Praying to Saints

[janelle]

It is unfortunate that people of other faiths don't understand the concept of praying to a saint. For the longest time, I had been misinformed and thought that we were "worshipping" a particular Saint and forgetting about Jesus and God himself. I didn't understand the concept of the Saint in Heaven intervening on our behalf and carrying our petition to the Lord Jesus. So we are essentially praying to Jesus but our particular patron Saint is aiding us and praying in agreement with us. I wish people of other faiths could grasp this concept because by mocking it and shunning it they miss out on all the wonderful blessings and powerful interventions that the saints in Heaven have in aiding our cause. Since Saints are already there with Jesus (and as Christians we all believe in eternal life, therefore the Saint is just as alive as Jesus) I believe they have a direct route to him. We need all the prayers we can get, so why not have a Saint pray for us and assist us in our petition. I do respect the concept of other Christians (such as the Babtists, etc) who make Jesus their personal Lord and Savior because I believe and practice that Jesus is my personal Savior as well, but that doesn't mean I can't pray to his foster-father for protection as St. Joseph was appointed by God to protect the infant Jesus. As far as Baptists pointing the finger at us and saying we are all going to hell if we don't repent, I don't take offense to that because there are just as many priests and nuns from my childhood who wagged that same finger at me with the same threats. Faith is a personal belief system, a relationship with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and I pray that none of us miss out on the glorious and wonderful gifts we receive from God when we pray, when we ask, when we seek and when we knock. I certainly don't mind having a Saint help me knock on Jesus' door for help. Thanks for reading this and God bless.


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I have never understood why people think that praying to a saint is a waste of time or idol warshipers. When we are in church we ask others to pray for us or when we are sick maybe laying of hands. Why then not a saint who has shown us the love of Christ. MY family after 30 years still can not accept me turning Catholic. When I was finaly ask why I have a statue of Mary I ask my brother if he had a picture of his wife. He said yes and I ask to see it then ask him if he was a idol worshiper. He said no but sometimes I just like to look at it when I need her strength and love. I told him it was the same with Mary for me and also when I am praying to a saint it helps me focus. He understood that and never made any more comments to me about it. I went to church with a friend who is not Catholic and when I was in that church with no saints or Mary I felt sad. The sadness I felt was like when I would visit my dad and stay with him. I loved being there but my mother name was not to be mentioned in his house. I felt the same way I felt I was in a house of God but could not mention my mothers name. The reformation was a divorce from the family of God how said for all of us christians. John
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[jdglmg]

My problem with this is that it is not biblical. Can you show me any scripture that backs up the practice of praying to saints? Jesus' perfect sacrifice gave us a direct relationship with the Father. I pray to Him alone because He is the almighty God. I do not go to my friend Shannon when I want to ask my friend Stacey for something, I ask Stacey directly. The same is true of my prayers. I go to God because He is the one who can answer my prayer.

[Cessie]

Up until a few years ago I was Catholic and found the intercession of the Saints comforting because my problems were so petty considering the horrid diseases, wars, natural disasters all over the world. I have never understood the non-Catholics disapproval and still don't. Praying to the Saints doesn't interfere with one's relationship with God, infact it enhances it in many ways. Most Catholics (with the exception of the Traditionalists, Opus Dei etc) are not fundamentalists and don't justify everything by chapter and verse in the NT. However there is justification. This article pretty well covers the Catholic point of view towards the Saints and prayer complete with ch/verse. HTH


http://www.catholicism.org/pages/praying.htm

[Whitequeen39]

Originally posted by jdglmg
My problem with this is that it is not biblical. Can you show me any scripture that backs up the practice of praying to saints? Jesus' perfect sacrifice gave us a direct relationship with the Father. I pray to Him alone because He is the almighty God. I do not go to my friend Shannon when I want to ask my friend Stacey for something, I ask Stacey directly. The same is true of my prayers. I go to God because He is the one who can answer my prayer.

ITA, and very well said.

[cathych]

Even Jesus stated that He was not worthy to be prayed to (I do not have the exact verse), & that we should pray to God. I have never heard any of the manifestations of God say that we should pray to saints.

[janelle]

Does everything you do about God have to be bibical?

It's so easy to understand. I ask you to pray for me, you ask me to pray for you. Then why not ask St. Paul to pray for you. After all he is in heaven with God. Why not ask all the angels and saints to pray for you. Now talk about a prayer chain. Catholics do that every Sunday in worship. A powerful prayer team if you ask me.

