Why Catholics Honor Mary
Catholics get accused of loving Jesus’ mother too much.
Think about that for a second.
Christians are supposed to imitate Jesus.
And Jesus kept the commandment to honor His mother perfectly.
So when someone says Catholics honor Mary too much, the honest answer is:
We are still trying to catch up with Him.
Wait… Why Do Catholics Make Such a Big Deal About Mary?
A lot of Christians look at Catholic churches and think:
“Why all the statues of Mary? Why all the feast days? Why all the hymns? The Bible says very little about her. Jesus is the one who saves.”
And at first that sounds right.
Jesus is the Savior.
Mary is not.
Catholics say that too.
But then you start reading a few passages and you have to stop for a second.
Because the first people to make a big deal about Mary were not Catholics in the Middle Ages.
It was an angel.
Then her cousin.
Then Mary herself, speaking by the Holy Spirit.
God Honored Her First
In Luke 1, God sends the Angel Gabriel to a young woman in a small town called Nazareth.
And the angel greets her like this:
“Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.”
— Luke 1:28
Wait.
An angel, sent from the throne of God, greets a human being with honor.
Angels do not usually do that.
When angels show up in the Bible, people fall on their faces.
Here the angel comes to Mary and says “Hail.”
That is the word you would use to greet royalty.
Catholics did not start the honoring of Mary.
God did. Catholics just repeat what His angel said.
Then Elizabeth Joins In
Mary goes to visit her cousin Elizabeth.
And Luke tells us that Elizabeth “was filled with the Holy Ghost” (Luke 1:41).
So what does a woman filled with the Holy Spirit say when Mary walks in?
“Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb.”
— Luke 1:42
And then:
“And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?”
— Luke 1:43
Notice the order.
The Holy Spirit fills Elizabeth.
And the first thing out of her mouth is honor for Mary.
If honoring Mary takes something away from God, somebody forgot to tell the Holy Spirit.
“All Generations Shall Call Me Blessed”
Then Mary answers with a song we call the Magnificat.
In the middle of it, she says something remarkable:
“Because he hath regarded the humility of his handmaid; for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.”
— Luke 1:48
Wait a second.
That is a prophecy.
Every generation of Christians will call Mary blessed.
So here is a fair question for any Christian:
When was the last time your church called Mary blessed?
Not just mentioned her at Christmas next to the shepherds and the donkey.
Called her blessed.
Catholics do it every day.
Every time someone prays the Hail Mary, Luke 1:48 comes true one more time.
Jesus Kept the Fourth Commandment
God gave Israel a commandment:
“Honour thy father and thy mother.”
— Exodus 20:12
Jesus never broke a single commandment.
Which means Jesus honored His mother perfectly.
Luke tells us that after the finding in the Temple, Jesus went home to Nazareth “and was subject to them” (Luke 2:51).
The Son of God, who holds the universe together, did what His mother asked.
Probably took out the trash too.
So when Catholics honor Mary, they are not inventing something new.
They are copying Jesus.
What Happened at Cana
At a wedding in Cana, the wine runs out.
That was a real disaster for a family in those days.
And who notices?
Mary.
“And the wine failing, the mother of Jesus saith to him: They have no wine.”
— John 2:3
She does not fix it herself.
She brings the need to her Son.
Then she turns to the servants and says the last words the Gospels record from her:
“Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye.”
— John 2:5
And Jesus works His first miracle.
Notice two things.
Mary brings our needs to Jesus.
And Mary points everyone back to Jesus.
That is exactly what Catholics believe she still does.
“Behold Thy Mother”
Now go to the Cross.
Jesus is dying.
Every breath is agony.
And with some of His last words, He thinks of His mother.
“When Jesus therefore had seen his mother and the disciple standing whom he loved, he saith to his mother: Woman, behold thy son.”
— John 19:26
“After that, he saith to the disciple: Behold thy mother. And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own.”
— John 19:27
Wait.
Notice the disciple is not named.
John calls himself simply “the disciple whom he loved.”
Christians have long seen every beloved disciple in that spot.
Jesus gave His mother to His Church.
