Catholic Mariology: Paralleling Mary with Jesus in the Fifth Marian Doctrine

It is a common claim that Roman Catholicism deliberately parallels the roles and privileges Catholic Mariology grants to Mary with the unique offices of Jesus Christ. Often such is claimed to be simply false by some apologists, but inevitably Rome’s theologians and apologists, when discussing Mary’s role in salvation, reveal that this is not as farfetched as some claim it to be. Robert Payesko, the author of the popular three-volume The Truth about Mary (Queenship, 1996), in a work defending the fifth Marian doctrine, provided the following table paralleling Mary with Jesus, and their roles in salvation history:

Second Eve	Second Adam
“Highly favored” daughter of the Father	“Well-beloved Son” of the Father
Theotokos	Theos
Mother of all the redeemed	Head of the mystical body of the redeemed
Queen	King
Immaculate Heart	Sacred Heart
Coredemptrix with the One Redeemer	The One Redeemer
Mediatrix of grace with the One Mediator	The One Mediator

(A Marian Dogma Whose Time Has Some: Short Answers to the Ten Most Commonly Asked Questions about the Definition of the Final Marian Dogma, ed. Robert J. Payesko [Santa Barbara, Calif.: Queenship Publishing, 1998], xii)

Elsewhere (p. 8), Payesko writes that:

Salvation comes to us through the cooperation of –
a divine Person and a human person
Theos and Theotokos
the King and the Queen
the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart
the New Adam and the New Eve
the Redeemer and Coredemptrix

Finally, on Mary’s role in the justification and final salvation of Christians, Payesko, speaking on her privilege of being conceived without original sin (the Immaculate Conception), writes (p. 23):

While she is wholly dependent on the Redeemer for this grace, all others are dependent on her for their justification and preservation and/or subsequent liberation from sin.

As I have said before, Mariology is not a “minor” issue—proper Mariology is essential, and the errors of Catholicism on this score shows, with great perspicuity, why one must be correct about Mariology.

For more on this, see my book-length treatment of the topic:

Behold the Mother of My Lord: Towards a Mormon Mariology (2017)