Knowledgeable & CHARITABLE Posters Only

[Bix]

Please, can someone knowledgeable and charitable answer this poster’s question?

The poster asked this question in another thread, but the replies seemed to go off track. I believe it’s a question easy enough to answer without correcting others and worthy of a knowledgeable response.

Thanks
God Bless~
Bix

I have read Jesus sent the holy spirit so it will ask what we need. Jesus is the mediator between us and god. Pray for the intercession of Mary and then I guess she goes to jesus. Who are we supposed to pray to? Geesh.

 

[cjmclark]

I am by no means the most charitable poster here, as I unfortunately succumb all too often to the ever-present temptation on these forums to “out-Catholic” each other. However, I will endeavor to do my best.

I have always seen prayer as our form of communication with those who are on another plane of existence (i.e., in Heaven or Purgatory).

As Catholics, we pray directly to God in the person of the Father and as Jesus the Son. These prayers are (as I believe has been stated elsewhere) generally either prayers of thanks, prayers of praise, or requests for help/spiritual guidance. (I’ve never really thought about praying to God as the Holy Spirit, but I suppose it can happen. If someone can remind me if/where we do as Catholics, I’d appreciate it.)

We also pray to Mary and the Saints. These prayers are generally requests for intercession with God on our behalf, or requests for guidance.

We can pray to the dead, asking them to pray for us.

We can also ask the living to pray for us.

I hope that covers it all!

 

[kepha1]

Jesus is the sole mediator between God and man because Jesus is both God and man. It does not mean that Jesus and only Jesus can go to God on our behalf. We go to God on behalf of others; that does not mean we are being sole mediators, we are being subordinate mediators like the bible tells us to. Mary is but another, and effective, subordinate mediator.

“Jesus is the sole mediator between God and man” is not a trump card to discredit the doctrine of the Communion of Saints. The family of God in heaven is not a different family from that of earth. But it is to those who wish to abuse the verse.

 

[tbcrawford]

I may not be the most knowledgeable but I hope I am charitable!

We pray to God in whichever form.God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Spirit
Glory be to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit
As it was in the begining
is now and ever shall be
world without end Amen
We ask the intercession of Our Blessed Lady to pray for us as her prayers are heard above all others and we ask the intercession of the saints for we believe theur prayers would be heard before ours.

These are my thoughts

God bless

 

[cjmclark]

I may not be the most knowledgeable but I hope I am charitable!

We pray to God in whichever form.God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Spirit
Glory be to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit
As it was in the begining
is now and ever shall be
world without end Amen
We ask the intercession of Our Blessed Lady to pray for us as her prayers are heard above all others and we ask the intercession of the saints for we believe theur prayers would be heard before ours.

These are my thoughts

God bless

That’s right, I forgot about the Glory Be…an excellent example of praying to God as the Holy Spirit.

 

[Bernward]

Please, can someone knowledgeable and charitable answer this poster’s question?

The poster asked this question in another thread, but the replies seemed to go off track. I believe it’s a question easy enough to answer without correcting others and worthy of a knowledgeable response @
Originally Posted by billcu1 View Post
I have read Jesus sent the holy spirit so it will ask what we need. Jesus is the mediator between us and god. Pray for the intercession of Mary and then I guess she goes to jesus. Who are we supposed to pray to? Geesh.

Thanks
God Bless~
Bix

Hi Bix & billcu1,

When we begin our prayers, we do so with the words ‘In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit’, and we do this because they form the Holy Trinity, a Godhead Three-in-One. This is because God, is the Trinity, and the source of all love, pure and inifinite. All prayer is to God, whether it is explicitly directed to the Father, the Son or the Holy Spirit.

In order to save us from the sins of our human condition, which erode our delicate, God-given souls, God chose Mary as a pure exemplar from which to provide His Word in human flesh, Jesus - God made Man. Mary agreed to provide the womb, and the Holy Spirit came upon Her. Mary raised Jesus to Manhood, supported by Joseph, and at the marriage feast of Cana we read that She intervened on behalf of the wedding hosts to ask Jesus a favour, His first recorded miracle: turning water into wine.

Mary demonstrates then and now, through her apparitions also, the power of her love for Her Son, and offers us a unique opportunity to ask Her to intercede for us in our prayers to God. Her cousin Elizabeth gave us the perfect words when she greeted Her: - ‘Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee - blessed art thou amonst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb’. Our prayer intention is then requested ‘holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now, and at the hour of our death, Amen’.

