It was coming, but for then there was a trial in her soul, perhaps more difficult than the actual crucifixion had been.
 
thanks for those insights everyone.

well all i can say is that i’m glad the salvation of humankind isn’t down to me. i would have hidden my child in the most remote cave i could fine and let humankind whistle for it.

that sounds completely selfish doesn’t it?

i’d love to know what happened to mary afterwards, i can’t find in my bible where she floats up to heaven. did she spread the gospel too?

as for one of the previous q’s about apparitions… the one at lourdes i find very sweet, all about helping people but the one at fatima seems more political. what do you think she was trying to say? beware communism?
 
ps another question…

why isn’t the virgin mary called saint mary? she seems to have lots of titles, our lady etc, why is this?

thank you!
 
LilyM said:
With all respect for the Blessed Mother I’m not sure she knew that Jesus would rise again.

She may not have gone to the tomb for lots of reasons - perhaps preparing a dead body wasn’t something the mother did in that society? Perhaps she was TOO griefstricken?
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It’s obviously not in the Bible but it is an accepted tradation:

According to traditional interpretation, the Virgin Mary was not the “other Mary” who visited the tomb after Jesus’ death (Matthew 28:1) – it is said she did not visit the tomb because she already knew he would not be there.

religionfacts.com/christianity/beliefs/mary.htm
 
tigerlily said:
ps another question…

why isn’t the virgin mary called saint mary? she seems to have lots of titles, our lady etc, why is this?

thank you!
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Actually the church I attend most of the year is called “St. Mary’s.” When you say the hail mary you say “sancta maria, mater dei,” translated “Holy Mary, mother of God,” but the “sancta Maria” could also be translated Saint Mary or saintly Mary.
 
Tiger Lily,

When you get right down to it, Jesus appears pretty much every day in every church around the world. I realize it’s not as spectacular as an “apparition,” but it is better for our souls. It also has the advantage of being approved by the Church, which most alleged apparitions are not. The Christian life is made up of everyday things, sanctified by the grace of God. Spectacular events are few and far between.
  • Liberian
 
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