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Fauken
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Just because it does not say word per word “Mary was holy, the Mother of God, and prays for us” does not make any of those things unbiblical.
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RedFan
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If by “unbiblical” you mean “contrary to what is in the Bible,” then you’re right – the Petition part of the prayer is not unbiblical. But if by “unbiblical” you mean “not found in the Bible,” then we will agree to disagree. There is not so much a hint, in any verse, of the notion that we should ask Mary to pray for us. Rather, " the petition “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.” is stated by the official “Catechism of the Council of Trent” to have been framed by the Church itself." http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07110b.htm
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Elizabeth3
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That statement is coming close to the Nestorian heresy. If Christ was fully human and fully God, and God is one, then she is the Mother of God. His divinity isn’t somehow separate from His humanity. Praying to her doesn’t take away what should be God’s. She IS God’s. He created her immaculate to be His Mother and to receive his flesh from hers. If He can be conceived in her her and take his flesh from her, why would it be so hard to believe that He would hear her prayers on our behalf. If the prayers of the righteous are heard and are pleasing to God, surely those of His own mother’s would be.
Nestorianism (5th Century)
This heresy about the person of Christ was initiated by Nestorius, bishop of Constantinople, who denied Mary the title of Theotokos (Greek: “God-bearer” or, less literally, “Mother of God”). Nestorius claimed that she only bore Christ’s human nature in her womb, and proposed the alternative title Christotokos (“Christ-bearer” or “Mother of Christ”).
Orthodox Catholic theologians recognized that Nestorius’s theory would fracture Christ into two separate persons (one human and one divine, joined in a sort of loose unity), only one of whom was in her womb. The Church reacted in 431 with the Council of Ephesus, defining that Mary can be properly referred to as the Mother of God, not in the sense that she is older than God or the source of God, but in the sense that the person she carried in her womb was, in fact, God incarnate (“in the flesh”).
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anon65111186
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Exactly some of the common passages about praying for others and why we should pray for others, but nothing about asking others to pray for us.
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Contender4TheFaith
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Oops, sorry! That was a typo…it should read Philippians 4: 6 & 7. I’ll amend that in my post.
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Contender4TheFaith
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Definition of pray according to an online dictionary: “address a solemn request or expression of thanks to a deity or other object of worship.”
That is not scriptural.
Believers are temporarily separated by physical death and no longer able to communicate during this time. Nowhere in scripture is there a go ahWe are warned strongly against calling up the dead:
"“There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or one who practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. For all who do these things are an abomination to the LORD, and because of these abominations the LORD your God drives them out from before you.” Deuteronomy 18: 10 - 12
One burning question I have is, why would anyone who may confidently approach the throne of God in prayer want to side-step Him in favor of someone else?
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sonofbarry
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I agree, Neutral. How on earth are Mary’s perpetual virginity, immaculate conception and body and soul assumption to heaven anything like the human experience? It’s hard to step up to the mark with any saint. Now we have a saint who never sinned. Gosh, it must be nice to be chosen.
I personally have no devotion to Mary at all. I don’t even believe the Marian doctrines. I think they’re just platitudes, arising from the need for a female somewhere in our patriarchal church.
I personally have no devotion to Mary at all. I don’t even believe the Marian doctrines. I think they’re just platitudes, arising from the need for a female somewhere in our patriarchal church.
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Contender4TheFaith
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Are you looking for examples of someone who asked for prayer for himself in the Bible? Paul asked for prayer in Romans 15: 30 - 32:
" Now I urge you, brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to strive together with me in your prayers to God for me, that I may be rescued from those who are disobedient in Judea, and that my service for Jerusalem may prove acceptable to the saints; so that I may come to you in joy by the will of God and find refreshing rest in your company."
Paul made another request for prayer for himself in Ephesians 6: 17 - 20:
“And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints— and for me, that utterance may be given to me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in it I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak.”
Does that answer your concern?
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MT1926
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Yeah that’s the modern definition. The Catholic Church tends to use the definition which was used from the first century which is simply…
1 : entreat, implore —often used as a function word in introducing a question, request, or plea, to make a request in a humble manner
Sure modern dictionaries also stated to address God, which we agree that prayer can be used to address God, but we don’t limit the definition to this modern inclusive meaning.
Not explicitly in Scripture, but it is Implicit. Any way, So what’s your point? Where does the scripture say everything has to be spelled out in scripture? I’m sure there are all kinds of things your church does and believes that isn’t explicit in scriptural.
Scripture please that explicitly states your claim. Sure seems like the Rich man was able to ask for Lazarus to go tell his brothers.
Totally agree, why do you think asking a saint to pray for us to God is the same as Calling up the dead?
Did Jesus practice Necromancy at the Transfiguration?
You are assuming we are side stepping?
I pray to God all of the time.
I’m guessing you never ask anyone to pray for you? After all isn’t that side stepping the throne of God.
Actually, doesn’t the Bible say God knows what we need before we ask, so what’s the sense of even praying to God if He already knows what we were going to say?
Who is more righteous, your buddy Bob sitting beside you at the bar or one of the saints in heaven?
