I've challenged FRoman Catholic FReepers to pray only to Jesus for one whole month and ignore Mary.
You'd think I'd asked them to kill their own mother.
Take Mary out of Catholicism and the whole thing collapses. she is so intertwined in everything they do, that they cannot imagine religion without her. That's a spiritually dangerous place to be as JESUS is the Author and finisher of our faith. He is the Alpha and Omega and it's by HIS blood lone that we are saved.
Spot on. I can only imagine what would happen to Rome if they were to admit their errors regarding their Marian dogmas.
Catholic Mariology is a symptom not the cause of problems within Roman Catholicism. The declarations of the Council of Trent locked the Church of Rome into aberrant beliefs. Luther and Calvin were basically trying to bring the RC back to orthodox beliefs, but that would have required the Church of Rome to give up vast power by yielding to Scripture. The five solas just don’t allow room for the Aristotelian humanism and dubious traditions that permeate the RC.
It’s no wonder the RC for centuries prevented the laity from having and reading the Scriptures. One only has to read Galatians to see that the Apostle Paul is addressing the same fundamental problem of reliance on works and merit that exist in the Church of Rome. Paul clearly thought the sinless life, atoning death and triumphant resurrection of Christ was totally sufficient for salvation; Rome not so much.