Postscripts From The Catholic Spitfire Grill

Of course not.  God uses lots of ways to bring people to Himself.  In fact, I love to hear how God worked in other peoples lives to bring them into the family of God.   However, the Scriptures are crystal clear, and replete with examples, that when we pray we should pray to God alone. Show me one example in the Scriptures of a person praying to another human being, even one already deceased, where that could be used as a pattern for Christians to follow.

No but Sacred Scripture is replete with examples of intercessory prayer and that’s what Catholics mean when we say “pray to saints.” Catholics do not “pray to saints” in the same sense that we “pray to the three persons of the Trinity.” We might use the same words as Protestants but in our faith, it means vastly different things. What Catholics mean when they say “pray to saints” is “praying in communion with the saints” or more simply “asking a saint to pray for us”….do “we” always make that clear in Catholic writing? No. Because quite frankly, Catholics generally write for other Catholics and we know what me mean.

From the CCC:

2682 Because of Mary’s singular cooperation with the action of the Holy Spirit, the Church loves to pray in communion with the Virgin Mary, to magnify with her the great things the Lord has done for her, and to entrust supplications and praises to her.

2850 The last petition to our Father is also included in Jesus’ prayer: “I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one.” It touches each of us personally, but it is always “we” who pray, in communion with the whole Church, for the deliverance of the whole human family. The Lord’s Prayer continually opens us to the range of God’s economy of salvation. Our interdependence in the drama of sin and death is turned into solidarity in the Body of Christ, the “communion of saints.”

Prayer as communion

2565 In the New Covenant, prayer is the living relationship of the children of God with their Father who is good beyond measure, with his Son Jesus Christ and with the Holy Spirit. The grace of the Kingdom is “the union of the entire holy and royal Trinity . . . with the whole human spirit.” Thus, the life of prayer is the habit of being in the presence of the thrice-holy God and in communion with him. This communion of life is always possible because, through Baptism, we have already been united with Christ. Prayer is Christian insofar as it is communion with Christ and extends throughout the Church, which is his Body. Its dimensions are those of Christ’s love.

That’s just a sample.

Let me be clear here. I am not trying to convince anyone to pray in any way other than they are doing right now. I am simply trying to defend this difficult Catholic practice as someone who has been on both sides of the fence as it were. I am sure that many people who know me now and the Catholic that I am (vocal to be sure but FAR from a good one) and have a hard time believing just how very anti-Catholic I was. I assure that nothing has been said about Catholics by anyone on this forum that I myself did not believe. Unless, it was something nice. The nice things I didn’t believe. So what I would like to do in this post is just explain how I got from there to here with nothing but my Bible.

I will confess here that I went to the Catholic Church unwillingly and with a very bad attitude. I barely accepted God’s clear leading in the issue (and it would have only been slightly more clear had an actual burning bush or talking ass been involved). but I went with a disobedient heart. I was in the Catholic Church praying “Lord, I believe. Help Thou my unbelief.” for a long time and that was more for form than from a genuine hunger for Our Lord to show my my errors. I tell you this because I want you to understand that I was sola scriptura for a long time in the Catholic Church. I accepted that I had to obey in the externals but my heart was far from real obedience. My belief in sola scriptura was actually one of the last things to fall as I truly converted to the Catholic Faith and went from being in the Catholic Church to being Catholic. So when I say that I came to these beliefs with nothing but my Bible, I am deadly serious and I fought the Lord every step of the way. To my great shame.

Let me outline what I see in Sacred Scripture that relates to this issue.

We are ONE Body. I see this clearly depicted in Sacred Scripture.

Colossians 1:18 He is the head of the body, the church He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he himself might be preeminent.

1 Corinthians 12:20-27 But as it is, there are many parts, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I do not need you,”nor again the head to the feet, “I do not need you.” Indeed, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are all the more necessary, and those parts of the body that we consider less honorable we surround with greater honor, and our less presentable parts are treated with greater propriety, whereas our more presentable parts do not need this. But God has so constructed the body as to give greater honor to a part that is without it,so that there may be no division in the body, but that the parts may have the same concern for one another. If (one) part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy. Now you are Christ’s body, and individually parts of it.

