Tis_Bearself
Patron
It’s likely they’re in tune with God’s will, but the point is, the saint isn’t the one deciding if God is going to grant a request or not. God is deciding and letting the saint know that.
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berniemcken
Guest
Beyond the “fiat” /the free will aspect, it’s so much grace in the first place. So I agree, I wouldn’t doubt that the righteous man’s prayers “availeth much” partly or much because they are rightly ordered.
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midori
Guest
So-- why was it that God didn’t allow Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar to pray directly to him for their own forgiveness?
And given that God is the God of the Living, and not the dead, how is it that it wouldn’t make sense for us to ask for the prayers of the righteous on our behalf?
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mrsdizzyd
Guest
That’s right. God decides.
This is the hard part for non-Catholics/non-Orthodox to wrap their heads around.
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berniemcken
Guest
Right, we are irrelevant. We are peons and so are saints. That’s irrelevant. God wants to use us anyway. He used people throughout salvation history to affect his will because he chooses to do it that way. I replied several other times to this same effect.Tis_Bearself:
If God is perfect and everything He does is optimal and perfect, then the opinion of a saint is of no relevance.
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TheLittleLady
Guest
We are commanded to pray for one another. “Bear ye one another’s burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ” springs to mind.
What is the first thing we say when we hear of a person in trouble or sickness “I am praying for you”. What is the first thing we ask for when our family member is ill? “Please, pray for my husband/child/aunt.”
Praying for each other is part of our core.
What is the first thing we say when we hear of a person in trouble or sickness “I am praying for you”. What is the first thing we ask for when our family member is ill? “Please, pray for my husband/child/aunt.”
Praying for each other is part of our core.
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berniemcken
Guest
Also, the way of things in earth is that His glory is made manifest in weakness.Tis_Bearself:
If God is perfect and everything He does is optimal and perfect, then the opinion of a saint is of no relevance.
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mrsdizzyd
Guest
I agree, and so to @kevink’s point, any righteous person either here on earth or up in heaven would intercede for us in a way that is rightly ordered.
Just as a personal practice (and I am by no means righteous), anytime someone asks for me to pray for them I always pray that God’s will be done and that the person be given the grace to accept his will.
Tis_Bearself
Patron
Right. 1 Corinthians 1:27 .
God chooses to act via the intercession of saints in order to build faith and show that the saint is a powerful intercessor in Heaven. That is how we get medical miracles to support canonizations.
Otherwise, one could just say, “well it was the will of God that this person be suddenly cured of their cancer, and the saint people asked to intercede had nothing to do with it really.”
God chooses to act through the intercession of his saints, often.
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berniemcken
Guest
Exactly. And saints are not “dead” but alive in heaven. They are no less a part of the body of Christ because they are in heaven. Part of the way we know they are saints is by how they obtain miracles from God for us. In the same way, Jesus proved WHO he was, they prove where they are and to whom they belong. In heaven and to Jesus.
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mrsdizzyd
Guest
My Baptist husband and I were just having a conversation along these lines. I said to him, “If you had been granted the gift of healing would it be right for you to claim that you are powerful of your own authority?” No, anyone healed through your gift would be healed by the power of God not by the power of you. So too with the saints. God works through them.
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berniemcken
Guest
Yeah it’s so hard for me to wrap my mind around the whole “competition with Jesus mentality.” With that line of thinking, even the apostles were competition for HimTis_Bearself:
My Baptist husband and I were just having a conversation along these lines. I said to him, “If you had been granted the gift of healing would it be right for you to claim that you are powerful of your own authority?” No, anyone healed through your gift would be healed by the power of God not by the power of you. So too with the saints. God works through them.
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berniemcken
Guest
Here’s another question… how do we know they are saints in the first place? For the same reason we know that the Bible is the Word of God and for the same reason we know WHICH books are in the Bible: Because 1 Timothy 3:15 “But if I should be delayed, you should know how to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth.”