Also, I just noticed verse 15 says the prayer of faith will save the sick man. Since you said me believing God will answer the prayer through the Saint is not scriptural do you also believe that the persons praying is what saved the sick man and not God? Since it says right here in scripture it’s the pray, not God, that actually healed the man?
Personally, I read this verse and see that it is the prayer of the righteous (Saints) on our behalf to God that is that saves us (the sick man) but this is don not by their power (their faith) but by the Will of God (who will raise us up).
God Bless
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Vonsalza
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Excellent points.
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Contender4TheFaith
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Perhaps this will help you understand where I’m coming from: What is the hypostatic union? | GotQuestions.org
Mary was special, but only as a human being, not God or any other degree of divinity. There is nothing in scripture to support any of the doctrines that teach regarding the immaculate conception and sinless nature of Mary. If she was sinless, then why was she required to make a sin offering after Jesus was born in Luke 2, according to the law in Lev. 12: 1 - 8?
Had Mary been sinless, she would not have needed a Savior, but these are words from her own lips: “My soul doth magnify the Lord, And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour”. Luke 1:47
Does that make sense?
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Vonsalza
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Again, friend, scripture isn’t the sole source of truth for the Christian; as even Paul clearly identified.
There are no Christians in the first 1500 years of the Church that held to the sufficiency of scripture for all Christian inquiry. “It must be explicitly found in scripture” is a relatively new innovation in the history of Christianity.
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rose321
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Respectfully opinion only. First one gives Honor Lovingly toward > Our Blessed Mother Mary!!! Matters not what others think one way or the other One Honors our Blessed Mother Mary, devotion toward in thankful prayer!
Has one read all of Matthew Chapter 23?
Whom is Jesus rebuking here?
Is it those who serve Him within His ownTemple or is Jesus rebuking the Laity?
Whom is Jesus harshly rebuking them calling them blood vipers, hyocrites x3 and puts questions to them >>>forcing them to look within His Holy Scriptures, having them to refer back to what is written>do not add or subtract from His Spoken Word given? Or Jesus in stating to the Sadducees >>>>Where does it say in your book ( writen Torah, not the Oral Torah?)>> Man cannot feed himself on the Sabbath?
Asking kindly, One does know that God is the very Author of Holy Scripture, which is put into a Book we call the Bible?
Asking kindly>>One does know that Jesus himself and St Paul even heavily quote from His Holy Scripture throughout all their Teaching, preaching and Jesus even reads from the Book of Isaiah?
Asking kindly>>Did Jesus come not only to be our Lord and Savior>> but maybe Jesus mission and task also given>>>>was to bring us back to the correct True teaching of His Spoken Word? Do not add or stubtract from His spoken Word> sadly got the Hebrew Israelites in trouble?
Jesus being the very Author of Holy Scripture>>His Spoken Word given, from which He >>>Heavily and Continually quotes from and found within His Spoken Word, written, must of known>> what would come to pass?>> Jeremiah 8:8 for He repeats this >>throughout His Spoken Word, 4 times, must be important to beware of?
Sorry just confused when stating of others being?>>Bible idolatry means what?
Jesus takes His Holy Scriptures seriously, being the Author of for He even quotes from and ask>>
What did King David mean?
What did Isaiah say, Jesus takes seriously for He reads from word for word, from what was Written, did he not?
Jesus continually refers to and quotes heavily from being the Author of His Holy Scriptures, mentions Jonah? Job? Jeremiah? Enoch? Amos? Elijah? Moses? Abraham? Samuel? a long list from which the very Author of Holy Scripture>>God continually refers back to His Spoken Word and heavily quotes from what we call >The Bible, does he not?
Who does one consider to be or can judge that one is a bible idolatry of His Spoken Word?
Ponder maybe on that? What about Jesus now?
Is it not His Spoken Word that gives us Eternal Breath and Eternal Life all who believe in and live by? He first Breathe into Adam nostrils but He Spoke Spoken first. Let there be and it existed?
Kindly and not to offend either>>but asking has not our Pope taught us>>Who am I to judge?
And to practice tolerance and our Pope does he not also quote form His Holy Scripture throughout His teaching?
Peace
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MT1926
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Totally, agree. Everything that makes her special is because of her son Jesus, nothing we believe of her comes from her own power.
Michelle Arnold gave a good answer to this question…
If you read Leviticus 12 you will see this is speaking of legal ceremonial impurity. The sacrifice was to obey the law concerning the blood making her unclean. Nothing in here tells us the sacrifice was to cleanse the woman’s moral failures or her personal sin.
We all need a savior, including Mary. Once again the Church does not teach that Mary was sinless on her own will. She did not save herself. She was sinless because our Lord gave her his free gift of grace before she fell into sin. We read scripture that tells us God has the ability to keep us from falling in the first place. We apply this verse, with many others, to come to the realization that Jesus, our Lord and Savior, kept His mother from falling into sin. Thus saving her before she fell and sinned instead of after.
If it’s impossible to believe that Jesus wouldn’t keep His mother from falling, then why does scripture tell us God is able to do something He never intends to do?
