The Virgin Mary

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doke

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I am not trying to come down on catholicism but most of the catholics that i know seem to be more interested in coming to Mary for help instead of the father or the son. Isn’t it a sin to pray to anybody else except God or Jesus? Correct me if i’m wrong but i seem to be getting the impression that it is contradicting the bible.
 
doke said:
I am not trying to come down on catholicism but most of the catholics that i know seem to be more interested in coming to Mary for help instead of the father or the son. Isn’t it a sin to pray to anybody else except God or Jesus? Correct me if i’m wrong but i seem to be getting the impression that it is contradicting the bible.
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:)Believe me, Doke, it is Mother Mary will only lead you more close to Christ,
it was Christ Himself gave us His Mother as our Mother.
 
doke said:
I am not trying to come down on Catholicism but most of the Catholics that I know seem to be more interested in coming to Mary for help instead of the father or the son.
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Though it is possible you are correct [there are certainly some abuses out there] I would suspect that you are misinterpreting the situation.

Take the Rosary, for example, it is a meditation on 20 specific mysteries only three of which have anything to do with Mary.

Even those three are not “about” Mary per se, they are about Humility, Bodily Resurrection and our ongoing participation in the Communion of Saints.
Isn’t it a sin to pray to anybody else except God or Jesus? Correct me if I’m wrong but I seem to be getting the impression that it is contradicting the bible.

Believe it or not, brilliant Catholic theologians have been reading the bible for a couple millennium now, and they don’t see your contradiction.

Would you find it a contradiction of scripture if I asked you to pray for me?

Chuck
 
doke said:
Isn’t it a sin to pray to anybody else except God or Jesus?
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It is not a sin to pray to Mary and the Saints. It would be a sin to worship Mary and the Saints.

But prayer is not worship, it is a means of communication.
 
The meaning of words change over the years, and the Catholic Church has been around for a very long time. Prayer for us is almost more a means of communication. To be clear, we do not pray to saints as though they are the source of anything we ask; rather we ask them to pray for us.

The logic of it is rather like this: If you would ask your Christian friend here on earth to pray for you, then why not your Christian friend in heaven? There is no verse in the Bible stating they cannot hear our prayer or that they are unaware of our plight, in fact I will show the opposite. There is nowhere in the Bible that says that once you die as a Christian, you have crossed an invisible boundary. In fact, quite the opposite, there are many verses speaking of us being alive in Christ; that there is no death in Christ. So asking a part of the body of Christ in heaven to pray for you is no different than asking a part of the body of Christ on earth to pray for you. It’s all one body of Christ.

**Matthew 17:1-3: “Jesus took with him Peter and James and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain apart. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shown like the sun, and his garments became white as light. And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him.” **

The above is also recorded in Mark and Luke, and here is something interesting. Moses and Elijah are DEAD. And Jesus is talking to them. It would seem right there that dead people in Christ are not only capable of conversing with us, but are interested in the affairs of the earth.

Hebrews 12:1: "Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us rid ourselves of every burden and sin that clings to us and persevere in running the race that lies before us…"

The above verse implies that those that have gone before us are indeed watching events on earth as a great cloud of witnesses.

**Revelation 5:8: “The four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and with golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.”

Revelation 8:3-4: " And another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer; and he was given much incense to mingle with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar before the throne; and the smoke of the incense rose with the prayers of the saints from the hand of the angel before God."**

In the above, our prayers are shown *passing through *both angels and spirits in heaven, and being presented before God. This fits in absolutely beautifully with catholic teaching, but protestants are often uncomfortable with it and find very odd ways to explain the text.

Revelation 6:9-10: "I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne; they cried out with a loud voice, ‘O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before thou wilt judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell upon the earth?’"

In the above verse not only do the saints appear aware of events on earth, but they are praying to God for action upon the earth. Hence, a prayer for those on earth. If they pray for us because they are alive in Christ, why should we not pray for them? Hope this helps. God Bless.
 
Every thing Mary does for us is through her prayers to God and through the blessings God gives her for us.

We call her “Mother” because she literally is our mother in the sense of her role in our lives. Just like a mother, she nurtures us, takes care of us, and guides us to success (her Son, Jesus), so long as we obey her and trust her.

We never worship her nor anyone besides God Himself, because only He is worthy of worship. Even though we honor Mary and place her as one of the highest examples of morality, even she gains everything she had and has by the Grace of the Lord. Without the Lord, even she is nothing.
 
doke said:
I am not trying to come down on catholicism but most of the catholics that i know seem to be more interested in coming to Mary for help instead of the father or the son. Isn’t it a sin to pray to anybody else except God or Jesus? Correct me if i’m wrong but i seem to be getting the impression that it is contradicting the bible.
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It is called the “Communion of Saints”. Almost all Christian Churches subscribe to it - it is in the Apostle’s creed. What is it? It means that neither death nor life nor anything else separates the members of the Body of Christ. We are all members of His Body through our baptism. Those of us who are in heaven can still pray, and do still pray. Actually, their prayers are much more effective than ours are, because they are perfect and stand in God’s presence.

