Is praying to Our Lady and other saints contrary to the Commandments?

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DoctorC

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In the 10 commandments, it basically states that we should place no others before God, & yet we pray to saints. I’ve always found this a confusing contradiction that seems, to me, to break that commandment. I mean, isn’t praying to a saint akin to placing another before God? Even praying to the Virgin Mary included. Yes, I do pray to Mary and, on occasion, saints too, however I’ve always had this nagging question in the back of my mind. I’d like to hear some of your thoughts on this & justifications for praying to saints & how it does NOT in any way break the 10 commandments.
 
Thanks Joel, but I need a little more “substance” than that. It’s not enough.
 
We do not worship the saints. As far as I know, we pray to the saints for their intercession to God. Kind of like asking them to pray for us to forward our requests to God. (I hope that made sense!) 🙂
 
The bible does say that the prayers of a righteous man are powerfull indeed. Although I have found in the bible cases of the living interceding for the living and for the living interceding for the dead.

I have not found any example in the bible of the living asking the dead for intercession. There must be more to it but I’ve not found it yet.

It’s good that you’ve asked this.
 
Discerning13 said:
Praying doesn’t equal worshiping.

-Joel
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We are supposed to give Mary Hyperdulia a form of profound honour, some liturgical music is unhelpful though and gives the wrong impression…
From Motet: Gaude virgo nobilis/Verbum caro factum/ET VERITATE
"Rejoice noble virgin, Mary, ***worshipful*** and pious...!
 
There is no confusion I feel. The Saints are not worshiped. To make it simple the Saints are praying and have close contact with God, so we place before them our intentions to pray for us also which cannot be equated to worship.
 
Aussieman88 said:
The bible does say that the prayers of a righteous man are powerfull indeed. Although I have found in the bible cases of the living interceding for the living and for the living interceding for the dead.

I have not found any example in the bible of the living asking the dead for intercession. There must be more to it but I’ve not found it yet.

It’s good that you’ve asked this.
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I suppose that would be because the dead, properly speaking, are not truly dead in Christ. Therefore, asking for prayers from the Blessed Virgin Mary, St. Paul, or whomever else one might wish to call upon is really little different than posting a prayer request on an internet message board or in a church bulletin/on a church bulletin board (my parish has a bulletin board in back where people may write out a prayer request and thumbtack it up, anyone passing it can see what requests are on the board).
 
Didascalia said:
We are supposed to give Mary Hyperdulia a form of profound honour, some liturgical music is unhelpful though and gives the wrong impression…
From Motet: Gaude virgo nobilis/Verbum caro factum/ET VERITATE

"Rejoice noble virgin, Mary, worshipful and pious…!
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Mary is not worshipful? :eek: Worshipful means capable of showing worship.

In an older context worship means other things. The old wedding vows included the groom saying “with my body I thee worship.” That did not mean that he worshipped his bride. Calling judges and other dignitaries “Your Worship” did not mean that, either.

The main problem is that you are equating all prayer with adoration. Prayer also includes supplication, which is not worship. In the book of Revelation, John sees that “the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and with golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints” (Rev. 5:8). Thus the saints in heaven offer to God the prayers of the saints on earth. Angels do the same thing: “The angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer; and he was given much incense to mingle with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar before the throne; and the smoke of the incense rose with the prayers of the saints from the hand of the angel before God” (Rev. 8:3–4).

This concept that the prayers of the saints can assist us has been with the Church since its beginning. This is part of why the Church in the catacombs celebrated its Masses over the tombs of the martyrs; from this practice came the practice we have of enclosing the relics of saints in our altars. The idea that the saints cannot help us with their prayers is a modern one, born of the Protestant Reformation and later. It was and is an historical novelty.
 
