However, I've learned from my own life . . .
we humans have an incredible capacity to compartmentalize and rationalize.
It's like the studies of the JW's who'd schedule the 2nd Coming on this or that hill on this or that date repeatedly only to have the prediction crash and burn YET AGAIN.
There's always a reason to justify whatever the deceitfully wicked human heart wants to justify. And for the hyper-religious, THAT/those REASON(s) IS/are USUALLY WRAPPED IN 24 LAYERS OF RELIGIOUS HOOPLA and carefully finessed & justified, !RELIGIOUSLY-NECESSARY!, or at least !RELIGIOUSLY-REWARDED! incremental steps toward hell . . .
usually all with the smug-self-righteousness reserved for the hyper-RELIGIOUS who are habitually thankful that
!!THEY!! ARE !!!NOT!!! LIKE those Prottys, publicans, whatever, over THERE!!! IN THAT HIDEOUS OUT-GROUP BOUND FOR HELL! HARUMPH!
vs
GOD BE MERCIFUL TO ME, A SINNER.
I think that's one of the more insidious things about the pagan QUEEN OF HEAVEN personage morphed into the caricatured pseudo-Mary QUEEN OF HEAVEN personage.
100% of the pagan, INAUTHENTIC "Christian" (& nonChristian)ideologies falls wholesale into the "RIGHTEOUSNESS-BY-PULLING-OURSELVES-UP-BY-OUR-OWN-BOOTSTRAPS-OF-RELIGIOUS-HOOP-JUMPING-EXERCISES" varieties of heresy.
In this case, the fossilized !!!!TRADITIONS!!!! OF MAN Institution has a very long list of comforting rituals, trinkets, idols, disciplines etc. to perform--particularly comforting for the hyper-RELIGIOUS. The rosary alone seems to be a very comforting ritual affirming to millions that THEY'VE GOT THIS RELIGIOUS RIGHTEOUSNESS THING DONE RIGHT.
There are probably some percentage who do focus more on God supremely via the ritual. It seems to me that must be a minority percentage. Rituals are inherently seductive and they do not seduce into RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD, but into flesh-driven self-righteousness and the delusion that one CAN earn one's salvation by RELIGIOUS HOOP JUMPING.
. . . which is akin to satan's lie in the beginning. God established a WALKING, TALKING WITH MAN RELATIONSHIP of FELLOWSHIP, INSTRUCTION, INTIMACY.
Satan had a 'better idea' . . . gain knowledge by rebellious PICKING FORBIDDEN FRUIT ONE'S SELF. !!!!CONTROL!!!! the acquiring knowledge one's self--don't WAIT ON GOD--do it NOW! BE IN CONTROL NOW!
WAITING ON GOD is soooooo . . . DEPENDENT, IMPRECISE, DISCONCERTING, HELPLESS, HAS TO BE FAITH-FILLED WITH CONFIDENCE IN GOD ALONE. Humans don't typically handle such things well.
Our sin infection fosters our NEEDING !!!!CONTROL!!!! !!!NOW!!!
RELIGION IS ONLY TOO HAPPY TO FACILITATE SUCH DELUSIONS that we can HAVE OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS AND EAT IT NOW by a list of rituals . . . that flatter our ego and the hierarchy all at the same time. Such a deal, from hell.
Before long, the rot of the delusion has sunk in . . . to desperately awful degrees in horrendous ways. Pretty soon, we think of, FEEL LIKE, TREAT LIKE THE RITUALS AND THE FOCUS OF THE RITUALS REALLY DO
EQUAL GOD AND GODLINESS.
When God isn't even in that building, at all. And hasn't been . . . for days or months or centuries.
God have mercy on such deluded souls and lead them into HIS BIBLICAL RELATIONAL PRINCIPLES, TRUTHS AND ACTIONS.
Of course the logical implication of this is that we should not listen to the humans who argue against our Church, since our faith in God leads us to believe that He is with our Church in spite of the humans involved.
Our critics agree in this proclamation, "Listen to me: DON'T listen to me!"