Mormon's & Mary

[rmcmullan]

I liked your post, AuntieA. If Mormonism seems wild, sometimes bizarre, untamed and raw in comparison to the well developed catechism and never wavering teachings of the Catholic church it’s because, well, it is! I’ll certainly grant you that point.

You serve God as a Catholic and I serve him as a Mormon and in the final day I am hoping that will be okay.

 

[zerinus]

rcmcmullan, I have been working at understanding the intercession of saints myself. The little bit I understand is this. Praying to a saint to intercede on one’s behalf is the same as asking a living relative to pray on one’s behalf. I know mormons and many Christian of all stripes do this. You ask your mother, “Mom, will you pray for me?” This is not praying to your mother.

My understanding is that by the fact that Mary is the Mother of God, she has especially strong intermediary influence, and thus, a lot of people ask her, as you would your own mother, to pray for them.

I don’t really know why this is so hard for mormons to grasp, but it is, and it took me a while, a lot of reading and studying, to “get it”. What clicked for me is something I read that described saints as Aunts and Uncles in the large community that is Catholicism. That community includes angels and souls that have passed on before. Mormons do the same thing, in a way, with all the work that is done for dead people. You believe that those people are part of one family, and call them brothers and sisters, and believe they exist in a hereafter. The difference is, the religious beliefs of mormonism is that the living do spiritual deeds for the dead. Catholics believe that the dead can do a spiritual deed for the living, that of praying for you, and interceding on your behalf.

I have already answered that in the following posts:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=2465538&postcount=42
forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=2073826&postcount=222
forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=2074086&postcount=231

Also it is not true that Catholics don’t pray to Mary, but just ask her to intercede on their behalf. Firstly, asking her to intercede is itself a form of prayer. Secondly, they literally pray to her. They kneel down at her statute with raised arms, and pray to her. That is an act of worship and prayer. I don’t know how else you could describe it.

zerinus

 

[truthsilence]

The difference is, the religious beliefs of mormonism is that the living do spiritual deeds for the dead. Catholics believe that the dead can do a spiritual deed for the living, that of praying for you, and interceding on your behalf.

I really liked what RebeccaJ said here.

Yes, Catholics do pray to Mary. Yesterday, a special mass was held at the Cathedral of the Madeleine in SLC, remembering the trapped miners in Huntington, Utah. Many touching prayers were offered on their behalf, including the following:

Mary Most Holy,

You, together with St. Joseph, experienced the terror
of losing your Child Jesus in the Temple,
and you knew the great joy of his safe return to you
after suffering fear, despair and hopelessness at his loss.

Today we entrust the six men trapped
in the Huntington Valley mine
to your maternal protection,
and we fervently pray for their safety, their health,
and their secure return to us.

May the Holy Angels be present to them in their need,
and may all of the saints,
together with Sts. Raphael and Mary Magdalene
join the fervent prayer of their families, loved ones,
and all gathered here in this cathedral church.

Mary Our Mother,
Help us in this hour of great need.
You are the lowly advocate of the poor,
the laborer, the refugee and immigrant.

We seek our Lord’s saving love and mercy
on behalf of these men,
and we ask that his comfort and peace
overshadow and embrace their families and loved ones.

Hear and grant this our prayer in the name of your blessed Son, Jesus,
who is Lord for ever and ever.
Amen.

What RebeccaJ said is so true. And who better to ask to pray for us, (a spiritual deed) than someone who is already in God’s presense? Of course to be Catholic, you are not required to ever pray to Mary, or any other Saint.

 

[Rbt_Southwell]

ever

pray to Mary, or any other Saint.

I would think that this would appeal to our Mormon friends. Since in their beliefs all of them will be gods and godesses someday of their own worlds.

Robert

 

[Auntie_A]

I liked your post, AuntieA. If Mormonism seems wild, sometimes bizarre, untamed and raw in comparison to the well developed catechism and never wavering teachings of the Catholic church it’s because, well, it is! I’ll certainly grant you that point. You serve God as a Catholic and I serve him as a Mormon and in the final day I am hoping that will be okay.

mcmullan, personally I can be as wild, untamed and raw as the next guy BECAUSE of the unwavering Catholic teachings. But I am not talking aesthetics though, I am talking about salvation. And not just the personal kind that we wish to experience at our death. I am talking salvation for the human race. I am concerned for more than my own personal individualism and that is why I do more than “hope it will be okay”. My Jackie Gleason quote defines humbly trying to unite to a larger Truth rather than mastering a very small fractured truth. I am not “King of the World”; God is.

