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But scripture says....Psalm 46:1 God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

Learning about Mary's role in the Church is not easy, especially for someone who does not respect, honor, and love her as the mother of Jesus to begin with:

The key to understanding Mary is this: We do not start with Mary. We start with Christ, the Son of the Living God! The less we think of Him, the less we think of her; the more we think of Him, the more we think of her; the more we adore His Divinity, the more we venerate her Motherhood; the less we adore His Divinity, the less reason we have for respecting her. We could even resent hearing her name, if we had become so perverse as not to believe in Christ the Son of God. Never will it be found that anyone who really loves Our Lord as a Divine Savior dislikes Mary. Those who dislike any devotion to Mary are those who deny His Divinity or find fault with Our Lord because of what He says about hell, divorce, and judgment. -Fulton J. Sheen, "The World's First Love: Mary, Mother of God"

Emphasis; mine

From Catholic Culture:

When Pope John Paul was at Fatima in 1982 he renewed the dedication to our Lady his predecessors had made. It is worth noting that in the strict sense 'consecration' is an act of religion that can only be properly made to God himself. This clarification was made most carefully by the Holy Father at Fatima and in subsequent explanations, especially for the formula he asked all the bishops of the world to make in 1984, March 24/25, which he called 'an act of entrusting' to our Lady and her Immaculate Heart. The core consecration is a consecration to God, as Jesus consecrated himself at the Last Supper with the Mother of Jesus as the perfect exemplar of consecration to God in intimate association to her Son.

The formula of entrusting of the world to the Blessed Virgin for the Annunciation, 1984, read: "Behold, as we stand before you, Mother of Christ, before your Immaculate Heart, we desire, together with the whole Church, to unite ourselves with the consecration which, for love of us, your Son made of Himself to the Father. 'For this sake,' He said, I consecrate myself that they also may be consecrated in the truth' (John 17, 19). We wish to unite ourselves with our Redeemer in this his consecration for the world and for the human race, which in his divine heart has the power to obtain pardon and to secure reparation."

Again we put the question: must Catholics believe in Fatima? The answer is two-fold. So far as the heart of the Fatima message goes, meaning prayer, penance, reparation and the compassionate Immaculate Heart of Mary — the Church's approval here is absolute. No Catholic is free to reject these key aspects of Christian belief and practise. The Church's judgment here is infallible because these are matters that affect the very core of our Christian and Catholic life. So far as the particular circumstances that gave rise to the Fatima message are concerned the Church has warmly recommended acceptance of the apparitions, but only as a matter of human faith, so that a Catholic is not obliged to accept the initial accounts, whether of 1917, or the appearances of the angel in 1916 or subsequent revelations communicated to Lucy since 1917. This may seem strange, but we cannot make obligations where the Church does not command us, and especially we must not impose on others the obligation of accepting private revelations. Very instructive in this regard is the advice of Pope Paul VI in his greatest Marian letter (February 2, 1974, Marialis Cultus, on the promotion of devotion to Mary). The letter explains the strong place of our Lady in the revised liturgy and then has a further section on the Rosary and the Angelus. We recall the role of the Rosary at Lourdes, LaSalette and Fatima. At the end of his warm pages about the Rosary Pope Paul wrote — it is surely applicable also to Fatima and other apparitions, that they must not be used to restrict the legitimate freedom of loyal sons and daughters of the Church: "In concluding these observations, which give proof of the concern and esteem which the Apostolic See has for the Rosary of the Blessed Virgin, we desire at the same time that this very worthy devotion should not be propagated in a way that is too one-sided or exclusive. The Rosary is an excellent prayer, but the faithful should feel serenely free in its regard. They should be drawn to its calm recitation by its intrinsic appeal" (n.55). http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=1165

Emphasis; mine

From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

964 Mary's role in the Church is inseparable from her union with Christ and flows directly from it. "This union of the mother with the Son in the work of salvation is made manifest from the time of Christ's virginal conception up to his death";504 it is made manifest above all at the hour of his Passion:

Thus the Blessed Virgin advanced in her pilgrimage of faith, and faithfully persevered in her union with her Son unto the cross. There she stood, in keeping with the divine plan, enduring with her only begotten Son the intensity of his suffering, joining herself with his sacrifice in her mother's heart, and lovingly consenting to the immolation of this victim, born of her: to be given, by the same Christ Jesus dying on the cross, as a mother to his disciple, with these words: "Woman, behold your son."505

965 After her Son's Ascension, Mary "aided the beginnings of the Church by her prayers."506 In her association with the apostles and several women, "we also see Mary by her prayers imploring the gift of the Spirit, who had already overshadowed her in the Annunciation."507 -CCC