Why We Should not Pray to the Saints

Standing Up · #**181** 3rd March 2012, 10:33 AM

So far, all we know is that folks who pray to the dead in Christ do so without any explicit apostolic teaching. Instead, it is tradition taught from bishops.

Churches of the bishops, rather than Churches from apostles.

jackmt · #**182** 3rd March 2012, 11:35 AM

Originally Posted by narnia59

What I cited contradicts your claim that our connection to Christ and one another is limited to earth. Christ has united all those in him into one body, both those in heaven and on earth. Scripture is quite clear about that. And as St. Paul teaches, there is no division in the one body of Christ (1 Cor 12:25). All of its members care equally for one another.

You will get no argument from any Catholic that we are not to 'consult' the dead. Necromancy is strictly forbidden by the church. Seeking to conjure up those who have died to elicit information from them is not only wrong, it's dangerous.

Asking another member of the body of Christ to pray for us is not 'consulting' them. And if you're going to cite 1 Tim 2:5 as Christ being our sole mediator to the Father (which Catholics agree he is), then you need to place it in the context of the first four verses of 1 Timothy 2, where Paul urges us all to become "intercessors" for each other. Our ability to intercede for each other is totally dependent upon the sole mediation of Christ to the Father, but not only can we intercede for each other but we are commanded to do so. And it in no way contradicts Christ being the sole mediator between God and man, or St. Paul would not have told us to do it in the same breath.

Claiming that we can ask those on earth to intercede for us but not those in heaven creates a division in the body of Christ where St. Paul says there is none. And it flatly denies the Scriptural truth that Jesus Christ by his death and resurrection has united heaven and earth into himself.

I took your question to refer to we who are still on earth. Otherwise the question answered itself. Jesus Christ the Godman is the nexus of heaven and earth. We can only access heaven through Him. Once so accessed, what need have we of any other intercessor, nevermind that we are forbidden to seek another?

narnia59 · #**183** 3rd March 2012, 12:26 PM

Originally Posted by jackmt

I took your question to refer to we who are still on earth. Otherwise the question answered itself. Jesus Christ the Godman is the nexus of heaven and earth. We can only access heaven through Him. Once so accessed, what need have we of any other intercessor, nevermind that we are forbidden to seek another?

Are you proposing that once in the body of Christ we are no longer in need of any intercessory prayer from any others?

narnia59 · #**184** 3rd March 2012, 12:28 PM

Originally Posted by Thekla

But we believe in the teachings and promise of Christ as present, now, and lived, for we:

"... are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,

To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,

And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel."

God is not "up there", but Christ is present with us, now, the heavenly KIngdom is here and now, all this is present and now in Christ in the Holy Spirit.

Is living Christ is "Judaistic traditions" ? No, it is the fulfillment of Judaism.
Not a pagan understanding, nor the secularism that boxes God off somewhere in scrolls, not an ideology that is an intellectual belief,
but the promise and living in God who is above time (chronos), and is with us in time (kairos), and all that are with Christ.

This. We have come to the spirits of just men made perfect, to the heavenly assembly NOW. This. We are with Christ, and all that are with Christ.

jackmt · #**185** 3rd March 2012, 12:45 PM

Originally Posted by narnia59

Are you proposing that once in the body of Christ we are no longer in need of any intercessory prayer from any others?

All prayer request and suggestions by the writers of Scripture were to and for the earth dwelling saints. Yes we need prayers and to pray for one another. Let's do it Scriptually and not twist or interpolate Scripture to justify unscriptural practices.

narnia59 · #**186** 3rd March 2012, 12:49 PM

Originally Posted by jackmt

All prayer request and suggestions by the writers of Scripture were to and for the earth dwelling saints. Yes we need prayers and to pray for one another. Let's do it Scriptually and not twist or interpolate Scripture to justify unscriptural practices.

Asking another member of the body of Christ to pray for us is not unscriptural.

Thekla · #**187** 3rd March 2012, 01:03 PM

Originally Posted by Standing Up

So far, all we know is that folks who pray to the dead in Christ do so without any explicit apostolic teaching. Instead, it is tradition taught from bishops.

Churches of the bishops, rather than Churches from apostles.

And where is the evidence for your claim ?

The tradition that death of the bios = death of the zoe, lethe, this pagan belief embraced, that seeks to extinguish the alethia that we are come to the heavenly kingdom, surrounded by angels, the Church of the firstborn .. and partition God off somewhere in the clouds, that the fullness of Christianity is not something lived but yet another collection of intellectual statements from which we create an ideology ...

this survival of the sophia/philosophia of men, and of pagan teachings on death -- this tradition is not of God.

jackmt · #**188** 3rd March 2012, 04:08 PM

Originally Posted by narnia59

Asking another member of the body of Christ to pray for us is not unscriptural.

Summoning a deceased one is.

jackmt · #**189** 3rd March 2012, 04:10 PM

Originally Posted by Thekla

And where is the evidence for your claim ?

The tradition that death of the bios = death of the zoe, lethe, this pagan belief embraced, that seeks to extinguish the alethia that we are come to the heavenly kingdom, surrounded by angels, the Church of the firstborn .. and partition God off somewhere in the clouds, that the fullness of Christianity is not something lived but yet another collection of intellectual statements from which we create an ideology ...

this survival of the sophia/philosophia of men, and of pagan teachings on death -- this tradition is not of God.

The Apostles never advocated summoning the deceased; the bishops of liturgical (=works) denominations do. And you know that we know the soul survives death and you know what we mean when we say prayers for and to the dead, but you refuse to make the distinction even for arguments' sake.

narnia59 · #**190** 3rd March 2012, 04:20 PM

Originally Posted by jackmt

Summoning a deceased one is.

We don't have to 'summon' them. Have you not read the 12th chapter of Hebrews that Thekla cited? We come into their presence.

"You have come to.... the spirits of just men made perfect". In fact, we're surrounded by them, per Scripture.

By our unity with Christ we have access to heaven. You said so yourself I believe.

Guess what. They're THERE. The idea that we would have to 'summon' them in order to be in their presence is not Christian.

The idea that we would have to 'summon' them to us instead of our being lifted up to them denies our unity to the resurrected Christ and our citizenship in heaven.

If you cannot recognize the fundamental change that occurs with the resurrection of Christ and the unity that exists in his body between heaven and earth, nobody here can do much to help you.