Like all honors, this one is a nuisance. Unlike many honors it is frightening. If you want to know what frightens me, check out this thread. Asbestos underwear recommended.
I think that since the Reformation there has been a certain counter-dependency to it, to tell you the truth. I don't know all the whys and wherefores of the Protestant depreciation of Mary (as one might say), but I do think we calflicks responded by saying, "Well you can't tell ME what to do. Gimme my Rosary, hold my Bible, and watch THIS!"
And, and the Protestantss will say this is delusional or demonic, for some of us it's experience. I won't say that Mary "brought me to Jesus", but I will say that she brought me closer to Jesus.
My own personal thinking, as an Episcopalian seminarian (in a virtually Calvinist seminary) was that I wanted to be at least analogically like Mary in that I wanted to offer all of myself to God and to bring God's love into the world. Of course, I say "analogically" because Mary already did that. But we still speak of people bringing the gospel to others or of them bringing people to Jesus, and we don't intend to lessen in any way God's role in any of that. (But after a couple of sleepless nights of sermon prep or after tears shed at the death of a child whom one didn't know 12 hours ago, one does feel brought into the "work of Christ", as a sharer or fellow-traveller, or something.)
Then, well, the Rosary is like vitamins. I mean I don't even know I feel bad when I don't take my one gazillion supplements (recommended, I hasten to say, by my physician.) I just sort of plod along.
But when I DO take my pills, if I look back, I say, "Woah, I have some energy! Looka that!"
Similarly, while the Mass, the Liturgy of the Hours (which, when all is said and done, is mostly psalms) and the Bible are at the heart of my daily life as a Calflick, I can sure tell -- if I think about it -- when I skip my Rosary.
Mind you, the Rosary mysteries (if you don't know them, ask. I'll provide a link) are mostly about the life of Jesus. But still, on the sort of childish and schematic basis that "Hail Marys" plus meditating on the life of her Most Holy Son are things pleasing to her, we consider the whole thing a kind of gift to her, as I might try to befriend a king not only for his (and my) sake, but also to ease the heart of his mother.
Anyway, if you say some couple of hundred Rosaries and have the experience I have had of growing closer to IHS, you tend to want to thank Mary.
As to my tag line:
That is part of a revelation less than 200 years ago to a "sister". The famous consequence of that revelation is what's called "The Miraculous Medal", a thing which in my protestant days and my early Catholic days gave me the heebie-jeebies.
But I was favored with a little revelation (NOT a vision, but there were tears) on April 15th of last year, and it had to do with our Lady, St. Catherine Laboure (the visionary of the medal), and with making a new attempt to give myself to the Lord.
And there really are miracles of conversion -- and conversion to Jesus, and only tangentially to our Lady -- associated with the medal. (I choose the word "associated" carefully.) So as I still hope to help people come to where they can see how much Jesus loves them, now I ask the Lady who told the servants, for her last recorded words of Scripture, "Do whatever he tells you," for her prayers
Also, it tends to sort of lay on the table my, ah, denominational predilections to have that tag-line.
Also, you say we put a big emphasis on Mary. You should see the Byzantine Church!
And you say you've been to Mass. How much emphasis was placed on Mary there? I would venture to guess that in by far most of the Masses I've been to she's mentioned maybe twice.
Thank you for all the information and links. You’ve given me a lot to think about.
I know the Catholic-Protestant differences can get people stirred up. I didn’t want this thread to turn into a bunch of rants: “Because they’re WRONG!” “No, YOU’RE wrong!” I was just intellectually curious about the difference.
I just meant that Catholic services mention Mary more than Protestant ones do. I’m most familiar with the Episcopal church, and I have seen a statue of Mary in one Episcopal church, but only one, and not seen statues of Mary in any other Protestant churches (except Nativity scenes at Christmastime). That’s what I meant about “more emphasis on Mary.”