Replies

As H. M. Carson remarks, "The development of Mariology has been accompanied by an ever-increasing tendency to accord Mary a worship that, in much popular devotion, is indistinguishable from that offered to God alone. H. M. Carson, Dawn or Twilight? A Study of Contemporary Roman Catholicism (Leicester, England: InterVarsity Press, 1976), p. 128.

It is at least true that no excess of praise rarely seems too much for Rome.

When one reads the supererogatory Marian praise and the reasoning of Newman below many years after the Reformation then one can see how easily the disputed description attributed to the CE could be reality.

It intends to express that God is her son, as truly as any one of us is the son of his own mother. If this be so, what can be said of any creature whatever, which may not be said of her? What can be said too much, so that it does not compromise the attributes of the Creator? He indeed might have created a being more perfect, more admirable, than she is; He might have endued that being, so created, with a richer grant of grace, of power, of blessedness: but in one respect she surpasses all even possible creations, viz., that she is Mother of her Creator .

It is this awful title, which both illustrates and connects together the two prerogatives of Mary, on which I have been lately enlarging, her sanctity and her greatness. It is the issue of her sanctity; it is the origin of her greatness.; What dignity can be too great to attribute to her who is as closely bound up, as intimately one, with the Eternal Word, as a mother is with a son? What outfit of sanctity, what fullness and redundance of grace, what exuberance of merits must have been hers,...

Basil of Seleucia says that, "she shines out above all the martyrs as the sun above the stars, and that she mediates between God and men." "Run through all creation in your thought," says Proclus, "and see if there be one equal or superior to the Holy Virgin, Mother of God." And St. Cyril, too, at Ephesus, "Hail. Mary, Mother of God,...through Whom the Holy Trinity is sanctified . . . through whom Angels and Archangels rejoice, devils are put to flight.. (Works taken from "Letter to the Rev. E. B. Pusey" contained in Newman's "Difficulties of Anglicans" Volume II); http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/newman-mary.asp

And what is the warrant for this novel hyperexlatation of an instrument of God, the like of which is seen nowhere in Scripture and in number of honorific titles (http://tomsdomain.com/rosary/titles.htm) surpasses that seen given to Christ by the same sources.

The alleged basis is that she is the mother is the mother of God, and blessed above women, full of grace so that no sin is attributed to her. Mary was indeed a chosen instrument to incarnate the Divine Son of God, through whom the body the Father prepared for Christ (Heb. 10:5) came, yet she owes all that she is to God, and is blessed because of that, not because she is described as being the most righteous soul on earth.

For as regards virtue, this no more required her to be sinless than those holy men whom God used to bring forth His Divine word, (2Pt. 1:121) or Mary's parents themselves, or Israel, of whom The Holy Spirit states "as concerning the flesh Christ came , who is over all, God blessed for ever," (Rm. 9:5) and it is certain the nation was not sinless. Note also the Holy Spirit's qualifier, "as concerning the flesh" (not as it Israel was the author of His Deity) which restriction applies to Mary as well.

And without detracting from her humility and virtue seen in Scripture, and as her privileged role as mother, what is missing is a record of extensive tested virtue and love for all the church like as the Holy Spirit record of Paul, who is relatively marginalized by Catholics compared to Mary.

It is not written of Mary such things as that she was, "in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep; In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. Beside those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? who is offended, and I burn not? " (2 Corinthians 11:23-29)

And thru whom most of the NT came, nor can any sin be attributed to him as a new creation with certainty. Yet where is the consecration to Paul among Catholics such as is given to Mary, or even a tenth of the laudatory titles and praise and (statues and prayers) given to him among Catholics, who can only wish Mary had a tenth of the record of Paul, whose testimony of his tested virtue and use of God is so extensive that some have composed a list supporting him as "pope Paul" (in satirical mimicry in response to RC exaltation of Peter)? And thinking of him (or Peter) above (or less) that which is written is also wrong as well.

As Ratzinger acknowledged, Mary, “in the gospel tradition is quite marginal,” (“God and the world;” p. 296 ) nor is her appearance always totally positive.

Mary is called "full of grace" by Catholics, quoting Lk. 1:28, yet the Scriptures do not say she was "full of grace," but highly favoured, as there is only one word used, which is the same as said of all believers in Eph. 1:6, which can denote "graced" or favored."

Trying to find support for superlatives from Aramaic is invalid as we must submit to the language the Holy Spirit chose to express the words of Christ in. As for other arguments, see here .

Jn. 1:14 uniquely states that Jesus was “full [plērēs, which is used 17 times, all denoting “full”] of grace [charis=grace] The key phrase in Lk. 1:28 simply says “Hail [chairō=rejoice, greeting, etc.] grace [chairō, denoting to be graced, favored, enriched with grace as in Eph.1:6.

Besides the lack of warrant for exalting Mary as the holiest of all, the hyperexaltation of Mary is based on her being the mother of God. While technically this is true in the limited sense that Mary was the chosen vessel thru whom her Creator was incarnated, and nurtured him as a child, yet her own body and blood came thru the One she birthed as a human being.

The unqualified use of the term "mother of God" (Theotokos) predominates Catholicism, and in which Catholics greatly emphasize what Christ owes to Mary, as if God actually owes anything to an instrument of His, while like Israel, the honor she has is due to God choosing to use her in His grace, and in His grace He rewards faith, (Heb. 10:35) and recompensing their works done by grace. This reason for Mary being blessed and her debt to God is far less prominent amid all the adulation of her as being the mother of God and holiest of all etc.

The abundant use of the term "mother of God" is part of the Catholic emphasis on what Christ owes Mary, in which case He also owes Israel, the corporate body "of whom Christ came, God blessed for ever," but Rm. 9-11 provides the right perspective.

Instead of the emphasis being on Mary's debt to Christ, the abundant use of the term "mother of God" is that it most naturally conveys that Mary is ontologically the mother of God, as if Mary was the author of the Divinity of Christ.

And the counsel of Ratzinger regarding title 'Co-redemptrix' is applicable here", he at least recognized that the title 'Co-redemptrix,'

“departs to too great an extent from the language of Scripture and of the Fathers and therefore gives rise to misunderstandings...” For, “Everything comes from Him [Christ], as the Letter to the Ephesians and the Letter to the Colossians, in particular, tell us; Mary, too, is everything she is through Him. The word 'Co-redemptrix' would obscure this origin. A correct intention being expressed in the wrong way." (God and the world: believing and living in our time, by Pope Benedict XVI, Peter Seewald, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 2000, p. 306

For indeed, the objection to the term "mother of God" is not that it cannot be correctly used in a qualified sense, and Lk. 1:43 (the mother of my Lord should come to me) may arguably be used to support that (if the Divinity of the Messiah was being understood), but that its use is part of the exaltation of Mary which not only far exceeds that which it written of her or anyone in the tempered manner that the Holy Spirit describes His instruments, but conveys things which are not Scriptural. And in which only the Lord is set forth as the Heavenly object of prayer and praise, and being a mother of a child normally means providing and thus being the same nature as it, which in this sense would require Mary to be Divine if she were ontologically the mother of God.