After a terrible and prolonged temptation to despair, caused by the discussions of the theologians of the day on the question of predestination, from which he was suddenly freed as he knelt before a miraculous image of Our Lady at St. Etienne-des-Grès, he made a vow of chastity and consecrated himself to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
(But he didn't worship her, lol)
After a terrible and prolonged temptation to despair, caused by the discussions of the theologians of the day on the question of predestination, from which he was suddenly freed as he knelt before a miraculous image of Our Lady at St. Etienne-des-Grès, he made a vow of chastity and consecrated himself to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
(But he didn't worship her, lol)
From Sacred Scripture
David commanded all the assembly: Bless ye the Lord our God. And all the assembly blessed the Lord the God of their fathers: and they bowed themselves and worshipped God, and then the king. And they sacrificed victims to the Lord: and they offered holocausts the next day, a thousand bullocks, a thousand rams, a thousand lambs, with their libations, and with every thing prescribed most abundantly for all Israel 1 Chronicles 29:20-21
(LOL! But they didn't worship David, right?!)
Please take the entire Scriptures into account before you jump to conclusions. Men kneel before other men and honor them. This is not worshiping as if they were God.
This is an example of worship given to God that is disordered and breaks the commandment:
the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Go, get thee down: thy people, which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, hath sinned. They have quickly strayed from the way which thou didst shew them: and they have made to themselves a molten calf, and have adored it, and sacrificing victims to it, have said: These are thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt. Exodus 32:7-8
The ONLY exterior act that is reserved for God is sacrifice. Note, bowing down is one thing, but sacrificing victims to "god" is clearly something else. Note in the Chronicles post, the Jews only sacrifice to God, not David. Note the underlined sections of Sacred Scripture. Compare righteous "worship" and sinful "worship". Thus, we Catholics (and Orthodox) may kneel before a statue or an icon in prayer, but this is not a form of worshiping God. The Divine Liturgy, the Mass, is the only place we offer sacrifice - and it is ALWAYS offered to God the Father ALONE. Not Mary or any saint.
Kneeling is certainly an act of honor, but it doesn't imply worship as if they were God. Kneeling is an act of humility. And we know what God said about being humble...
Regards
Okay, I'll bite. What's the joke?
Very typical of the counter-Reformation.
Here's what de Sales has to say in "The Catholic Controversy" regarding who controls the world...
I maintain that this judge is no other than the Church Catholic, which can in no way err in the interpretations and conclusions she makes with regard to the Holy Scripture, nor in the decisions she gives concerning the difficulties which are found therein. For who has ever doubted it?""But it is impious to believe that Our Lord has not left us some supreme judge on earth to whom we can address ourselves in our difficulties, and who is so infallible in his judgments that we cannot err.
At its heart, the counter-Reformation was fought over the sovereighty of God which is just another term for Predestination. Either God elects according to His good pleasure, or men work to please God enough to get themselves elected by God.
The counter-Reformation never ended. It slithered through the Arminian camp, winded its way through European and American Protestantism and exists to this day as more of the same lie from Rome which is actually the lie from Eden -- "...and ye shall be as gods."
"Ritual performances are very pretty spectacles for silly young ladies and sillier men to gaze upon—but there is no shadow of spirit or life in them. The High Church ritual does not look like a Divine thing—on the contrary—if I stand among the throng and gaze at all its prettiness, it looks amazingly like a nursery game, or a stage play!" -- Charles Spurgeon