Some help defending Catholicism

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BrooklynBoy200

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I’ve recently made a practice of frequenting anti-Catholic websites and reading what they have to say, as I’ve found it a lot easier to refute arguments after I’ve become familiar with them. I came across one that is about 95% obvious error, but there were a few things that I would like clarified by my fellow posters.

For instance, the site brought up the protestant second commandment (idolatry), and the usual protestant accusations for this have of course been refuted to the point of exhaustion. But one thing I hadn’t really thought of before was this:

Exodus 20:4-6 “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or serve them”

The site goes to great lengths to emphasize how this is not listed as a commandment in the Catholic Church.

My question is why is this not listed as a commandment?
And can somebody explain to me how us bowing before an image of Jesus or Mary does not conflict with this?

Two more questions that are so different from the above one that a simple link or something would be nice:
  1. How do we know about Mary’s assumption and coronation?
  2. Can somebody explain the rosary in regards to the quote of Jesus telling us not to use lists of names and vain repetition in prayer?
Again, I’m Catholic and I believe in all of these practices, I just don’t know the words to use to refute the accusations of certain protestants. So any help would be welcome, thanks.
 
I will take a shot.

We, Catholics, DONT bow down to Idols. We simply kneel in prayer. We are not praying to the statue but are using it’s physicality as an aide in prayer. Do not we all have pictures in our homes? The same thing applies. I belive, but I will defer to whomever, that the words “Bow down” to mean to place the statue itself before God. Well we all knw that is NEVER the case. We use the Saints as intermiderarys to intercede with God to grant us Graces and to present our petitions. So and when an anti-Catholic looks upon a picture of Christ then in essence they are looking upon an Idol, albeit and Idol of Christ but an Idol non the less. I love the pictures in my house cause they help me remember and I love the statues when I pray cause it puts a face to the name, and I remember… What could be wrong with that?

Assumption and repetitive prayer someone else will ahve to respond. Good luck hope I hit on something for you. 👍
 
Catholics bow before a statue to show the reverence due to the person that it depicts. We do not hold the statue as an idol in that it is what we are honoring. The commandments are different but not really. Our first commandment encompasses the notion that there is only one God and that we shall have no other gods besides Him. The redundancy in the Protestant numbering is to emphasize the idol worship that we are erroneously accused of performing. Protestant numbering then ties the last two commandments into one.

Many cultures bow to other people and it is not always a posture of worship. We find that God commanded Moses to carve the cherubim that was placed on the ark of the covenant. The emphasis is on idol worship and it doesn’t matter how Protestants try to accuse us of such practices the truth is that we don’t worship idols. We only worship God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It is a shame that the very articles used to spread the Gospel before many could read are now deemed as idols and objects of worship. It is this very type of ignorance that bolsters my faith in the Catholic Church…teachccd
 
For vain repetitious prayer read psalm 136 and then tell me how you could pray such a psalm without rebuking Christ’s words in Matt. 6:7?
 
Ah, thank you the cherubim reference will definitely come in handy.
Yes, the websites I’ve seen have often made me laugh out loud, they are usually quite ridiculous. And extremely ill-informed.
 
Hope I can help a little.

Firstly to vain repetitions. Jesus is not teaching against repetitive prayer, otherwise when He prayed the psalms He was a hypocrite, but to VAIN repetition. So, an evangelical may well be guilty of this himself when he delivers the same prayer asking for things that may not be in God’s will.

Sometimes it is helpful to really look at the objection first and sometimes it doesn’t take much to clear it up.

Secondly bowing to statues. Notice in Exodus that God commands the building of the ark of the covenant in which STATUES were to be made of gold. The temple of Solomon was apparently the most ornate temple the world has ever seen or will over see again. All the walls of the temple had ornate depictions of angels etc. If God was us having statues, then He contradicted Himself when He commanded the building of the ark and the temple. The ark of the covenant was so revered that if you touched it, you would die. In the New Covenant Catholics use statues to honor God through His saints. God can use material means to convey His grace. In the book of Acts we see that handkerchiefs were being passed around that Paul had touched so that people may be healed.

Thirdly, the numbering of the commandments is a classic anti-Catholic objection. However, this is an easy one to refute because the bible doesn’t number them, scribes did! The verses and chapters in the bible were also a much later addition. The 1st commandment “I am the Lord your God, you shall not have strange gods before me” covers idol worship. The catechism clearly tells us that idol worship is a mortal sin. The CC is not afraid of the bible and so does not have to manipulate texts or verses to suit their theology, which is what anti-Catholics believe.

The assumption of Mary is given to us in the book of Revelations. I think the site www.scripturecatholic.com has some fantastic scripture that you can fire at these anti-Catholics. He covers any topic.

Hope that helped a little.
 
I’ve written blog entries/articles on the topics of Catholic “idol worship” and “vain repititions”. I’m not doing this to toot my own horn, but you may find some answers you’re looking for in these blog entries of mine (it saves me rewriting them here):

Catholics and “idol worship” - thespiritmagnus.blogspot.com/2009/10/debunking-another-anti-catholic-myth.html

Catholics, the Communion of Saints, and “necromancy” - thespiritmagnus.blogspot.com/2009/10/another-quick-thought-catholics.html

What does “vain repititions” really mean? - thespiritmagnus.blogspot.com/2009/08/vain-repititions-what-did-jesus-really.html

I hope you find these helpful.
 
Hi Magnus1981
Your contribution was much better than mine. Thanks.
It’s good to know there are other Aussies on board at CatholicAnswers. Congratulations on your blog.
 
If someone was actually worshiping the representation of Mary, that would be inappropriate. Catholics are meant to be taught that the images they are using are simply a tool to help them think about what they are really praying to or speaking to. The same is true of words and descriptions - they help us understand the thing we are thinking about. Also, bowing down in that passage I believe refers to worship, not kneeling in prayer.

Now, I think it is reasonable to admit that if people are often making mistakes about this issue, it might be better to restrict the practice in some way, if reteaching wasn’t helping. I can imagine a group that had recently converted from an idol worshiping religion might be better off, at least for a time, without religious statuary and so on.

I think an important point with prayer is that we are not to imagine that simply repeating a prayer over and over again can get us into Heaven, as if it were a magical formula. This isn’t quite what Catholicism teaches, however there have been Catholics who believed this. Protestants tend to separate the idea of works and faith more than Catholics do of course, and this can rather fall into “works” from a Protestant perspective. As a Catholic, it is probably best simply to say that works spring from faith, and such prayers are simply an expression of that. Also, the Rosary actually isn’t that repetitive from an interior perspective, and people who haven’t done it do not always realize that, so it can be worthwhile to mention it.
 
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