Mary

WarriorAngel said:

I dont know what to say except that was disrespectful and twisting of what we do.

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What is the answer to a friend who says we are worshiping the Babylonian goddess Ishtar when we honor Mary? He uses Jeremiah 44 as proof because we call Mary the Queen of Heaven.
Answer

The fact that a pagan deity was known as the queen of heaven doesn't mean this term can't rightfully be applied, in another sense altogether, to Mary. The pagan king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, is called the king of kings by Daniel (Dn 2:37), yet this doesn't preclude Jesus from being called by the same title (Rv 17:14; 19:16).

Since the destiny of all Christians is to reign as kings and queens with Christ in heaven (Eph 2:12; Rv 1:6; 5:10), and since Mary is the preeminent Christian, there's nothing wrong with giving her the title which Christ, the King of Kings, bestowed upon her in making Mary his mother.

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Did you know that Catholic bishops are actually high priests of Dagon, the ancient fish deity of the Philistines? You see, the miter the bishop wears is a replica of the costumes worn by the priests of Dagon. That’s right, the priests of Dagon wore a head dress that looked like the head of a fish with an open mouth, and down their back they wore a long cape that looked like the skin of a big fish. When you look at a Catholic bishop sideways you can see the open-mouthed fish head, and his cope looks just like that fish skin they wore! This proves that Catholicism is really just old-fashioned devil-worshipping paganism, right? Wrong.

The bishop’s miter developed from the camelaucum, a form of crown worn in the imperial court in Byzantium. There are no pictures of a Catholic bishop wearing what we would recognize as a miter until the 11th century—and then it was a shorter, softer hat which only developed into its present form in the late middle ages, long after the worshippers of Dagon were dead and gone.

Three Forms of Anti-Catholicism

The true history of the bishop’s miter can be found with a simple Internet search, but explain it to the kind of Protestant who believes everything Catholic is simply warmed-up paganism, and he will think you have been brainwashed, that you are a naive dupe of a sinister regime, and the source of your information is part of a cover-up by the vast Catholic disinformation machine deep within the bowels of the secret walled city of the Vatican.

A second Protestant friend may not be quite so extreme in his “Catholice-equals-pagan” beliefs, and he eschews the wild-eyed fundamentalism of the Chick Tracts. Nevertheless, he shakes his head sadly and informs you that Catholic doctrine is not Scriptural. It is a mishmash of pagan philosophy and religious customs. He tells you how veneration of the Virgin Mary and prayers to the saints have their roots in pagan goddess religions and ancestor worship. He will tell you how the doctrines of purgatory and the sacraments (which we call “mysteries&#8221 have come from Gnosticism, how transubstantiation is imported from Aristotelianism, and how your beliefs about heaven and hell and the afterlife are infected with the pagan philosophies of neo-Platonism.

Finally, there is your secular friend with his own brand of “Catholic-equalspagan” anti-Catholicism. He does not fear Catholicism because it is pagan; he dismisses it because it is pagan. Secularists don’t realize how influenced they are by old-fashioned Protestant anti- Catholicism. They have uncritically imbibed “Catholic-equals-pagan,” and they ridicule or dismiss Catholicism because “all religions are merely different versions of primitive pagan superstition.”

Protestant Propaganda

The idea that the Catholic Church is the pagan anti-Christ has been around since the Protestant Reformation. If your sect had been persecuted by Catholics, it was easy enough to see the corrupt Roman hierarchy in the ominous warnings from the Book of Revelation:

I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was covered with blasphemous names and had seven heads and ten horns. The woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and was glittering with gold, precious stones and pearls. She held a golden cup in her hand, filled with abominable things and the filth of her adulteries. The name written on her forehead was a mystery: Babylon the Great, the mother of prostitutes, and of the abominations of the earth. I saw that the woman was drunk with the blood of God’s holy people, the blood of those who bore testimony to Jesus. (Rv 17:3-6)
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As a Protestant reading those words, you couldn’t help but think of the opulence of the Roman prelates in their palaces. You see the cardinals and canons in their robes of purple and scarlet celebrating Mass at an altar glittering with jewels and holding up a golden cup. Then when you read that the “seven heads” were the seven hills on which the harlot sat, and you knew that Rome was the city of seven hills: The Roman Catholic Church was that great harlot, and she had sold her soul to the disgusting, devil-worshipping pagan religions of ancient Rome.

