[James Dewitt]

Re: Did You Know?

Dear Fatty10, why do you spit on the face of Sweet Jesus? You silly catliks have all theses shrines around the earth, all to glorify Mary. Mary was nothing more than a female that gave birth to Jesus, she is not to be worshiped. Why do you hate Jesus?

[Didymus Much]

Re: Did You Know?

Everytime someone says something about Catholics, everyone refers to the same link "Catholics are not Christians".

I've referred only to a dictionary, and your own words.

The ideas that you have about Catholics are completely absurd.

I'm still waiting for the "If saints aren't real, why does the Pope keep finding more of them?" argument.

Mediator defined

A mediator is one who brings estranged parties to an amicable agreement.

Find me a prophet or angel in the Bible who said, "Hey, this is what God wants. Is it OK with you or should I tell him to try again?".

[Meek and Humble]

Re: Did You Know?

Too long, didn't read. Blasphemy deleted

Mary is dead, child. She can't hear you.

PSALM 146:3 Do not trust in princes, in mortal man, in whom there is no salvation. 4 His spirit departs, he returns to the earth; in that very day his thoughts perish. (NASB)

ECCLESIASTES 9:5 "For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not anything, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten."10

Deuteronomy 18:10 Let no one be found among you who sacrifices his son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, 11 or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead. 12 Anyone who does these things is detestable to the LORD, and because of these detestable practices the LORD your God will drive out those nations before you.

[Levi Jones]

Re: Did You Know?

Everytime someone says something about Catholics, everyone refers to the same link "Catholics are not Christians". The ideas that you have about Catholics are completely absurd. This link does not give an accurate description of Catholic beliefs at all.

If you want to find out what Catholics actually believe, i suggest you stop looking into these biased forums, and following some Pastor who thinks he knows anything about Catholicism.

Actually study some authentic Catholic doctrine before you keep referring me to this ridiculous link.

Didn't you read Pastor Zeke's sermon on the matter? It's all there quoted with scripture.

[Meek and Humble]

Re: Did You Know?

Yes i do, just as the prophets mediated from God to man.
just as the Angles act as messengers from God
including the Angel that mediated from God to Mary,
Just as we do when we pray for another.

All are examples of Mediation between God and man no?

http://www.prayerfoundation.org/why_protestants_dont_pray_to_saints.htm

Some Additional reasons (besides I Timothy 2:5) why Protestants don't pray to Christians now in Heaven (the Saints, including Mary) or even ask them to intercede on their behalf:

• God does not tell us in His Word (the Holy Scriptures) to do so.
• Protestants don't see any evidence in the Bible that believers who are now in Heaven can even hear us.
• The Apostles in the New Testament never teach that Christians should pray to Mary, or even ask her to intercede for us., nor do even the Church Fathers do so during nearly the entire first 400 years of the Christian Faith.
• There is no recorded example of anyone asking for Mary's intercession until the late 4th century---possibly as early as 379 A.D. (by Ephraim the Syrian, however this is disputed) but definitely in 389 A.D. (when Gregory of Nyssa in his writings mentions, not himself, but only someone named Justina doing so.) The numerous writings of some of the most important Church Fathers: John Chrysostom, Athanasius, Augustine, and Basil the Great, furnish no example of an invocation of Mary. (Excerpted from: "History of the Christian Church" by Philip Schaff: Volume III, Nicene and Post-Nicene Christianity, A.D. 311-390 Chapter VII, P. 409-427). For more details on this, see: Why Protestants Don't Pray to Mary).
• Why pray to someone who wouldn't seem to even know who you are, instead of to God the Father Himself and in Christ's name ("For God so loved the world...and Christ, who you know loved you enough to actually die for you)?
• Can the Saints (including Mary) hear millions of prayers simultaneously? Are they omniscient like God? There is no Biblical teaching to support these contentions, or any other related arguments that have so far been put forward.
• And perhaps most importantly: Protestants don't want to disobey Christ's own clear teaching on how Christians should pray.

Protestants don't want to disobey Christ's own clear teaching on how Christians should pray:

When the disciples (who would later become the apostles) asked the Lord Jesus to teach them how to pray, Christ taught them (and all Christians) to pray our prayers to God the Father:

Christ taught us to Prayto God the Father...