Saints cannot grant you what you ask for but they can pray to God to grant it to you just like your one friend might not be able to give you something but if your other friend talks to her about your request she just may be able to do it even faster than if just you asked.

[Whitequeen39]

I most certainly think that everything you do about God should be bibical, that is what the Bible is for, for us to follow, most people don't want to do that or they want to modify it to suit themselves.

[jdglmg]

Question: "What does the Bible say about praying to Mary and/or saints?"

Answer: For me there are the following issues to consider regarding this topic of praying to saints, angels, and Mary instead of to God alone.

(1) We are told to pray to God (Luke 11:1-2; Matt. 6:6-9; Phil 4:6; Acts 8:22; Luke 10:2). (2) There is only the repeated example of two things in Scripture: a) Prayer is made to God alone (by righteous people) (Rom. 10:1; Rom. 15:30; Acts 12:5; Acts 10:2; Acts 8:24; Acts 1:24; Zech. 8:21-22; Jonah 2:7; 4:2) b) Requests for prayer are made only to the living (1Thes 5:25; 2Thes 3:1; Heb. 13:18). (3) We are never told to communicate with the dead (even with prayer requests). When Saul tried to communicate with Samuel, it was deemed an evil thing, not a good thing (those who support praying to the saints may say it was only deemed evil because of the manner in which he sought to do it...through witchcraft). It is interesting to note that Samuel told Saul that if God wasn't listening to him, there was nothing that he could do then either (1 Sam. 28:16).

(4) We are never told to pray to angels and when people had occasion to talk with any angel besides the Angel of the Lord (the pre-incarnate Christ) and tried to worship them, they were told to stop and worship God alone (Rev. 19:10; 22:9; Col. 2:18). (5) We are never told that the dead know what is going on the earth (some think it is possible based on one interpretation of Hebrews 12:1). (6) God alone is omniscient and omnipresent. He alone is able to hear a multitude of prayers simultaneously. He is the one who commands angels and sends them to do His bidding (Dan. 9:20-23). (7) Angels (Daniel 9:20-23) and the spirits of the dead remain finite (Luke 16:19f.), limited to one location at a time.

(8) The Catholics statement that they go to angels, saints, and Mary to ask for prayer is not consistent with the normal practice of asking for prayer. For example, if I remember correctly, in the saying of the Rosary in which the large majority of the time is spent in devotion to Mary and then they ask her to pray for them now and at the hour of their death (they pray this same prayer 50 times). Whereas, when I ask someone to pray for me, I don't ask them over and over and over again minute after minute. Rather, I ask them to pray and then should be spending my time on my knees before God not before them. (9) God promised to hear us when we ask anything according to His will (1 John 5:14-15; 1 Pet. 3:12). He entreats us to come boldly unto the throne of grace (His throne) that we may find grace and help in time of need (Heb. 4:14). (10). God promised us that the Holy Spirit makes intercession for us according to the will of God with groanings that cannot be uttered (Rom. 8:26). Considering such truths, why do we need to go through a saint, angel or Mary, especially considering the fact that neither the example of doing so, nor the command of doing so is ever given in Scripture? The Catholic Church cites the example of the wedding feast (John 2) as an example of Mary getting Jesus to do something for others and uses that as a proof text for prayer to her, but to use this example to support such a doctrine that flies in the face of countless other admonitions and examples of praying to God alone is ridiculous.

Thus, not only is it contrary to Scriptural admonition to pray to God and Scriptural example to do so, but it is illogical to substitute praying to an all-loving, omniscient, and omnipotent God who invites us to come before His throne because He is completely acquainted with all of our doings (Ps. 139) to pray to some saint who can only listen to one conversation at a time (all the time not ever being sure if the saints in heaven know what is taking place in our lives here on earth). God's Word says that there is one God and one mediator between God and man, Christ Jesus (1 Tim. 2:5). Let us then come to God through His work on the cross of Calvary, not only for salvation, but also for our needs as well (Heb. 4:14).

Recommended Resource: Reasoning from the Scriptures with Catholics by Ron Rhodes.

http://www.gotquestions.org/prayer-saints-Mary.html

[jdglmg]

Who is a saint?

When people speak about a saint today, invariably their concept of a saint is not the same as the Bible’s.

