Protestants:If you don't pray to Saints, do you pray to Angels?

[byoby]

Okay, try your Bible out on the following:

The Eucharist
John 6: 48-59
Math 26: 26-28
Mark: 14: 22-24
Luke 22: 19-20
1 Cor 11: 23-29

Penance and the forgiveness of sins:
Math 18: 15-18

Christ founds his Church:
Matt 16:18
John 10: 27-28
John 10: 14-16
1 Cor 12: 12, 27
Eph 4: 4-6
Acts 2: 1-4
John 14: 16-17
Luke 10:16
Acts 1: 8

peace

I believe in the Eucharist as it is presented in the Bible. Jesus said “Do this in memory of me.” I do not believe the bread and wine are literally the Body & Blood of Christ and this is affirmed by the Apostle Paul in 1 Cor. when he calls bread, bread. Christ is all we need spiritually and someday physically as well at the ressurection. Do you beleive that at the Passover Meal Jesus was giving the Apostles his literall flesh & blood to eat & drink? or is He speaking in a spiritual sense. If we take this literally than Catholics, once they partake in the Eucharist should never have to eat and drink again if you read John chapter 6 in its entirety. I believe that Christ is present at the Eucharist because He is in all of us who believe. I do not need an ordained Catholic Priest to put Christ in me. I believe that is a job for God.

I do not see how Mathew 18:15-18 applies in the way you have presented it. If I have sinned against you by expressing my beliefs than I am sorry and I will leave this site.

I would encourage you to read 1 Peter 2:4-12 to see what Peter and I believe about Mathew 16:18. I to believe in the one “True Church” I think that you and I might define Church differently. I believe that all Believers of the Gospel both hearers and doers of the Word are members of the True Church, One Body. Those who are members of this Body should exhibit an attempt to become more like Christ because we are His visible presence to unbelievers in the world. This again is not a literall body because I do not see the hands or the feet or any other body part at any church in the literall sense of the word. I can see how Catholics if they replace the word “Church” with the words “Catholic Church” in the Bible can arrive at an entirely different meaning for the word church. I point to the book of Revelations in which there are 7 Churches with Christ as the head. If they were Catholic with Peter as the head than why did Christ communicate his praise and rebuke through John? These Churches all had differing doctrines, some that Christ praised and others He rebuked. There have been divisions and doctrinal heresy’s since the beginning of the Church Age. Christ does not save churches, but people and in Revelations Salvation is promised to those who repent of practices Christ does not approve of in there respective local Churches.

Some of the scriptures you have pointed me to seem to imply that you believe that I am not a Christian.

 

[byoby]

Alright here we go…prayers other than those given to God:

Psalm 103:20-21
Bless the LORD, O you his angels, you mighty ones who do his bidding, obedient to his spoken word. Bless the LORD, all his hosts, his ministers that do his will.

Psalm 148:1-2
Praise the LORD! Praise the LORD from the heavens; praise him in the heights! Praise him, all his angels; praise him, all his host!

And we can see the unity of earthly and heavenly prayer in Rev 5:13 where it says, "And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all therein, saying, “To Him who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might for ever and ever!”

Likewise, The book of Revelation tells us that the heavenly elders and the Angel carry our prayers to the altar and offer them to God.

More intercession by the saints is found in 2 Maccabees 15:11-16
which says:

“Having armed each one of them not so much with the safety given by shield and lance as with that confidence which springs from noble language, he encouraged them all by describing to them a convincing dream, a vision, as it were. What he had seen was this: Onias, the former high priest, that paragon of men, modest of bearing and gentle of manners, suitably eloquent and trained from boyhood in the practice of every virtue, Onias was stretching out his hands and praying for the whole Jewish community. Next, there appeared a man equally remarkable for his great age and dignity and invested with a marvellous and impressive air of majesty. Onias began to speak: “This is a man”, he said, “who loves his brothers and prays much for the people and the holy city, Jeremiah, the prophet of God.” Jeremiah then stretched out his right hand and presented Judas with a golden sword, saying as he gave it, `Take this holy sword as a gift from God; with it you will shatter the enemy.”

