Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: ctdonath@rodan.acs.syr.edu (Carl T. Donath) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Why invoke the Saints? Message-ID: Date: 29 May 90 06:43:21 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY Lines: 99 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article jhpb@garage.att.com writes: >> I am most eager to hear of verses that do instruct us >> to pray to someone other than God. I've never seen them. >> >> - Carl > Thanks to those who have answered my question. After asking a lot of Catholics this question for a long time, I was starting to wonder if anyone had an answer. To summarize, there were two kinds of answers: 1. A. You can ask other people to pray for you. B. Saints are people (alive, though not on Earth) C. Prayer is just talking to someone not on Earth (God, Jesus, saints) D. therefore, praying to Saints is just asking them to pray for you. 2. Some people interpret the Transfiguration, events in Job, etc. as equivalent to prayer to the saints. These haven't yet convinced me to pray to saints (for reasons that I'll only get into if someone asks). However, I can finally understand and respect one of the Catholic activities and will stop "condemning" it. (flame on: It just amazes me how many people go through the motions that they have been taught without having any idea why they are doing it. :flame off) One thing that came up during this does bother me: >Why does the practice have to be found in Sacred Scripture? Isn't it >enough that it is an ancient tradition of the Church? > >Joe Buehler I feel that every practice followed by any religious organization (specifically Christian churches) falls into one of three categories: mandated by God, forbidden by God, and "God doesn't care as long as you do it for right reasons and don't go in a wrong direction". I want to know which of these our assorted traditions fall into. Some "traditions" are mandated by God: "faith in Christ", baptism, communion, prayer, obedience to the commandments. Some are forbidden: human sacrifice, worship of anyone/thing other than God, blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, wasting your life. Some don't matter: what songs you sing during a worship service, whether or not there is a choir, and others. What bothers me about traditions is that people tend to put them into the wrong category, usually into the "mandated" one. (WARNING: what I say below may bother people with itchy flame-throwers. I'm just using points as examples, not criticizing. We can discuss them later.) The reason I brought up the infamous Prayer-to-Saints question is that I see so many Catholics putting it into the "mandated" category (prayer is mandated, so you must ask the saints to help you) when, from an outsider's point of view I see it closer to the "forbidden" category (it often looks an awful lot like worship of someone other than God). BY LOOKING INTO SCRIPTURE with the aid of you folks, I saw that it was not forbidden (some verses can be interpreted easily as promoting it), but did not see any verses mandating it, I realized that it is in the "doesn't matter" category: if it helps you, do it. If it doesn't (or it bothers you), don't. Some people, out of tradition or otherwise, state vigorously that thou shalt not eat meat. They put eating meat into the "forbidden" category, BY LOOKING INTO SCRIPTURE, I find (at least it's my own interpretation) that it does not matter whether you do or not. Some people, out of tradition or otherwise, state that baptisim is optional. BY (oh no, here I go again) LOOKING INTO SCRIPTURE, I find that it is mandated. Am I getting my point across? (probably not - just got some flame-throwers ready) My point: tradition is nice, but only by looking into God's word can we find out how emphatically we should follow tradition, or whether a tradition should be followed at all. I have seen too many people faithfully follow tradition without having the foggiest notion as to why they are doing it. Their only reason is "its traditional". The long article describing the Rosary and it's purpose was wonderful. Obviously it can have great, scriptural, significant meaning to someone who makes use of it. It can (not is, but can) be a great tradition. Unfortunately few people seem to know its meaning and most say it as if they were holding onto a dead fish. By justifying a tradition with scripture (this must be done by every person following the tradition), we learn its true meaning and can justify its continuation. Without scriptural meaning, tradition is just "going thru the motions". {$Babble off} - Carl