People generally think that a saint is someone who is dead, whose life conformed to Roman Catholic teaching and who has performed some miracles after dying. Once canonised, a saint becomes the object of prayer, devotion and veneration.

But the Bible teaches differently. The word ‘saint’ simply means one who is sanctified, or set apart for God. It is not a status that only a few Christian attain. On the contrary, a saint is one who has a living relationship with God through his mercy and grace expressed in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, every Christian is a saint and no one has to wait to die before becoming a saint. This can be seen from a very small sampling from the Bible:

When Saul was persecuting the church he was said to have done great harm to the ‘saints in Jerusalem.’ (Acts 9:13)

Peter visited with ‘the saints in Lydda.’ (Acts 9:32)

Recalling his persecution of the church, Paul said, ‘On the authority of the chief priests I put many of the saints in prison …’ (Acts 26:10)

Writing his famous epistle on the grace of God to the Christians living in Rome, Paul greets them: ‘To all in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints.’ (Romans 1:7)

Concluding his lovely letter to the church of Christ at Philippi Paul says, ‘All the saints send you greetings, especially those who belong to Caesar’s household.’ (Philippians 4:22)

These examples are sufficient to show that today’s understanding of sainthood is not in harmony with what the Bible teaches. Saints in the Bible are all those who are God’s children, not just a select few. Saints are found among the spiritually weak and the strong, the educated, the uneducated, the slave, the free, etc. If one is saved, redeemed, forgiven, reconciled to God, then one is a saint. Furthermore saints never became the object of veneration upon their death no matter how pious their life had been. And the idea of actually praying to a departed soul is never taught in the Bible. God alone is the object of all our prayers, our devotion and veneration.

For a full discussion on how God makes one a saint, a redeemed person, see Biblical Topics.

http://www.bibleanswers.ie/Q&A/Who%20Is%20A%20Saint.html

[ang in NC]

To me it doesn't matter how you pray as long as you pray. Just a thought here~~~I haven't found anything in the Bible that says only baptist or catholics or methodist or etc. will be in Heaven. Love and praying for you all!

[guesswho!]

janelle, thanks for helping me to better understand where others are coming from.

I gotta tell ya, frankly(for me) it's a scary thot that someone who is dead is hearing my prayers! A relationship w/Jesus is so personal; I don't want a dead person intercepting my prayers. We're told Biblically to go into our "prayer closets" & "close the door" & the "Father who sees in secret", will reward....

Trust is a major issue in our lives on earth. Deciding whom to trust is difficult. I find it hard to trust a Saint that I never knew, & know very little about, enough to entrust carrying prayers to Jesus on my behalf. Relationships generally are one-on-one & I believe that this is what Jesus died on the cross to establish a relationship w/us.

Jesus paid a HUGE price hanging on that cross for us.If the Saints were able to intercede on our behalf, then Jesus could have been spared from the cross. But Jesus said, "No one can come to the Father except by Me."

[ckerr4]

The idea behind the rosary is not just the intercessory prayer. It is also a meditory prayer. In praying the same prayer over and over, you free yourself from a focus on the actual words, and give yourself over to the spirit of the prayer. It's really a beautiful prayer - the entire rosary. It is not just a prayer asking for Mary's (Mother of God) intercession, but also includes the Lord's Prayer, and a prayer to the Holy Spirit as the Third Part of the Holy Trinity, and includes reflections on the Mysteries of the Rosaries, which are different points in Jesus' life.

Catholics can only ask saints to intercede because Jesus has died and gone to heaven. None of the intercession could have been done before. They are interceding with God, the Trinity ,the mystery which we as humans cannot understand.

The article the Cessie posted actually gives scripture to support intercessory prayer. I don't guess anyone read it. :(

Catholics don't prayer for saintly help in order to go to hell. Truly, we don't, lol. We see it is asking for help. I find it a comforting ritual, and I love to hear the priest list the saints ("...and all the angels and saints in heaven.") during Mass. It's simply a difference in Rite. I don't think that any of y'all are wrong for your prayer methods. In the same tone, you won't convince me that I'm wrong in my methods.

[ckerr4]

Originally posted by jdglmg
Who is a saint?

When people speak about a saint today, invariably their concept of a saint is not the same as the Bible’s.

People generally think that a saint is someone who is dead, whose life conformed to Roman Catholic teaching and who has performed some miracles after dying. Once canonised, a saint becomes the object of prayer, devotion and veneration.