Ephesians 5:29-30  For no one hates his own flesh but rather nourishes and cherishes it, even as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.

Romans 12:4-5 For as in one body we have many parts, and all the parts do not have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ and individually parts of one another.

1 Corinthians 6:15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take Christ’s members and make them the members of a prostitute? Of course not!

Jesus only has ONE Body and we are it.

Ephesians 4:4-6 one body and one Spirit, as you were also called to the one hope of your call; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

Colossians 3:15 And let the peace of Christ control your hearts, the peace into which you were also called in one body. And be thankful.

Death does not separate us from Christ OR from each other.

Romans 8:35-39  What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? As it is written: “For your sake we are being slain all the day; we are looked upon as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Mark 12:26-27 26 As for the dead being raised, have you not read in the Book of Moses, in the passage about the bush, how God told him, ‘I am the God of Abraham, (the) God of Isaac, and (the) God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead but of the living. You are greatly misled.”

Luke 23:43 He replied to him, “Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise .”

Christians are bound together in mutual love and commanded to pray for each other and we imitate the writers of Sacred Scripture when we do so.

Romans12:9-12 Let love be sincere; hate what is evil, hold on to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; anticipate one another in showing honor. Do not grow slack in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, endure in affliction, persevere in prayer.

Romans 15:30 I urge you, (brothers,) by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to join me in the struggle by your prayers to God on my behalf,

Colossians 4:2-3 Persevere in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving; at the same time, pray for us, too, that God may open a door to us for the word, to speak of the mystery of Christ, for which I am in prison

1 Thessalonians 5:11 Therefore, encourage one another and build one another up, as indeed you do.

1 Thessalonians 5:25 Brothers, pray for us (too).

2 Thessalonians 3:1 Finally, brothers, pray for us, so that the word of the Lord may speed forward and be glorified, as it did among you,

Galatians 6:2 Bear one another’s burdens, and so you will fulfill the law of Christ.

Ephesians 6:18-19 With all prayer and supplication, pray at every opportunity in the Spirit. To that end, be watchful with all perseverance and supplication for all the holy ones and also for me, that speech may be given me to open my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel

I have seen you say many times words to the effect of “show me where is says to pray to saints.”

Catholics don’t pray to saints in the sense that we pray to God. We ask them to pray for us. Now I know that many people don’t believe that is what the Catholic Church teaches but there’s not a lot I can do about that. Don’t look at what at Catholic you know says or does, or to any snippet of an Encyclical taken out of context, look to the Catechism of the Catholic Church. You can read it all at the Vatican Website or here  (the latter copy is searchable) That’s what the Catholic Church teaches and while it is individually regrettable that not every Catholic adheres to Catholic teaching that is a human failing and common to every church in every place and time.

Back to the “showing” part. I was like that too. I didn’t see any clear positive indication that we were to ask the saints to pray for us either. And then God slapped me right upside the head….I am so stubborn and disobedient it shames me how often He has had to do that and how often I must confess it to others in order to make my point. I realized that it wasn’t the Catholic Church or Sacred Scripture with the problem.

I was the problem.

I didn’t have faith and I didn’t believe Sacred Scripture.

Let me say that again. I refused to ask Saints to pray to me because I didn’t believe Sacred Scripture. And if I am going to be brutally honest, there was no small amount of feeling holier than those who did ask the saints to pray for them (superstitious nonsense and all of that.)

I asked myself what part of what I have outlined above, didn’t I believe? Which of those scriptures I have quoted didn’t mean what they said? Are we not one body? Are we separated from each other by death because **I** can’t see my brothes and sisters in faith that have gone before me? What about that being “surrounded by a cloud of witnesses” thing?  Was I going to blow off that scripture too? Where does scripture place limits on praying for one another? We are part of one body and we are supposed to pray for each other? I couldn’t find any limits on that….I WANTED limits, but they weren’t there.