Respectfully,

Auntie A

 

[Kristine1957]

rmcmullan: If Mormonism is sometimes bizarre or untamed as you put it then why on earth are you a Mormon?

 

[rmcmullan]

Well, Kristine1957, it’s like Jackie Fielding Gleason said, "“I would rather be a bad Mormon than a good anything else!” No, I’m just kidding of course.

I have been trying for the past many posts to establish some kind of line of reasoning that the Mormon church has only been around since 1830 and is somewhat comparable to the Catholic Church circa 200 A.D., even before the Nicene Creed. Since then, the Catholic Church has been able nail down every last loose nail in the doctrinal framework and has tied the whole thing down and is protecting it from change. We’re not there yet. Allweather has bemoaned the lack of an LDS catechism. Our critics (maybe some of you here!) point out that if our church is so divinely inspired, it should have come out right the first time (and preferebly matched all the Catholic doctrine). That’s a valid point but where I differ is that I think we did get it mostly right and also I think that because of the limits of man’s understanding, it takes time to understand. And by time I mean generation after generation.

 

[nonsumd]

There’s a difference between a mistake and a misunderstanding. I don’t think it’s just Mormons who fail to distinguish the differecne between venerate and worship. The Hail Mary really confuses the point. Jesus prayed only to His Father.

Hello rmcmullan!

First of all, let me say it’s pleasant to be following such a civil, mutually respectful thread.

I am not sure how the words of the Hail Mary could of themselves encourage people to confuse veneration with worship, whether Catholics saying them themselves or non-Catholics observing Catholics saying them.

As has been pointed out, the first half of the Hail Mary quote the words of the Angel Gabriel at the Annunciation – was Gabriel “worshipping” Mary at that moment - or merely giving her due respect (which is what “venerating” means)?

The second half of the Hail Mary is our requesting Mary to pray for us (“praying her to pray for us,” if we were to put it in archaic English). We do not ask her to do anything only God can do; actually we are asking her to do what God logically cannot do – to whom would God pray for us?

That Jesus did not pray to others to intercede for him with God does not mean that we are to “pray only to the Father.” Catholics use “pray” in its original meaning, “address a request to someone”; Protestants seem to equate “praying to someone” with “worshipping someone.” Jesus being God Himself, what created being would be in the position to intercede between one Person of the Triune God with another?

The Second Person of the Trinity took on human flesh so that He could transfer His Sonship to us humans, to each of us, so that we could know and approach God not merely as the Sovereign of the Cosmos but also as Our Father (Abba).

I think that a proper Catholic understanding of God balances different ways of relating to God: to the ineffable Cosmic Sovereign; to our most intimate Friend; to our most loving Brother; to our most tender Father; etc. A proper Catholic way of prayer (one which I am still far from attaining) combines memorized prayer and spontaneous prayer, “worship” and “communication.”

Oftentimes there is no better way to express ourselves to God than in the prayers taken word for word from Scripture, indeed in the case of the Our Father taken word for word from the mouth of Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Meditating on the words of the Our Father as we pray them is valuable in itself: it is God speaking to us just as we speak to Him (“Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” is a divine lesson in itself).

 

[RebeccaJ]

I have already answered that in the following posts:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=2465538&postcount=42
forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=2073826&postcount=222
forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=2074086&postcount=231

Also it is not true that Catholics don’t pray to Mary, but just ask her to intercede on their behalf. Firstly, asking her to intercede is itself a form of prayer. Secondly, they literally pray to her. They kneel down at her statute with raised arms, and pray to her. That is an act of worship and prayer. I don’t know how else you could describe it.

zerinus

I did not not say that Catholics do not pray to Mary. I was responding to the statement that Jesus did not pray to Mary while on the cross. Of course he didn’t. He was alive still. She was alive. There is no reason to communicate via prayer with a live person who is standing right in front you.

As far as I know, praying to saints is not a requirement of being Catholic.

I read your links. The precedence that I read for Catholics using other people to intercede was found in the Old Testament. I do admit that as a former mormon turned atheist who is working back to God, praying to dead people is something that I don’t really understand. But, I don’t really understand prayer, at all. I still struggle with not feeling like I am talking to nothing but air molecules. So I’m probably not a good person to debate the finer points of praying.

 

[zerinus]

I read your links. The precedence that I read for Catholics using other people to intercede was found in the Old Testament.

I don’t know of such a precedent in the Old Testament.

I do admit that as a former Mormon turned atheist who is working back to God, praying to dead people is something that I don’t really understand. But, I don’t really understand prayer, at all. I still struggle with not feeling like I am talking to nothing but air molecules. So I’m probably not a good person to debate the finer points of praying.