But the Bible teaches differently. The word ‘saint’ simply means one who is sanctified, or set apart for God. It is not a status that only a few Christian attain. On the contrary, a saint is one who has a living relationship with God through his mercy and grace expressed in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, every Christian is a saint and no one has to wait to die before becoming a saint. This can be seen from a very small sampling from the Bible:



Oh, I did want to mention this (not picking on ya either, I just saw this in your post :) )

The Catholic Church teaches this also, although it is not widely known. I learned it in school and church. We are all saints, as part of the body of the church. As Catholics, we simply have people that we remember and celebrate as exemplary members of the community, who illustrate the true Christian life of charity, devotion, etc. These are the saints that people remember. But we are all saints. :)

[janelle]

Of course God told the people to stop WORSHIPING THE ANGELS only God is to be worshiped. Same with Mary, we don't WORSHIP Mary.

Taken from Catholic answers.


Praying to the Saints


The historic Christian practice of asking our departed brothers and sisters in Christ—the saints—for their intercession has come under attack in the last few hundred years. Though the practice dates to the earliest days of Christianity and is shared by Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, the other Eastern Christians, and even some Anglicans—meaning that all-told it is shared by more than three quarters of the Christians on earth—it still comes under heavy attack from many within the Protestant movement that started in the sixteenth century.


Can They Hear Us?



One charge made against it is that the saints in heaven cannot even hear our prayers, making it useless to ask for their intercession. However, this is not true. As Scripture indicates, those in heaven are aware of the prayers of those on earth. This can be seen, for example, in Revelation 5:8, where John depicts the saints in heaven offering our prayers to God under the form of "golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints." But if the saints in heaven are offering our prayers to God, then they must be aware of our prayers. They are aware of our petitions and present them to God by interceding for us.

Some might try to argue that in this passage the prayers being offered were not addressed to the saints in heaven, but directly to God. Yet this argument would only strengthen the fact that those in heaven can hear our prayers, for then the saints would be aware of our prayers even when they are not directed to them!

In any event, it is clear from Revelation 5:8 that the saints in heaven do actively intercede for us. We are explicitly told by John that the incense they offer to God are the prayers of the saints. Prayers are not physical things and cannot be physically offered to God. Thus the saints in heaven are offering our prayers to God mentally. In other words, they are interceding.


One Mediator



Another charge commonly levelled against asking the saints for their intercession is that this violates the sole mediatorship of Christ, which Paul discusses: "For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (1 Tim. 2:5).

But asking one person to pray for you in no way violates Christ’s mediatorship, as can be seen from considering the way in which Christ is a meditor. First, Christ is a unique mediator between man and God because he is the only person who is both God and man. He is the only bridge between the two, the only God-man. But that role as mediator is not compromised in the least by the fact that others intercede for us. Furthermore, Christ is a unique mediator between God and man because he is the Mediator of the New Covenant (Heb. 9:15, 12:24), just as Moses was the mediator (Greek mesites) of the Old Covenant (Gal. 3:19–20).

The intercession of fellow Christians—which is what the saints in heaven are—also clearly does not interfere with Christ’s unique mediatorship because in the four verses immediately preceding 1 Timothy 2:5, Paul says that Christians should interceed: "First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all men, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life, godly and respectful in every way. This is good, and pleasing to God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1 Tim. 2:1–4). Clearly, then, intercessory prayers offered by Christians on behalf of others something "good and pleasing to God," not something infringing on Christ’s role as mediator.


"No Contact with the dead"



Sometimes Fundamentalists object to asking our fellow Christians in heaven to pray for us by declaring that God has forbidden contact with the dead in passages such as Deuteronomy 18:10–11. In fact, he has not, because he at times has given it—for example, when he had Moses and Elijah appear with Christ to the disciples on the Mount of Transfiguration (Matt. 17:3). What God has forbidden is necromantic practice of conjuring up spirits. "There shall not be found among you any one who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, any one who practices divination, a soothsayer, or an augur, or a sorcerer, or a charmer, or a medium, or a wizard, or a necromancer. . . . For these nations, which you are about to dispossess, give heed to soothsayers and to diviners; but as for you, the Lord your God has not allowed you so to do. The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brethren—him you shall heed" (Deut. 18:10–15).

