The inefficacy of prayers to Mary

“There is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus.” The scriptures are clear on this. But I’m a pastor living in a culture that demands I accept Mary as a co-mediator between God and man, and sometimes even a better one. I’ve even had people from outside our church fellowship demand that I not speak against Mary’s salvific mediation inside our church, where they don’t even attend. But here’s the thing: God the Son didn’t sacrifice by becoming one of us forever, and suffer and die in our place on the cross, just to have His “church” claim He is an insufficient mediator on His own and we must get to Him through His human, earthly mother. She was greatly blessed to be the vessel through whom He forever entered His human nature. But she is not a go-between that can get you and me heard by Him. He is the go-between we need, and He is more than sufficient in the role. He even played that role for Mary. The goal is for us to gain fellowship with God the Father. And The Son alone is the way. “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” Jesus said. “No one comes to the Father except by Me.” Mary isn’t even in that equation, not even mentioned as an afterthought. It is not disrespecting her to say that; it is disrespecting both her and her God to pretend otherwise. If she could hear your prayers, and thus knew you were calling her Son’s sacrifice insufficient for your salvation, it would only make her rightly angry at you. She loves her Son, both as Son of Man and Son of God. Disrespecting Him by venerating her would be no way to get her attention, even if you needed it.