And like John, Catholics take her into their homes.
She Was There When the Church Was Born
After Jesus ascends into heaven, the Apostles go back to the upper room to pray and wait for the Holy Spirit.
And look who is there:
“All these were persevering with one mind in prayer with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.”
— Acts 1:14
Mary was there when Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit.
And Mary was there when the Church received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
She was praying with the first Christians.
Catholics believe she still is.
Then You Read the First Christians
This is where a lot of people have a “wait a second” moment.
Around A.D. 155, St. Justin Martyr compared Mary to Eve.
Eve, a virgin, listened to the serpent and brought disobedience and death.
Mary, a virgin, listened to the angel and said yes to God.
Around A.D. 180, St. Irenaeus of Lyons said it like this: the knot of Eve’s disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary.
Wait.
That is the second century.
The first Christians already saw Mary as the New Eve.
Adam had Eve at his side when everything fell apart.
Jesus, the New Adam, has Mary at His side as everything is put back together.
Some of the oldest Christian art in the catacombs of Rome shows Mary holding the Child Jesus.
Christians were honoring her long before anyone built a cathedral.
“Doesn’t That Take Away From Jesus?”
This is the big worry.
And it is a fair one.
But think about the moon.
The moon is beautiful.
People write songs about it.
But the moon has no light of its own.
Every bit of its glow is borrowed from the sun.
Nobody looks at a full moon and says, “Well, that’s an insult to the sun.”
If anything, the moon shows you how bright the sun must be.
That is Mary.
Everything she is comes from her Son.
When you honor her, you are praising what He did in her.
Mary said it herself: “My soul doth magnify the Lord” (Luke 1:46).
She does not compete with God.
She makes Him look bigger.
“But Didn’t Jesus Say ‘Rather, Blessed Are They…’?”
Some people point to Luke 11.
A woman in the crowd calls out:
“Blessed is the womb that bore thee, and the paps that gave thee suck.”
— Luke 11:27
And Jesus answers:
“Yea rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God, and keep it.”
— Luke 11:28
Is that a put-down?
Look at who heard the word of God and kept it better than anyone.
Mary said, “Be it done to me according to thy word” (Luke 1:38).
And Luke tells us twice that she kept all these words in her heart (Luke 2:19, 2:51).
Jesus is not lowering His mother.
He is telling us why she is blessed.
Not only because she gave birth to Him.
Because she believed and obeyed.
She is blessed twice over.
Honor Is Not Worship
One quick but important point.
Catholics do not worship Mary.
Worship belongs to God alone.
The Church teaches that the honor given to Mary is different in kind from the adoration given to God (CCC 971).
You can honor your mother, your country’s heroes, and your grandparents without worshiping any of them.
Catholics honor Mary the way Jesus did.
And they worship Jesus the way Mary did.
So What Is the Catholic Claim?
Here it is in simple terms.
God honored Mary first, when He sent an angel to greet her as “full of grace.”
Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, called her blessed and “the mother of my Lord.”
Mary prophesied that all generations would call her blessed.
Jesus honored her perfectly, worked His first miracle at her request, and gave her to His beloved disciple from the Cross.
The first Christians called her the New Eve.
And Catholics still honor her today, because everything she has points back to her Son.
So the real question is not:
“Why do Catholics honor Mary so much?”
The better question is:
“If God honored her this much, why would any Christian honor her less?”
Because if Jesus gave her to us from the Cross, she is not just His mother.
She is ours too.
Keep reading: Why Catholics Believe Mary Is the Mother of God, or browse more questions in Catholicism Explained.
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Catholic Sources
Scripture (Douay-Rheims): Exodus 20:12; Luke 1:26–56; Luke 2:19, 2:51; Luke 11:27–28; John 2:1–11; John 19:25–27; Acts 1:14.
Catechism of the Catholic Church: CCC 487–507 (Mary in the plan of salvation); CCC 963–972 (Mary, Mother of the Church); CCC 971 (devotion to Mary).
Early Christian writers: St. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 100 (c. A.D. 155); St. Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies 3.22.4 (c. A.D. 180).