God thus indicates that one is not to conjure the dead for purposes of gaining information; one is to look to God’s prophets instead. Thus one is not to hold a seance. But anyone with an ounce of common sense can discern the vast qualitative difference between holding a seance to have the dead speak through you and a son humbly saying at his mother’s grave, "Mom, please pray to Jesus for me; I’m having a real problem right now." The difference between the two is the difference between night and day. One is an occult practice bent on getting secret information; the other is a humble request for a loved one to pray to God on one’s behalf.

[janelle]

Overlooking the Obvious



Some objections to the concept of prayer to the saints betray restricted notions of heaven. One comes from anti-Catholic Loraine Boettner:

"How, then, can a human being such as Mary hear the prayers of millions of Roman Catholics, in many different countries, praying in many different languages, all at the same time?

"Let any priest or layman try to converse with only three people at the same time and see how impossible that is for a human being. . . . The objections against prayers to Mary apply equally against prayers to the saints. For they too are only creatures, infinitely less than God, able to be at only one place at a time and to do only one thing at a time.

"How, then, can they listen to and answer thousands upon thousands of petitions made simultaneously in many different lands and in many different languages? Many such petitions are expressed, not orally, but only mentally, silently. How can Mary and the saints, without being like God, be present everywhere and know the secrets of all hearts?" (Roman Catholicism, 142-143).

If being in heaven were like being in the next room, then of course these objections would be valid. A mortal, unglorified person in the next room would indeed suffer the restrictions imposed by the way space and time work in our universe. But the saints are not in the next room, and they are not subject to the time/space limitations of this life.

Further, the Bible indicates that the glorified human intellect enjoyed by the saints in heaven has a phenomenal ability to process information, dwarfing anything we are capable of in this life. This is shown by the fact that, on Judgment Day, we will review every act of our lives. But since Judgment Day is not going to take eighty years to review the events of an eighty year life (if it takes any time at all), our intellects will be able to process enormous amounts of information and experience once freed from the confines of this mortal life. And not only will we be aware of the events of our own lives, but of the lives of those around us on Judgment Day as well, for Christ stated that all our acts will be publicly revealed (Luke 12:2–3).

This does not imply that the saints in heaven therefore must be omniscient, as God is, for it is only through God’s willing it that they can communicate with others in heaven or with us. And Boettner’s argument about petitions arriving in different languages is even further off the mark. Does anyone really think that in heaven the saints are restricted to the King’s English? After all, it is God himself who gives the gift of tongues and the interpretation of tongues. Surely those saints in Revelation understand the prayers they are shown to be offering to God.

The problem here is one of what might be called a primitive or even childish view of heaven. It is certainly not one on which enough intellectual rigor has been exercised. A good introduction to the real implications of the afterlife may be found in Frank Sheed’s book Theology and Sanity, which argues that sanity depends on an accurate appreciation of reality, and that includes an accurate appreciation of what heaven is really like. And once that is known, the place of prayer to the saints follows.


"Directly to Jesus"



Some may grant that the previous objections to asking the saints for their intercession do not work and may even grant that the practice is permissible in theory, yet they may question it on other grounds, asking why one would want to ask the saints to pray for one. "Why not pray directly to Jesus?" they ask.

The answer is: "Of course one should pray directly to Jesus!" But that does not mean it is not also a good thing to ask others to pray for one as well. Ultimately, the "go-directly-to-Jesus" objection boomerangs back on the one who makes it: Why should we ask any Christian, in heaven or on earth, to pray for us when we can ask Jesus directly? If the mere fact that we can go straight to Jesus proved that we should ask no Christian in heaven to pray for us then it would also prove that we should ask no Christian on earth to pray for us.

Praying for each other is simply part of what Christians do. As we saw, in 1 Timothy 2:1–4, Paul strongly encouraged Christians to intercede for many different things, and that passage is by no means unique in his writings. Elsewhere Paul directly asks others to pray for him (Rom. 15:30–32, Eph. 6:18–20, Col. 4:3, 1 Thess. 5:25, 2 Thess. 3:1), and he assured them that he was praying for them as well (2 Thess. 1:11). Most fundamentally, Jesus himself required us to pray for others, and not only for those who asked us to do so (Matt. 5:44).

Since the practice of asking others to pray for us is so highly recommended in Scripture, it cannot be regarded as superfluous on the grounds that one can go directly to Jesus. The New Testament would not recommend it if there were not benefits coming from it. One such benefit is that the faith and devotion of the saints can support our own weaknesses and supply what is lacking in our own faith and devotion. Jesus regularly supplied for one person based on another person’s faith (e.g., Matt. 8:13, 15:28, 17:15–18, Mark 9:17–29, Luke 8:49–55). And it goes without saying that those in heaven, being free of the body and the distractions of this life, have even greater confidence and devotion to God than anyone on earth.