"In this manner therefore pray: Our Father, who art in Heaven..."-Matthew 4:6

...in His (Christ's) Name...

Later Christ clarified his teaching to pray to God the Father by saying that we should do so in His (Christ's own) Name---

"...I go unto my Father. And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If ye shall ask anything in my name, I will do it. If ye love me, keep my commandments." -John 14:12-15
...Christ Himself being our only mediator...
"For there is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus;" -I Timothy 2:5

[Flatty10]

Re: Did You Know?

No. Prophets and angels in the Bible act as messengers, ie. God talks to us through them (one-way street).

If a True Christian™ wants to talk to God, they pray directly to God.

Mediator defined

A mediator is one who brings estranged parties to an amicable agreement. In New Testament theology the term invariably implies that the estranged beings are God and man, and it is appropriated to Christ, the One Mediator. When special friends of God — angels, saints, holy men — plead our cause before God, they mediate "with Christ"; their mediation is only secondary and is better called intercession. Moses, howover, is the proper mediator of the Old Testament (Galatians 3:19-20).

Christ the Mediator

St. Paul writes to Timothy (1 Timothy 2:3-6) . . . "God our Saviour, Who will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus: Who gave himself a redemption for all, a testimony in due times." The object of the mediatorship is here pointed out as the salvation of mankind, and the imparting of truth about God. The mediator is named: Christ Jesus; His qualification for the office is implied in His being described as man, and the performance of it is ascribed to His redeeming sacrifice and His testifying to the truth. All this originates in the Divine Will of "God our Saviour, Who will have all men to be saved". Christ's mediatorship, therefore, occupies the central position in the economy of salvation: all human souls are both for time and eternity dependent on Christ Jesus for their whole supernatural life. "Who [God the Father] hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love, In whom we have redemption through his blood, the remission of sins; Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature . . . all things were created by him and in him. And he is before all and by him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he may hold the primacy: Because in him, it hath well pleased the Father, that all fulness should dwell; And through him to reconcile all things unto himself, making peace through the blood of his cross, both as to the things that are on earth, and the things that are in heaven". (Colossians 1:13-20)

Qualifications

The perfection of a mediator is measured by his influence with the parties he has to reconcile, and this power flows from his connection with both: the highest possible perfection would be reached if the mediator were substantially one with both parties. A mother, for instance, is the best mediator between her husband and her son. But the matrimonial union of "two in one flesh", and the union of mother and child are inferior in perfection to the hypostatic union of the Son of God with human nature. Husband, mother, son, are three persons; Jesus Christ, God and man, is only one person, identical with God, identical with man. Moreover, the hypostatic union makes Him the Head of mankind and, therefore, its natural representative. By His human origin Christ is a member of the human family, a partaker of our flesh and blood (Hebrews 2:11-15); by reason of His Divine Personality, He is "the image and likeness of God" to a degree unapproached by either man or angel. The Incarnation establishing between the First-born and His brethren a real kinship or affinity, Christ becomes the Head of the human family, and the human family acquires a claim to participate in the supernatural privileges of their Head, "Because we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones." (Ephesians 5:30). Such was the expressed will of God: "But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent his Son, made of a woman . . . that we might receive the adoption of sons." (Galatians 4:4-5; also Romans 8:29) The man Christ Jesus, therefore, who was designed by God to mediate between Him and mankind, and whose mediatorship was not accidental and delegated, but inherent in His very being, was endowed with all the attributes are required in a perfect mediator.

Christ's function as mediator necessarily proceeds from His human nature as principium quo operandi; yet it obtains its mediating efficacy from the Divine nature, i.e. from the dignity of an acting person. Its first object, as commonly stated, is the remission of sin and the granting of grace, whereby the friendship between God and man is restored. This object is attained by the worship of infinite value which is offered to God by and through Christ. Christ, however, is mediator on the side of God as well as on the side of man: He reveals to man Divine truth and Divine commands; He distributes the Divine gifts of grace and rules the world. St. Paul sums up this two-sided mediation in the words: ". . . consider the apostle and high priest of our confession, Jesus" (Heb. iii, I); Jesus is the Apostle sent by God to us, the high priest leading us to God.