Any of the many saints who have gone before us, marked with the sign of faith, who have been demonstrably able to help answer prayer requests for particular causes, may also be seen to intercede on our behalf with God. So by adding a worthy intermediary to our prayer intentions to God, they become stronger and more worthy of response.

I hope this helps,

God Bless

 

[UNITE_MY_WILL]

I would add for clarity… The “dead” are only dead in the physical realm, they are very much alive in the spiritual realm. So “praying” (asking for intercessions) to the saints (Church Triumphant), now born into life eternal is actually most beneficial since they are with God. Even those in purgatory (Church Suffering) are closer to heaven than we (Church Militant) are.

Peace,
T

 

[NHInsider]

The original question suggests that this is an either/or proposition: Pray to Jesus OR Pray to Mary OR ask the Holy Spirit to pray for you.

In reality, of course, it’s not either/or, it’s both/and/and. . . . We can approach the Throne of the Father, invoke the Holy Spirit, enlist the prayers of all the angels and saints, both here on earth and in eternity - all because of the Sacrifice of the Son!

 

[AmbroseSJ]

Jesus is the sole mediator between God and man because Jesus is both God and man. It does not mean that Jesus and only Jesus can go to God on our behalf. We go to God on behalf of others; that does not mean we are being sole mediators, we are being subordinate mediators like the bible tells us to. Mary is but another, and effective, subordinate mediator.

“Jesus is the sole mediator between God and man” is not a trump card to discredit the doctrine of the Communion of Saints. The family of God in heaven is not a different family from that of earth. But it is to those who wish to abuse the verse.

I might also add that Jesus is the mediator between God and ALL of creation, including the Angels. Jesus is the King and mediator of all creation. Our Mother Mary is the Queen and mediatrix of all creation. As was said in another post, it is not an “either/or” situation when we pray. Prayers to Jesus are seconded by his Holy Mother, even if we don’t specifically pray to her. Prayers to the Holy Spirit are still mediated by Jesus, the Word made Flesh, but the Holy Spirit is our advocate (paraclete) with God, even if we don’t pray to the Holy Spirit specifically.

 

[TimothyH]

Paul’s comments and arguments about Jesus being the mediator between God and man have nothing to do with prayer. It has to do with Jesus’ mediation of a covenant.

*Now he has obtained so much more excellent a ministry as he is mediator of a better covenant, enacted on better promises. (Hebrews 8:6)

For this reason he is mediator of a new covenant… (Hebrews 9:15)

…and Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant… (Hebrews 12:24)*

Paul was writing to Jews, some of whom had lived under the old covenant which was mediated by Moses. Paul was also writing to Timothy when he used the famous phrase, “There is one mediator between God and the human race”. Timothy was a Jewish convert who also had lived under the old covenant.

The old covenant was mediated by Moses.

Moses went up on the mountain where God presented Moses with his proposition to the nation of Israel. Moses then went down from the mountan and presented the proposition to the people. The people agreed to the obligations imposed by the covenant and agreed to enter into that covenant. Moses then sealed the covenant with blood and went back up onto the mountain to inform God. Thus Moses was the mediator of the first covenant.

But the old covenant was imperfect. The old covenant was a forshadow of the new covenant which was to come, and which was to be mediated by Jesus Christ. Jesus was the mediator of the new perfect covenant just as Moses was the mediator of the old covenant.

The belief at the time was that the Messiah would be the New Moses and establish a new covenant with the nation of Israel.

See, days are coming—oracle of the LORD—when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of JudahIt will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors the day I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt.. They broke my covenant, though I was their master—oracle of the LORD. But this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days—oracle of the LORD. I will place my law within them, and write it upon their hearts; I will be their God, and they shall be my people. (Jeremiah 31:31-33)

This is exactly what Jesus did, mediate a new covenant.

For there is one God. There is also one mediator between God and the human race, Christ Jesus, himself human, (1 Timothy 2:5)

Jesus could mediate a perfect covenant because as Paul writes above, Jesus is both God and man. Jesus alone is both God and a member of the human race. As mediator, he perfectly represents both parties who enter into the covenant because his both of them - he is both God and man. Jesus alone stands in the breach between God and man caused by sin because Jesus alone is both God and man.

So Paul, in writing to Jews, is adressing the subject of the old imperfect covenant being replaced by a new and perfect covenant. Paul is making the argument that Jesus is the mediator of that new and perfect covenant, and arguing why that is so. These are specifically Jewish arguments and they have to be read in light of Jewish understanding of the covenants. Jews were covenant people. The unique relationship of the Jews to God was because of the covenant.

It really has nothing to do with prayer. Paul’s use of the word mediator has nothing to do with prayer.

-Tim-