Chatter163 said:
**Mary is not worshipful? :eek: Worshipful means capable of showing worship.
**
The context of the motet is not that May worships, ie Mary worships god, but that she is *worthy enough to be worshiped! *, which is of course untrue, only god is worthy of worship. People often use excuses for such poorly written liturgy by saying we use the term worshipful in everyday circumstances such as calling Judges and dignitaries worshipful, but this simply implies that the term is being misapplied just as much to the dignitaries as it is to Mary. When you use to term worshipful in a uk court, you are in fact worshiping the crown and the queen. If one is forbidden to worship Mary in heaven, why would the same not hold true for a queen on earth? 🤷
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Aussieman88 said:
The bible does say that the prayers of a righteous man are powerfull indeed.

I have not found any example in the bible of the living asking the dead for intercession.
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Why wouldn’t that first sentence be enough to settle the question? Why must the Bible give a specific example? For instance, the Bible may not give an example of a man named Rufus praying for a girl named Sally, either. Yet a Rufus may certainly pray for a Sally.

Besides, the Church clearly teaches it. That’s the Word of God.
 
Me think’s you jest…It’s the oath penned by Henry VIII putting the Church of England as the font of all religious purity!
[/quote]
 
Think about it. If it’s wrong to ask St Therese of Lisieux or St Anthony of Padua to intercede on your behalf, then it would also be wrong to ask a family member or someone at church to do the same thing.
 
DoctorC said:
In the 10 commandments, it basically states that we should place no others before God, & yet we pray to saints. I’ve always found this a confusing contradiction that seems, to me, to break that commandment. I mean, isn’t praying to a saint akin to placing another before God? Even praying to the Virgin Mary included. Yes, I do pray to Mary and, on occasion, saints too, however I’ve always had this nagging question in the back of my mind. I’d like to hear some of your thoughts on this & justifications for praying to saints & how it does NOT in any way break the 10 commandments.
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First - If you are uncomfortable in praying to the saints then do not do it. There is no requirement in the Church that we ask for saintly intercession.

Having said that -
Do you think that asking a friend to pray for you would be placing that person “before God”? If you say no - then you can simply apply that same concept to the saints and to Mary.
Those in heaven are our friends and they like nothing better than to add their prayers to ours.

Peace
James
 
Aye, Doc, it also says to keep the Sabbath holy, but we don’t use the Sabbath anymore, do we? The Sabbath is Saturday. We use the Lord’s Day and keep that holy. The 10 commandments are important but be careful of the way you’re using them. They were part of the Old Covenant, not the New Covenant.

Like stated before:
Prayer to a saint is prayer for intercession from them. If you ask your friends to pray for your sick, you’re asking for their intercession on your sick’s behalf. Are you worshiping them?

The dead are alive in Christ, this is shown even as far back as 2 Mac (Jeremiah praying in a vision, prayers for the dead…) Mary is a human, I am a human. Ask me to pray for you, but not Mary? Why, but Mary is the Queen Mother, a position referenced 29 times if memory serves, in the OT, and the Queen Mother holds a special place with regards to the King’s favor.
 
Didascalia said:
We are supposed to give Mary Hyperdulia a form of profound honour, some liturgical music is unhelpful though and gives the wrong impression…
From Motet: Gaude virgo nobilis/Verbum caro factum/ET VERITATE
Code: 
      "Rejoice noble virgin, Mary, ***worshipful*** and pious...!
Click to expand...
This is likely an older English translation of Greek or Latin which has a distinction between worship due to God alone and honor that can be given to any. In more modern language, we say that we honor the saints, but worship God alone.

And when we ask for the saints to pray for us, it shouldn’t be to the exclusion of praying to God ourselves.

In the book of James, we are told to pray for one another, and there is no reason why this should cease in heaven. Following the command to pray for one another, it reads that the fervent prayers of the righteous are powerful. And who among men is more righteous than the saints (to the exception of Jesus)?

If we are not to pray to the Saints, asking for their intercession, then we also shouldn’t be asking our friends and family to pray for us either, because by doing so, not only are we also praying to them (‘pray’ (verb) to ask; to petition; to beg; to plead), but we are also making them intercessors and mediators. Christ is to be understood as the sole mediator between God and Men (as a whole) and Men’s prayers for each other go through Christ before reaching the Father or the Holy Spirit, or you could say, the ultimate mediator, where we play the role of a small mediator, but not to the extent to where it is usurping Christ’s ultimate mediatorship.
 
