Hail Mary full of grace…And by their fruits you shall know them 😉

Trad catholic here to explain the consequences of differing theology between trad catholics and protestants.

The book “the city of God vs the city of man by Timothy S Flanders sums up the theological differences in a few words “By removing Mary as the throne of Christ, it was the denial of original sin and the corresponding belief in infinite progress”.

By “Removing the divinely-appointed human authority of the mother, the fundamental hinge of Christian culture in piety of the fourth commandment received a devasting wound”.

So basically by not honouring Mama Mary, one commits a mortal sin and as a consequence Grace is diminished (our minds are darkened and are wills are weakened).

One can easily see the impact of differing levels of grace by denomination. https://onepeterfive.com/new-survey-shows-disparity-of-beliefs-between-latin-mass-novus-ordo-catholics/
Basically its a survey of traditional catholics beliefs/practices vs novus ordo catholic (which is in line with many protestant denominations).
As Jesus has said “you shall know them by their fruits”

About Jesus’ brothers:
Joseph was older when he was betrothed to Mary. More than likely, given the culture, he had a wife (who probably died) and could very well have had kids. Extremely likely. We don’t know though.
And, as I had it explained to me, the original language (greek or aramaic) was way more descriptive than english and ‘brothers’ would also be synonymous with ‘cousins’. Hard to say, but no big deal for me as a devout Catholic. Many fixate on Mary’s continued virginity, but the writers didn’t think it was important so it’s probably not. We do know that Joseph died inbetween the incident at the temple and when Jesus started his ministry. Again, the gospel writers didn’t think it pertinent.

About interceding for us though, that’s big in Catholicism. Others than Mary have been known to intercede. Does she? Yes. She told us so herself. She’s appeared to a number of people in the centuries since – to Juan diego in Mexico, and to the kids at Lourdes, as well as others, now considered saints.

That all happened well after the gospels and epistles were written. Part of the Magisterium and is why the Bible isn’t the whole story.