Jesus himself spoke with Moses and Elijah on the mount of transfiguration and it is clear that he received some kind of consolation from this. If Jesus would do something like this than surely it must be acceptable for us. It seems clear to me that there is plenty of biblical evidence for the Catholic practice of praying to Mary and the saints.

I have responded to these scriptures in earlier post on this thread and if you read them you will see what my reasoning is. Right or Wrong this is where I am in my thinking and still remain unconvinced.

 

[Ginger2]

reost # 7

If you are asking saints to pray for you, aren’t you praying to them with your request?

When you ask God to help you overcome some obstacle, you are praying to Him asking for His help, correct?

So, you must be praying to the saint asking for their help (to pray for you) also.

If you are not praying to the saint, what is the method by which you are asking for their prayers, called.

You are not texting. You are not using a telephone. You are not emailing, nor snail mail.

I call it prayer. What do Catholics call it?

 

[Pax]

I have responded to these scriptures in earlier post on this thread and if you read them you will see what my reasoning is. Right or Wrong this is where I am in my thinking and still remain unconvinced.

Perhaps, the problem in your response is the “I” and “my thinking.”

Your personal interpretation and my interpretation cannot rightly be outside the lines of historical Christian teaching. The Catholic position is the historical Christian teaching. If you do not listen to the Church where are you?

 

[christcnection1]

Except for the Scripture discussed earlier in this thread…see posts 14, 15 and afterward.

I believe the Church’s teaching on this is only complimented by scripture. I don’t believe it endorses it in the most direct and absolute sense as with many other truths. This doesn’t bother me however. The Bible itself never claims to be the final and sole rule of faith. The Bible does however support that the Church is the pillar and bulwark of the truth. (1 Tim 3:15)

The early Church did not believe in using the Bible alone, but they supported the God-given hierarchal authority of the Church. This is more than good enough for me. It was also good enough for all the individuals who affirmed which books belonged in the Bible centuries after Christ, as well as supported our Biblical interpretations concerning a litany of issues.

If God allowed His people to fall into countless serious falsehoods for approximately 1,500 years, He either doesn’t care or isn’t a God of mercy and compassion. No, quite the contrary. The authority of the Church stands, not only on this issue, but all others.

He didn’t give us a Bible alone with thousands of denominations to interpret it for themselves. This is a God of confusion and disunity.

 

[mgrfin]

I believe in the Eucharist as it is presented in the Bible. Jesus said “Do this in memory of me.” I do not believe the bread and wine are literally the Body & Blood of Christ and this is affirmed by the Apostle Paul in 1 Cor. when he calls bread, bread. Christ is all we need spiritually and someday physically as well at the ressurection. Do you beleive that at the Passover Meal Jesus was giving the Apostles his literall flesh & blood to eat & drink? or is He speaking in a spiritual sense. If we take this literally than Catholics, once they partake in the Eucharist should never have to eat and drink again if you read John chapter 6 in its entirety. I believe that Christ is present at the Eucharist because He is in all of us who believe. I do not need an ordained Catholic Priest to put Christ in me. I believe that is a job for God.

I do not see how Mathew 18:15-18 applies in the way you have presented it. If I have sinned against you by expressing my beliefs than I am sorry and I will leave this site.

I would encourage you to read 1 Peter 2:4-12 to see what Peter and I believe about Mathew 16:18. I to believe in the one “True Church” I think that you and I might define Church differently. I believe that all Believers of the Gospel both hearers and doers of the Word are members of the True Church, One Body. Those who are members of this Body should exhibit an attempt to become more like Christ because we are His visible presence to unbelievers in the world. This again is not a literall body because I do not see the hands or the feet or any other body part at any church in the literall sense of the word. I can see how Catholics if they replace the word “Church” with the words “Catholic Church” in the Bible can arrive at an entirely different meaning for the word church. I point to the book of Revelations in which there are 7 Churches with Christ as the head. If they were Catholic with Peter as the head than why did Christ communicate his praise and rebuke through John? These Churches all had differing doctrines, some that Christ praised and others He rebuked. There have been divisions and doctrinal heresy’s since the beginning of the Church Age. Christ does not save churches, but people and in Revelations Salvation is promised to those who repent of practices Christ does not approve of in there respective local Churches.