Hope this helps,
God Bless
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Elizabeth3
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Ok. Catholics believe in the hypostatic union. I’ll quote from the link you shared.
“In summary, the hypostatic union teaches that Jesus is both fully human and fully divine, that there is no mixture or dilution of either nature, and that He is one united Person, forever.”
If it is true that Jesus is both fully human and fully divine…one united Person, forever, then it is reasonable to say that Mary was the mother of God. She carried the God-Man in her womb, gave birth to Him and fed Him at her breast. These are all actions that only a mother can do. At no point in any of those actions, was He not fully God.
Mary indeed provided his flesh and not His divinity. However, the title Mother of God isn’t about what she gave Him. It is about what is true about Christ. Remember, Catholics believe that anything we say or do about Mary, is always in reference to Him. To take the title of Mother of God as saying only something about her is not the way to think about it.
She is rightly called Mother of God, because to deny it would be to deny the hypostatic union. As your link stated, “Jesus’ two natures, human and divine, are inseparable.” It isn’t true to say that Mary was only mother to his humanity because His humanity and divinity are inseparable.
Further,being fully divine, Jesus was never separated from God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. The mystery is in the fact that Christ, while always remaining one with the Father and the Holy Spirit, was able to take on flesh as the second Person of the Trinity. So while we don’t say Mary carried the Father or the Holy Spirit, there is still that mystery in that the God-Man is and always was one with them, from the moment of His Incarnation in Mary’s womb.
Catholics would say Mary was favored among humanity to be given the special graces that would make our salvation possible, as willed by God. Surely, you know Catholics don’t say she is God or divine.
There is nothing in scripture that contradicts any of the doctrines about Mary either.
More following…
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Elizabeth3
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https://www.catholic.com/index.php/...offering-lk-224-lv-128-if-she-was-without-sin
“For the same reason Jesus was baptized by John, though he had no sins to repent. Mary fulfilled the Law.”
“The purification had to do with ritual uncleanliness and didn’t imply a moral fault in childbirth. As Jesus would later, Mary fulfilled all the precepts of the Law, which, clearly, wasn’t written to make allowances for a sinless man (the Messiah) or his sinless mother.”
She was sinless as a result of being saved by the merit of Christ at the moment of her conception. She was “full of grace” as the angel said when he greeted her. (before she gave her fiat) Why and how could any human have been full of grace before Christ died on the cross? It can only mean that a special grace was granted to them by God, not for the person’s sake, but in order that the plan of salvation could be carried out according to God’s will.
Because Christ was to receive His flesh from her, she had to be preserved from original sin or else she would have passed it on, and nothing unclean could be united to God which Christ fully is. Mary was saved from the moment of her conception for Christ’s sake.
If the desert where God walked was “holy ground” (Moses had to remove his sandals), how much more holy would Mary have to be to have God conceived in her womb? If the Ark of the Covenant was pure and holy because it contained The Word of God in stone tablets, how much more pure and holy would Mary have to be to carry The Word made flesh? We see in the Old Testament that where God was present in a particular way the people of God had to go to great lengths to keep that place pure, holy and ritually clean. Why would we suddenly believe that the Incarnation would take place in one who was tainted with original and personal sin? Would God have not prepared her for His presence in a much greater way than even in the Old Testament?
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anon65111186
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My concern was in simply trying to see what you think is a “green light” to pray for those alive.
My next step was going to ask you if you think the saints in heaven can hear or see us.
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Agathon
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Even though I’m a practicing cradle Catholic, this is the one thing that makes me feel uneasy.
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PJM
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HEAR us For SURE; see us; not so much.
We belong to the Communion of Saints:
quote… COMMUNION OF SAINTS. The unity and co-operation of the members of the Church on earth with those in heaven and in purgatory. They are united as being one Mystical Body of Christ. The faithful on earth are in communion with each other by professing the same faith, obeying the same authority, and assisting each other with their prayers and good works. They are in communion with the saints in heaven by honoring them as glorified members of the Church, invoking their prayers and aid, and striving to imitate their virtues. They are in communion with the souls in purgatory by helping them with their prayers and good works … end quote
Father John A. Hardon’s Catholic Dictionary
Keep asking questions my friend; its a great way to learn our Faith
Blessings
Patrick
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anon65111186
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Why not see us, it’s in the scriptures?
The living often say they feel the dead present and watching them. Is this illusion or fact?
It is fact. The Bible says we are surrounded by “a great cloud of witnesses”. The context is speaking of the dead. They are alive. For God is “not God of the dead, but of the living; for all live to him”.
Reason confirms revelation here. Does their love for us cease? Does it not rather increase in purity and power? And do not their vision and understanding also increase?
“The Communion of Saints” means not only
(1) love and understanding among the blessed in Heaven and
(2) love and understanding among the redeemed on earth but also
(3) love and understanding between those two groups, the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant, temporarily separated by death.
What difference does this make? Well, what difference does it make to you if you believe you are being watched by a thousand living human eyes? Multiply this consequence by millions and by the increase in love and understanding in Heaven. Throw in literally innumerable angels, all of them sharing mightily in God’s love and knowledge. Then you have the difference it makes: the exponent of infinity.
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