Why do the Roman Catholics pray to Mary when she is only human?

Answer 1

Here is part of a prayer offered to Mary by pope Benedict XVI. Remember, this prayer is not offered by a congregation member but by the apparently most holy person to wander this earth:

"Virgin Most Holy, Mother of the Incarnate Word and our Mother,

venerated in the Shrine of Sheshan under the title "Help of Christians",

the entire Church in China looks to you with devout affection.

We come before you today to implore your protection.

Look upon the People of God and, with a mother's care, guide them

along the paths of truth and love, so that they may always be

a leaven of harmonious coexistence among all citizens..."

Really you guys???

But please, don't listen to me, open God's amazing Word and read for yourselves:

John 8:12(NIV) When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."

Perhaps answering why protestants DON"T pray to Mary will help clarifying why Catholic pray to Mary:

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Response to Why don't Protestants pray to Mary? What in their history shaped this view.The Protestant approach to Mary and to many other doctrinal beliefs of original Christianity reveals an underlying insecurity about the legitimacy of their faith. No thinking person, observing the rampant fragmentation, widespread conflict, and blatant contradictions in Protestant beliefs, could reasonably accept that such a system of opposing manmade sects could ever constitute a reliable guide to truth. Since Protestants recognize, subconsciously if not consciously, that the very nature of such an approach to Christian truth is indefensible and unsupportable on the face of it, the only semblance of legitimacy they can muster is therefore dependent upon the application of the principle of the lesser of two evils. They recognize that their modern tradition of men came into existence through an open rebellion against the original Christian Church. The only way such a rebellion could ever be justified is by demonstrating that the object of the rebellion was something truly horrific. A rebellion can be just if that which one rebels against is evil; but if the object of the rebellion is good, then the rebellion itself is evil. If the Church Christ founded - the one He promised He would be with until the end of time - the one He said the Holy Spirit would guide to all truth - the one with a divine guarantee of teaching bound in heaven - can be made to appear corrupt, heretical, apostate, satanic, etc., than some measure of justification might be claimed for the rebellion that brought the denominationalism system into existence. Protestants could then say, in effect, "even though our beliefs conflict at every turn, and therefore cannot really be true, just look at the even GREATER untruths that exist in Catholicism! Therefore we are in a better place." This argument is about as close as any Protestant can come to justifying the plague of denominations which the original Protestant rebellion spawned, in direct opposition to the will of Christ, Who stated His divine intent that all Christians would be ONE, even as He and His Father are ONE. Protestants therefore do not wage their attacks on traditional Christian truth out of spite or hatred, or even jealousy, but rather out of a desperate quest for a legitimacy which is objectively lacking in their religious tradition. The bizarre accusations they bring against God's Church - worshipping statues, making human beings equal to God, adopting pagan beliefs, etc. might possibly legitimize such a rebellion, if any of it were true. Of course, that would also make Jesus Christ a liar - but that's a separate issue. Building a shared base of anti-Catholic myths allows them to maintain a thin veil of seeming legitimacy over the underlying doctrinal chaos which prevails in their collective churches, and provides a necessary distraction from the hard truths they simply cannot bring themselves to face - that Christ founded only one Church, that He intended all men to belong to that one Church, that History clearly identifies the Catholic Church as that one Church, and that the fruit of their manmade tradition is contrary to the will of God. Of course, every year tens of thousands break through that veil, face those truths, and respond in spirit and in truth, converting to the Holy Catholic Church. But for those who have yet to receive the grace to make that transition, the only hope of clinging to the partial truth they are comfortable with is to find new and better reasons to convince themselves that the Church Jesus Christ founded for all men is evil.

-- Paul (PaulCyp@cox.net), June 06, 2003.

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When catholics "pray to Mary"they are merely asking Mary and/or the Saints to pray for us in exactly the same way as when we ask another Christian to pray for us. This is nothing more than asking for intercessory prayer. And just like most Christians ,when we are in need of prayer we ask those we consider to be closest to God. The problems is that there is no need for intercessory prayer. When the Messiah (Yeshua) or the Christian Messiah (Jesus) came to earth and dies on the cross he was the intercessory. "I and the Father are one." ( John 10:30) "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also." ( John 14:6-7)