Some of the scriptures you have pointed me to seem to imply that you believe that I am not a Christian.

 

[mgrfin]

The celebration of the Eucharist for 1500 years was the celebration of the Body and Blood of our Saviour until he comes again.

Even Luther believed that the Eucharist was physically the body and blood of Christ.

If you read the Old Testament, the Passover meal, which Christ celebrated with the Apostles on Holy Thursday, was a sacrificial meal, and that the lamb slain, and whose blood was on the doorposts, was a prefigure of the true sacrifce of Christ on the Cross. He asked that the same unbloody sacrifice offered in the Eucharist be done in remembrance of him.

Christ understood it that way. The Apostles understood it that way, When Christ spoke to the multitudes in Chapter 6 of John he knew he was preaching a ‘hard’ saying… Many left Christ at that time. If he was speaking only of a spiritual thing, he would have called them back, and said, “No, you misunderstood me”. “No, I misspoke”.

Paul makes it clear in 1 Cor 11:27: Therefore whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord:".

I am amazed that Protestants find it so easy to believe Paul in 'justification by faith", a difficult doctrine to explain to anyone, do not understand these easy passages on the Eucharist, and understood by the Church in this sacramental way for over 2,000 years.

Of course, Protestants, by and large, in their zeal to free the Church, have removed the altars, and the priesthood, which they hated so much. So, now they can’t go back. They can’t have a sacrifice, they can’t have a Eucharist. What they have is an imitation.

peace

 

[water]

I call it prayer. What do Catholics call it?

we call it prayer - does this mean we worship the Saints?

When you pray to God to have a job, but then whom actually you are asking for a job -it is the guy who owns the company- Does this mean you are praying to the guy? Or when you pray, a job will fail down from the sky?

You can’t just simply compare words and their meaning like that.

 

[Pax]

I have responded to these scriptures in earlier post on this thread and if you read them you will see what my reasoning is. …

O offense, but I have read every post on this thread and none of them have mentioned some of the scriptures I provided. Moreover, you have not addressed the new ones I included. Likewise, those that I did repeat were not refuted. Either we interact with angels and saints or we do not. If we interact with them it makes no difference which side initiates it.

I noticed that even after the Catholics on this thread made it quite clear that prayer to the angels and saints is not worship you still insisted that it is. Likewise, when Catholics on this thread pointed out that intercession requests of the saints in heaven is really no different than requests for intercession on the part of the saints on earth, you did not refute that point but merely continued with the strawman argument that prayer equals worship.

Please address the scriptures that I posted. Those scriptures are as follows:

The book of Revelation tells us that the heavenly elders and the Angel carry our prayers to the altar and offer them to God. You have to ask yourself why these prayers did not go directly to God, but were instead brought to him by the saints and angel. This is intercession by the saints in heaven.

More intercession by the saints is found in 2 Maccabees 15:11-16
which says:

“Having armed each one of them not so much with the safety given by shield and lance as with that confidence which springs from noble language, he encouraged them all by describing to them a convincing dream, a vision, as it were. What he had seen was this: Onias, the former high priest, that paragon of men, modest of bearing and gentle of manners, suitably eloquent and trained from boyhood in the practice of every virtue, Onias was stretching out his hands and praying for the whole Jewish community. Next, there appeared a man equally remarkable for his great age and dignity and invested with a marvellous and impressive air of majesty. Onias began to speak: “This is a man”, he said, “who loves his brothers and prays much for the people and the holy city, Jeremiah, the prophet of God.” Jeremiah then stretched out his right hand and presented Judas with a golden sword, saying as he gave it, `Take this holy sword as a gift from God; with it you will shatter the enemy.”

Jesus himself spoke with Moses and Elijah on the mount of transfiguration and it is clear that he received some kind of consolation from this. If Jesus would do something like this when he he could have simply prayed to the Father, than surely it must be acceptable for us. It seems clear to me that there is plenty of biblical evidence for the Catholic practice of praying to the saints for intercession.