Also, God answers in particular the prayers of the righteous. James declares: "The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects. Elijah was a man of like nature with ourselves and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth its fruit" (Jas. 5:16–18). Yet those Christians in heaven are more righteous, since they have been made perfect to stand in God’s presence (Heb. 12:22-23), than anyone on earth, meaning their prayers would be even more efficacious.

Having others praying for us thus is a good thing, not something to be despised or set aside. Of course, we should pray directly to Christ with every pressing need we have (cf. John 14:13–14). That’s something the Catholic Church strongly encourages. In fact, the prayers of the Mass, the central act of Catholic worship, are directed to God and Jesus, not the saints. But this does not mean that we should not also ask our fellow Christians, including those in heaven, to pray with us.

In addition to our prayers directly to God and Jesus (which are absolutely essential to the Christian life), there are abundant reasons to ask our fellow Christians in heaven to pray for us. The Bible indicates that they are aware of our prayers, that they intercede for us, and that their prayers are effective (else they would not be offered). It is only narrow-mindedness that suggests we should refrain from asking our fellow Christians in heaven to do what we already know them to be anxious and capable of doing.


In Heaven and On Earth



The Bible directs us to invoke those in heaven and ask them to pray with us. Thus in Psalms 103, we pray, "Bless the Lord, O you his angels, you mighty ones who do his word, hearkening to the voice of his word! Bless the Lord, all his hosts, his ministers that do his will!" (Ps. 103:20-21). And in Psalms 148 we pray, "Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord from the heavens, praise him in the heights! Praise him, all his angels, praise him, all his host!" (Ps. 148:1-2).

Not only do those in heaven pray with us, they also pray for us. In the book of Revelation, we read: "[An] angel came and stood at the altar [in heaven] with a golden censer; and he was given much incense to mingle with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar before the throne; and the smoke of the incense rose with the prayers of the saints from the hand of the angel before God" (Rev. 8:3-4).

And those in heaven who offer to God our prayers aren’t just angels, but humans as well. John sees that "the twenty-four elders [the leaders of the people of God in heaven] fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and with golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints" (Rev. 5:8). The simple fact is, as this passage shows: The saints in heaven offer to God the prayers of the saints on earth.

[janelle]

The Rosary


The word rosary comes from Latin and means a garland of roses, the rose being one of the flowers used to symbolize the Virgin Mary. If you were to ask what object is most emblematic of Catholics, people would probably say, "The rosary, of course." We’re familiar with the images: the silently moving lips of the old woman fingering her beads; the oversized rosary hanging from the waist of the wimpled nun; more recently, the merely decorative rosary hanging from the rearview mirror.

After Vatican II the rosary fell into relative disuse. The same is true for Marian devotions as a whole. But in recent years the rosary has made a comeback, and not just among Catholics. Many Protestants now say the rosary, recognizing it as a truly biblical form of prayer—after all, the prayers that comprise it come mainly from the Bible.

The rosary is a devotion in honor of the Virgin Mary. It consists of a set number of specific prayers. First are the introductory prayers: one Apostles’ Creed (Credo), one Our Father (the Pater Noster or the Lord’s Prayer), three Hail Mary’s (Ave’s), one Glory Be (Gloria Patri).


The Apostles’ Creed



The Apostles’ Creed is so called not because it was composed by the apostles themselves, but because it expresses their teachings. The original form of the creed came into use around A.D. 125, and the present form dates from the 400s. It reads this way:

"I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended into hell. The third day he arose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. From thence he shall come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen."

Traditional Protestants are able to recite the Apostles’ Creed without qualms, meaning every line of it, though to some lines they must give meanings different from those given by Catholics, who composed the creed. For instance, we refer to "the holy Catholic Church," meaning a particular, identifiable Church on earth. Protestants typically re-interpret this to refer to an "invisible church" consisting of all "true believers" in Jesus.

Protestants, when they say the prayer, refer to the (lower-cased) "holy catholic church," using "catholic" merely in the sense of "universal," not implying any connection with the (upper-case) Catholic Church, which is based in Rome. (This is despite the fact that the term "Catholic" was already used to refer to a particular, visible Church by the second century and had already lost its broader meaning of "universal").