Never mind that the writer of Revelation was actually referring to the decadent court of the Roman emperors; it is only a short hop from there to see in every manner of Catholic beliefs and practices a reenactment of the pagan religions. With only a little bit of imagination, you see that Christmas and Easter are versions of the pagan spring and winter celebrations, that the “worship” of the Blessed Virgin Mary is derived from the ancient cult of Diana, that the Eucharist is taken from Egyptian fertility rites, that the cross was the ancient Egyptian tau symbol, that baptism and the idea of the sacraments were lifted from Mithraism, and that not only was the bishop’s miter part of the secret worship of Dagon the fish god of the Philistines, but the icthus fish sign of the early Christians was part of the pagan conspiracy too!

The list could go on and on. In fact, it is only limited by the imagination of those who wish to discover pagan connections to Catholicism. It’s simple. As with any conspiracy theory, look hard enough, and you will find what you seek. Begin with your theory and then find the “facts” to support it. All of these “historical” connections of paganism with Catholicism can be easily refuted with a bit of research and explanation, but instead of tackling the different particular theories, I would like to unlock the thinking behind the fable that Catholicism is rehashed paganism and show how best to counter it.

The Missing Link

First, you have to do your homework: There are connecting points between early Christianity and the pagan culture in which it was born, but what are they? Are the connections real or just coincidental? Just because two things happened at the same time does not demand a link between them, and it certainly does not demand a causal link. So, for example, the decline of the number of Catholic priests and nuns in the United States coincided with the popularity of Elvis Presley and the decline in popularity of Bing Crosby. This does not mean that the two phenomena were linked (even though Bing Crosby played the part of a Catholic priest), and it certainly doesn’t mean that the popularity of Elvis Presley caused the decline in the number of priests.

Likewise, to see the similarity between two things and their coincidence in history does not require that they be linked in any way, and it certainly does not prove a causal link between the two. Even if a cultural link can be proved, a causal link must also be proved. If a causal link is proved, then it must also be proved which way the causal link flows. Does the existence of a winter-solstice celebration in oth Christianity and Roman paganism demand that one caused the other? If so, which influenced the other? It used to be a commonplace that the Christians borrowed the pagan winter Saturnalia and replaced it with Christmas. It now seems that the celebration of the Nativity of Christ was established first, and the pagans invented the Saturnalia to compete with the increasingly popular Christian celebrations.

These are interesting questions, but they are complex and cannot be truly answered without solid historical research and scholarship.

We’re All Pagan

Second, all the major doctrines of the Christian faith can be seen to have pagan antecedents. A Protestant may say that veneration of the Blessed Virgin Mary hearkens back to pagan goddess worship, but the Virgin Birth (which he will affirm) also has multiple echoes in the myths of the pagan religions.

He sees as pagan belief in purgatory or prayers for the dead, but he believes in the Incarnation—and pagan religions abound in stories of god-men coming down to be born on earth. Does he believe in the Resurrection? Does he celebrate it at Easter? How does he fit that in with all the pagan myths of the dying and rising god who was worshiped annually at the springtime of the year? Does he believe in the inspiration of the Holy Spirit? The Ascension? Does he practice baptism? The Lord’s Supper? All of these beliefs and practices have parallels in paganism. You can’t blame Catholics for being pagan in some beliefs and practices while happily endorsing beliefs that might just as readily have their origins in paganism. If Catholic doctrine and devotions are pagan, then Protestantism’s must be too.

This is the crunch of the argument. There are links between paganism and Christianity. That is natural because the Church was born in a particular culture, and that culture was bound to have some influence on it. Furthermore, there is nothing wrong with this interaction. From the very beginning it was considered to be good missionary method: Find what connects with the Christian story in the culture you are preaching to and make the connection. Build on that and use it to share the Christian gospel through images and concepts with which they are familiar. This is precisely what we see taking place in the New Testament. In Acts 17, St. Paul preaches in Athens and sees an altar to an “unknown god.” He picks up on this idea and uses it to preach the gospel.