Hebrews 11:1 Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen.

In the end, I realized that to fail to share my burdens with the whole Body of Christ and to fail to pray for the whole Body of Christ was a sinful lack of faith on my part in the Word of God contained in Sacred Scripture….not to mention a sinful lack of faith in the authority He has placed over me but that’s another confession for another day.

Obejctions?

There is only one mediator. Christ. Exactly. I don’t disagree AT ALL. Every Catholic I know agrees 100%. But we aren’t talking about mediating; we are talking about interceding in prayer for each other. If interceding in prayer for each other takes away from the Mediatorship of Christ, then we shouldn’t pray for each other here in the Church Militant (the church here on earth in Catholic speak. The saints in heaven are the Church Triumphant.) either. We have been commanded to intercede in prayer for one another and I can’t see that there were any exceptions made to that command.

They’re dead. No. They’re alive in Christ. (Luke 23:43; Mark 12:26-27)

They can’t hear us. So what if that is true? Is that any different than someone asking me to pray and me saying “Yes” then completely forgetting to do so? If I put a prayer request on an internet forum for prayer requests, I have NO evidence whatsoever that any person will pray for me. Our church chapel has a book of prayer requests in the back of the chapel and I know those requests get prayed for because I often go through them and pray. But if I write a request in it, is it somehow sinful if I am not assured that someone else will do the same for me? I don’t think so. If I ask you face to face, to pray for me I have no evidence that you will follow through. I don’t think it matters. You know why? God who is omniscient and omnipresent, heard me humbly share my burdens. God saw me treat you as my sister in Christ. He saw me step out in love and faith in the Body of Christ. It is obedience to Him that matters. I hope that you would pray for me. I believe that the prayers of others benefit me immensely. I don’t see that I am required to request prayer only of those who I know hear and follow through. Do I think the angels and saints hear us? Yes I do and one scriptural defense of that I have seen lately comes from Randy Alcorn (a noted and respected Protestant) and is up on Cor ad Loquitur Do I think the saints in heaven (including Mary) possess any attributes of divinity such as omniscience or omnipresence? Most emphatically no and the Catholic Church doesn’t teach otherwise. I do believe that praying for each other and sharing our burdens is something Our Lord commanded us to do. I don’t believe that anything He commands us to do, even if we don’t understand it fully, is purposeless. It isn’t my job to work out the details. I have the faithful obedience part.

And let me ask you this? Who would you rather pray for you? Someone in grave sin? Or the best Christians that you know? (James 5:16b “The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”; John 9:31, “Now we know that God does not hear sinners; but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does His will, He hears him.”; Isaiah 59:2 “But you iniquities have separated you from your God; and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear.”; 1 Peter 3:12, “For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are open to their prayers; but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”; Proverbs 28:9; “One who turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination.”) How do we know that the person here on earth that we ask to pray for us isn’t in grave sin and the Lord isn’t listening to him/her? I may have to step out  on faith and ask the saints in heaven to pray for me, I may not know exactly how or if they hear me  but I do know this; I know that if they hear me and pray for me, the Lord will be listening. It seems to me to run roughly parallel to those I ask to pray for me on earth. I may know they heard me (not always if I leave a prayer request on a bulletin board or a notebook) but I have no assurance that they will follow through or that if they do that there isn’t some grave sin in their lives that has them so far enough from the Lord that He’s not listening.

As Sister Mary Martha (crusty Catholic nun with a blog) says, “It’s a mystery. That’s Catholic-speak for ‘let it go.’”

The Catechism of the Catholic Church on The Communion of Saints  

The Catechism of the Catholic Church on  Mary, the Mother of Christ, the Mother of the Church

Jen from Daughter of the King has posted Catholic Carnival #125: Prayers, Priests, and Politics. Go take a look at what other Catholic bloggers have to say.