Despite these differences Protestants embrace the Apostles’ Creed without reluctance, seeing it as embodying basic Christian truths as they understand them.


The Lord’s Prayer



The next prayer in the rosary—Our Father or the Pater Noster (from its opening words in Latin), also known as the Lord’s Prayer—is even more acceptable to Protestants because Jesus himself taught it to his disciples.

It is given in the Bible in two slightly different versions (Matt. 6:9-13; Luke 11:2-4). The one given in Matthew is the one we say. (We won’t reproduce it here. All Christians should have it memorized.)


The Hail Mary



The next prayer in the rosary, and the prayer which is really at the center of the devotion, is the Hail Mary. Since the Hail Mary is a prayer to Mary, many Protestants assume it’s unbiblical. Quite the contrary, actually. Let’s look at it.

The prayer begins, "Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee." This is nothing other than the greeting the angel Gabriel gave Mary in Luke 1:28 (Confraternity Version). The next part reads this way:

"Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus." This was exactly what Mary’s cousin Elizabeth said to her in Luke 1:42. The only thing that has been added to these two verses are the names "Jesus" and "Mary," to make clear who is being referred to. So the first part of the Hail Mary is entirely biblical.

The second part of the Hail Mary is not taken straight from Scripture, but it is entirely biblical in the thoughts it expresses. It reads:

"Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen."

Let’s look at the first words. Some Protestants do object to saying "Holy Mary" because they claim Mary was a sinner like the rest of us. But Mary was a Christian (the first Christian, actually, the first to accept Jesus; cf. Luke 1:45), and the Bible describes Christians in general as holy. In fact, they are called saints, which means "holy ones" (Eph. 1:1, Phil. 1:1, Col. 1:2). Furthermore, as the mother of Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, Mary was certainly a very holy woman.

Some Protestants object to the title "Mother of God," but suffice it to say that the title doesn’t mean Mary is older than God; it means the person who was born of her was a divine person, not a human person. (Jesus is one person, the divine, but has two natures, the divine and the human; it is incorrect to say he is a human person.) The denial that Mary had God in her womb is a heresy known as Nestorianism (which claims that Jesus was two persons, one divine and one human), which has been condemned since the early 400s and which the Reformers and Protestant Bible scholars have always rejected.

[janelle]

Another Mediator?



The most problematic line for non-Catholics is usually the last: "pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death." Many non-Catholics think such a request denies the teaching of 1 Timothy 2:5: "For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus." But in the preceding four verses (1 Tim. 2:1-4), Paul instructs Christians to pray for each other, meaning it cannot interfere with Christ’s mediatorship: "I urge that prayers, supplications, petitions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone. . . . This is good, and pleasing to God our Savior."

We know this exhortation to pray for others applies to the saints in heaven who, as Revelation 5:8 reveals, intercede for us by offering our prayers to God: "The twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and with golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.


The Glory Be



The fourth prayer found in the rosary is the Glory Be, sometimes called the Gloria or Gloria Patri. The last two names are taken from the opening words of the Latin version of the prayer, which in English reads:

"Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen." The Gloria is a brief hymn of praise in which all Christians can join. It has been used since the fourth century (though its present form is from the seventh) and traditionally has been recited at the end of each Psalm in the Divine Office.


The Closing Prayer



We’ve covered the opening prayers of the rosary. In fact, we’ve covered all the prayers of the rosary except the very last one, which is usually the Hail Queen (Salve Regina), sometimes called the Hail Holy Queen. It’s the most commonly recited prayer in praise of Mary, after the Hail Mary itself, and was composed at the end of the eleventh century. It generally reads like this (there are several variants):

"Hail holy Queen, Mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness, and our hope! To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve. To thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this vale of tears. Turn, then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us, and after this our exile show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus. O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary."

So those are the prayers of the rosary. Between the introductory prayers and the concluding prayer is the meat of the rosary: the decades. Each decade—there are fifteen in a full rosary (which takes about forty-five minutes to say)—is composed of ten Hail Marys. Each decade is bracketed between an Our Father and a Glory Be, so each decade actually has twelve prayers.

Each decade is devoted to a mystery regarding the life of Jesus or his mother. Here the word mystery refers to a truth of the faith, not to something incomprehensible, as in the line, "It’s a mystery to me!" The fifteen mysteries are divided into three groups of five: the Joyful, the Sorrowful, the Glorious. When people speak of "saying the rosary" they usually mean saying any set of five (which takes about fifteen minutes) rather than the recitation of all fifteen mysteries. Let’s look at the mysteries.