Infected by Philosophy?

Now, let’s address the less-extreme Protestant, who thinks Catholic doctrines are non-scriptural and infected by pagan philosophy. He needs to see that borrowing concepts from the philosophers of the time is exactly what the writers of the New Testament did. John used the existing Greek philosophical concept of the logos (the Word) to articulate the doctrine of the pre-existing Son of God and the Incarnation of the Son of Man. In doing so he was borrowing a concept from Greek philosophy. Throughout his writings, Paul uses the concept of “the mystery of godliness,” and in doing so he connects with his pagan audience’s awareness of the mystery religions. Likewise, the Epistle to the Hebrews talks of an “earthly temple.” The image of the “heavenly temple” is steeped in a Platonic metaphysical understanding. In both these cases, as in the borrowings in early Church theology, the writers take a concept and change it from the inside out.

So for John, the vague philosophical concept of the logos is clarified and fulfilled in the incarnate Christ. For Paul, the “mystery” is a mystery no longer, for that hidden wisdom is now revealed clearly in Christ Jesus. For the writer of the letter to the Hebrews, the earthly temple and the heavenly temple are united in the body of Christ on earth. The early Christians did use the philosophical concepts of their culture, but as they did so, they transformed those ideas and fulfilled them with a new and radiant expression of the truth, and this transaction indicates the real answer to the riddle of the relationship between paganism and Catholicism.

The Riddle and the Revelation

The secular critic also argues that Catholicism is simply a rehash of paganism, but for him it is a reason to reject Christianity altogether. “Ha!” he cries, “I’ve seen through it all. Christianity was nothing new. The myth of the virgin-born God-man saving mankind by his death and rising was around for centuries! Don’t you see” he continues, “all religions developed when human beings were primitive. They looked at the sun, moon, and stars and were awed by them. They gave them personalities and made up stories about them. These became the gods and goddesses of ancient myths. They told stories of how the gods sent one of their own to earth to save the human race. Then some Hebrews wanted people to believe their teacher was also a god, so they spliced all these myths into the story of his life, and then they had a top-notch product: Once the emperor bought into this newfangled hodgepodge of myths and mysteries, Christianity never looked back.”

Having worked out a seemingly credible alternative history, the secularist sits back and smugly dismisses its claims. The problem is that his version of anti-Catholicism is just as leaky and insubstantial as the various forms of Protestant anti-Catholicism. In his version, the early Christians enthusiastically graft paganism into their new religion; in reality, the early Christians were Jews and as such were thoroughly opposed to paganism. Nor does his version account for the persecution of Christians. The early Christians died to defend Christianity from compromise with paganism. The idea that they heartily adopted pagan myths to boost their popularity is ridiculous. Finally, if early Christianity was a cleverly concocted amalgamation of paganism and the stories of a wandering rabbi, why would anyone be tortured and die for such a fraud?

The links between paganism and Catholicism require another answer. They require an explanation of just how and why there are connections and links between Christianity and other religions, and the answer is riddle and revelation: Paganism in all its forms was the riddle, and Christ was the revelation.

Hints and Glimpses

C.S. Lewis said that it didn’t bother him that Christianity has links with earlier religions: What would have bothered him was if it didn’t have links with earlier religions. The fact is, you can find echoes and connecting points between Christianity and all the other religions both ancient and modern, and it is this fact which validates rather than invalidates Christianity. If a religion is not only true but more true than all the other religions, then it should connect with all those other religions at the points where they are true.

The Catholic understanding is that there are echoes, connections, and similarities among Catholicism and all the other religions because Catholicism fulfills them and transforms them from within. The other religions are partial truths. They are hints and guesses at the truth. They are the riddles and Christ is the revelation which completes them and answers their questions. The Hebrew religion was the one which most perfectly pointed to the coming Christ, but each of the pagan religions and philosophies in their own way—some better than others—point to and prophesy the coming of Christ.

