The Myth that Mary Props Up the Church

This is Father Jared Cramer from St. John’s Episcopal Church in Grand Haven, Michigan, here with today’s edition of Christian Mythbusters, a regular segment I offer to counter some common misconceptions about the Christian faith. With the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe coming up this Friday, I want to talk about a part of the Christian tradition that makes a lot of people—especially non-Catholics—a little uncomfortable: visions of Mary. For some, these stories feel strange at best, manipulative at worst. The myth I want to take on today is the idea that these kinds of visions mainly exist to prop up church authority and control people through fear or superstition. Now, you don’t have to believe in Marian apparitions at all to notice something fascinating about the pattern they follow. Even if you take a completely historical or symbolic view of them, one thing is remarkably consistent: when Mary shows up in these stories, she almost never appears to powerful religious leaders. She appears to ordinary people with no status, no influence, and often no protection. Take Guadalupe as an example. In 1531, in what is now Mexico, a poor Indigenous farmer named Juan Diego claims that Mary appeared to him and asked that a church be built. The colonial and church authorities didn’t immediately jump on board. They were skeptical, slow to act, and frankly dismissive of him at first. That alone tells you something important: this wasn’t a vision that conveniently originated from those already in charge. But when, through the miracle of roses and the image of Mary that appeared on Juan Diego’s cloak, the bishop could no longer deny something was happening, the vision was affirmed. And by affirming that vision, the indigenous and mestizaje people were also affirmed and ennobled by a church that had been—until then—very colonial. The same thing happens in other well-known stories. At Lourdes in France, Mary appears to a sick, impoverished teenage girl collecting firewood. At Fatima in Portugal, she appears to children watching sheep. In Ireland at Knock, it’s ordinary villagers who claim the vision during a time of deep suffering and political oppression. Again and again, the pattern is the same: God’s presence—symbolized by the mother of God, Mary, appearing, whether you interpret it literally or symbolically—shows up among the poor and the overlooked… not the powerful. Several years ago, I stumbled into this pattern myself when I was preparing an Advent Quiet Day on visions of Mary. I expected to be dealing mostly with devotion, art, and tradition. What surprised me was how consistently these stories carried a prophetic edge. Over and over again, the message attached to these visions wasn’t “protect your privilege” or “bless the status quo.” It was repentance. Justice. Conversion. Solidarity with suffering people. And just as consistently, the authorities were slow to affirm what was happening. What finally clicked for me was how closely this matches the Mary we meet in the Bible. In the Gospel of Luke, Mary sings the Magnificat—a radically political prayer that says God lifts up the lowly, brings down the powerful, feeds the hungry, and exposes the illusion of wealth and control. Whether you believe in later visions or not, that biblical Mary is already a voice of disruption, not of institutional comfort. So here’s the deeper Mythbusters point: you don’t have to be Roman Catholic, and you don’t have to accept Marian apparitions as literal events, to recognize the theological truth they all keep circling around. God consistently sides with the powerless. God consistently chooses messengers the world would ignore. And God consistently speaks words that make the powerful uncomfortable. That’s true at Guadalupe. It’s true in the Gospels. And it’s still true today. So as the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe approaches this week—even if you usually scroll right past things like that—maybe the real invitation isn’t to debate visions, but to wrestle with this deeper question: If God still chooses to speak from the margins, are we actually listening? Thanks for being with me. To find out more about my parish, you can go to sjegh.com. Until next time, remember: protest like Jesus, love recklessly, and live your faith out in a community that accepts you but also challenges you to be better tomorrow than you are today.