Angels: Catholic and LDS

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I know Catholics and LDS have very different views on what angels are etc. I don’t think LDS believe in guardian angels like the Catholic’s do and LDS believe Angels and Humans are the same.

My question is can you clarify the belief in angels and where do these beliefs stem from? Is it revelation (in the case of LDS)? Sacred tradition? Scripture?
 
Truth_Faith13 said:
I know Catholics and LDS have very different views on what angels are etc. I don’t think LDS believe in guardian angels like the Catholic’s do and LDS believe Angels and Humans are the same.

My question is can you clarify the belief in angels and where do these beliefs stem from? Is it revelation (in the case of LDS)? Sacred tradition? Scripture?
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Speaking the LDS perspective here–
An “angel” is a messenger, that is what the greek word actually means. So an angel is simply someone who is playing the role of a messenger. They can be a spirit of someone not born yet, someone who has passed, etc. This is from logic (the greek word) and latter day revelation. I don’t know much about the Catholic tradition of guardian angel to comment on that.
 
Truth_Faith13 said:
I know Catholics and LDS have very different views on what angels are etc. I don’t think LDS believe in guardian angels like the Catholic’s do and LDS believe Angels and Humans are the same.

My question is can you clarify the belief in angels and where do these beliefs stem from? Is it revelation (in the case of LDS)? Sacred tradition? Scripture?
Click to expand...
Angels are mentioned all over in Scripture in both the Old and New Testaments. So the catholic belief in angels comes from divine revelation of which Holy Scripture, the word of God, is a part. The other source of divine revelation for catholics of course is Sacred Tradition. Through the study and contemplation of Holy Scripture and sound reasoning, the holy fathers, doctors, and saints of the Church have provided the Catholic Church with a profound body of theological knowledge concerning the angels. The existence of the angels is a dogma of the Catholic Church. They are wholly spiritual beings with intelligence and free will.

Interestingly, not a few ancient pagan cultures believed in the existence of some form of angels though they may have not called them angels or some kind of spiritual immaterial beings between humans and the divinity. For example, greek philosophy in some of its forms developed a doctrine of the existence of immaterial beings between humans and the divinity which they called intelligences. This belief stemmed from a doctrine of the gradation of beings.
 
Truth_Faith13 said:
I know Catholics and LDS have very different views on what angels are etc. I don’t think LDS believe in guardian angels like the Catholic’s do and LDS believe Angels and Humans are the same.

My question is can you clarify the belief in angels and where do these beliefs stem from? Is it revelation (in the case of LDS)? Sacred tradition? Scripture?
Click to expand...
The Encyclopedia of Mormonism entry on angels is here: eom.byu.edu/index.php/Angels

It contains sections on angels, archangels, and guardian angels, including some 50 references to scripture both old and new. I hope this helps…
 
In Catholicism Angels are a separate species from humans. They are pure spirit, non corporal beings. The have free will, and all the angels do no procreate, or die.
You’ve been given some good links.
 
Truth_Faith13 said:
I know Catholics and LDS have very different views on what angels are etc. I don’t think LDS believe in guardian angels like the Catholic’s do and LDS believe Angels and Humans are the same.

My question is can you clarify the belief in angels and where do these beliefs stem from? Is it revelation (in the case of LDS)? Sacred tradition? Scripture?
Click to expand...
Tour of the Catechism, video series on YouTube. This one covers paragraphs 325-384 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC).

Check the footnotes of the CCC for references to scripture and Vatican II documents. For example, CCC says "From its beginning until death, human life is surrounded by their watchful care and intercession.202 "Beside each believer stands an angel as protector and shepherd leading him to life.“203 Already here on earth the Christian life shares by faith in the blessed company of angels and men united in God.”

Checking footnote 202, you’ll find the scriptural references for the statement, “From its beginning until death, human life is surrounded by their watchful care and intercession”. Which are:

Mt 18:10
Lk 16:22
Ps 34:7; 91:10-13
Job 33:23-24
Zech 1:12
Tob 12:12

You can then use the Bible at USCCB.com (US Conference for Catholic Bishops), it is an online version of the New American Bible Revised Edition. And again, check the footnotes as this is a study bible.
 
Angels are a higher order of beings than humans. They are beings of pure spirit and intellects. Humans after they die do not become angels. A whole human is body and soul. A whole angel is just spirit.

It is true that angels have operated human looking bodies at least by appearances for short periods of time, but whereas a human is an intimate union of body and soul, an angel operated such things a bit more like a puppet master controlling material. An angel does not have animal appetites that pull their wills in all sorts of directions like we do. They do not gain new knowledge in the fashion of material beings. As beings of pure spirit and intellect, their will has been set by a choice they made at creation based on all the knowledge they possessed.
 
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