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Question Title Posted By Question Date
Using statues at church and home Joseph Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Question:

Dear bro,
I am really confused on certain things. I believe you would give me a proper answer.

Exodus 20:4 says " Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:".

When the Bible says it clearly, why are we catholic still have the statues of Jesus , Mary and other saints in our Churches? Isn't it a disobedience to God's word? I have seen people in my church touch the statues and praying, bow before them, worshiping them.

Jesus took form of human being and showed us how should we live as a human but He never prayed to any statue, instead He looked up to Heaven and prayed.

How can we judge these things?

Another question is about Mother Mary and the Saints.. Is it good if we give the praise, worships and adoration to them when God in Heaven, the only one who is worthy to be praised, and worshiped still exists ?

How can we even think that Mother Mary sits beside Jesus, the Son of God or God Himself and she should be given the same respect as we give Jesus? Don't you think that its Satan's way of deceiving people to divert their focus from God to others? so that God does not get the praise He deserves.

I am still a catholic and believe in it, but I am getting confused always when it comes to these things.

Again, angels are the messengers of God and they just do what God orders them to do. So, why should we pray to an angel? Why don't we just pray to God instead? If God wants to send the angel to help us, He will. the Angel cannot come to help us by himself.. I need answers for all these bro.. please send reply at least to my email id.

Thanks... and God bless,
S.Joseph



Question Answered by

Dear Joseph:

I think the problem is that you are approaching Scripture and these issues in the same manner as a Protestant. So-called "Bible Christians" are actually among the most ignorant of the Bible. So, let me explain these issues from the Bible and from Church teaching.

First, the Ten Commandments does not say that graven images are wrong. It is important to take verses in context. To single out a verse without it context I can prove that we should all hang ourselves. The Bible says, "Judas hung himself." The Bible also says, "Go out and do likewise." This is obviously wrong, but it shows how one can make the Bible say just about anything by taking verses out of context.

The context of the First Commandment is:

(Ex 20:4-5) "You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them..."

 Protestants split the First Commandment into two. This is done to falsely accuse the Catholic Church worships statues, which it does not. The graven image issue was a contemporary problem. At the time one of the primary ways people were committing idolatry was worship statues. If the Ten Commandment came down today, the example of :have no other gods before me" would probably be "do not make for yourself a sports star into a god."

Whether we consider these passages to be the First and Second Commandment, which it is clearly not, or one commandment matters not.  It is not graven images that is the problem, it is the worship of graven images that is the problem.

Is there Biblical proof of this interpretation I am outlining. You betcha.

If the so-called Bible Christians actually knew their Bible they would know the proof, too, and stop their silly accusations against the Church that Jesus personally founded.

If we read a few chapters over (Exodus 25:18-21), we find that God commands Moses,  to make two statues of angels (cherubim) for the top of the Ark of the Covenant. In Numbers 21:8-9, God again commands Moses to make a graven images — a bronze serpent, so that the people who were bitten by snakes could look upon it and be healed.  In the Gospel, Jesus compared Himself to the bronze serpent (John 3:14).

The inner sanctuary of the Temple contained two large statues of angels according to 1 Kings 6:23-28. In the following verses, Solomon also had the walls of the Temple decorated with carved images of angels, palm trees and flowers (1 Kings 6:29ff). During the Babylonian Captivity, Ezekiel had a vision from God about the design of the new Temple. According to Ezekiel 41:17-25, this new Temple contained graven images of angels and palm trees. These passages in the Bible indicate that God does not forbid the making of statues. If God truly condemned the making of graven images in the "Second Commandment", then He must have changed His mind later in the Old Testament.

Obviously, if graven images were inherently evil, God would not be commanding Moses to make graven images.

It is the Worship of graven images that is wrong. Also, the phrase, "bow down to them or serve them" refers to the worship of idols.

The Catholic Church has no idols. When people bow down in front of a statue or image, they are bowing down to God, not the statue. The statue is merely a reminder of God and the Saints, a way to focus prayer by a visual reminder. Many Protestant have a prayer altar in their homes. Such home altars tend to have a image of Jesus, a Cross, and the Bible. Are these Protestants worshiping the picture of Jesus, or the Cross, or the Bible? O course not.

You say, "I have seen people in my church touch the statues and praying, bow before them, worshiping them." Joseph, you have just committed the crime (grave sin) of rash judgment. You do not know what is in the hearts of these people. You cannot know if they are "worshiping" anything but God. Touching the statues is no different that touching a photograph of a dead parent or grandparent. God made us sacramental people, that is, he made is tactile. We understand the world through our senses. To touch a picture of a dead loved one is to touch the memory of that loved on in a tactile way.

Jesus Himself was an image. He was the image of the living God. He came down from heaven and incarnated himself to the image of a man. If we are to be strict about this, God sinned by sending His image to earth to be incarnated as Jesus. Of course, that is nonsense.

You said, "Another question is about Mother Mary and the Saints.. Is it good if we give the praise, worships and adoration to them when God in Heaven, the only one who is worthy to be praised, and worshiped still exists ?"

We venerate not worship Saints. We give honor to the Saints because they are worthy to receive honor. In addition, when we honor the Saints we honor God.

If my daughter receives an award, I am honored because I am her father. God is pleased when we honor His Saints. He is pleased when we consider Him and the Saints a family. That is what we are, a family, and as such, we can go to each other for advice or ask a brother to intercede for us in prayer. God is not just God and we are his creatures. God made us in His image to be his children. We are family.

Mary is the Queen Mother (mother of the King). In Old Testament times the position of Queen Mother was a powerful one as the mother had the ear of her son, the king. In fact, the practice of asking Mary to intercede for us is a principle that goes back to the days of Solomon. Bathsheba, Solomon's mother, was the Queen Mother. When people wanted something from the King people would come to her to intercede for them before the King (1 Kings 2:10-25). In those days, the Queen Mother traditionally had the job of interceding for the people.

You see, Joseph, every doctrine of the Catholic Church can be found explicitly or implicitly in the Bible. The New Testament is a Catholic document. It was written by Catholics and vetted by Catholics. And it was Catholic who settled in the canon of New Testament Scripture based upon whether or not the particular letter was consistent with the Church's Oral Tradition. The Church gave us the Bible, the Bible did not give us the Church. And it is the Church, not the Bible that is the pillar of truth:

(1 Tim 3:15 KJV) But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth."

And that is how the Bible Christian's favorite translation, the King James, words it.

See the Catholic Encyclopedia articles, Veneration of Images, Adoration, and Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

As for angels, we see the veneration of angels in the Bible (Joshua 5:14; Daniel 8:17; Tobit 12:16). Angels are called Saints, even though they are not human, because they are worthy of veneration.

Each of us is assigned a Guardian Angel at the moment of conception. The job of the Guardian Angel is to watch over us, to protect us from danger when it does not violate free will (angels can never violate free will), encourage us to love God, and sometimes to carry messages from God to us.

God giving us a Guardian Angel is an act of great love.

See the Catholic Encyclopedia article, Guardian Angels.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary

 

 

 


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