Meditation the Key



First we must understand that they are meditations. When Catholics recite the twelve prayers that form a decade of the rosary, they meditate on the mystery associated with that decade. If they merely recite the prayers, whether vocally or silently, they’re missing the essence of the rosary. It isn’t just a recitation of prayers, but a meditation on the grace of God. Critics, not knowing about the meditation part, imagine the rosary must be boring, uselessly repetitious, meaningless, and their criticism carries weight if you reduce the rosary to a formula. Christ forbade meaningless repetition (Matt. 6:7), but the Bible itself prescribes some prayers that involve repetition. Look at Psalms 136, which is a litany (a prayer with a recurring refrain) meant to be sung in the Jewish Temple. In the psalm the refrain is "His mercy endures forever." Sometimes in Psalms 136 the refrain starts before a sentence is finished, meaning it is more repetitious than the rosary, though this prayer was written directly under the inspiration of God.

It is the meditation on the mysteries that gives the rosary its staying power. The Joyful Mysteries are these: the Annunciation (Luke 1:26-38), the Visitation (Luke 1:40-56), the Nativity (Luke 2:6-20), the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple (Luke 2:21-39), and the Finding of the child Jesus in the Temple (Luke 2:41-51).

Then come the Sorrowful Mysteries: the Agony in the Garden (Matt. 26:36-46), the Scourging (Matt. 27:26), the Crowing with Thorns (Matt. 27:29), the Carrying of the Cross (Luke 23:26-32), and the Crucifixion (Luke 23:33-46).

The final Mysteries are the Glorious: the Resurrection (Luke 24:1-12), the Ascension (Luke 24:50-51), the Descent of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:1-4), the Assumption of Mary into heaven (Rev. 12), and her Coronation (cf. Rev. 12:1).

With the exception of the last two, each mystery is explicitly scriptural. True, the Assumption and Coronation of Mary are not explicitly stated in the Bible, but they are not contrary to it, so there is no reason to reject them out of hand. Given the scriptural basis of most of the mysteries, it’s little wonder that many Protestants, once they understand the meditations that are the essence of the rosary, happily take it up as a devotion.

[ladybreaker]

to me, praying to "saints",asking a "man" for forgivness,and bowing down in prayer to a statue of a man/woman are forms of idol worship and are sins. a man can NOT forgive your sins--only the lord can do that!"saints" were all declared to be "saints" by men--not God!while i do believe that those who serve the lord are special and sometimes blessed in the eyes of God, they are in no way worthy of prayers directed to them.no person can perform a miracle--God can and does.after all,it was God himself who told moses "THOU SALT HAVE NO OTHER GODS BEFORE ME"

ladybreaker

[Whitequeen39]

I TOTALLY AGREE LADYBREAKER!

[janelle]

I wish you would study it more. We don't ask a man for forgiveness. The man (priest) is substituting in the roll of Christ and acting for Him. It's in the bible. Jesus gave his apostles the power to forgive or to retain sins that were confessed to them. They were to act for Him in His absence. They do not forgive sins, they act in the role of God forgiving though them. Only God can forgive sins and they are making it possible for people to confess their sins and have them forgiven. If this were not true then how do you intreprete what Christ ordered his apostles (priests) to do?

We do not bow down in prayer before a statue to worship the statue but to remember the saint. It's like a picture of a loved one. Don't you have loved ones pictures on display in your home and don't you look at them to remember your loved one after they die? This is the same thing. We only worship God and no one else. Acually, I rarely bow down before any statures but I may have a holy card with the saints picture or likeness that they may have looked like and I look at it at times. Not a lot of times but just sometime.

No person can preform a miracle unless God preforms it through them. But I do believe if one prays to a saint for healing or something else that only could be accomplished with a miracle and it happens, then God did act through the saint. Look at Mother Theresa. She will only be proclaimed a saint when a living person can prove by praying to Mother Theresa to intercede for them to heal them or a person they know and the healing occurs that is unexplained and could only be a miracle will she be proclained a saint. This has to happen not just once but twice. The church is very careful in proclaining someone a saint.

No saint can be God. Only God can be God. The saints have no authority to heal or do anything unless God allowes it. There is no contradiction here.