Wow, that sounds really screwed up and I’m glad you’re still alive to tell the tale!

As for Mary representing matter, it likely won’t make sense to you, especially if you’ve delved into the non-dualistic aspects of Buddhism. I am a non-dualist myself, and the separation of matter and spirit I find to be a major distraction to finding wisdom.

However, I can grant an olive branch to someone who symbolizes matter as Mary, or the divine feminine. Because in many wisdom traditions, the feminine is attributed to the Earth spirit, or Gaia. The ground is the womb where we plant our seeds. It nurtures and scolds us like a mother or grandmother. So I can see the metaphorical connection, at least