Please explain to me how asking for intercession of the angels and saints in heaven is incompatible with the above scriptures. Frankly, I prefer the intercession of the saints in heaven to that of those on earth. James tells us that the “prayers of a just man availeth much.” Now note the following:

Hebrews 11 speaks about all of the great figures in scripture that went before us in faith. Finally, in verses 39-40 it says, " And all these, though well attested by their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had foreseen something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect. The very next verse says, “THEREFORE, SINCE we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us,” Finally, in Hebrews 12:22-23 it says,"…you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the first-born who are enrolled in heaven, and to a judge who is God of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect."

We are not separated from the saints in heaven. We are all part of the body of Christ, and that is why none of the patriarchs and heroes of the OT mentioned Hebrews 11 would be perfected without us. We are all joined in the body of Christ. Likewise, they are a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us. They are not off in some far corner of heaven and somehow oblivious to us. They are right there with the angels. Moreover, they are now the spirits of just men made perfect. If the prayer of the just man availeth much and men are to intercede for one another, than I am excited that the members of the body of Christ in heaven will intercede for me.

If you do not wish to have them intercede on your behalf than you are simply missing out on something Jesus has given to those that are members of his mystical body. Paul says that not even death can separate us, and I firmly believe that.

 

[Pax]

There is another point to be made concerning the angels vis-a-vis the saints. In heaven there is little or no distinction to be made between the angels and saints in terms of what they know and how they interact with one another. Scripture clearly tells us that once in heaven we will be as angels[see Matthew 22:30]. And when the angels rejoice over one sinner repenting as mentioned, in Luke 15:7-10, I’m sure that the saints are aware as well and that they likewise are rejoicing.

This also says something about what they can know and in what kind of quantity. We know that people repent all the time and in great numbers. Apparently, those in heaven are aware of all these repentant sinners wherever they may be and regardless of how many there are. Likewise, the angels and saints are involved in many other things as well, and it is simply silly to limit what they may or may not know based upon our human understandings of our earthly limitations.

The saints are in heaven and they are as Peter points out, “partakers of the divine nature”[per 2 Peter 1]. God grants many things to those in his heavenly presence. The members of his family love and care for one another and they intercede for us.

I hope this helps.

 

[mgrfin]

O offense, but I have read every post on this thread and none of them have mentioned some of the scriptures I provided. Moreover, you have not addressed the new ones I included. Likewise, those that I did repeat were not refuted. Either we interact with angels and saints or we do not. If we interact with them it makes no difference which side initiates it.

Please address the scriptures that I posted. Those scriptures are as follows:

The book of Revelation tells us that the heavenly elders and the Angel carry our prayers to the altar and offer them to God. You have to ask yourself why these prayers did not go directly to God, but were instead brought to him by the saints and angel. This is intercession by the saints in heaven.

More intercession by the saints is found in 2 Maccabees 15:11-16
which says:

Please explain to me how asking for intercession of the angels and saints in heaven is incompatible with the above scriptures. Frankly, I prefer the intercession of the saints in heaven to that of those on earth. James tells us that the “prayers of a just man availeth much.” Now note the following:

QUOTE]

Don’t take Protestant visitors to this site that seriously, if they don’t take us seriously.

Very few are really interested in learning about our faith. They are here to throw obstacles up just in case there are individuals who are serious about learning about the truth.

Faith is a gift, and they just don’t have it.

Peace

 

[MariaG]

reost # 7

If you are asking saints to pray for you, aren’t you praying to them with your request?

If you define praying to them as asking them yes.

To pray is defined as “to ask”. The meaning has narrowed for Protestants to mean something that is used only in relation to God. This has not always been the case. Since your Protestant denomination is relatively new, it seems as if you are insisting that Catholic Christians should replace the more ancient and historic use of the word pray and put your relatively new definition in its place?

When you ask God to help you overcome some obstacle, you are praying to Him asking for His help, correct?

Yes.

So, you must be praying to the saint asking for their help (to pray for you) also.

Not in the manner you mean. Again, you have narrowed the definition of Prayer to be asking God alone. The word pray has not historically been used in that manner, only by those who have come along.

If you are not praying to the saint, what is the method by which you are asking for their prayers, called.

We ask them as we ask you. Through God’s grace, He allows the saints to hear us, because we are one body.

