Worship or worship

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Am looking for a working definition of Worship. Not one from a text book or the Catechism or a dictionary. What do you as Catholic and Non-Catholic consider to be Worship?
 
love4mary said:
Am looking for a working definition of Worship. Not one from a text book or the Catechism or a dictionary. What do you as Catholic and Non-Catholic consider to be Worship?
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For Muslims, this answer is simple.

Worship must be to the Creator alone and must be only on His terms and must follow how He Himself has commanded His creations to worship Him.

The creations cannot determine by themselves how to worship their Creator because these acts of “worship” will very likely indeed be rejected by the One who is being worshiped.

Think of it this way – Suppose you owe someone money, can you then arbitrarily decide to pay him in say sugar or flour instead of cash, without his written consent?
 
I am kind of looking in another direction with my question. I know what Worship is for, what I am looking for is a good working definition of what worship IS.

If I was to approach you on the street and asked you what Worship Is, not who you worshiped but how you went about it, what would you say.
 
I think my word for what worship is, is showing devotion.

I love my husband and am truly devoted to him that you may say from the looks of my devotion I worship him.

This in turn is what we show in what we do for each other.

So also my worship of God is shown in my devotion for Him.

Devotion is more than adoration, which can be done from afar or in silence, but devotion is an action of worship.

Am I confusing you?
Good topic 👍
D.
 
Yep dessert, kinda left me confused a bit. By your post it sounds like you worship your husband.

I guess where I am headed with this is that many of my protestant friends have one define Worship one way and Catholics seem to have a different definition. Just curious as to what each would define as worship and what acts make up this.
 
<<For Muslims, this answer is simple.

Worship must be to the Creator alone and must be only on His terms and must follow how He Himself has commanded His creations to worship Him.>.

I confess there is no God but Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and Jesus is God Incarnate!
 
love4mary said:
Yep dessert, kinda left me confused a bit. By your post it sounds like you worship your husband.

I guess where I am headed with this is that many of my protestant friends have one define Worship one way and Catholics seem to have a different definition. Just curious as to what each would define as worship and what acts make up this.
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Worship is an act of adoring and reverencing God and God alone. For Catholics the highest act of worship is the Mass, where we offer up the one, true and eternal Sacrifice made on Calvary. This is worshipping in spirit and truth. During the Mass, we join together earthly and heavenly worship (Holy, Holy, Holy God…). Catholics partake of the sign of the New Covenent, which is, in a sense, upholding our end of the Covenant. That sign is the Eucharist which is the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ. Speaking from a Catholic perspective, the most profound and intimate worship of God is found in the Mass, when we receive Our Lord in a complete act of faith.

I believe that one of the reasons protestants have such a problem with Catholics praying for intercession is that for them prayer, and prayer alone, is their worship. They do not make an offering because they believe that Jesus made the offering “once and for all” and it is done with. A Catholic would agree only to a certain extent, of course, saying that although Jesus died once, the Sacrifice is as eternal as He is.(but that is a subject for another thread).

Catholics can offer worship up in their personal prayers. We confess He is a mighty God, we ask for mercy on poor sinners, and we praise Him with a thankful heart. But, on the whole, our highest act of worship is the Mass. And, on a side note, the Mass is a daily occurence all over the world in all different times. In my view, this is a beautiful fulfillment of Mal 1:11:
For from the rising of the sun, even to its setting, my name is great among the nations; And everywhere they bring sacrifice to my name, and a pure offering; For great is my name among the nations, says the LORD of hosts.
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Prayer_Warrior said:
I believe that one of the reasons protestants have such a problem with Catholics praying for intercession is that for them prayer, and prayer alone, is their worship. They do not make an offering because they believe that Jesus made the offering “once and for all” and it is done with. A Catholic would agree only to a certain extent, of course, saying that although Jesus died once, the Sacrifice is as eternal as He is.(but that is a subject for another thread).:
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okay, so there are a ton of threads all basically asking why protestants presume to know catholic doctrine when they really don’t. i would say i know catholic doctrine better than most cradle catholics. so now i have to ask the question why catholics seem to think they know protestant doctrine when they really don’t. protestants only offering is prayer??!! where do you get this?? the protestant worship is sacrifice as well. they offer their bodies as living sacrifices (Rom. 12:1&2, just as many catholics do), they give sacrificially of their finances (something not many catholics do in my experience). there is plenty of sacrifice. they also celebrate the once for all sacrifice that Jesus made (some every week, some once a month), they just don’t believe as you do about the nature of the elements. i believe something miraculous takes place with the bread and wine but i don’t believe in the narrow view of the way it happens. please try to do some research before spouting off on things you don’t really know. after all, that is a huge argument on these boards by catholics against protestants.
 
bengal_fan said:
okay, so there are a ton of threads all basically asking why protestants presume to know catholic doctrine when they really don’t. i would say i know catholic doctrine better than most cradle catholics. so now i have to ask the question why catholics seem to think they know protestant doctrine when they really don’t. protestants only offering is prayer??!! where do you get this?? the protestant worship is sacrifice as well. they offer their bodies as living sacrifices (Rom. 12:1&2, just as many catholics do), they give sacrificially of their finances (something not many catholics do in my experience). there is plenty of sacrifice. they also celebrate the once for all sacrifice that Jesus made (some every week, some once a month), they just don’t believe as you do about the nature of the elements. i believe something miraculous takes place with the bread and wine but i don’t believe in the narrow view of the way it happens. please try to do some research before spouting off on things you don’t really know. after all, that is a huge argument on these boards by catholics against protestants.
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I spoke from first hand experience with your average American non-denom church. So, please don’t tell me that I don’t know what I’m talking about. But I am guilty of generalizing “protestants” and for that I apologize. I’m sure your church believes as you described, but I assure you that many protestants would emphatically disagree with you about anything happening to the bread and wine.

I want to clarify that I did not mean say that protestants do not offer anything up to the Lord period. Only that they do not make “offerings” during their worship, ie. during church services. I said that their “worship” seems to be prayer only. And what I meant by that is that they (the ones I’ve seen in their churches and several here online) equate “prayer” with with “worship” as if it is the same thing. It is not necessarily the same thing, in my opinion.

As far as offering up oneself, well, that is just part of Christianity- I suppose I just assumed that all Christians do that. I’m sure you’ve heard of the Catholic expression “offer it up”. Most of the Catholics I know make a “morning offering”. Those are acts of worship, but not the primary act of worship for Catholics.
 
Bengal_fan, trust me when I say I have little knowledge of Protestant worship other then what I have read here in these rooms and what little I have read on the net.

But another poster did bring up a point of interest to me concerning this. DO (I truly want to know-not for argument sake, but for learning) protestants believe that Prayer IS worship?

Also, as a Catholic I know that the Holy Mass is the highest form of Worship. It just seems that we Catholics and our Protestant friends have different definitions for the same thing.
 
My worship for God is more so than for my husband and my devotion to my husband is great so even more so for my God.

Geezeee I am off this thread it is going to go in circles if you can’t even understand the relationship of the bride and the bridegroom.
Byeee
D.
 
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