The Church Fathers saw that every aspect of the ancient world (not just the religions) were imperfect but definite pointers to Christ. In the myths and philosophies, in both the horrors and the glories of the ancient world, they heard echoes of the Word of God and saw glimpses of glory. So the Fathers loved to use quotes from the ancient philosophers which hinted at the fullness of revelation that would come in Christ. The most famous is from Virgil’s fourth Eclogue, written the century before the coming of Christ. It expresses the longing of the pagan heart for a coming Redeemer.

The virgin is returning . . .
A new human race is descending from the heights of heaven . . .
The birth of a child, with whom the iron age of humanity will end and the golden age begin . . .
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Catholicism is not the practice of paganism, but the fulfillment of the hints and glimpses of revelation that are given in every ancient religion, philosophy, and prophecy. Truth, wherever it appears, is Catholic truth, and once we see the beautiful and true relationship between other religions and philosophies and the Catholic faith, the sooner we will see their beautiful fulfillment in one faith, one baptism, one flock, one Shepherd, and one Lord.

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Perhaps the most emblematic sacramental in Catholicism is the rosary, that string of beads with a crucifix attached. Televangelist Jimmy Swaggart pictured one on the dust jacket of his anti-Catholic book, <Catholicism and Christianity>.1 Swaggart wrote, "The rosary (or prayer beads) was introduced by Peter the Hermit in A.D. 1090. This was copied from the Hindus and Muhammadans [sic]. The counting of prayers is a pagan practice and is expressly condemned by Christ (Matt. 6:5-7)."2 Aside from the fact that the rosary consists of prayer beads, Swaggart got nothing right. This is regrettable since such crude misrepresentations frighten away uninformed Christians from a powerful aid to prayer and contemplation.

Tradition links the rosary not to Peter the Hermit but to St. Dominic (1170-1221), who is said to have received it from the Virgin Mary to combat the Albigensian heresy. This legend seems to be derived from the writings of Alan de la Roche (1428-1475), that indefatigable Dominican preacher of the rosary. Modern critical scholarship from Dominicans and others reveals a far more complicated history, though one having nothing to do with Hindus and Muslims.

Medieval monks had a practice of daily praying the 150 psalms. Since lay brothers of the orders were illiterate and couldn't read the psalms, among them arose the practice of reciting the Our Father 150 times. Beads were used to keep track of the prayers. (The word "bede" in Middle English, from which we derive the word "bead," originally meant "prayer.") This practice spread among the laity, and other easily-remembered prayers were added. During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the rosary settled into its present form. It now consists of the Apostles' Creed, the Our Father, the Hail Mary, and the Gloria.

The Apostles' Creed appeared first as a second-century Roman baptismal creed, and it took its present form in the 400s. Although this creed wasn't written by the apostles, it's generally agreed it could very well have been of apostolic origin.

The Our Father is prayed on the solitary beads that separate the groups of ten beads (the "decades"). Every Christian is familiar with this prayer, which is found in Matthew 6:9-13.

Significantly, it is given in the same passage of Scripture in which Jesus says, "But when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words" (Matt. 6:7). This is the verse Jimmy Swaggart says condemns the "pagan practice" of "counting prayers." Though Jesus himself gave us the Our Father, some Fundamentalists try to discourage Christians from using it as anything other than a model prayer because they feel that actually praying it would constitute a "vain repetition."

But let's look at the context of the "vain repetitions" verse. Matthew 6:5-6 deal with the prayer practices of the Jews themselves; Jesus derides these as hypocritical. He doesn't condemn repetitive Jewish prayers, of which there were a countless number. For example, the book of Psalms is a collection of hymns and prayers repeatedly used in Jewish celebrations in which Jesus himself participated. The Passover, celebrated by Jesus before his Crucifixion, had fixed prayers that were repeated annually. Following the Last Supper, Jesus went to the Garden of Gethsemane and prayed the same prayer three times in a row (Matt. 26:39-44)—he engaged in repetitive prayer.