You are not texting. You are not using a telephone. You are not emailing, nor snail mail.

Yes, we use the much more reliable method, God’s Grace.

I call it prayer. What do Catholics call it?

Asking someone to pray for them.

To pray=to ask

Notice, I do not ask you to redefine and broaden your definition of what prayer means. I respect that you believe that the word prayer in your heart and mind are synonymous with God alone. But I do ask you to not put your new definition on an old word and claim that I am doing something wrong just because you have changed the meaning of an old word.

From Praying to the Saints by James Akin
Because the verb “to pray” means “to ask.” The English word “pray” originally simply meant “ask,” and so when one would ask God for something, one was praying to God, and in the same way when one asked another to ask on your behalf, you were praying to them to pray for you.

This usage began to change in English after the Protestant Reformation, when the people running the English language became Protestants. The idealized form of English is “the King’s English,” and the king of England was the head of the Protestant Church of England. In the same way, all of the universities in England went Protestant, and so English began to take on a Protestant ideological bent (see our discussion of this in the FAQ “What is a Saint?”).

One of the Protestantisms that was introduced into English was to begin to restrict the verb “to pray” to God alone, and the semantic range of the word began to shrink in most circumstances. Still, however, there were survivals of the older, broader usage.

One of them is found, for example, in the British expression, “prithee,” as in “Prithee, fetch the book” or “Prithee, do tell.” “Prithee” is a contraction of “I pray thee” or, more contemporarily, “I ask you.” (There are a lot of English contractions like that; “goodbye” is a contraction of “God be with ye” and “zounds!” is a contraction of “by God’s [Christ’s] wounds!” Check a dictionary.)

In America, where the movers and shakers of the English language were also Protestants, even this usage dropped off, but even here there are survivals of the older, broader use of the term, for example, in court documents.

Once back when I was a Protestant I had occasion to file a motion with a court, and when I got the paperwork my lawyer had submitted, I was stunned to see him writing things like “My client prays that the court will do thus and so.” My Protestant sensibilities were shocked! "Your client does nothing of the sort!" I thought. But I was only encountering a survival of the older, broader use of the word “pray,” of which I was at that time unaware, thanks to the efforts of my Protestant forebears in amputating it from the English language.

Another survival of the older usage of “pray,” and the one which concerns us here, is of course its use in Catholic circles. English-speaking Catholics never dropped the older usage when the Protestants around them began to restrict its meaning, and so Catholics still today speak of praying to the saints and meaning by it simply asking the saints to intercede for us.

Bold underline and color by me

God Bless,
Maria

 

[mgrfin]

reost # 7

If you are asking saints to pray for you, aren’t you praying to them with your request?

When you ask God to help you overcome some obstacle, you are praying to Him asking for His help, correct?

So, you must be praying to the saint asking for their help (to pray for you) also.

If you are not praying to the saint, what is the method by which you are asking for their prayers, called.

You are not texting. You are not using a telephone. You are not emailing, nor snail mail.

I call it prayer. What do Catholics call it?

We call it prayer too, Ginger. You’re being hypersillious

peace

 

[mgrfin]

Jhn 16:24 Until now you have asked nothing in My name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

Mat 18:20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.

Jhn 14:13 And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

God wants us to talk to Him. He cares about us. Just like He cared for Abraham in Genesis 18. God knew that Abraham was concerned for Lot.

So it is with us. We are concerned for family and friends. It is good for us to pray for each other.

You don’t have better Scriptural quotation to justify praying for one another than that?

peace

 

[mgrfin]

re: Post # 17

I have never prayed to anyone I knew who died.

I have always prayed directly to God. When I was told a better way to pray is thru the saints in heaven - especially Mary - I tried.

It didn’t feel right so I went back to praying directly to God.

As I read the Bible (my Catholic Bible) I saw Jesus told us to pray to God and that whatever we ask in his name, if we believe it is already been given, it would be so.

I do ask the saints still on earth to pray for me or someone else. WE are told in the Bible to pray for one another. It has great benefits, not only to the one being prayed for, but also to the one doing the praying.