Thank you for your candour; and I am glad to hear that, after turning to atheism, you are working your way back to God. Finding your way back to God is always preferable to being an atheist—even if that means joining the Catholic Church! However, if you feel that your prayers are like “talking to air molecules,” there is a reason for that. Paul explains it like this:

Hebrews 11:

6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

To be able to pray to God with a minimal of faith, you need to have a spiritual witness that He exists, and hears and answers your prayers; and you can only obtain that by returning to the Church which you left, the LDS Church. The reason is that the LDS Church is the only true Church of God in the world that He has established in the latter days, and which He acknowledges to be His own, and to which He is willing to testify by His Spirit. You cannot obtain that witness in any other church. Unless you return to that Church, and strive to regain that spiritual witness (that you probably had before and then lost), you prayers will always feel like “talking to air molecules”.

zerinus

 

[rmcmullan]

Nonsumd (is that like being nonplussed?), I know what you’re saying, there’ sort of a continuim between memorized and free prayer. Even in Mormon public prayer, which is never memorized, there’s a pattern and common requests that are always made. It’s a la plus ca change, la plus ca meme chose sort of thing.

 

[PaulDupre]

That’s one thing LDS should be careful of. They rail against the rote prayers of “apostate Christianity”, yet their supposedly extemporaneous prayers are very rote, especially that one long hastily-spoken word at the end: “isaythesethingsnamejesuschristamen”. One would think the speaker has no idea what s/he is saying.

Let’s at least be honest that all public prayer is formulaic to some extent. We Catholics have just perfected the art.

God love you,
Paul

 

[truthsilence]

To be able to pray to God with a minimal of faith, you need to have a spiritual witness that He exists, and hears and answers your prayers; and you can only obtain that by returning to the Church which you left, the LDS Church. The reason is that the LDS Church is the only true Church of God in the world that He has established in the latter days, and which He acknowledges to be His own, and to which He is willing to testify by His Spirit. You cannot obtain that witness in any other church. Unless you return to that Church, and strive to regain that spiritual witness (that you probably had before and then lost), you prayers will always feel like “talking to air molecules”.

zerinus

Oh PLEASE!! The only way to receive a spiritual witness that God exists, hears and answers RebeccaJ’s prayers, is for her to return to the LDS church? Zerinus you are showing your ignorance and arrogance as usual. Do you really believe GOD is that small?

You’re the same guy who told me, after you’d been here telling everyone at C/A if they’d just pray to know the BOM was true, they’d get the answer that it is, that, you yourself never prayed to ask God if the BOM was true. You “just knew” that it was. How should we know if you actually pray to God about anything? How dare you tell someone else how God is going to reveal Himself to them!

I have a spiritual witness that God exists, hears, and answers prayer and I have that witness outside of Mormonism, or even Catholicism for that matter. Its baloney like what you’ve just told RebeccaJ that made me question and almost lose that witness too. For some of us, being LDS lead only to confusion about God, and unfortunately for many, complete disbelief. If I hadn’t had that witness outside of being LDS, I probably would have “thrown the baby out with the bathwater” too.

Zerinus, we all know you’re zealous about your religion, but please quit trying to put God in that little box you’ve created with the help of your church. And you might want to stop spouting bible scripture around here as though it’s really authoritative to you anyway. After all, how do you know which parts you can believe, which parts are “translated correctly”?

 

[RebeccaJ]

I don’t know of such a precedent in the Old Testament.

Thank you for your candour; and I am glad to hear that, after turning to atheism, you are working your way back to God. Finding your way back to God is always preferable to being an atheist—even if that means joining the Catholic Church! However, if you feel that your prayers are like “talking to air molecules,” there is a reason for that. Paul explains it like this:

Hebrews 11:

6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
To be able to pray to God with a minimal of faith, you need to have a spiritual witness that He exists, and hears and answers your prayers; and you can only obtain that by returning to the Church which you left, the LDS Church. The reason is that the LDS Church is the only true Church of God in the world that He has established in the latter days, and which He acknowledges to be His own, and to which He is willing to testify by His Spirit. You cannot obtain that witness in any other church. Unless you return to that Church, and strive to regain that spiritual witness (that you probably had before and then lost), you prayers will always feel like “talking to air molecules”.

zerinus

You don’t know me zerinus, and it strikes me as arrogant that you would think you know what I think, feel, believe and even what my relationship with God is, or is not. And to take that even further and preach to me. What the hell?

