In Ineffabilis Deus, 1854, Pope Pius IX offers a tidy summary of established dogma regarding Mary.

“Let all the children of the Catholic Church, who are so very dear to us, hear these words of ours. With a still more ardent zeal for piety, religion and love, let them continue to venerate, invoke and pray to the most Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, conceived without original sin. Let them fly with utter confidence to this most sweet Mother of mercy and grace in all dangers, difficulties, needs, doubts and fears. Under her guidance, under her patronage, under her kindness and protection, nothing is to be feared; nothing is hopeless. Because, while bearing toward us a truly motherly affection and having in her care the work of our salvation, she is solicitous about the whole human race. And since she has been appointed by God to be the Queen of heaven and earth, and is exalted above all the choirs of angels and saints, and even stands at the right hand of her only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, she presents our petitions in a most efficacious manner. What she asks, she obtains. Her pleas can never be unheard.”

The above paragraph can be taken point by point and compared with Scripture to show where each is doctrinally incorrect, forbidden, or relegated to God alone. This last category is why people say Catholics worship Mary. Catholic doctrine may give it a different name (adoration, reverence, veneration, honor, etc) but when it includes attributes that Scripture has expressly reserved for the recognition of God alone, it is rightly called worship.

This isn’t a difference of Bible interpretation. The Catholic church freely admits that tradition supersedes the authority of Scripture. Which makes me wonder: Are there any components of Biblical worship in Catholic tradition that are reserved for God alone? I can’t think of any.

Samhain was practiced by one small community in Ireland, and by the best evidence, was a festival taken after the harvest. There’s no indication it had any religious connotations.

The bonfires are first attested after the Church of England split from the Catholic Church. Catholic peoples would light fires and pray through the night until the fires went out. They did this because the Anglican Church discriminated against the Catholic beliefs.

The “dark” things like skeletons and the grim reaper that are associated with Halloween aren’t tied to pagans; it’s a kind of memento mori. Remember death. It’s important for Christians to remember the examples of our faith that have passed on, and to remember that we are not guaranteed tomorrow.

It’s not just Catholics, but the majority of Christians believe in the immortality of the soul and reject soul sleep, or at least don’t find it as the only plausible interpretation of Scripture. Also, even with soul immortality being the norm among Catholics, the Church does not dictate how Hell must be conceptualized. There are schools of thought that believe souls in Hell are annihilated or eventually stop being tortured though they remain forever separated from God.

The Catholic Church does not teach that any saints, including Mary are worthy of worship; neither do the Orthodox or several Protestant denominations. A clear distinction is made between intercessor and mediator. If one asks another to pray for them, they ask another to intercede, but that doesn’t equate to worshipping that other person nor believing they can save your soul. The same is true when Catholics (and many other Christians) ask the dead to pray for them. In fact, the term “pray” comes from Old English “I pray thee”, which was a way of asking someone to do something; it’s not worship.

If you’re going to preach on what the Catholic Church believes, don’t straw men them. Also, don’t single them out for beliefs shared by many other kinds of Believers.

Even if you think the Catholic Church is entirely wrong, the Reformation is not something to be celebrated. At best, it’s like a surgery or chemotherapy; much of the disease had to be painfully removed. Even to this day, there are those separated from the Truth one way or the other. That’s why the Reformation should be something mourned, even if you view it as necessary.

Momento Mori. Remember death. And may God have mercy on those deceived.