©2025 Victor R. Claveau, MJ
George asked, “What about your worshiping Mary or praying to the saints, or the baptism of babies, or praying to statues…?”
“Whoa,” I said, “let’s take them one at a time. Let’s start with Mary, the Mother of Jesus. What is your question?”
George responded, “Why do you Catholics worship Mary? Jesus referred to her by saying ‘who is my Mother, and who are my brethren?’[i] It doesn’t appear in Scripture that she was as special as you Catholics believe her to be.”
“Let’s look at this from a logical perspective,” I said. “To begin with, Catholics do not worship Mary in any way, shape, or form. As you know, the commandment teaches that we are to worship God and God alone. The Catholic Church literally condemns the worship of anything or anyone other than God in Trinity. I must admit that we Catholics hold Mary in the highest regard, but in doing so we are simply emulating God.”
“How so?” George inquired.
“Consider this,” I said, “Jesus (as God) created his own Mother. Do you agree?”
“Well, I must admit that I have never thought of it in that way, but yes, I suppose we could say that He did”, said George.
I continued, “Now, if you were God, and decided to create your own Mother, the Mother of the Incarnation, would you not make her perfect in every way?”
George, once again, agreed.
“The Bible tells us that nothing unclean will enter heaven, [Revelation 21:27]. Doesn’t it stand to reason that if nothing profane can be in God’s divine presence in heaven, then God would not come into the world in a soiled vessel?
“The Catholic Church teaches that Mary was conceived in her mother’s womb, without the taint of the sin of Adam, which we call Original Sin. She would have to have been pure in every way or it would be an affront to God’s majesty. We call this doctrine the ‘Immaculate Conception’ [defined in 1854].
“Now, let’s go on.” I said, “God gave us the Ten Commandments, one of which tells us to ‘Honor our Father and Mother’, is this not so?” George nodded his head in agreement. “Don’t you think that Jesus would have followed this commandment concerning His Mother to the fullest, when as God He could do no less?”
“Yes, I guess so,” said George.
“In this regard it would have been a rejection of His own commandment if He allowed His Mother to come under the power of Satan even for an instant.” Again, I asked, “Doesn’t this make sense?”, and once again George nodded his head.
“OK, so you agree that Mary was conceived without sin and remained sinless her entire life, is this not so?”
“Well, yes, I suppose so, it does seem reasonable”, said George reluctantly.
I could tell by the look on George’s face that he wasn’t sure he liked where I was going with this.
I continued, “What loving son would refuse his mother any request within his power to grant? Remember the Miracle at Cana?[ii] Mary came to Jesus and said that the wedding party had run out of wine.[iii] Jesus responded “O woman,[iv] what have you to do with me? My hour has not yet come.” Mary continued and said to the servants ‘Do whatever He tells you’ [John 2:5, RSVCE]. It seems to me that Jesus had made it quite clear that he was not ready to reveal his miraculous powers, but as a dutiful Son, he could not refuse his loving mother.
“This is why Catholics pray to Mary. Not because we believe that she has any miraculous power. She cannot heal our infirmities, forgive our sins, or grant us salvation. This can only be accomplished by God. What Mary can do is intercede for us with her Son. We believe that, while every Christian, in a state of grace has intercessory power, Mary alone is ‘full of grace’ and all generations will call her blessed.”
George interrupted, “But Jesus said that he alone was the way to the Father. Why do we have to go through Mary?”
“We don’t have to go through Mary,” I responded. “Nothing prevents us from going to Jesus directly in prayer. However, we believe that the prayers of the righteous are apt to be more favorably answered, assuming that we are acting within the will of God.
“Paul continually exhorts the early Christians to pray for one another. As Mary and the other saints in heaven are truly alive, maybe more so than when they were on earth, they can pray and intercede for us. Don’t you think those that are in heaven would be continually praying for those of us still struggling through our lives?”
“Well, I suppose so,” answered George, “I have just not thought of this in that way.”
“If you had the choice between asking me to pray for you, or of our Blessed Mother, whom would you choose?”
“Well,” said George, “No offense intended, I would have to choose Mary.”
“None taken,” I said, with a smile.
“To sum up, George, we Catholics believe that Mary was conceived without sin, remained sinless throughout her life and that as the Mother of our Savior, she is also our Mother, for we too, are children of God. “God chose Mary above every other human being who would ever live to be the Mother of his son. He honored her above every other creature; don’t you think that we should also?”
“Yes, I agree”, said George, this time with conviction.
[i] Matthew 12:48: Christ is not denying his relatives, least of all his mother; he is simply declaring, as he has done before in similar circumstances ((Lk. 11:28), that in his kingdom the rights of blood relationship are not of prime importance. “Whoever does the will of my Father, who is in heaven” takes the place of family for him, so much so that he will not hesitate to treat his near relatives as strangers if they come to place themselves between him and the work for which he has been sent (Lk. 2:49). Saint John tells us that his brethren, at least many of them, did not believe in him (Jn. 7:5). The “brethren of the Lord” is mentioned in the following chapter: James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas (Mt 13:55). The Catholic faith has always taught that Jesus had no blood brothers; this s the dogma of the perpetual virginity of his mother. Those, therefore, who are called in biblical language ‘his brothers’ and elsewhere “the brethren of the Lord” cannot be more than cousins. The Lord had no need of calling attention to the fact that he was the only son of Mary. At both Capharnaum and Nazareth, everyone knew him as “the son of Mary” (Mk. 6:3).
[ii] The Gospel of John specifically tells us Cana is in Galilee, which is a region in Northern Israel.
[iii] As a wedding in the olden times was a feast for practically the whole village and still is, the normal time for such feasts is usually determined by the rhythm of the farmers’ life with its periods of labor and of comparative inactivity. New wine was well liked and marriages could be celebrated only when large quantities of it were on hand. The harvest of the raisin in Palestine takes place from about the middle of August till the end of September. The most suitable time for Jewish weddings, then, was after the vintage in September. It was not surprising that at the wedding feast at Cana in April the wine ran short, or that Our Lord supplied them with such a quantity of this libation.
[iv] This is not a rebuke, nor an impolite term. Nor an indication of a lack of affection. It was Jesus’ normal, polite way of addressing women (Mt. 15:28; Lk. 13:12; Jn. 4:21, 8:10, 20:13); and as such it is attested in Greek writing as well. For the meaning of the words of this verse it should be said that the Gospel account of this dialogue between Jesus and his Mother, does not give us his gestures, tone of voice, etc.: to us, for example, his answer sounds harsh, as if he were saying, “This is no concern of ours,” But that was not the case.
“Woman” is a respectful title, rather like “lady” or “madam”; it is a formal way of speaking.
“Woman” both in Greek and Semitic is a title not indeed of domestic intimacy (our Lord would not have used it in Nazareth) but of solemn honor. This honorific may be tested in John 4:21; 20:15, but most of all in John 19:26, when addressing his mother from the cross with great affection and veneration. So, you see, Jesus was not speaking harshly to his mother, he was addressing her with respect.