Understanding/knowing the saints

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Mi3hael

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Hi,

I’m still quite early in my journey to Catholicism so forgive me if I’m asking obvious questions.

I’ve been to Mass (I thought it was amazing, and am going back this sunday) and I’ve also been on a guided tour of a local Catholic Cathedral - I’m going glad I did as there was so much I would not have noticed, I the Holy Door, but it turns out it’s the door I’ve been using anyway, so guess I can tick that box too.

One thing I’m not quite getting is the use of saints during prayer/life. Some things I’ve read is that you should ‘get to know’ a particular saint and treat them as a friend through prayer - other times I see people going to different saints for different things? How do you approach saints? Also is there a resource (books or online) you would recommend for next to get to know the saints more?

Thanks, any (name removed by moderator)ut will be gladly received.

Michael
 
Think of the saints as your older brothers and sisters in Christ, and you as still just a young child. They’ve persevered, put their childhood problems behind them, and are close friends with God now. And they’re willing to kneel down and pray for you and intercede for you as they may. Being so closely united with God, and having put down the burden of sin behind them, they’re good advocates to have on your side (not as the bridge between God and man, but in their own way).

The Church can also be thought of as one body. All the living, all the dead detaching themselves from sin on their way to heaven, and all those in heaven with God are ONE body in Christ. We are all united together in Christ, praying together, helping each other, being one Church. Those in Heaven, seeing the glory of God, are in many ways more vibrantly alive than we are.

Now, I don’t think you should feel pressured to pick a saint if that does not call to you, but you may wish to buy a book that gives the summaries of the lives of many saints. You’ll never find something exhaustive, but within those pages you may find someone whose story you have a particular affinity with, whose struggles are like the struggles you faced, or who is known as a patron for someone in your profession or with your needs. Catholics and Orthodox also have a strong affinity for Mary the Mother of God. She gave birth to Christ, and we are Christ’s body. Christ calls her mother, and so may we (though she is still only human, she just has a special place in the Communion of Saints). If Christ is the king of the New Israel, she’s the Queen Mother. Not the sovereign ruler, but given a place of honor beside her king who she worships with us.

Know that special devotion to saints is not necessary, not even to the Virgin Mary, though they’re all available to listen and pray for you if you ask (and even if you don’t). I hope others can give you better advice on finding a saint that speaks to you and the roles the saints play in their lives.
 
Well if you look at the studies that have been done, the Catholic ones are pretty much all in agreement that devotion to saints improves your holiness, although this effect has diminishing returns in the number of saints venerated. The studies say that the relationship is:

Relative Soul Whiteness = A0(1 - exp(-A1/n)) + 1

Where A0 and A1 are empirical constants, and n is the number of saints venerated. Relative Soul Whiteness is an index which measures the ratio of your current soul to a hypothetical version of yourself which venerates 0 saints.

The exact value of the constants A0 and A1 are hotly debated, mostly because measurement error is huge. Catholic apologists say that this error is the reason Protestant scientists typically come up with negative values for A0.

Now at this point, I’m sure you’ve noticed that the relative soul whiteness increases monotonically, and so the strategy to maximize your holiness would seem to be to venerate as many saints as possible. However, as you are probably aware, devotion to saints has a opportunity cost: by spending time venerating saints, you are missing instances when you could increase your holiness by other means (e.g. evangelism.) Therefore, the optimal holiness strategy is typically found to be one where you venerate 1-4 saints before focusing on other holiness-increasing activities. The wide range of recommendations is simply an indication of how much disagreement there is over the value of A0.
 
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