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Bible Questions and Spiritual Discussion
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Catholica
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04/04/2012 08:46 |
Grogan, to your last post, 04/04/2012 3:55, I respond:
I thought that Jesus was the "only intercessor"...
You can not on one hand say that Jesus is the only intercessor while on the other hand say that we can intercede for one another.
You are right, 1 Tim. 2:1-4 does not say whether or not the saints in heaven can hear our prayers. I didn't say that it did. 1 Tim. 2:1-4 however destroys the argument that we cannot go to others in the body of Christ, the one vine, and ask for intercession. We are co-workers with Christ; God has always lent that privilege of the ability to intercede to his people.
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Catholica
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04/04/2012 10:29 |
Grogan, to your post, 04/04/2012 3:01, I respond:
You wrote: "What is there to interpret in Revelation 5:8? It is a vision with metaphors and symbols."
What is there /NOT/ to interpret?! Symbols must be interpreted to understand what they are symbols of. Metaphors must be interpreted to understand what they are metaphors for. Without interpretation, metaphors are symbols make it just a cool-sounding story.
You wrote: "You say you are interpreting their symbolism. You say that this teaching has been in the church for 2000 years. I say prove it."
I did not say that the "teaching has been in the church for 2000 years". What I actually said was: "This interpretation I am offering is not my own, but rather that of a 2000 year old Church, a Church that many reasonably believe was founded by Jesus Christ himself to proclaim the Truth of the Gospel to the whole world." There is a difference.
The teaching flows from the deep understanding of the communion of saints that the Church was given by Christ, and is supported by evidence in scripture. Only through this deep understanding of the communion of saints could the Church come to the correct interpretation of Rev. 5:8. With that understanding, the interpretation of the verse is obvious. Without it, the interpretation of the verse is impossible.
I could post manifold quotes here from Church Fathers to demonstrate the continuity of belief among Christians, but it would be tedious because they are long and there are so many. Rather I will post links which only the honestly interested will likely follow, but I am happy to help educate.
http://www.catholic.com/tracts/the-intercession-of-the-saints
http://www.scripturecatholic.com/saints.html#tradition-I
http://www.mycatholicsource.com/mcs/pc/saints/honoring_intercession_of_saints.htm
As for the verse you pointed out, Deut. 18:11, I don't see how a person would suddenly come upon that verse without doing "research" on sites set upon disproving the practice of asking for the intercession of saints, but if you did not, then your complete knowledge of scripture is quite admirable, even if your interpretation of Deut. 18:11, which clearly only talks about _gathering hidden information from spirits_, was lacking. Or possibly you thought that we try to gather hidden information from the saints? No Catholic does this, and that is not what praying to the saints involves.
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Saint Grogan
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04/04/2012 18:44 |
What is the rest of the verse, Andre?
“For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;” (1 Timothy 2:5)
I never said that we cannot pray for one another here on Earth. I said that dead people cannot pray to the Father thru Jesus Christ on our behalf the same way we pray for one another here on the Earth. Christ is our High Priest. It is He and He alone who goes before the Father.
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Craig from Illinois
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04/04/2012 20:43 |
Grogan, I would say "mediator" is not the same as "intercessor" in this text. Paul is talking about Christ as a mediator between God and mankind for salvation.
Andre, Is there any part of Catholic doctrine that claims one can be saved through the Saints apart from Christ? I would be surprised if you say yes.
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Saint Grogan
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04/05/2012 00:57 |
Thank you Craig for pointing that out. I am aware of the difference between intercession and mediation although they are closely related. The fact is I did not say on this thread that Jesus was the only intercessor when it comes to prayer. Andre seems to think I did. I thought that he may have been thinking of 1 Timothy 2:5.
When we pray, we pray to the Father through the Son. Jesus said, “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly” (Matthew 6:6). Jesus said to pray to the Father.
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Saint Grogan
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04/05/2012 03:28 |
Catholica wrote:
“Deuteronomy 18:11 is in context of conjuring up the dead in an effort to gain secret information from them. That is not what Christians do when we ask the saints in heaven for their prayers.”
