I do not usually write polemical articles but given the large Catholic population of the greater Cincinnati area, I think it is necessary to review why prayer to or through Mary the mother of Jesus is incorrect on many grounds. For those who are unfamiliar with Catholic or Orthodox prayers, many of them, including the rosary, entreat Mary to supplicate her Son on our behalf.

First, praying to dead “Saints” is not founded by Scripture. While I am unsure of where or when this practice originated, it resembles more the pagan religion of the Greeks and Romans, who prayed to patron deities, much like Catholics pray to patron saints. Correct prayer in Scripture is always addressed to God, more specifically, to Yahweh.

Second, the language used in these prayers to talk about Mary venerates her as divine, albeit, less divine than Yahweh. To quote a part of the rosary, “Hail, holy Queen, Mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope…” Mary is portrayed as the Queen of Heaven or Holy Queen in other prayers, yet nowhere is she portrayed as a queen in Scripture, and, to my knowledge, in the earliest (non-biblical) writings of early Christianity. Again, this seems more in line with Greco-Roman paganism than Christianity.

Finally, and most importantly, Mary is treated as an intermediary between Jesus and Christians. She is entreated to supplicate for us to her Son on our behalf for mercy, forgiveness, etc. Yet the Bible (especially Hebrews) says that Jesus alone is our mediator (Heb 8:6; 9:15). We have direct access to God through Jesus. Why would we want to have another mediator when Jesus himself is willing to do the job? If anything, prayers through Mary demean the importance of Jesus as our Mediator and High Priest. We are either communicating that he alone is not sufficient or degrade God’s work through Jesus, namely, that Jesus’s blood and priestly activity are not sufficient to make us worthy to come before God ourselves. Or, perhaps, it portrays Jesus as reluctant to be our mediator.