The Immaculate Conception of the BVM
Today is the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Along with the Assumption of Mary, it is one of the more recently created holy days of obligation thanks to the inflammability of the Pope, itself a relatively recent attribute..
As one who has been through the Catholic school system (grades 2-12), I have been exposed to the rapidly expanding role of the Mother of God in Catholicism. There is a word for this: Mariolatry (Mary + Idolatry). It didn’t help that the priests who taught me at Chanel High School in Bedford, Ohio, belonged to a religious order called the Society of Mary. Just to make things more confusing, there were two Societies of Mary (both denoted with an S.M. after the priest’s name), the Marianists and the Marists. Our order were the Marists.
In addition to all the attributes of Mary, and the special devotions to her held by the Legion of Mary, to which I did not belong, there were a whole host of saints. Our school was named after St. Peter Chanel, a French Marist missionary who was martyred for his faith in Polynesia (on the island of Futuna) and eaten by cannibals—the only saint known to have suffered such a fate.
New saints are being created all the time. Just this year, Benedict XVI elevated Kateri Tekakwitha, an Indian maiden, to sainthood. Here she is:
St. Kateri Tekakwitha
Just so she doesn’t feel jealous, some new attributes for the Blessed Virgin Mary are even now being dreamed up by the Sacred Consistory of Adventitious Marian Attributes (SCOAMA) in the Vatican, including the ability to solve Rubik’s Cube puzzles in less than two minutes, miraculously finding parking places directly in front of whatever her destination may be, and being able to keep her girlish figure for over two millennia.
That reminds me of my friend Alain Silver, who was once offered a relic in Europe, nothing other than a piece of wood from the Blessed Virgin’s boat. Now I do not recall any tales from the Bible about Mary’s boating proclivities, but it could be true!
Catholicism sometimes seems as cluttered as the Hindu or Graeco-Roman Pantheon, but I do not object to it. There are many aspects of Catholicism about which I feel nostalgic, though the statutory rape of altar boys and attempts to dictate what is and what is not sinful regarding human sexuality are not among them. But when I get troubled and confused, I simply return to my special devotion to the Sacred Multiplicity of the BVM.
Tarnmoor 
Wait… inflammability… does that mean he can catch on fire or he can’t? I always forget how that works.
Both meanings apply in this case: It was a sacred fire showing he was far from fallible.
Ahhhhhh. I am close to fallible myself… very close.
Mary, Isis, Goddess
The feast day of the Lady of Guadalupe is quite a party around here
lol knowing several folks that have come out of the Catholic School system I am not sure if that is good for the church a little knowledge is a dangerous thing..Seems to produce a limited amount of types . Those who run screaming from the place , those who run screaming at it or the ones who buy the whole thing and join the race to become pope..
I also am a product of a Catholic education. The nuns at the Catholic grammar school were, as best as I can remember now, Sisters of the BVM.
Mary evokes deep positive feelings in many people, not all Catholic. They see her as a loving, heavenly mother, and as a woman who lived, suffered and felt the joys of a real mother, as well. Sometimes these things have meaning apart from institutionalized religion of any kind.
When I look with lust at a hot babe, a Hail Mary helps me put feminine beauty into perspective ~ “blessed is the fruit of thy womb…”