SighGuy said:
Aye, Doc, it also says to keep the Sabbath holy, but we don’t use the Sabbath anymore, do we? The Sabbath is Saturday. We use the Lord’s Day and keep that holy. The 10 commandments are important but be careful of the way you’re using them. They were part of the Old Covenant, not the New Covenant.

Like stated before:
Prayer to a saint is prayer for intercession from them. If you ask your friends to pray for your sick, you’re asking for their intercession on your sick’s behalf. Are you worshiping them?

The dead are alive in Christ, this is shown even as far back as 2 Mac (Jeremiah praying in a vision, prayers for the dead…) Mary is a human, I am a human. Ask me to pray for you, but not Mary? Why, but Mary is the Queen Mother, a position referenced 29 times if memory serves, in the OT, and the Queen Mother holds a special place with regards to the King’s favor.
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The 10 Commandments are based on Natural Law and are just as valid today as they were in the OT times. They are not part of the Old Law. The Sabbath is, however, part of the Old Covenant, which is why we are not held to the Saturday Sabbath, but to the Sabbath of Christ, which is the Lord’s Day, Sunday. This is the new day which we are to keep holy, and why it is that we are to worship on Sunday and not miss it.
 
DoctorC said:
In the 10 commandments, it basically states that we should place no others before God, & yet we pray to saints. I’ve always found this a confusing contradiction that seems, to me, to break that commandment. I mean, isn’t praying to a saint akin to placing another before God? Even praying to the Virgin Mary included. Yes, I do pray to Mary and, on occasion, saints too, however I’ve always had this nagging question in the back of my mind. I’d like to hear some of your thoughts on this & justifications for praying to saints & how it does NOT in any way break the 10 commandments.
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In order for praying to saints to be a problem according to the first commandment, it must be shown that doing so equates to putting saints before God.

Keep in mind that a prayer is simply a request (in older language, it was used even when talking with other living humans). To address your concerns effectively, we’d have to know exactly why it is you think making requests to those in heaven (especially requests that they ask God to do something) puts them above God.

But a short answer: it is no more worshiping a saint to ask them a favor than it is putting your older brother above your parents’ authority when you ask them to lend you a hand with something.
 
Didascalia said:
Chatter163;11110423 said:
Mary is not worshipful? :eek: Worshipful means capable of showing worship.
Click to expand...
The context of the motet is not that May worships, ie Mary worships god, but that she is *worthy enough to be worshiped! *, which is of course untrue, only god is worthy of worship. People often use excuses for such poorly written liturgy by saying we use the term worshipful in everyday circumstances such as calling Judges and dignitaries worshipful, but this simply implies that the term is being misapplied just as much to the dignitaries as it is to Mary. When you use to term worshipful in a uk court, you are in fact worshiping the crown and the queen. If one is forbidden to worship Mary in heaven, why would the same not hold true for a queen on earth? 🤷

There is nothing “poorly written” about the motet. First of all, it is not actually liturgical, not in its original form, anyway. Secondly, it is accurate, and the context–which you, not being a Catholic, know nothing about–most definitely is not that Mary is to be worshiped. Only an outsider would ever even think that. That is context that your mind created because no Catholic, no matter how praising of Mary the text may be, ever intends to worship her. Your multiple posts here have all been argumentative; this is a Catholic forum, not one for non-Catholics to come in and ridicule Catholic teaching. Go away, or at least knock off the ridiculous posts. Otherwise, that is what we have moderators for.

For everyone else, here are the words of the motet in question:

Motet: Gaude virgo nobilis/Verbum caro factum/ET VERITATE
Triplum:
Rejoice noble virgin, Mary, worshipful and pious,
brought forth the king of creation.
Hail unique virgin, hope of the faithful.
Hail virgin queen; hail virgin of virgins,
salvation of mankind, light of lights.
Our only hope, o daughter,
soften your son [toward us], virgin full of grace.

The word was made flesh and dwelt among us,
whose glory we see as the only-begotten of the father,
full of grace and truth.
Thus let our assembly bless the supreme Lord.
Click to expand...
 
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