In the next pair of verses Jesus warns against the prayer practices of the pagans, who held a magical view of prayer and whose repetitious prayers he< does> condemn. Verse 7 reads, in the King James Version, "[D]o not use vain repetitions [<battalogeo>] as the heathen do." This is a misleading rendering. The Greek word <battalogeo> is better translated as "babbling," and it is so translated in the New International Version. (The Revised Standard Version has "empty phrases.")3 Jesus isn't condemning mere repetition—something he himself engaged in, as did other good Jews—but the babbling of the pagans.

What sort of babbling did the pagans practice? Look at 1 Kings 18:2629, where the pagan prophets on Mount Carmel tried to invoke Baal all day long, repeatedly calling on his name and performing ritual dances: "[They] called on the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, 'Oh Baal, answer us!' But there was no voice, no one answered. And they leaped about the altar which they had made.... And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their custom with swords and lances, until the blood gushed out of them. And as midday passed, they raved on until the time of the offering of the [evening] oblation, but there was no voice, no one answered, no one heeded." Once the pagan prophets had given up, Elijah came forward and called on the God of Israel, and immediately his prayer was answered.

The prayers of the pagan prophets were "vain" because, after spending the entire day frantically calling upon him, Baal never responded. He wasn't a real god, unlike the God of Israel, who always answers sincere prayer. Jesus' point in Matthew 6:7 is that we don't need to spend all day leaping over altars, cutting ourselves, and raving to get our heavenly Father's ear. He hears our prayers no matter what type of prayer is offered: lengthy or short, composed or extemporaneous, group or individual, repetitious or unique.

Thus Jesus says in the next verse: "Therefore do not be like them [the pagans]. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask him" (Matt. 6:8). This doesn't mean that, since God already knows our needs, we don't have to pray at all. As Jesus taught in the parable of the persistent widow (Luke 18:1-8), we are to be tenacious in prayer, freely and repeatedly (repetitiously) bringing our petition before the seat of grace.

Paul says we are to "pray without ceasing" (1 Thess. 5:17), not "pray reservedly lest we repeat ourselves" (as is inevitable in ceaseless prayer). One of the benefits of the rosary is that it leads naturally to the ceaseless prayer and meditation which Scripture enjoins upon us.

If there should be any lingering doubt that God doesn't look askance on repetition in prayer, note that in Revelation 4:8-11 we find the heavenly host engaging in repetitive prayer ("Holy, holy, holy Lord God Almighty"), said "day and night" before the throne of the Almighty, followed by repetitious antiphons from the elders.

The Hail Mary is the heart of the rosary and is said on each of the ten beads which are grouped together to form a decade, there being fifteen decades totaling 150 Hail Marys- as many Hail Marys as there are psalms. The first part of the prayer is composed of two Bible verses strung together: "Hail Mary full of grace, the Lord is with thee" (Luke 1:28) and "blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb" (Luke 1:42).

The remainder of the prayer reads, "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen." As she was on earth called the object of divine grace (Luke 1:28) and is now in heaven a glorified saint, Mary is called "holy."

The title "Mother of God" (Greek, <Theotokos>, "God-bearer") is an ancient one. A piece of papyrus found in Egypt and dating to 250-270 invokes the intercession of the <Theotokos>.4 Catholics maintain that the person born of the Virgin Mary is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, the divine Word (Greek, <Logos>), and is therefore God (John 1:1,14). As Jesus is God, humanity and divinity fully united in one Person, the mother of Jesus is therefore the mother (but not the originator or creator) of God; she is the <Theotokos>.5

Many non-Catholics object to the practice of asking the saints in heaven, including the Virgin Mary, to pray for us. Often cited is 1 Timothy 2:5, "For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus." Since Jesus is our only mediator, they argue, Mary (or any other saint) shouldn't be asked to pray on our behalf. By praying "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death," Catholics intrude on the sole mediatorship of Christ. But this idea can be held only if one believes that death creates a chasm between Christians on earth and Christians in heaven.

