Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!usc!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: cms@dragon.uucp Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: 'Veneration of the 'Saints'' Message-ID: Date: 2 Jul 90 05:28:58 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Computer Projects Unlimited Lines: 87 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article , cms@dragon.uucp writes: > In article , jmgreen@pilot.njin.net (Jim Green) writes: > [For Protestants, angels are the intermediary??? Generally > Protestants oppose anything that would detract from a direct > relationship with God, or with Christ's role as the only mediator > between God and man. I don't think most of us would want to refer to > angels as intermediaries. Heh heh, I should have specified that what Protestants believe Protestants believe is not the same thing as what Catholics believe Protestants believe. For Protestants, angels are the intermediary because Protestants do not specify whom they wish their mediary to be, even though all people must pray through a mediary (I won't cite the Biblical passages again). This is the Catholic understanding of prayer to God. I meant that this is what Protestants do, not that this is what Protestants believe they do. I saw a movie once called "The Littlest Angel." A boy dies, goes to heaven, and tries to pray to God: Every time he prays, a celestial choir of angels shows up behind him and sings "DEEEAAAARRR GOOODDDD," whereupon he becomes frustrated and tries praying quieter and quieter, but even then the angels still sing his prayers to God. This is the Catholic attitude. Also, as an aside, Catholics do not view angels and saints as "detractors" from the only mediator between God and human beings, who is Jesus Christ. You certainly don't need to refer to the angels as intermediaries; an understanding of the method is less important than an understanding of the result, which is a relationship with God. I told the Father in Confession once that I often prayed to God to help me get the right cards I needed when playing solitaire. I told him my parents told me that was an inappropriate thing to pray for. Father said it was a perfectly appropriate thing to pray for; at that stage in my life, at least, he said, establishing a relationship with God was more important than the kinds of things I prayed for. What's important to us as children often isn't important to us as adults, however, this doesn't make the importance of the childhood thing any less profound in terms of our relationship with God. > I have to say that although I accept the defense of Catholic practice > that has appeared here in principle, I have some qualms about the > practice. I do not doubt that for the people who have written these > postings, asking Mary or various saints to pray for them adds to their > Christian life. However in my conversations with friends who grew up > in the Catholic Church, I find that most of them believe that the > invocation of saints had reached the point of being superstitious. > The saints were not used as fellow Christians, appreciation of which > deepened their prayer lives. Rather they were used as charms to help > find lost things, protect against winter colds, etc. This does not > necessarily mean that the practice needs to be abandoned. When things > are abused, one has to decide whether to correct the abuse or abandon > the thing. Reasonable people can disagree over which is appropriate. > But it is not simply misunderstanding that causes Protestants to be > suspicious of devotion to the saints. There is some reason. > > --clh] I pray to Saint Bede, patron saint of scholars, to help me in my Bible studies as well as studies in general. I might ask my Professor to pray for me. If I were having trouble in math, it makes sense to ask a math Professor to pray for you; he might understand the difficulties of math and convey this to God. Of course, God knows this already, but perhaps the process by which God knows everything is by virtue of the kinds of people he created, including people in the math field. I've prayed to Saint Anthony to help me find things because Saint Anthony is the patron saint of lost things; it can get superstitious if you allow it to. This is true of all people; just as many Protestants as Catholics believe in ghosts, however, Catholics almost instinctively do not equate ghosts, and their associated stories, with apparitions of the saints. One is supersitition, the other is religion; it's as simple as that. On your last two sentences, I agree with you completely. My reply to his article indicated that he truly did not understand invocation of the saints when he placed such prayer in an either-or position with respect to prayer to God which excludes the saints in direct invocation. Did God ever actually help me play solitaire? I say, unequivocally, yes, God did indeed help me play solitaire. Did he always or even ever help me to win? Perhaps, perhaps not; but that isn't the original question, is it? -- Sincerely, Cindy Smith _///_ // SPAWN OF A JEWISH _///_ // _///_ // <`)= _<< CARPENTER _///_ //<`)= _<< <`)= _<< _///_ // \\\ \\ \\ _\\\_ <`)= _<< \\\ \\ \\\ \\ <`)= _<< >IXOYE=('> \\\ \\ \\\ \\_///_ // // /// _///_ // _///_ // emory!dragon!cms <`)= _<< _///_ // <`)= _<< <`)= _<< \\\ \\<`)= _<< \\\ \\ \\\ \\ GO AGAINST THE FLOW! \\\ \\ A Real Live Catholic in Georgia