Genuine love…is demanding. But its beauty lies precisely in the demands it makes. Only those able to make demands on themselves in the name of love can then demand love from others. Message to Young People, Camaguey Cuba

From Pope John Paul II: In My Own Words

Life is swamping me these days. Please forgive some spotty blogging. I promise to pick up the pace as soon as I am able. RNW

I’ve been “asked”…challenged is a better word…to show how what Catholics believe about Mary comes from Sacred Scripture in order to prove that these are not “man-made doctrines.”

As a non-Catholic, I was completely oblivious to what scriptures taught about Mary because I was looking for trees and missing the forest. What Sacred Scripture taught about Mary became clear when I switched the process, I looked at the forest and suddenly I could see the trees with clarity. The Catholic Church teaches that Sacred Scripture is a unity. People and events in the Old Testament prefigure events and people in the New Testament. As a non-Catholic, I understood clearly how the liberation of the Hebrews from Egypt prefigured our own salvation, but for some reason I never looked too far beyond that. What is only dim shadow when looking at only the words of Sacred Scripture, becomes quite clear when you take a few steps back and look at what the people and events of the New Testament as the fulfillment of what is prefigured in the Old Testament implies in its fullness. The Catechism of the Catholic Church speaks to the unity of the Old Testament and the New Testament and in my opinion, this is was a crucial change in perspective for me with regard to understanding the Catholic Marian Doctrines….although not JUST those.

The unity of the Old and New Testaments

128 The Church, as early as apostolic times, and then constantly in her Tradition, has illuminated the unity of the divine plan in the two Testaments through typology, which discerns in God’s works of the Old Covenant prefigurations of what he accomplished in the fullness of time in the person of his incarnate Son.

129 Christians therefore read the Old Testament in the light of Christ crucified and risen. Such typological reading discloses the inexhaustible content of the Old Testament; but it must not make us forget that the Old Testament retains its own intrinsic value as Revelation reaffirmed by our Lord himself. Besides, the New Testament has to be read in the light of the Old. Early Christian catechesis made constant use of the Old Testament. As an old saying put it, the New Testament lies hidden in the Old and the Old Testament is unveiled in the New.

130 Typology indicates the dynamic movement toward the fulfillment of the divine plan when “God [will] be everything to everyone.” Nor do the calling of the patriarchs and the exodus from Egypt, for example, lose their own value in God’s plan, from the mere fact that they were intermediate stages.

So with the concept of ‘typology’ in mind, what do Catholics see revealed about Mary in the Old Testament?

1. Mary is the New Eve. Jesus is a New Adam (Romans 5:14; 1 Corinthians 15:45) and Mary is the New Eve. Eve was tempted by the words of a fallen angel bringing words of death. The obedient angel Gabriel brought words of life to Mary and her obedience is the source of New Life for the world. Through Eve’s disobedience, sin and death entered the world. In Genesis 3:15 it is prophesied:

I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; He will strike at your head, while you strike at his heel.

It is the Son of the woman who will crush the serpent’s head (and calls to mind the number of times in the NT where Jesus refers to His Mother as “Woman”). If it is Jesus who crushed the serpent’s head, and I think that most Christians would agree that this is true; then, the woman must be Mary. Throughout the OT we are reminded of women (types of Mary) who crush the heads of Israel’s enemies (types of Satan). In Judges 4:17-22, Jael drives a tent stake through the skull of Sisera and in Judges 5:24, we see her describes as “most blessed of women.” (Foreshadowing the words of Elizabeth to Mary in Luke 1:42). In Judges 9:50-55 a woman drops a millstone on King Abimelech. In Judith 12-13, Judith beheads the Assyrian commander-in-chief and is praised in Judith 13:18:

“Blessed are you, daughter, by the Most High God, above all the women on earth; and blessed be the Lord God, the creator of heaven and earth, who guided your blow at the head of the chief of our enemies. Your deed of hope will never be forgotten by those who tell of the might of God.”