Catholics believe that Christians aren't separated from Christ or each other at death (Rom 8:38-39). The Body of Christ "is one though it has many parts" (1 Cor. 12:12), and Christians don't become amputated from the Body when they go to heaven. Nor are there two Churches, one in heaven and another on earth, separated by death and thus somehow not in communion with each other. The Church is the Bride of Christ (Rev. 21:9ff), and Jesus is a strict monogamist. We reject any idea that separates us from one another and consequently destroys the unity of the Church.

As stated in the Apostles' Creed, Catholics believe in "the communion of saints." This means that since we're all one in Christ, we can ask the saints in heaven to pray for us every bit as much as we can ask our brothers and sisters in the Lord here on earth to pray for us. Since we are specifically commanded to pray for each other (1 Tim. 2:1, Eph. 2:1, Heb. 4:16), and since the word of the Lord "stands firm in the heavens" as well as on earth (Ps. 119:89), we don't violate Scripture by asking for the prayers of the saints in heaven. It is precisely because of Christ's mediatorship that Christians in heaven can pray for those on earth.

We know the saints in heaven are aware of what occurs to us (Heb. 12:1, Luke 15:7) and that they offer prayers (Rev. 5:8-10, 8:3), including praying for God's intervention on the earth (Rev. 6:9-10). Hebrews 12:22-24 tells us we approach not only Jesus, "the mediator of the new covenant," but the heavenly Jerusalem and the "assembly of the first-born enrolled in heaven" and "the spirits of the just made perfect." We don't hesitate to ask them for their prayers because the prayers of the righteous "availeth much" (Jas. 5:16b).

Some object that the saints are dead and that the Bible forbids communication with the dead (Lev. 19:31, 20:6, 27) through mediums and other occultic means (necromancy).

But Catholics do not attempt to get information from spirits, as is done in seances. The Church condemns occult practices. Moreover, the saints in heaven aren't "dead"; they're more alive than you or I: "I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob," Jesus quoted from Exodus. "He is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living. Ye therefore do greatly err" (Mark 12:26-27). If Jesus did not intend the saints on earth to communicate with the saints in heaven, he certainly set a rather poor example in appearing to Peter, James, and John on Mount Tabor (Matt. 17:1-8).

Sometimes Fundamentalists such as Jimmy Swaggart say that praying ten Hail Marys to every Our Father confirms their worst fears about Catholicism: Catholics prefer Mary to God by a margin of ten to one. This assertion is not only offensive to Catholics, but it's logically awry as well. Looking at a King James Bible, does the fact that Paul's name occurs 126 times in the book of Acts compared with only 68 times for Jesus' name imply that the author of Acts thought Paul twice as important as Jesus? Does the fact that the Protestant translation of the book of Esther contains neither the word "God" nor the word "Lord" mean that the author of that book was an atheist? Such statistical "proofs" prove nothing at all. The rosary is a devotion in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary, who, under divine inspiration, herself prophesied that all generations would call her blessed (Luke 1:48). In such devotions Catholics happily fulfill the prophecy, recalling that God blesses us when we bless those whom he has especially favored (Gen. 12:3, 27:29, Num. 24:9).

After the ten Hail Marys, the Gloria is said on the solitary bead separating the decades. It's a doxology that has been used since the Trinitarian controversies of the early Church: "Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen." It is, like the Apostles' Creed and the Our Father, to be found in most mainline Protestant churches.

Yet there is more to the rosary than "rattling off" prayers. The rosary is a contemplation of the Gospels. With each decade is associated a "mystery," Gospel episode to be meditated upon, the word "mystery" being used in the theological sense of divine revelation. There are fifteen mysteries divided into three groups of five: joyful, sorrowful, and glorious.

The joyful mysteries are the Annunciation (Luke 1:26-38), Mary's visitation to Elizabeth (Luke 1:3956), the Nativity (Luke 2:1-20), the presentation of Jesus in the Temple (Luke 2:22-38), and the finding of Jesus in the Temple (Luke 2:41-52).

The sorrowful mysteries are the agony in the garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:39-53), the scourging (John 19:1; Is. 53:5), the crowning with thorns (Mark 15:17-20), the way of the cross (Mark 15:20-22), and the Crucifixion (John 19:18-30).

