To the contrary, Jesus himself said Mary was no more special than we are:
Matthew 12:46-50: (46)While He was still speaking to the crowds, behold, His mother and brothers were standing outside, seeking to speak to Him. (47)Someone said to Him, "Behold, Your mother and Your brothers are standing outside seeking to speak to You."(48)But Jesus answered the one who was telling Him and said, "Who is My mother and who are My brothers?" (49)And stretching out His hand toward His disciples, He said, "Behold My mother and My brothers! (50)"For whoever does the will of My Father who is in heaven, he is My brother and sister and mother."
I won’t load you with the great theological discourses of Augustine, Aquinas, Newman, or Benedict on the subject. So let’s try a once die-hard Protestant who converted Catholicism and who spoke to the Eucharist, the Sacraments the Veneration of Saints, and Marian dogmas.
A VERY SHORT ABSTRACT OF EVANGELICAL HISTORIAN
DR. A. DAVID ANDERS
From Dr. A. David Anders, who was born, raised and educated, as an Evangelical Protestant and studied Wheaton College. He set out deliberately to show why Catholicism was wrong. He ended up a Catholic convert. He brilliantly essays the belief in the Eucharist in these compelling terms. But first a short summary of his journey,
PROTESTANTISM: A CONFUSED MASS OF INCONSISTENCIES
AND TORTURED LOGIC
“By the time I finished my Ph.D., I had completely revised my understanding of the Catholic Church. I saw that her sacramental doctrine, her view of salvation, her veneration of Mary and the saints, and her claims to authority were all grounded in Scripture, in the oldest traditions, and in the plain teaching of Christ and the apostles.
I also realized that Protestantism was a confused mass of inconsistencies and tortured logic. Not only was Protestant doctrine untrue, it bred contention, and could not even remain unchanged.
The more I studied, the more I realized that my evangelical heritage had moved far not only from ancient Christianity, but even from the teaching of her own Protestant founders.”
THE EUCHARIST
“Scripture teaches that the Church is the Body of Christ (Ephesians 4:12). Evangelicals tend to dismiss this as mere metaphor, but the ancient Christians thought of it as literally, albeit mystically, true. St. Gregory of Nyssa could say, “He who beholds the Church really beholds Christ.” As I thought about this, I realized that it spoke to a profound truth about the biblical meaning of salvation. St. Paul teaches that the baptized have been united to Christ in His death, so that they might also be united to Him in resurrection (Romans 6:3-6).”
“This union literally makes the Christian a participant in the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4). St. Athanasius could even say, “For He was made man that we might be made God” (De incarnatione, 54.3). The ancient doctrine of the Church now made sense to me because I saw that salvation itself is nothing other than union with Christ and a continual growth into His nature. The Church is no mere association of like-minded people. It is a supernatural reality because it shares in the life and ministry of Christ.”
CATHOLIC SACRAMENTS
“This realization also made sense of the Church’s sacramental doctrine. When the Church baptizes, absolves sins, or, above all, offers the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, it is really Christ who baptizes, absolves, and offers His own Body and Blood. The sacraments do not detract from Christ. They make Him present.”
“The Scriptures are quite plain on the sacraments. It you take them at face value, you must conclude that baptism is the “bath of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5 NAB). Jesus meant it when he said: “My flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink” (John 6:55 NAB). He was not lying when he promised “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them” (John 20:23 NAB). This is exactly how the ancient Christians understood the sacraments.”
ANCIENT CHRISTIANS & CATHOLIC PRACTICES
“I could no longer accuse the ancient Christians of being unbiblical. On what grounds could I reject them at all? The ancient Christian doctrine of the Church also made sense of the veneration of saints and martyrs. I learned that the Catholic doctrine on the saints is just a development of this biblical doctrine of the body of Christ. Catholics do not worship the saints. They venerate Christ in His members. By invoking their intercession, Catholics merely confess that Christ is present and at work in His Church in Heaven.”
“Protestants often object that the Catholic veneration of saints somehow detracts from the ministry of Christ. I understood now that the reverse is actually true. It is the Protestants who limit the reach of Christ’s saving work by denying its implications for the doctrine of the Church.”
“My studies showed this theology fleshed out in the devotion of the ancient Church. As I continued my investigation of Augustine, I learned that this “Protestant hero” thoroughly embraced the veneration of saints. The Augustine scholar Peter Brown (born 1935) also taught me that the saints were not incidental to ancient Christianity. He argued that you could not separate ancient Christianity from devotion to the saints, and he placed Augustine squarely in this tradition. Brown showed that this was no mere Pagan importation into Christianity, but rather tied intimately to the Christian notion of salvation (See his The Cult of Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity).”
MARIAN DOGMAS
“Once I understood the Catholic position on salvation, the Church, and the saints, the Marian dogmas also seemed to fall into place. If the heart of the Christian faith is God’s union with our human nature, the Mother of that human nature has an incredibly important and unique role in all of history. This is why the Fathers of the Church always celebrated Mary as the second Eve. Her “yes” to God at the annunciation undid the “no” of Eve in the garden. If it is appropriate to venerate the saints and martyrs of the Church, how much more is it appropriate to give honor and veneration to her who made possible our redemption?”
If you want a truly scholarly and well researched and well balanced study may I suggest you read:
Mary Through the Centuries
Her Place in the History of Culture
by
Jaroslav Pelikan
[Author Profile:
Jaroslav Pelikan is Sterling Professor of History Emeritus at Yale University. He has received honorary degrees from universities all over the world, as well as medals and awards from many scholarly societies and institutions, including the Jefferson Award of the National Endowment for the Humanities, the highest honor conferred by the U.S. government on a scholar in the humanities. He is currently president of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.]
The Virgin Mary has been an inspiration to more people than any other woman who ever lived. For Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and Muslims, for artists, musicians, and writers, and for women and men everywhere she has shown many faces and personified a variety of virtues. In this important book, a world-renowned scholar who is the author of numerous books—including the best-selling Jesus Through the Centuries—tells how Mary has been depicted and venerated through the ages.
Jaroslav Pelikan examines the biblical portrait of Mary, analyzing both the New and Old Testaments to see how the bits of information provided about her were expanded into a full-blown doctrine. He explores the view of Mary in late antiquity, where the differences between Mary, the mother of Christ, and Eve, the “mother of all living,” provided positive and negative symbols of women. He discusses how the Eastern church commemorated Mary and how she was portrayed in the Holy Qur’an of Islam.
He explains how the paradox of Mary as Virgin Mother shaped the paradoxical Catholic view of sexuality and how Reformation rejection of the worship of Mary allowed her to be a model of faith for Protestants. He considers also her role in political and social history. He analyzes the place of Mary in literature—from Dante, Spenser, and Milton to Wordsworth, George Eliot, and Goethe—as well as in music and art, and he describes the miraculous apparitions of Mary that have been experienced by the common people.
Was Mary human or divine? Should she be revered for her humility or her strength? What is her place in heaven? Whatever our answers to these questions, Mary remains a symbol of hope and solace, a woman, says Pelikan, for all seasons and all reasons.