Deborah,

A lot of the beliefs in Christianity come from the pagan religions that existed at the time of Christ. The major church holydays, Christmas and Easter, are both of pagan origen. Christmas is Yule or the winter solstice and Easter was the name of a goddess of fertility.

These pagan religions in many cases also venerated various women or goddesses. If you are in a library some time, there is a book called "The Golden Bough" by Frazer that goes into a lot of these ideas.

The Bible as your aricle notes, mentions Mary a few times, but never in the sense of worshiping her. That aspect comes from the pagan religions.

I have speculated (and it is speculation only) that some ext ra-ordinary events may have surrounded her birth since Jesus himself was a person without a human father. So there may be something to the immaculate conception and possibly her assumption.

That is a far cry from saying she is worthy of worship. Personally I do not and have never prayed to Mary.

As for honering saints on a particular day, I see no problem with that. There are days to remember many of the saints. The fact that I remember someone's birthday does not mean I worship them.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. Thanks for the writeup. It was interesting.

Glenn