Because the Church canonized the books in the Bible and the Church recognized the miracles of the saints and because the Church says so
because it is the “pillar and foundation of truth”
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KevinK
Guest
How can an omniscient, perfect Being be “persuaded”? That would mean God didn’t intend on doing something until He was persuaded. If persuaded to do something, was the subsequent action perfect, or prior lack of action perfect? It seems incoherent to think of it this way.
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TheLittleLady
Guest
This is an allegorical incident. God cannot change His mind.
Tis_Bearself
Patron
The point is not that God changed his mind. God clearly knew what Abraham would say before he said it. Abraham’s request conformed to God’s will. (One reason God could have let it happen that way was to teach us humans reading the story later - which I myself don’t see as purely “allegorical” - the importance of repeated prayer to God.)
In the same manner, a saint’s request conforms to God’s will because the saint is in tune with the will of God, as we were discussing earlier in the thread.
Likewise, Jesus (who is God) likely had the will to help the Cana couple, and in doing so followed the suggestion of Mother Mary who is completely in tune with the will of God at all times.
God doesn’t change his mind when “persuaded” by a saint because the saint was already in tune with God’s will. But he allows the saint to intercede, choosing to act through them rather than not act through them.
In the same manner, a saint’s request conforms to God’s will because the saint is in tune with the will of God, as we were discussing earlier in the thread.
Likewise, Jesus (who is God) likely had the will to help the Cana couple, and in doing so followed the suggestion of Mother Mary who is completely in tune with the will of God at all times.
God doesn’t change his mind when “persuaded” by a saint because the saint was already in tune with God’s will. But he allows the saint to intercede, choosing to act through them rather than not act through them.
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TheLittleLady
Guest
I can dig that 
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Roseeurekacross
Guest
God is not a being. The Catholic Church does not define God as a being.
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IsaiahSpirit
Guest
The Holy Angels and Saints are with Jesus Christ and fully cooperate by Grace with His Only Divine Mediation. I think God allows asking the living Holy Angels and Saints to pray for us partly to admire what the Grace of God did through them on earth to help imitate their growth in holiness. To imitate Michael the Archangel’s Awe of God, ‘who is like unto God!,’ or Gabriel’s Evangelization witness; or Raphael’s healing witness. It is all to bring Glory to God, and how God Leads and shares Covenant Chesed with (Loves) adopted sons and daughters of God’s Promise. " But now the LORD declares: Far be it from Me! For I will honor those who honor Me…" - from 1 Samuel 2:30 “If anyone serves Me, he must follow Me; and where I am, My servant will be as well. If anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him.” - John 12:26
" I am the vine; you are the branches. The one abiding in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit. For apart from Me you are able to do nothing." - John 15:5
“And concerning the dead, that they rise, have you not read in the book of Moses on the bush, how God spoke to him, saying, ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead, but of the living. You err greatly.” - Mark 12:26-27
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off every encumbrance and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with endurance the race set out for us.” - Hebrews 12:1
" Instead, you have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. You have come to myriads of angels in joyful assembly, to the congregation of the firstborn, enrolled in heaven. You have come to God the judge of all men, to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel." - Hebrews 12:22-24
“For we can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth.” - 2 Corinthians 13:8
" And the smoke of the incense went up before God, with the prayers of the saints, out of the hand of the angel." Revelation 8:4
" I am the vine; you are the branches. The one abiding in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit. For apart from Me you are able to do nothing." - John 15:5
“And concerning the dead, that they rise, have you not read in the book of Moses on the bush, how God spoke to him, saying, ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead, but of the living. You err greatly.” - Mark 12:26-27
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off every encumbrance and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with endurance the race set out for us.” - Hebrews 12:1
" Instead, you have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. You have come to myriads of angels in joyful assembly, to the congregation of the firstborn, enrolled in heaven. You have come to God the judge of all men, to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel." - Hebrews 12:22-24
“For we can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth.” - 2 Corinthians 13:8
" And the smoke of the incense went up before God, with the prayers of the saints, out of the hand of the angel." Revelation 8:4
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KevinK
Guest
That’s fine but doesn’t address my main point about persuasion
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