Mary Ann Collins On Mary Worship

Candy's current offering is a copy of an article by Mary Ann Collins.


Because the article is so extensive, I'm going to break it into sections, rather than go through the entire thing point by point.

Introduction:

We get reminded of Catholic abuses of power:
I always thought that abuses of power by the Catholic Church were something
that happened long ago.

See our article on Catholic Atrocities.

She mentions statues in churches: There were statues of Mary and the saints. They looked solid, real, as if they represented people of power.

I wrote about statues here, and Elena covers statues and crucifixes here.

There is a section on Devotion To Mary, which begins with pointing out the riches of the church: Vast sums of money are spent on jeweled crowns and lavish clothing for some special statues of Mary.

I wrote about the riches of the church here. I noticed that her source here is Dave Hunt, who is not a reliable source of information.

She brings up Mary as Mediatrix: De Liguori said that people should pray to Mary as
a mediator and look to her as an object of trust for answered prayer.
The book even says that there is no salvation outside of Mary.

See my Something About Mary post.

Next section: Catholic Doctrines about Mary

The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception was first introduced by a heretic
(a man whose teachings were officially declared to be contrary to Church
doctrine). For centuries this doctrine was unanimously rejected by popes,
Fathers and theologians of the Catholic Church. (Note 13)

ALL-HOLY -- Mary, "the All-Holy," lived a perfectly sinless
life. ("Catechism" 411, 493)

In contrast, Mary said that God is her Savior. (Luke 1:47) If God was
her Savior, then Mary was not sinless. Sinless people do not need a Savior.

Mary Ann gives a Catechism citation, but doesn't show what it says:

411 The Christian tradition sees in this passage an announcement of the "New Adam" who, because he "became obedient unto death, even death on a cross", makes amends superabundantly for the disobedience, of Adam. Furthermore many Fathers and Doctors of the Church have seen the woman announced in the Protoevangelium as Mary, the mother of Christ, the "new Eve". Mary benefited first of all and uniquely from Christ's victory over sin: she was preserved from all stain of original sin and by a special grace of God committed no sin of any kind during her whole earthly life.

493 The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God "the All-Holy" (Panagia), and celebrate her as "free from any stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature". By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long.

These paragraphs of the Catechism show that the Catholic Church teaches Mary DID need a Redeemer.

Catholic Answers explains it in this way:

Consider an analogy: Suppose a man falls into a deep pit, and someone reaches down to pull him out. The man has been "saved" from the pit. Now imagine a woman walking along, and she too is about to topple into the pit, but at the very moment that she is to fall in, someone holds her back and prevents her. She too has been saved from the pit, but in an even better way: She was not simply taken out of the pit, she was prevented from getting stained by the mud in the first place. This is the illustration Christians have used for a thousand years to explain how Mary was saved by Christ. By receiving Christ’s grace at her conception, she had his grace applied to her before she was able to become mired in original sin and its stain.

Matthew 1:24-25 says, "Then Joseph being raised from sleep did as the angel of the Lord had bidden him, and took unto him his wife: And knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn son: and he called his name JESUS." "Till" (until) means that after that point,
Joseph did "know" (have sexual relations with) Mary. (See Genesis 4:1 where Adam "knew" Eve and she conceived and had a son.)

2 Sam 6:23 says that Michal had no child until the day she died. Does that mean that she bore children after her death? Until does not have the same connotation in the Bible as it does in modern English. It carries no implication of what happened after that time.

My Something About Mary covers these subjects, and this article contains links which show that these teachings were ACCEPTED, not rejected, for centuries by the Early Church Fathers, Popes, and theologians.

The Incarnation means that Jesus was both fully God and fully man. Mary
was only the mother of Jesus as man, and not the mother of Jesus as God.

I did an article on this just this week.

There is no biblical reference to the assumption of Mary.

If we are going by the criteria that "if it isn't mentioned in the Bible, it didn't happen", then I think you must also conclude that Mary is still alive, because her death isn't mentioned either.

The Bible contains everything we need to know in order to attain salvation. It does not claim to be an exhaustive compilation of all miracles which ever occurred, even just concerning Jesus.
John 21:25: And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.

There is actually historic evidence, or lack of it, for the Assumption or Dormition of Mary; lack of a body. While the tomb of Mary has been a tourist attraction since the earliest centuries of the Church, the tomb is empty. No early accounts mention there every being a body in the tomb. Certainly, there is Biblical precedent for a person being assumed into heaven. As we keep talking about Mary as the Ark of the New Covenant, it would be fitting if her body is hidden, just as the Ark remains hidden.

The early Church clearly considered the doctrine of the Assumption of Mary to be a heresy worthy of condemnation.

I think the testimony of the early Church would disagree.

Okay folks, I'm out of time. Feel free to discuss in the comments, and I'll work on part two later.