 

[RebeccaJ]

That’s one thing LDS should be careful of. They rail against the rote prayers of “apostate Christianity”, yet their supposedly extemporaneous prayers are very rote, especially that one long hastily-spoken word at the end: “isaythesethingsnamejesuschristamen”. One would think the speaker has no idea what s/he is saying.

Let’s at least be honest that all public prayer is formulaic to some extent. We Catholics have just perfected the art.

God love you,
Paul

We thank thee for this food, and ask you to bless it. That it will strengthen and nourish our bodies and do us the good that we need. inthenameofjesuschristamen

Even my raised-as-atheist daughter knows that one!

All prayer is ritual.

 

[zerinus]

Oh PLEASE!! The only way to receive a spiritual witness that God exists, hears and answers RebeccaJ’s prayers, is for her to return to the LDS church? Zerinus you are showing your ignorance and arrogance as usual. Do you really believe GOD is that small? . . .

I was addressing my remarks to a very specific group of people, not to just anybody. There is an interesting quote from Joseph Smith, as follows:

The Prophet Joseph Smith made the following statement to a man who wondered why those who had left the Church fought so fiercely against it: “Before you joined this Church, you stood on neutral ground. When the gospel was preached, good and evil were set before you; you could choose either, or neither. There were two opposite masters inviting you to serve them. When you joined this Church, you enlisted to serve God. When you did that, you left the neutral ground, and you never can get back on to it. Should you forsake the Master you enlisted to serve, it will be by the instigations of the evil one, and you will follow his dictation and be his servant.” (in “Recollections of the Prophet Joseph Smith,” Juvenile Instructor, 15 Aug. 1892, 492)

Those who leave the LDS Church, become doubly darkened in their minds, much more so than they had been before they joined it—and “how great that darkness” will be!

Matthew 6:

23 If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!

Luke 11:

35 Take heed therefore that the light which is in thee be not darkness.

zerinus

 

[zerinus]

You don’t know me zerinus, and it strikes me as arrogant that you would think you know what I think, feel, believe and even what my relationship with God is, or is not.

I never claimed to know you. I merely commented on what you had told me about yourself.

And to take that even further and preach to me. What the hell?

Oh, too bad you don’t like the preaching bit! I am a preacher! Here is more preaching for you if you like:

Hebrews 6:

4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,

5 And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come,

6 If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.

7 For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God:

8 But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned.

zerinus

 

[nonsumd]

I do admit that as a former mormon turned atheist who is working back to God, praying to dead people is something that I don’t really understand. But, I don’t really understand prayer, at all. I still struggle with not feeling like I am talking to nothing but air molecules. So I’m probably not a good person to debate the finer points of praying.

RebeccaJ,

I think all of us have experienced that feeling that we may be “talking to nothing but air molecules” when we pray. Many saints and saintly people (such as Teresa of Avila and Mother Theresa) have admitted to periods, often years-long ones, of “spiritual dryness,” when they felt that they were getting nothing out of their prayer, that God was silent to them.

I guess we have to get beyond hanging our spiritual life entirely upon getting a “rush” out of our prayer, upon feelings and nothing else. If we can transcend the need always to “feel something” when we pray, we can train ourselves gradually to perceive God in the simplest, seemingly inconsequential, things, to hear Him even in the deepest silence, to see that He is truly all around us.

 

[GrandpaD]

Grandpa,
Where did you or your wife ever get the idea that Catholics worship Mary or believe that she sits at the right hand of God? We don’t.

Well, I know where your wife got it - from the Mormons. They teach all kinds of stuff about Catholics that is simply false, just as the Evangelicals do. When I was LDS, I was taught all kinds of anti-Catholic lies. Once I discovered that they were lies, it got me questioning all of Mormonism and that was the beginning of the end.

God bless,
Paul

All of you who think I said we worship Mary, please disregard that thought. I thought I was saying that my LDS wife thinks we do, if you thought that I was saying that, I apologize for the misunderstanding. No matter how I explain to her, she does not understand our veneration of Mary, and I think never will. But, that does not mean I am agreeing with her. Whoa on attack Paul, you are a bit sensitive there. I think you should not take it so hard. and poor Rbt, that is not how it happened as much as you would like it to have happened that way about Missouri, you have been reading to much anti-Mormon literature. Get a fair and balanced view, even if you hate them, be fair.

 

[Philothea53]

Mary is considered “an ordinary woman given an extraordinary task”. Mormons barely discuss her at all, except at Christmas.

Joseph Smith’s wife #1, Emma, is revered more than Mary.