This past week, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith promulgated a document to help clarify the role of the Blessed Virgin Mary and her cooperation in the work of salvation. One could say that this is the office at the Vatican that is responsible for responding to questions and areas of confusion about the central aspects of our Faith. We are always growing and deepening our understanding and new challenges arise in every generation.
Some of you have likely read and heard reports about some of the content of this document, primarily about the use of the title of Co-Redemptrix for Mary. These documents are always carefully and attentively written as they seek to explain some of the most intricate matters, always trying to preserve and protect the faithful. And often, the careful work that is accomplished is quickly undone through media reports and commentators trying to fit their opinions into YouTube soundbites and attention grabbing headlines.
In the face of this we need to all the more be bearers of the virtues of wisdom, understanding, deliberation and discernment, and the humility to receive and seek understanding over judgment.
Here are a few points that I take away from my initial reading of the document on Mary, the Mother of the Faithful:
- The purpose for the document is to address some titles of Mary that “pose significant difficulties regarding their content because they can often lead to a mistaken understanding of Mary’s role.” The titles of Mary are intended to help open for us the mysteries of salvation and draw the faithful deeper into an understanding of the Mother of God.
- The document includes a substantive discussion on the Eastern Christian teachings on Mary and therefore seems to me to be highlighting our closeness to the Eastern Catholic Churches, something Pope Leo XIV has emphasized many times already. I do not read this as any kind of a response to Protestantism or attempts to draw us closer to them.
- Mary is recognized as a Co-Redeemer in two ways: that salvation was made possible through her fiat and in her participation in the suffering with our Lord at the Cross. But the title is often misunderstood as placing her on an equal footing with the Redeemer, rather than a cooperator. Pope Benedict XVI also wrote of this confusion.
- In considering the Church Fathers, like St. Augustine, the words of a number of Popes, the Dicastery concludes that it is inappropriate to use the title Co-Redemptrix to define Mary’s cooperation because it clouds our Lord’s role as the sole Redeemer and the Role of Mary in her cooperation.