Mary - Mother of the Son

While recovering sight in my left eye with its recently reattached retina, I am reading Mark Shea's first volume in his Marian trilogy, Mary – Mother of the Son. I cannot speak highly enough about it.

Shea deals with the usual criticisms and misunderstandings between Catholics and Protestants regarding Our Lady (from the uber-Catholic haters like Jack Chick to the mildly disdainful Evangelicals). Then he really goes to work on the "pseudo-knowledge" sorts like Dan Brown who see all Christian faith as a derivative of pagan religions and conspiracies keeping this Gnosis from us by the "evil" Catholic Church.

Shea does all of the above not with a caustic defensiveness, but with a Chestertonian wit and brimming faith which, by definition, has sought understanding and found it in Mother Church's patrimony.

So Mary, Mother of the Son is not merely a defense of Marian devotion. It is an excellent little book that helps move converts and wannabee converts from the road-map learning of catechesis to the more mature, Spirit-led faith seeking understanding realms of mystagogy.

Thumbs up!