Suppose someone comes to your Church and yell these words to you.
“Protestant worship the ceiling of the Church because they raise their hands up to the ceiling. You idol worshippers! You shall worship the Lord God alone!”
Of course you would think how ridicules this charge is. It is foolish. This is exactly how we Catholics feel when Non-Catholic Christians charged that we are idol worshippers. To those who insist that we put Mary and the saints above God, you better get that out of your mind.
Your analogy is funny. I certainly get your point. I too get very tired of being accursed of being an idol worshiper by those who do not understand our religion and our use of things like statues and icons.
Your analogy does however miss the main point… A statue or icon has a meaning that is important to Catholics. The ceiling is of no meaning except to separate the inside from the outside and to protect those who are inside from the elements.
I’ve never heard anyone calling protestants bible worshipers. But this is really the best analogy. Protestants do not worship the bible any more then Catholics worships the bible, statues or icons. But all of these object serve the same purpose… to teach and to remind one of the word.
The use of icons, paintings and statues started in the Catholic church from the very beginning. They were used because most people were illiterate. So the individuals and stories of the bible were rendered as statues, paintings and icons. The people were taught using these visual aids. A good example are the icons or paintings of the stations of the cross that have been in all (or just about all) of the Catholic Churches I have ever been in. These tell the story of the crucifixion. Every Catholic knows them and is reminded of them every time they attend mass.
Just as a Baptist, or other protestant might pray with a bible in front of them open to the chapter they that reflects what they are contemplating, a Catholic might pray with a statue, icon or artwork that reflects what they are contemplating. The art/statue/painting is not being worshipped any more then the bible is. They are way of recording the scriptures and its meanings.
In ancient times, those who painted the insides of Churches and who created icons had copy books. They contained outlines of the saints, angles, and different biblical stories. They would trace these on their media (walls, canvases, etc) and then color them with paint. This is why in many churches we see very similar art that differ only in the way an individual artist applied the paint. Typically this art did not try to be realistic but instead was very stylistic. The reason for this is that the story it told as what was important, not that person who was being drawn/painted. The painting or statue was to portray something spiritual, not something earthly.
I love the Catholic, Byzantine and Orthodox artwork. When I see one the entire story it relates goes through my head. It puts me in a place of religious contemplation. And of course I am not thinking that the object itself is to be worshiped.
As humans we have many ways to communicate. We should use all of our senses in communicating our faith. Having it written in words in the Bible is wonderful. But having the same depicted in art and in music raises to a level that helps the human mind understand it in a totally different light.
When people start going on about how I worship idols and statues I just tell them the above. Then its on them, now that they have had the truth of it told to them, if they want to continue ranting on about untruths. Some get it. Others continue to rant on …. For those their intent is to discredit the Catholic Church and not to understand our point of view. It’s their problem, not mine.
But just FYI: Not all protestant services are with hands raised towards the ceiling - most Lutheran services are actually quite similar, as far as I understand, to the Catholic mass in the way it is “performed” (sorry for the lack of a better English word…comes with being ESL