The question of the title “Co-Redemptrix,” raised and clarified in the Doctrinal Note “Mater Populi fidelis”, is not a simple terminological dispute, it is symptomatic of a failed analogy. When attempting to speak of God and his work, human language is forced to resort to analogy. But authentic analogy, especially in theology, is not a convenient similarity; it is a path along the edge of an abyss, where  dissimilarity is always greater than similarity.

The instinct that leads to the forging of the term “Co-redemptrix” is the same one that, applied naively, constructs an analogy by similarity: Mary resembles Christ in the work of salvation, so we can call her “co-redeemer.” It is an analogy that seeks to tame the mystery, to make it comprehensible and controllable through a parallelism. But it is precisely here that the traditional analogy, if not “overturned,” betrays itself and generates theological monsters.

Analogy by similitude instinctively (that is, without critical scrutiny) leads to the birth of “salvific parallelism.” With surgical precision the document dismantles the title.  Not because Mary is uncooperative, but because the term constructs a misleading image. Analogy by similitude works as follows: 

a. it isolates a point of contact (both Christ and Mary suffered for our salvation. Both were associated with the redemptive event); 

b. it extends the similitude (if Christ is the Redeemer, and Mary is similar to Him in this work, then she can be called “Co-Redemptrix”); 

c. it minimizes the dissimilarity (in this process, the unbridgeable difference—Christ acts as God and Man, the primary and autonomous source of grace; Mary acts as a creature, redeemed and transformed, a derivative and subordinate channel—is flattened. The dissimilarity becomes an appendix, a footnote).

This is how, almost instinctively, a “parallel path to salvation” is established. The document warns against precisely this: “The danger of obscuring the exclusive role of Jesus Christ […] would not be a true honor to the Mother ” (n. 22). Analogy by similitude, failing in its primary task of preserving the mystery, ends up creating a diarchy in which Mary is no longer merely the first of the redeemed, but almost a complementary source of redemption.

The “Co-Redemptrix” becomes the terminus of a poorly applied analogy.

The Reversed Analogy does not deny similarity, but subjects it to a radical transformation. It does not begin with similarity and then add differences, but  begins with constitutive dissimilarity to interpret, in its light, the only possible similarity . It is an epochal shift in perspective.

Applied to Mary’s role in salvation, the Reversed Analogy asks us: 

a. what is the absolute and irrevocable dissimilarity? The uniqueness of Christ as Redeemer. He alone is “the one Mediator between God and men” (1 Tim 2:5). His mediation is causal, source-based, hypostatic (in the sense of the hypostatic union). This is not a difference of degree, but of nature. It is the primary, non-negotiable given; 

b. in light of this dissimilarity, what kind of similarity is possible? The similarity can only be  participated, derived, subordinate, and, above all, receptive . Mary does not “do” something similar to what Christ does from a position of equality or complementarity. She receives Christ’s work in a unique and perfect way and, by virtue of this received fullness, can be associated with its diffusion.

The document is a master in this application. It does not say: “Mary is similar to Christ in redeeming, but in a subordinate way.” Rather, it says: “The unique mediation of the Redeemer does not exclude, but rather inspires in creatures, a varied cooperation shared by a single source” (n. 28). Similarity (cooperation) is the consequence and  effect of dissimilarity (unique mediation). It is an action that Christ, in his glory, “inspires.” Mary’s similarity lies not in “redeeming with” Him, but in being the creature shaped by the Redemption so completely as to become the most transparent sign of its efficacy.

Through this lens, many passages of the document reveal a new depth:

Read it all in L’Osservatore Romano

The author is the president of the Pontifical Academy of Theology