[Sister Charli]

Re: Did You Know?

Everytime someone says something about Catholics, everyone refers to the same link "Catholics are not Christians". The ideas that you have about Catholics are completely absurd. This link does not give an accurate description of Catholic beliefs at all.

If you want to find out what Catholics actually believe, i suggest you stop looking into these biased forums, and following some Pastor who thinks he knows anything about Catholicism.

Actually study some authentic Catholic doctrine before you keep referring me to this ridiculous link.

You are trying to hyjack your own thread and turn it back on us.

Flatstuff. Can you not see the TRUTH?

Catlicks pray to dead people.

True Christians(tm) pray to God the father, God the son and God the holy Ghost.

[Flatty10]

Re: Did You Know?

Everytime someone says something about Catholics, everyone refers to the same link "Catholics are not Christians". The ideas that you have about Catholics are completely absurd. This link does not give an accurate description of Catholic beliefs at all.

If you want to find out what Catholics actually believe, i suggest you stop looking into these biased forums, and following some Pastor who thinks he knows anything about Catholicism.

Actually study some authentic Catholic doctrine before you keep referring me to this ridiculous link.

[Didymus Much]

Re: Did You Know?

All are examples of Mediation between God and man no?

No. Prophets and angels in the Bible act as messengers, ie. God talks to us through them (one-way street).

If a True Christian(tm) wants to talk to God, they pray directly to God.

[Flatty10]

Re: Did You Know?

Do you believe that Mary mediates between God and men? If not, what's the point of praying to her? If so, read 1 Timothy 2:5 and repent of your blasphemy.

Did you know:
Praying to Mary achieves nothing?
Roman Catholics are not Christians?

Yes i do, just as the prophets mediated from God to man.
just as the Angles act as messengers from God
including the Angel that mediated from God to Mary,
Just as we do when we pray for another.

All are examples of Mediation between God and man no?

[Lisa H]

Re: Did You Know?

I have held that belief for a number of weeks Sister Lisa.

Why else would he hang around a True Christian™ forum.

It is only a matter of time. I pray for him every day as I am sure many of the True Christians™ here do.

I can't wait for the day that God shows him the light.

Very true Sister Charli. I pray he will turn to the Lord. I noticed he does like talking to me, do you think I have a positive influence on him.

[Sister Charli]

Re: Did You Know?

I think Jo Freddie is slowly becoming a Christian

I have held that belief for a number of weeks Sister Lisa.

Why else would he hang around a True Christian(tm) forum.

It is only a matter of time. I pray for him every day as I am sure many of the True Christians(tm) here do.

I can't wait for the day that God shows him the light.

[Didymus Much]

Re: Did You Know?

It's nice to see you turning your life over to Christ as well.

Sorry if I misled, Levi. The OP raised some points that I felt hadn't been addressed sufficiently, is all. I'm still atheist.

Can I get a little monkey icon (both of them , actually), in the interest of clarity?

[Disciple Luke]

Re: Did You Know?

Australian Catlicks are all holding their breath that Mary McKillop will get a sainthood. Therefore they have to pray directly to her and believe that she has performed miracles so that the Poop in Rome can make her a saint. Saints are dead people Flatty. Jesus is the risen God. The son of God. And part of the Trinity. There is no room in the Trinity for dead people Flatty.

[landoverlover]

Re: Did You Know?

The Catholic church assigns sainthood to dead people, and it's not just a postmortem honorific. There's the patron saint of this and that, meaning they allegedly protect certain classes of people. I was driving through Mexico last year and visited the patron saint of drug traffickers.

When the church does not condemn praying to dead people for intercession in earthly affairs, it's heresy, apostacy, and just "dead" wrong.

As I've pointed out before, and not been contradicted, a survey of Catholics about three years ago showed that Jesus is SIXTH in line of who get prayed to among Catholics when a favor is needed. That the people doing the praying in this way are probably dirt-poor, ignorant, superstitious rock farmers probably encourages the phenomenon.

I don't know why you bother arguing the point. The church places a priestly burearcracy in between the Lord and His followers anyway, so what's the difference?