This may be an unusual question, but why do we pray to the saints? When I started out on my faith journey I used to do novenas etc to padre pio and other saints, over the years that activity kinda fizzled out and I rarely pray to any saint now, but would focus my prayer on Jesus and ask all the saints in general to intercede, depending on the circumstances and if I thought of it. I know some people will state great graces they have received through the saints but that is not what I want this thread to be about. My question is; do you think praying to the saints is a stage we go through as our faith increases to a level where we won't need them as much?
I view it the opposite way. Praying only to Jesus is a stage some people go through. Later, they progress to a deeper understanding that they are part of the Mystical Body of Christ. Christianity is not a Me & Him Alone union, it's a We--The Communion of Saints.
Praying through other saints and angels is very pleasing to our Lord. Protestants also wonder why we go to a priest to confess our sins, while they can go straight to Jesus. Once again, it is humility that Jesus desires. We go to priests and through saints, because this is what our Lord asks in scripture. "pray for one another" and "I absolve you from your sins" are directions from our Lord himself. It is all about how our humble, merciful, loving, forgiving and benevolent God chooses for us to come to him.
In a recent series of talks by Fr. Ripperger on youtube, he said something very interesting. He said that the Saints you have a particular fondness for are probably assigned to you, because they conquered the enemy over some weakness they share with you. When he said that, it really resonated with me. Lately I've been spontaneously thanking our Blessed Mother for the divine assignment of angels and Saints to me, and to all of her children. She is the Queen of all Saints, the Queen of Angels, and Mediatrix of all graces. And I pray to my favorite Saints, "Thank you for your example, your intercession and your friendship." If we could get a glimpse of all the help that comes from our Blessed Mother's hand, we would be astonished. It's up to us to receive it!
Similiarly I think in loving Mary we are loving someone who is a rainbow of all the virtues, of all the graces. So, as her children we can eack of us find something there to nourish ourselves. My mother had ten children and looking back on it I can see how she was ten different mothers to ten different kids, nourishing each of them differently. When ig o to Mary I see different things that attract me as an indiviual. Things that might not attract of that others might not notcie. I like the fact she laughs and smiles and has a sense of humour. I love the fact that she is an individual very much in her own right. I loe t fact that she is very much a fighter and a soldier. i love the fact that she is at such deep, deep peace. I love the fact that she is so very,very deeply a person of the deepest prayer. I love her Grace and beauty. I lvoe that she is Queeen of the Angels because I am especially fond of the angels I love it she is Queent of Saints and AMrtys because I cont them all as frineds. I love the fact she is Mother of the Church because I love the Church so much. I adore the fact she has ru n ins with the devil, because I keep running up against him. ..and so on. But toehrs would pick different flowers from her crown. I gotta admit but it is her laughter and sen e of humour that ujst fell me. I never read anyone else write about this which perplexs me, I just adore this.
Just to explain how this question came about, one of my friends was diagnosed recently with cancer, this person has lots of prayer friends. I met one of them one day and he told me a group of them were doing a novena to a particular saint for her healing. A few weeks later I was talking to this person again and he informed me they were doing a novena to a different saint for the same intention, the first saint hadn't produced any goods it seemed! Upon a little probing as to how this particular person was praying, it emerged he was doing the novena but expecting the person to die and as far as I could gather some of the group were of the same mindset. It was obvious their faith was very weak so it got me wondering why pray to saints, if doing so allowed people the option of remaining in weak faith and falling back on the "it was God's will" if the person dies. This person goes to medj at least twice every year for many years. As do a lot of his prayer group. Whereas Jesus challenges us to ask for the gift of faith and to strengthen our faith... James 1:6. Mk 11:24. Mt 15:28. Jn 14:12. Thanks guys for all the various replies so far...
Padraig; What a wonderful thing, that she lets you see this side of her! I am so grateful for my sense of humor, and joy is my natural inclination. But I have only experienced the Blessed mother as regal and serious.