Are you still using Douay-Rheims? If so, why?

peace

 

[Ginger2]

we call it prayer - does this mean we worship the Saints? .

You are saying you do call it prayer, but other Catholics say they aren’t praying to saints. That is why I was asking, what the terminology is for talking to saints in heaven, if it isn’t prayer.

I agree with you it is prayer.

I also have no objection to it, altho I only pray directly to God.

I didn’t mean to suggest it was some sort of worship. I understand you are simply asking them to talk to God on your behalf as you fell they are closer to God because they are in heaven. Correct

I guess I am wondering now, Why some Catholics say they are not “praying” to saints? If the correct term is prayer why say you are not praying?

BTW Your analogy doesn’t make any sense to me. Maybe because you misunderstood what I was asking.

 

[Ginger2]

MariaG,

Thanks for the explanation on praying to saints. I was really not trying to say you are wrong to do so.

I simply wanted to know why some Catholics deny they are praying to saints.

I think the only way to talk to them is thru pray. Like I said, we can’t text them, etc.

 

[MariaG]

MariaG,

Thanks for the explanation on praying to saints. I was really not trying to say you are wrong to do so.

I simply wanted to know why some Catholics deny they are praying to saints.

I think the only way to talk to them is thru pray. Like I said, we can’t text them, etc.

Not a problem. And I hope you understand that some Catholics deny that they are praying to the Saints is because many Protestants use the newer and narrow definition of what the word to pray, means.

Most Catholics would not deny that they pray to the saints as long as by “praying” one is not breaking any commandmants by doing so. If ones definition of Prayer means praying to saints is against the commandments, Catholic Christians NEVER pray to the saints.

Here in these forums, when one says they ONLY pray to God, ie only ask God for anything, then that puts out the idea that a person has the narrow definition of what prayer means, instead of the more historical and older defintion which is simply, to ask.

God Bless,
Maria

 

[mgrfin]

Jhn 16:24 Until now you have asked nothing in My name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

Mat 18:20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.

Jhn 14:13 And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

God wants us to talk to Him. He cares about us. Just like He cared for Abraham in Genesis 18. God knew that Abraham was concerned for Lot.

So it is with us. We are concerned for family and friends. It is good for us to pray for each other.

2Mach 12:46 It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from their sins.

Math 5: 44-45 But I say to you, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who persecute and calumniate you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven, who makes his sun to rise on the good and the evil, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.

Romans 15: 30-31 Now I exhort you, brethren, through our Lord Jesus Christ and through the charity of the Holy Spirit, that you help me by your prayers to God for me, that I may be delivered from the unbelievers in Judea.

James 5:16 Pray for one another, that you may be saved. For the unceasing prayer of a just man is of great avail.

and, 1 Tim 2:1-4

peace

 

[mgrfin]

Not a problem. And I hope you understand that some Catholics deny that they are praying to the Saints is because many Protestants use the newer and narrow definition of what the word to pray, means.

Most Catholics would not deny that they pray to the saints as long as by “praying” one is not breaking any commandmants by doing so. If ones definition of Prayer means praying to saints is against the commandments, Catholic Christians NEVER pray to the saints.

Here in these forums, when one says they ONLY pray to God, ie only ask God for anything, then that puts out the idea that a person has the narrow definition of what prayer means, instead of the more historical and older defintion which is simply, to ask.

God Bless,
Maria

I disagree. I don’t know what Protestants define by ‘prayer’, but Catholics have been praying for the dead since the early inception of the Church and before. Check out my quote from 2Mach.12:46. We have proof from the Catecombs of prayers for those who have gone before us, as is also evident from our great pray, the Mass.

We also say a Mass for the deceased before burial. We have masses said for the deceased all the time.

As for praying to the saints, I don’t know where these Catholics have been. We pray to the saints constantly. We have a Canon of saints, and every day, we say Mass in honor of a particular saint with prayers to them for their intercession for us.

We pray to saints who have shed their blood for the Faith (martyrs), and we pray to the canonized Confessors, Doctors, Patriarchs, Angels, Virgins, and particularly to the sinless Mother of God that she should intercede for us in heaven.

Maybe you have us confused with some Protestant sect, who only will pray directly to God. Not us.

peace