That Greek devotion to Mary ought to alleviate Anglican grievances against Catholic Mariology
2 min • Digitized on May 9, 2023
From A Defense of the Teachings of Mary, page 95
By St. John Henry Newman
2. As you revere the Fathers, so you revere the Greek Church; and here again we have a witness on our behalf, of which you must be aware as fully as we are, and of which you must really mean to give us the benefit.
In proportion as this remarkable fact is understood, it will take off the edge of the surprise of Anglicans at the sight of our devotions to our Lady. It must weigh with them, when they discover that we can enlist on our side in this controversy those “seventy millions” (I think they so consider them) of Orientals, who are separated from our communion.
Is it not a very pregnant fact, that the Eastern Churches, so independent of us, so long separated from the West, so jealous of Antiquity, should even surpass us in their exaltation of the Blessed Virgin?
That they go further than we do is sometimes denied, on the ground that the Western devotion towards her is brought out into system, and the Eastern is not; yet this only means really, that the Latins have more mental activity, more strength of intellect, less of routine, less of mechanical worship among them, than the Greeks. We are able, better than they, to give an account of what we do; and we seem to be more extreme, merely because we are more definite.
But, after all, what have the Latins done so bold, as that substitution of the name of Mary for the Name of Jesus at the end of the collects and petitions in the Breviary, nay in the Ritual and Liturgy? Not merely in local or popular, and in semi-authorized devotions, which are the kind of sources that supplies you with your matter of accusation against us, but in the formal prayers of the Greek Eucharistic Service, petitions are offered, not “in the name of Jesus Christ,” but “of the Theotocos.”
Such a phenomenon, in such a quarter, I think ought to make Anglicans merciful towards those writers among ourselves, who have been excessive in singing the praises of the Deipara. To make a rule of substituting Mary with all Saints for Jesus in the public service, has more “Mariolatry” in it, than to alter the Te Deum to her honour in private devotion.