Yes, I think it's tempting to think that Saints can wrestle things from God for us. When really, God allows them to obtain graces for us in His Will, because we are all family, and He wants us to know the reality of the communion of Saints. He's so good!!! You've got to read this hilarious short article about mistaken beliefs regarding the intercession of Saints: http://jenniferfulwiler.com/2010/07/yaya-meets-st-anthony/
it's maybe not ideal, but I think we go to God from where we are at , rather than from were we should ideally be. Maybe she or he is doing a bit of shopping about in the Holy Shop upstairs, but at least they have a strong Faith. personally if I am praying to the saints fro something I want I would not be afraid to go through every saint that comes to mind, with a few angels thrown in. I like to think heaven makes allowances.
I think one thing about Our Lady and the way we regrard her is this, Kathy, that we are inclined to regard her, quite naturally in the light of what we can do for her (which is sweet of course) rather than what we can do and the effect we have on her. My idea of things is that like any Mother with her children she totally delights in our company. She thinks , like any Mother that each and everyone of us is the best thing that ever happened. So when we go to her we have her whoel and complete attention, totally undivided. This delight of Mary in our presense (and yes it realy is a delight for her0 is a result of the MOtherly heart God has given her, a heart big enough to embrace us all for room to spare. I think Mary..and heaven in general delights in this that we should come as very,very little children. Very little children can get away with loads of things adults cannot, including snuggling right close to their mother. They are totally unafraid and open. What Mother could resist this? My own mother , looking back on it never refused me anything really, I am afraid she was putty in my hands. But I think the greatest delight for me in being in Mary's company is that she really enjoys my company. She enjoys and dleights in all our company. it's a two way street. I wish people could understand this more, that it is not just a one way ticket. It's two way deal. I think it would make us more relxed, she really is a mother and if we only knew how much she loved us , we would all of us die of joy. But I think this is something we can apreciate and deepen our relationship with mary, that we give her so much enjoyment simply by being there. ..and in reality, compared to her ,we are very,very,very,very little indeed.
When I was a Protestant I had a problem with praying to the Saints for intercession. Just before coming into the Catholic Church I prayed a Novena to Saint Terese and asked if it were God's Will that we should pray for their intercession. On the last day of the Novena, I walked into my rose garden to pick a rose for my house and there were no roses, only very small unopened buds. I went back into the house, and a few hours later happened to pass by the garden and noticed, very close to the house, a very large yellow rose in full bloom! I realized that praying through the intercession of the Saints is praying to Jesus as they are in His Divine Will in Heaven.
I am always stunned, when I go near a shrine to St Therese at all the roses. So many colours of roses , where do they get them? So many hundreds. Always at her shrine. When St Therese was very young, just 15 and entered Carmel she admitted the one thing she realy missed was running about in meadows full of flowers. She said one time whe she dreamed it was always of meadows and flowers and bunny rabbits..a great sign of her essential inocence, her child like spirit. So when I see all these flowers I understand God is doing pay back to her....and WHAT A PAYBACK!
I do believe it is a joy for God our Heavenly Father when we acknowledge our Heavenly brothers and sisters who have been raised to sanctity by the Church. Saint Anthony must be the most loved and pestered saint in Heaven. I have just done the 8th of 9 Tuesday prayers in the novena ready for the Feast of Saint Anthony on 13th June. Padraig, I never realised Blessed Mother had a sense of humour; but when you think of it she must have. Beyond the joy and delight she had in bringing Jesus up, I only consider what she went through when He began His public ministry and ending with His Crucifixion. And the courage and support she gave the Apostles in the early days of the Church. I believe asking Saints and especially Blessed Mother or the Angels to intercede for us is like speaking to someone who already knows the protocol and the most respectful way to approach God when we need accidental help from Heaven. For He surely is blessing and renewing and healing and looking out for us every second of our lives even when we don't call for assistance. Praised be Jesus and Mary.