The glorious mysteries comprise: the Resurrection (John 20:1-29), the Ascension (Acts 1:6-12), the descent of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:1-13), the Assumption of Mary (Rev. 12:12), and Mary's coronation in heaven (Rev. 12:1-2, 5).

Note that all of the fifteen mysteries, except for the last two, are explicitly taught in the Bible. We'll close with an examination of the two that are present only by implication.

The bodily Assumption of Mary into heaven at the end of her life is neither explicitly taught nor contradicted by the Bible, though there are precedents (Hebrews 11:5 mentions the assumption of Enoch; 2 Kings 2:113 recounts that of Elijah; Paul admits the possibility of his own bodily assumption in 2 Corinthians 12:2-4). There is no indication that Mary's remains were venerated as relics (a customary practice in the early Church), and the belief in her Assumption is held both in the East (Orthodox) and in the West (Catholic).

Mary is perceived in Catholic thought as the proto-Christian and the symbol of the Church as a whole. Hence her Assumption is seen as a sign of the ultimate destiny of the Church: Christ will come at the end in order to take his Bride into the kingdom and to glorify her (2 Thess. 4:16-17). The belief in the Assumption is affirmed by all Christian communities having historic links with the ancient Church—which our Lord promised to lead into all truth (John 16:12-13; cf. Matt. 16:18, 28:20). The belief is very old as well as widespread, and those who deny this teaching do so without scriptural warrant, for Christians are to follow <all> apostolic traditions, whether or not written in the New Testament (2 Thess. 2:15).

The coronation of Mary in heaven should be understood against the Jewish background of early Christianity. In Judah, partly because of the Fourth Commandment (Ex. 20:12), the mother of the anointed king had a function of considerable importance, and her name is with only two exceptions associated with the accession of the king in the official annals.6 The king's mother bore the powerful and prestigious title of Gebirah7 and received honors of the first order. She had an official place at the court, was mistress of the harem, had enough power to seize complete control over the nation (as did Athaliah in 842 B.C., 2 Kgs. 11:1-3), was sent into exile with the king (as was Nehushta in 597 B.C., Jer. 29:2), and could be deposed (as was King Asa's idolatrous grandmother, Maacah, who first became queen mother during the reign of her son Abijam,1 Kgs. 15:2, 10,13, 2 Chron. 15:16). The< Gebirah> was a monarchical institution and had a throne and a crown.8

As Jesus is the ultimate King of the Jews, fulfilling the messianic prophecy in 2 Samuel 7:10-17, it would be strange indeed if Mary did not have this crown as the ultimate queen mother. The monarchical nature of the kingdom of God, complete with queen mother, may be difficult to appreciate for those who live in a democratic culture, but it was something accepted as natural in early Christendom, as witnessed by the art and literature.

In 1 Kings 1:16, 31 we see Queen Bathsheba petitioning King David, her husband, by bowing "her face to the earth, and [doing] homage to the king, and [saying], 'Let my lord, King David, live forever!'" This was common protocol in the court of an Oriental monarch, though the position of the queen seems to have been somewhat higher in other Near Eastern countries than it was in Judah and Israel (but compare Jezebel in 1 Kings 21:7-11).

Contrast this to the next chapter. In 1 Kings 2:13-20 Solomon, the son of David, has come to the throne. Adonijah approaches "Bathsheba the mother of Solomon" with a request and says, "Please speak to King Solomon, for he will not refuse you." Bathsheba promises to intercede with Solomon on his behalf (compare John 2:1-11, where Mary intercedes with Jesus), not seeing through Adonijah's plot to seize the throne. "Bathsheba therefore went to King Solomon, to speak to him for Adonijah." The use of the title "King Solomon" hints that Solomon acts in his official capacity (cf. verse 23).