I disagree. Moses said that they that practice those “arts” were an abomination to the Lord. Verse 14 says that even though those nations practice those things, God will not allow Israel to do them.The verse is not limiting the practice to just gathering secret information. Even the Douay Rheims translation says that the nations “harken”which means to listen. Invoking the aid of deceased spirits is a form of necromancy. Leviticus 20:27 says,” A man or a woman who is a medium or a necromancer shall surely be put to death. They shall be stoned with stones; their blood shall be upon them. "
Catholica wrote:
“The teaching flows from the deep understanding of the communion of saints that the Church was given by Christ, and is supported by evidence in scripture. Only through this deep understanding of the communion of saints could the Church come to the correct interpretation of Rev. 5:8. With that understanding, the interpretation of the verse is obvious. Without it, the interpretation of the verse is impossible.”
You haven’t shown me where you got this interpretation or proved that it is the correct one. All you have is “vails full of the prayers of the saints” and crammed a bunch of theology into it that supports your belief system.
Everything in the links you provided can be refuted. As far as the early church fathers that you provided, nobody there proved that the practice of praying to the saints was taught by Jesus, the Apostles or anyone in the first hundred years of the birth of the church. This only reinforces what I believe that praying to the saints crept into the church at a later time.
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Catholica
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04/05/2012 08:25 |
Craig, the answer to your question is "No", there is no part of Catholic doctrine that says that one can be saved through the Saints apart from Christ.
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Catholica
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04/05/2012 08:45 |
Grogan, you wrote: "Dead people cannot pray to the Father thru Jesus Christ on our behalf the same way we pray for one another here on Earth."
What leads you to believe this? Do you believe that Jesus takes away the privilege to pray for others once we enter heaven? Why would He do that? What makes you believe such a thing?
Then you wrote (immediately after): "Christ is our High Priest. It is He and He alone who goes before the Father."
Yes, Jesus is our High Priest. To the second part, I would state, that we are in a very real way the _body of Christ_ and we are "in Christ". Jesus asks us to pray to the Father directly in the "Our Father" prayer. So the picture I am getting in my head when you say "It is He and He alone who goes before the Father" is that you are saying that Jesus must actively take each prayer and deliver it, like a relay, to the Father. Is this correct? If so, I believe that is too simplistic an understanding. We are in Christ, and so our connection to Christ is more organic than that, such that we can call out to the Father without having to worry about using the right formula.
Anyway, analyzing that is a tangent, because the Christians in heaven will be praying to God using the same mechanisms, whatever those are, as we do here on Earth. They are just be more connected to God that we can yet understand. We know from Rev. 5:8 that they are offering the prayers up to the lamb on the throne. The lamb is Jesus.
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Catholica
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04/05/2012 15:25 |
Referring back to this comment on Deuteronomy 18:11, it almost goes without saying that the "arts" that are referred to are similar to black magic and spirit conjuring. There is no "art" to praying. Making a prayer to a saint is no different than making a prayer to Jesus, except that you ask the saint to pray for you instead. No arts involved.
[14] These nations, whose land thou shalt possess, hearken to soothsayers and diviners: but thou art otherwise instructed by the Lord thy God.
The Douay-Rheims is right to say "hearken" or "listen" to something, because obtaining secret information is something that one must listen or harken to. Praying to the saints does not involve listening. It is one-way only.
Certainly I am grateful that you have not been exposed to what necromancy or divination actually is and are blissfully ignorant, but that in turn has made it hard for you to understand what the Bible is talking about when it refers to it. If you understood them then you would understand that it is nothing like praying through the saints.
Here is what divination is, from Webster's dictionary:
div·i·na·tion
noun \?di-v?-'na-sh?n\
Definition of DIVINATION
1: the art or practice that seeks to foresee or foretell future events or discover hidden knowledge usually by the interpretation of omens or by the aid of supernatural powers
Here is what necromancy is, from Webster's dictionary:
nec·ro·man·cy
noun \'ne-kr?-?man(t)-se\
Definition of NECROMANCY
1: conjuration of the spirits of the dead for purposes of magically revealing the future or influencing the course of events
Please explain how praying to the saints is anything like divination or necromancy... no spirits are being conjured, no seeking future events or secret knowledge is done....
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Craig from Illinois
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04/05/2012 16:04 |
Andre, Does the Catholic doctrine claim that their could be communication from a Saint to earthly man? For instance, is it acceptable orthodoxy to claim that a Saint spoke to me? I may have an "if so, then" statement after I hear your answer.
Ok, I'll ask it now... if a Saint spoke to me after I prayed to the Saint, then couldn't that fall under the definition of divination or Necromancy?
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