When we go to Mary, it is because she is our mother - the mother of the Church, which is Christ’s Body. We never worship her, but only venerate her and honor her, just as God did by creating her to bear His only Son. Since she is most blessed among women (Luke 1:42), and all generations will call her blessed (Luke 1:48), we ask her to pray for us. She intercedes, and Jesus mediates. No conflict at all. Can we go directly to Jesus? Of course! We do that, both in private and communal prayer, as well as at Adoration, when we are in His presence. Even more profoundly, we eat His Body and drink His Blood. There is no more personal relationship on earth with Christ than that. That is why no believing Catholic can never leave the Church. To do so is to leave Christ, as those in John 6:66 did.

Remember that Jesus, for nine months, was inseparably one flesh with His mother, Mary. If that alone does not make her special among all humans, nothing can. In biblical times, the Queen was the mother of the King. Bathsheba was Queen, because she was Solomon’s mother. Thus, Mary is Queen, but Christ remains King forever. But, remember how Bathsheba had influence with Solomon? Ditto.

Your problem with the bible and Mary is strictly the particular interpretation that you might be using. Catholic doctrine is 100% consistent with scripture and not one thing is contrary to it. On the other hand, nowhere does any scripture ever say that it alone is the sole rule of faith.
 
One of my protestant friends said it best:
If we ask our friends to pray for us then what’s wrong with asking Mary to pray for us? After all, she’s a little closer to Jesus and probably has a little more sway.
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Needless to say, that didn’t go over very well among his protestant friends.
 
PrayHarder said:
One of my protestant friends said it best:

Needless to say, that didn’t go over very well among his protestant friends.
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Isaiah 1:15: “When you spread out your hands, I close my eyes to you; though you pray the more, I will not listen, your hands are full of blood!”

In the above verse, God does not listen to the prayers of a sinful man. So the protestant may object, oh but that’s the Old Testament, that doesn’t apply anymore, we are all righteous before God. Because they believe in that legal transaction of imputed righteousness, every single christian is the exact same level of righteousness before God, because of the merits of Christ. Except that the next few verses come from the New Testament.

James 4:16: “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful.”

Now why is the above verse important? Well, first off it links confession with prayer, by saying that the prayer of a righteous man is powerful. This implies that confession cleanses you somehow. Very catholic. This also implies that you can be considered “less righteous” before God’s eyes. It also talks of the necesity of having others pray for you, implying that if you are not righteous by having confessed, your brother who is more righteous before God, can pray for you.

1 Peter 3:7: “Likewise, you husbands should live with your wives in understanding, showing honor to the weaker female sex, since we are joint heirs of the gift of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.”

The above verse is stating plainly that poor conduct hinders your prayer, as does James. This validates what is spoken by Isaiah and also in Proverbs, where David speaks of God answering the righteous. This all goes to show that there *are *levels of righteousness, and just admitting that in itself is against protestant belief.
Okay, but what’s the point in showing all this? Well, saints are people that made it into heaven. They are perfected. They are holy, in the presence of God. They are more righteous than us. So if you are failing as a good christian, failing to be righteous, and God will not hear your prayers, you ask a righteous saint to pray on your behalf. This simply makes perfect sense. God listens to righteous people. Perhaps due to sin, He is not hearing your prayers. So you ask a righteous man to pray for you, because God will hear him. This is why we pray to saints. We can’t do this alone, and indeed we should not.

It is is actually *arrogant *to assume that we are righteous simply because of our faith in Christ and not on our example (from grace) as well. Even the demons believe, and shudder, as it states in the New Testament. Protestants also like to say that Jesus is the one mediator between God and man. Oh yes this is quite true. Now look at the context. The context is, Jesus is the mediator for salvation. We do not claim that salvation comes from Mary or the saints. But their prayer is scriptural, as is our prayer with them, and it is effective because they are righteous. To deny otherwise is to cherrypick the Bible.
 
Not only is it not a sin to pray to the communion of saints for intercession, God gives them the power to hear our prayer and present it to Him through their fully righteous hands. And, it is completely scriptural unless you are reading the incomplete version of scripture. Read Tobit chapter 12 where the Archangel Raphael tells Tobit that he heard his prayer and interceded with the Lord on Tobit’s behalf.
 
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