POPE: DEVOTION TO MARY COULD AID CHRISTIAN UNITY
Vatican City
-- Delaware State News. 1987 (Date unknown)
Pope John Paul II on Wednesday affirmed the Roman Catholic Church's teachings
on the Virgin Mary, and said her veneration could help promote unity
with other Christians, especially those in the Soviet Union.
The pope issued a 114-page encyclical titled "The Mother of the Redeemer"
in which he also outlined the church's goals for a special Marian year,
which starts June 7, 1987, and ends August 15, 1988.
Vatican officials said the document reflects John Paul's profound personal
devotion to Mary.
"Her exceptional pilgrimage of faith represents a constant point of reference
for the church, for individuals and for communities, for peoples and
nations, and in a sense for all humanity," the pope wrote in the introduction
to the encyclical, the most authoritative form of papal letter.
John Paul reaffirmed the church's teachings on Mary - that she was born
without sin, conceived Jesus through divine intervention, remained
a virgin and was assumed bodily into heaven.
He also said that while Mary was the first to believe in Christ and "leads
the way" for his Apostles, she did not "directly receive" the apostolic
mission from Christ.
Some critics have called the emphasis on Marian veneration a throwback
to the Middle Ages, saying it would not help the cause of Christian
unity.
Most Protestants, while in agreement on the virgin birth of Christ, do
not accept the Catholic belief that Mary was born without sin, remained
a virgin or was assumed bodily into heaven.
But the pope wrote that a study of Mary can help heal division among
Christian churches: "Why should we not all together look to her as
our common mother, who prays for the unity of God's family?"
"Reformed churches oppose the intercession route [or Mary's power of
intercession], but the encyclical will not hurt the ecumenical dialogue,"
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine
of Faith, told a news conference on the encyclical.
The pope also noted in the encyclical that Marian veneration has "molded
the faith, piety, and prayer of the faithful" in parts of the Soviet
Union.
"Such a wealth of praise....could help us to hasten the day when the
church can begin once more to breathe fully with her 'two lungs,' the
East and the West," the pope wrote.
Web Editor's note: Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is now pope Benedict. (2/8/2007)
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