Is the Communion of Saints Real?

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iohannes13

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I’m having an especially difficult time believing in the Communion of the Saints. On one level, I understand the Church’s teaching and see how it is possible to commune with Saints within the framework of the theology. But looking at history and how the Communion of the Saints teaching is applied by the Church, it does not seem like something that is real. These are just a few of the reasons that I am having trouble believing in this teaching. I hope, and would appreciate it if, you read them and take the time to discuss these topics.
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               Pagan Roman Religion.   Pagan Rome had a pantheon of over 3,000 patron gods of a myriad of purposes and/or occasions. Rome had a god to protect the home, to protect travelers, to help painters, to cure a cough, to help flute players, to look over fathers, to look over children, and the list goes on and on.  And the Roman practice was to pray to the correct god for the desired purpose or occasion. So if the appropriate god was not consulted, the cough would not be cured.  The rub is that this appears to be no different than the how the Communion of the Saints is taught/applied by the Church. There are hundreds if not thousands of patron saints for a myriad of purposes or occasions.  Who decides what the saint is a patron of? How was it determined that one saint would help flute players while another would not?  Why is it better to pray to one saint to help heal cancer and not another? Why pray to one saint for impossible causes but not another saint?  Sometimes a purpose or occasion is dropped and another added for a saint. Is the saint in agreement that he will no longer support “x” purpose and will instead help people with HIV (maybe even a cause or purpose that did not exist during his or her lifetime)?  In practice, the Communion of the Saints only appears to be a continuation of the old pagan religion and practices.
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               All the miraculous events associated with the saints always occur in some far off time, in some far off land, most of the time only to one individual. In modern times, like the miracles of Pope John Paul II, they still occur in some far off land with only one witness.  Mary’s apparitions are especially difficult for me to accept.  In the appearances, she takes on the physical/cultural features of the individual she appears to.  For instance, in France, she appeared as a Caucasian woman, in Mexico, as a mestizo woman.  I understand why Mary would speak to the person in his or her language and not in Aramaic, but why wouldn’t she appear as she was in life, a dark-skinned 1st-century Semite woman? All the other saints are claimed to appear as they were in life.
I admit that I am not familiar with all the Marian apparitions. But the ones that I know about fill me with even more doubt. For instance, Our Lady of Lourdes has been held by the Church as the heavenly validation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. In this case, Mary’s message seems redundant and unnecessary because the Pope is Infallible in matters of faith. His approval of the Dogma was enough, wasn’t it? That I’m aware of, Mary never appeared during the almost 400 years of study and debate regarding the divinity of Jesus. At least any such appearance has not been held up by the Church as validation of the resulting dogmas. Not until the Council of Nicaea did the Church establish the dogma of Jesus’ divinity and Mary’s title of Mother of God. Many excommunications, harsh treatments, burning of books, and banishments were dealt to various bishops from both sides of the aisle during these 400 years and especially during the times of the council of Nicaea. Why didn’t Mary simply appear to Arius to confirm Jesus’ divinity and that she was the Mother of God? Then there is La Virgen de Guadalupe…
 
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