Did the Early Church Pray to Mary? What Christians Believed Before the Split

Did the early church pray to Mary? What the first Christians actually believed about praying to Mary, the Theotokos, and the intercession of saints — centuries before Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant existed. The evidence is stranger than either side admits. A disputed Egyptian papyrus containing the oldest known prayer to Mary. Six hundred graffiti prayers scratched into a Roman catacomb wall asking Peter and Paul to intercede. A second-century bishop, two handshakes from the apostle John, calling Mary the new Eve. A fourth-century heresy hunter condemning a group for offering sacrifice to Mary — while defending her honor in the same breath. And a council in Ephesus in 431 AD that crowned her with the highest title in Christian history for reasons that were never actually about her. This is the full record, date by date: the New Testament's silence, Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, the Protoevangelium of James, the Sub tuum praesidium and the fight over its dating, the Council of Ephesus and Nestorius, Epiphanius and the Collyridians, Jerome on the perpetual virginity, what Luther, Zwingli, and Calvin actually kept, and why the Immaculate Conception and Assumption were only defined in 1854 and 1950. Whichever tradition raised you, tell me in the comments what you were taught about Mary — and which piece of this history you had never heard. Sources: Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 100 · Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.22.4 · Protoevangelium of James · Rylands Papyrus 470 (Sub tuum praesidium), John Rylands Library; C.H. Roberts, Catalogue (1938); dating reassessed by H. Förster (2005) and T. de Bruyn · Triclia graffiti, San Sebastiano, Rome · Catacomb of Priscilla fresco · Alexander of Alexandria, encyclical letter (c. 325) · Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 24 · Epiphanius, Panarion 78–79 · Jerome, Against Helvidius · Cyril of Alexandria, Letter 24; Acts of the Council of Ephesus (431) · Second Council of Constantinople (553) · Bernard of Clairvaux, Letter to the Canons of Lyon · Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III q.27 · Luther, Commentary on the Magnificat (1521) · Zwingli, sermon on Mary (1522) · Calvin, Harmony of the Gospels · Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus (1854) · Pius XII, Munificentissimus Deus (1950) · S. Shoemaker, Mary in Early Christian Faith and Devotion (Yale, 2016) #ChurchHistory #EarlyChurch #Theology