But Jesus and Mary together (just as we must work TOGETHER with the saving Grace of Our Lord) crush the serpent’s head and David (who prefigures Jesus) cuts off Goliath’s head with Goliath’s own sword (nice touch in my I-think-God-does-vengeance-really-well sort of opinion) in Samuel 17. Note also that the place of the crucifixion is called skull-place in all four gospel accounts. And again I will call to your attention that Jesus refers to his mother from the cross as “Woman.”  Mary is the “woman” of the Genesis prophecy, the “woman” on John 2 when Jesus begins his public ministry, and the “woman” of Revelation 12 who with her Son is victorious in the battle against the Serpent.

2. Mary is the New Ark of the Covenant. In the Old Testament, the Ark of the Covenant carried Aaron’s rod (symbol of the Aaronic Priesthood), the written word of God in the stone tablets of the law, and a container of manna. In the New Testament Mary carried in her womb, the living word of God, the Eternal High Priest, and the Bread of Heaven. Mary is clearly shown to be the New Ark of the Covenant in Revelation 11:19-12:1-18. The OT Ark of the Covenant was made of incorruptible acacia wood and plated inside and out with gold. Even touching the Ark of the Covenant carried the death penalty executed by God himself (2 Samuel 6:6-7)

Catholics believe that the language and description of the NT writers of Mary further develops the parallels between the OT Ark of the Covenant and Mary as the New Ark of the Covenant. In the OT we see in Exodus 4:34-35 and Numbers 9:15 a cloud of glory covering the Tabernacle. In the Luke 1:35 we are told that ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.‘ The OT Ark of the Covenant spent three months in the house of Obededom (2 Samuel 6) and in the NT Mary spends three months in the house of Zechariah (Luke 1). In 2 Samuel 6:9, King David asks “How can the ark of the Lord come to me?” and in Luke 1:43 Elizabeth exclaims “And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” Finally David in 2 Samuel 14-16 leaps and dances in the presence of the Ark of the Covenant just as John the Baptist leaped in the womb of Elizabeth in the presence of the Mary (Luke 1:44)

Solomon, the son of David, built a temple that housed the Ark of the Covenant. Jesus, the son of David, also builds an eternal Temple which houses the New Ark of the Covenant in Heaven. (Revelation 11:19-12:1-18)

3. Mary is the Queen Mother. In many respects, the Old Testament kings prefigured Jesus who is called the King of Kings (Revelation 19:16) in the NT. Even the imperfect kings in David’s line especially prefigure Jesus’ perfect Kingship. In 1 Kings 2:19-20 we the importance of the King’s mother:

Then Bathsheba went to King Solomon to speak to him for Adonijah, and the king stood up to meet her and paid her homage. Then he sat down upon his throne, and a throne was provided for the king’s mother, who sat at his right. “There is one small favor I would ask of you,” she said. “Do not refuse me.” “Ask it, my mother,” the king said to her, “for I will not refuse you.”

The king’s mother, not his wife, had an official position in Israel. We know this from historical records, but we also see it reflected in 1 Kings 15:13.

He also deposed his grandmother Maacah from her position as queen mother, because she had made an outrageous object for Asherah. Asa cut down this object and burned it in the Kidron Valley.

NT Jewish Christians who understood Jesus to be the promised King of the Jews would naturally have understood Mary to be the Queen Mother. The typology Mary as Queen Mother would have led them to seek her intercession with the King just as we see Adonijah do. We see this reinforced at the Wedding of Cana where Mary’s intercession is sought. And finally we see in Revelation 11 & 12 the culmination of the OT, the Gospels, with Mary as the Queen of heaven. She is the Ark of the Covenant in 11:19 who gives birth to the son who will “rule all nations” and together they defeat the serpent.  She is crowned with 12 stars giving further credence to her as Queen of Heaven.

The cultural expectation of the Jews and the teaching of the typology of Sacred Scripture makes what were formerly shadows to me as a non-Catholic, explicit statements statements indeed about Mary and her role. When you combine what Sacred Scripture teaches us through the typology of Jesus and Mary in the Old Testament with the other implicit statements of Sacred Scripture (and I will get to those on another day) what the Catholic Church teaches about Mary becomes quite clear. In fact, rather than say that Sacred Scripture, doesn’t say something explicitly enough I am left with the expectation that unless Jesus or the New Testament writers gave an explicit exception to the typology that the only appropriate understanding of implicit statements is that which fully harmonizes with the typology of the Old Testament. 

