Catholics Worship Mary. That statement is one that I have heard a gazillion times throughout my life and one that I have to correct. We don’t worship Mary or any other saint for that matter. It is easy to think that we do especially if you have ever been in a Catholic church. You usually will find a a beautiful statue of Mary with flowers around, a bank of candles in front of it and people kneeling down saying the rosary. It looks as though they are worshiping her. They are in fact praying and there is a difference between praying and worshiping.
The official Catholic answer would be Latria, Dulia and Hyperdulia. Latria which is worship and it is worship that is only due to God. Dulia is honor which we give to the saints. We honor them for their achievement, their acts, whatever it was that they did to become saints and who God made them to be. Hyperdulia is the honor we give only to Mary. It is the highest honor we have because she was selected by God himself to receive that honor. We worship only God himself and none other. We pray to Mary and to various saints for various reasons. With Mary we ask for her intercession in various things. We do the same with other saints. For example if we have lost something we might pray for St. Anthony to help us find it.
Here is how I look at it and I hope I don’t offend anyone at all. God is like the head of a the biggest corporation and he is busy. He doesn’t have the time for every little thing there is is so there are Mary (who to me is like the assistant who knows everything and gets things handled. Then there are all the other saints who are like office workers and managers. You say your prayer and if one of them can handle the job then it gets taken care of. However if it requires more attention it gets passed on up the chain of command til it gets to the man in charge. After all if you call somewhere and make a complaint and whoever answers the phone takes care of it you are happy with the company itself. You even praise it saying things like “I had an issue and company XYZ did a great job taking care of it.” You don’t really care who handled your problem.
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I probably have had this misconception about Catholics worshiping Mary and other saints. Thanks for clarifying. I never thought about the idea of prayers being passed up the chain of command in heaven. This is an interesting perspective or way of looking at prayer.
It is a common misconception. If you were to come into my home you would see statues of Mary and other saints but also crucifixes and more. With the prayers I just think there are maybe little things that angels and saints handle and leave the big stuff to God. I know many people will be offended by that and it is not how it is meant.
I am not offended by this idea, there will always be other offend by what you believe you just have to stand strong and not worry about them.
I love how you explained this, I have family members (on my husband’s side) that are so against Catholics because we worship Mary, it’s frustrating to try and get them to understand that we don’t worship Mary at all.
It is frustrating and usually when people hear that I am Catholic and Roman Catholic at that the first thing they ask is why we worship Mary.
Wow! What a great way to look at! I have never thought of it that way. But you totally nailed it! I don’t know how many times I have been told Pray to St. Anthony, Peter, Christopher or who ever. You did a great job explaining it. Most people think we worship all of them. I have tried to explain it to friends before, in the future I am using your analogy.
I am so glad that it all made sense. Sometimes I worry because it sounds good in my head.
Thank you for the explanation. I never really gave it much thought but I can see how someone outside the Catholic church might perceive praying the rosary to Mary as an act of worship. And I think your analogy is great!
I like learning about Catholics. Being a Baptist, we do things differently so it’s nice to hear other perspectives on religion.
What a great explanation! I kid you not, in the past week two different people (one a former Catholic) have asked me what the deal is with catholics and their love affair with Mary.