Instead of Bathsheba scraping her face on the floor before Solomon as previously she had done before David, King Solomon "rose up to meet her and bowed down to her and sat down on his throne and had a throne set for the king's mother; so she sat at his right hand. Then she said, 'I desire one small petition of you; do not refuse me.' And the king said to her, 'Ask it, my mother, for I will not refuse you'" (vv. 19-20). Solomon wasn't merely being a nice son. It was a custom throughout the ancient world to make the right-hand seat the place of honor and of delegated authority, which is precisely why the New Testament speaks of Christ as being seated at the right hand of the Father. Bathsheba's status in society had changed; she had become the "king's mother."

The Bible teaches that the Old Testament types (such as the Passover lamb, the Flood, Hagar, and Sarah) find their fulfillment in the New Testament (John 1:29, 1 Pet. 3:18-21, Gal. 4:21-31). As Christ is superior to the Passover lamb which foreshadowed him, the fulfillment of the type is always greater than the type itself. Christians have recognized that Jesus Christ, Son of David and King of Israel <par excellence>, is the perfect fulfillment of King Solomon, the original son of David. Christians have also recognized that the Virgin Mary fulfills perfectly the role of Solomon's mother, the original <Gebirah> who foreshadowed the mother of the Messiah.

Catholics believe Jesus rose from his throne in heaven and, like Solomon, came down to meet his mother and elevated her to be with him (the Assumption). He then led her to a throne set up for her at his right hand in a position of authority and special honor (the coronation). Here, like Bathsheba, she intercedes on our behalf as the queen mother of the Church, the spiritual Israel (Rom. 11:17ff, 1 Pet. 2:9). From lowly handmaid of the Lord to <Gebirah> of the kingdom of God: "For he has regarded the lowly state of his maidservant; for behold, henceforth all generations will call me blessed. For he who is mighty has done great things for me.... He has put down the mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly" (Luke 1:48-49, 52).

Epicetus in the second century said that "if your heart is set upon a crown, make and put on one of roses, for it will make the prettier appearance." "Rosary" comes from the Latin <rosarium>, which means "rose garden" and suggests the presention of a rose wreath to our Lady.

Here is the crowning of the King's Mother (Rev. 12:1) and, more importantly, of the King of Kings himself (Rev. 6:2). It is through persevering in the faith that we hope to be given our own crowns (Rev. 2:10), and no other devotional practice surpasses the rosary in obtaining and strengthening the grace necessary for this end. "Every athlete exercises discipline in every way. They do it to win a perishable crown, but we an imperishable one" (1 Cor. 9:25).

T. L. Frazier writes from the Los Angeles area, where he prays the rosary regularly.

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1. Hislop's theory of the harlot of Babylon
2. An Evangelical refutes Hislop
3. Augustine responds to pagans
4. Why can't the modern Rome be the harlot?
5. Altars and the Sunday Sabbath are OK with God
6. Don't the bad Popes of the Middle Ages prove Catholics are pagan?
7. Evangelicals fail to avoid symbolism that can be linked to paganism

1. Mary a pagan goddess?
2. "Are Catholics in Conspiracy with the Pagan Muslims who worship the Crescent Moon?"
3. Flowchart of Catholic Doctrine

Caedmon said:

99% of the stuff non-Catholics cite as problems about Mary are non-required and non-important, in my opinion. If it's still that big of a deal, don't worship her. I mean, don't order drunk midnight pizza and charge it to her credit card. Wait, that's not right either...

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Jimmy P said:

Also, try this, get 100 people, be the 1st person, tell person 2 about something big time and have person 2 pass it on until eventually it gets to person 100...is it going to be the same thing that you told person 2? I don't think so...so many things can get reworded and/or twisted through word of mouth thus the Scriptures tell us what we need to know and it's always there unchanging...but lots of stuff can change through 'telling others and passing it on'...

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Jimmy P said:

Believe me Michie, I'm workin' on it...I have read alot on the CCC...I have the updated version I got from the Father Jordan...he has since moved on to a Parish in NY...

And yeah, alot of the stuff does scare me...at times I fear if I believe something and then find I shouldn't have, well then, I'm screwed...but then if I don't believe in something that I should have, well then, I'm screwed...
So basically, I'm saying, I'm screwed...

My apologies to any that were offended...it was never intended as offense...just replying to replies...

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