“Everyone knows” that Catholics have incorporated pagan practices into their faith. For example, here is photographic “proof” that the Pope’s mitre reflects worhsip of Dagon the fish-god. Or here. And there’s more. Just do a Google search on “Dagon the Fish God” and “Catholic” and you’ll find plenty. What this is actually evidence of is that if you repeat a lie often enough it will begin to sound like the truth. What is tragic is that too many will simply accept that because they have always heard it and because it confirms what they’d like to believe (that Catholics are pagan, idol-worshippers) and never look to see if a superficial similarity actually will withstand the scrutiny of a serious examination. I admire those who take the time to take a closer look and follow the truth no matter where it takes them.

A recent convert on Take the Long Way Home shares a little bit about her research on the connection between Dagon the Fish God, the Pope’s Mitre, and reality. If the Catholic Church is wrong, then the truth should be sufficient to keep people from making the mistake of joining her and lies like the so-called connection between worship of Dagon the Fish God and the Catholic Church should not be necessary.

If you must reject the the Catholic Church, reject what she actually is and what she actually teaches and not the straw men set up by those who fear her.

I was taught that suffering excavates a deep place in our souls which can then be filled with God’s peace and joy. Mother Teresa would remind us so beautifully that “even Almighty God cannnot fill what is already full.” So, let us allow this hollowing out in our souls. And know that, even if we are experiencing trials and feelings of emptiness at the moment, we are in prime condition for being filled up with God’s inestimable treasures of grace — not the least of which is His own divine presence in our soul.

Susan Conroy in Praying in the Presence of Our Lord with Mother Teresa

I was reading Sacramentum Caritatis this evening and came across this quote:

14. Through the sacrament of the Eucharist Jesus draws the faithful into his “hour;” he shows us the bond that he willed to establish between himself and us, between his own person and the Church. Indeed, in the sacrifice of the Cross, Christ gave birth to the Church as his Bride and his body. The Fathers of the Church often meditated on the relationship between Eve’s coming forth from the side of Adam as he slept (cf. Gen 2:21-23) and the coming forth of the new Eve, the Church, from the open side of Christ sleeping in death: from Christ’s pierced side, John recounts, there came forth blood and water (cf. Jn 19:34), the symbol of the sacraments (30). A contemplative gaze “upon him whom they have pierced” (Jn 19:37) leads us to reflect on the causal connection between Christ’s sacrifice, the Eucharist and the Church. The Church “draws her life from the Eucharist” (31). Since the Eucharist makes present Christ’s redeeming sacrifice, we must start by acknowledging that “there is a causal influence of the Eucharist at the Church’s very origins” (32). The Eucharist is Christ who gives himself to us and continually builds us up as his body. Hence, in the striking interplay between the Eucharist which builds up the Church, and the Church herself which “makes” the Eucharist (33), the primary causality is expressed in the first formula: the Church is able to celebrate and adore the mystery of Christ present in the Eucharist precisely because Christ first gave himself to her in the sacrifice of the Cross. The Church’s ability to “make” the Eucharist is completely rooted in Christ’s self-gift to her. Here we can see more clearly the meaning of Saint John’s words: “he first loved us” (1 Jn 4:19). We too, at every celebration of the Eucharist, confess the primacy of Christ’s gift. The causal influence of the Eucharist at the Church’s origins definitively discloses both the chronological and ontological priority of the fact that it was Christ who loved us “first.” For all eternity he remains the one who loves us first.

That bolded part? Wow. Just LOOK what you have time to think about when you allow the Magisterium to settle the big issues. Being Catholic is just so cool because you get to hang out with such smart people who think such interesting things! Fascinating stuff….I may not sleep tonight for meditating on all the implications.