CAN WE PRAY TO THE SAINTS?
Since the third
century, invocation of defunct Christians considered to be ‘saints’ and in God’s
presence, has been practiced in Christendom, and eventually been accepted as
established doctrine by all traditional branches of Christianity around the
world.
Even though the
Bible expressly forbids to contact the dead, under any circumstance or form
(Deuteronomy 18:9-14), and only God has the power to listen to prayers passing
the barrier of death and from multiple people at the same time, this practiced filtered
into Christianity from the Hellenic mind of the gentile converts, as well as
other practices like the veneration of images and the cult of angels
(Colossians 2:18-19; Ephesians 4:17).
COMMUNION
OF SAINTS
The biblical
doctrine of Communion of Saints (John 17:21; 1Thessalonians 5:11; James 5:16)
is invoked to justify this erroneous practiced, arguing that since the
Christians dead are in God’s presence, they can pray for us, and that because they
are still part of the Body of Christ, they can be invoked to ask them for
intercession.
This does not consider
the following:
1 – The Body of
Christ is one, and it is conformed by the living members of the Church as well
as the departed ones in Glory. However, their conditions are totally different
in more than one aspect. The salvation of the living is still tested, while the
dead’s is already guaranteed. The living still subjected to temptation, the ones
in Glory not. The living saints are separated from the departed ones by the barrier
of death.
Only God can
deal with each member of the Body of Christ, alive or dead, since only God can
transcend the barrier of death.
2 – The call of
Lord Jesus to be one, and from the apostles to pray for, and confess to one
another, refers only to the living members of the Church, not the departed
ones.
There is nothing
to assume that the dead saints are part of this commandment.
OTHER
REASONS WHY WE SHOULD NOT CONTACT THE DEPARTED SAINTS
There are also other
theological reasons why is useless to try to contact the departed saints.
1 - Death is an
invincible barrier that separates the living from the dead, saints, and sinners
alike.
There is nothing
in the Scripture that may lead us to believe that the dead are aware of what
happens on Earth, or able to listen any of the living. This idea is foreign to
Christianity, and it is born from magical practices of paganism (Ecclesiastes
9:5-6). None of the saints of Heaven can listen to any living creature. They are
beyond the reach of the living.
2 – Humans conserve
their natural human faculties after dead. They still have the same personality
and virtues they had while alive, and the condemned also preserve their vices
and sins. Only God is omniscient in the universe, no other created being is.
Only God has the
faculty to trespass the invincible barrier of death, and able to listen the
petitions of millions of people elevating prayers to Him all over the world at
the same time, 24 hours a day. No saint can do this.
The attribution
of god-like qualities to the departed is also an idea of pagan origin, which
attributed similar qualities to their demigods.
A FINAL
REASON
There is also an
exegetical reason of why it is useless to ask for the intercession of the
departed.
It is commonly
said that the saints or Mary are intercessors between Jesus and humans, and
that their intercession can do what our prayers cannot do.
The Bible calls
Jesus the ONLY MEDIATOR between God and men:
“For there
is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus”
1Timothy 2:5
Through his
incarnation, Jesus united his divine nature with our humanity.
One of the purposes
of this incarnation, was to feel the human temptations and weaknesses, so that we
may know that He understands us when we fall in sin and claim for help and
forgiveness (Hebrews 4:15-16).
Jesus is the only
intermediary between God and humanity, because as a man without sin, there is
nobody who can understand us better than Him, in all aspects of our existence. The
incarnation would be pointless if there was no mercy in Jesus or lack of
understanding of our weaknesses so that we would need someone else to ask Him
to ‘listen’ our claims.
Jesus alone is
declared to be the bridge that unites the divinity with our finite humanity,
and He is all sufficient.
CONCLUSION
Invocation of
saints is an old practice, but it is wrong.
The fact that it
is old, does not make it right. It contradicts the Bible principles and was
never practiced by primitive Christians for the first 300 years.
It crept into
Christianity, the same way it filtered into Judaism and Islam, in open
opposition to the theology of those religions, due to the influx of Hellenic pagan
ideology.
The departed
saints pray for us. That is certain. They are not in an unconscious state or absorbed
into their own happiness. They still live holy lives, and intercede for
humanity, the Church, and all of God’s intentions until the Great Judgement Day
(Revelation 6:9-11), but they do this on their own accord, and not because they
are aware of the living or by listening to our petitions.
To invoke saints
is invocation of the dead, and it is sinful.
The intercession
of Jesus to the Father is the unique and only invocation humans can do.
Omar Flores.
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