Well certainly Julia the Franciscan spirituality is full of joy and laughter, I cannot imagine St Francis without thinking of him laughing. Funny thinking of St Anthony when he had the classic experience of holding the Child Jesus in his arms. I think all the saints have this huge quality of Childlikeness. St Anthony could never have held the Child Jesus in his arms unless he was very, very childlike himself. If we turn our eyes inwards, there are many signs of our walk torwards God going onwards. But I think a particulary delightful one is that we become more and more like children. This has to be so, for as Jesus warned us unless we do become like children we shall not enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Itis maybe not the first quality we might seek in ourselves in this modern world, it is very counter cultural, but it comes with prayer. A return to innocense. http://www.americancatholic.org/Messenger/Jun2000/Anthony.asp 'According to one version of the legend—and there are many—there was a Count Tiso who had a castle about 11 miles from Padua, Italy. On the grounds of the castle the count had provided a chapel and a hermitage for the friars. Anthony often went there toward the end of his life and spent time praying in one of the hermit cells. One night, his little cell suddenly filled up with light. Jesus appeared to Anthony in the form of a tiny child. Passing by the hermitage, the count saw the light shining from the room and St. Anthony holding and communicating with the infant. The count fell to his knees upon seeing this wondrous sight. And when the vision ended, Anthony saw the count kneeling at the open door. Anthony begged Count Tiso not to reveal what he had seen until after his death.'
Padraig, Having entrusted our cares to her maternal constancy, I believe Our Lady enjoys our playfulness and she is joyfully present at those times. Remember how Our Lady came to the playful Fatima children. Yes, we are engaged in battle, but we must never cave in to gloomy dispositions. We must avoid the trap of becoming worry-warts. The Two Hearts will provide; let us be playful in their presence, and we just might hear the laughter of Our Lady! I have especially sensed her companionship when walking in the stillness of snowstorms. After all, there was not too much opportunity for that during her life in Nazareth! Safe in the Hearts of Jesus and Mary!
It was St Phillip Neri's Feast Day last week Terry. He should have been the Patron Saint of Laughter. Apparently if he thought the novices were too serious he used to stand on his head and tell them jokes. http://www.crisismagazine.com/2012/st-philip-neri-apostle-of-rome 'And running through and crowning all is St. Philip’s outrageous sense of humor. He was a person of immense joy, and of that special kind of humor that can be experienced only by those who see the human race as God sees us: often silly, regularly stupidly pompous, in great need of help, but beloved and called to a high destiny. Philip seemed to be almost a clown in his constant practical joking, in the penances he would give to his followers, in his private conversation. It was the same kind of “clownishness” displayed by St. Thomas More on the scaffold: an ability to laugh at the worst that the Devil could do, a recognition of the absurdity of so much human pretension, and an abiding confidence in a loving and often humorous Heavenly Father. An age such as ours—so deadly serious while so steeped in the distraction and presumption and despair that inevitably settles upon mind and heart when men forget God—is in great need of this laughter of St. Philip. It was said that there was enough joy in him to set a kingdom laughing. May we be given some measure of this medicine, and learn to laugh, and to love, in the manner of this great Apostle of Rome.'
That's a good point P, perhaps I'm a bit harsh but it is difficult to be praying in faith and knowing others who have asked for your prayers for the same person are actually praying prayers of doubt and fear. (As in James 1:6.) I challenged this person on their way of prayer and they replied, " but her doctors/ surgeons said..." Sorry for my rant but our faith, hope, and love are never real unless tested and nothing tests like someone or something close to our hearts!
I was a little bit troubled by your opening post on the prayer request for your friend, but I prayed anyway. I'm glad that you started this thread because it helps me understand what you meant by asking us to pray for a cure without adding if it be God's will. We must hope that all we pray for conforms to the will of God, otherwise what we are praying for cannot be good. Now I understand that you were warning us against praying for something while really believing that it wouldn't happen which could be a sign of either a lack of faith or trust that God answers prayers. I only pray to a few saints. Mostly I pray to Our Lady. When praying to them, I always ask them to unite their prayer to mine because, being in their glorified state in the presence of God, I reckon that their prayers will carry more weight than mine and will compensate in some way for my poor efforts.
Here is a very interesting Saint for anyone interested in Prophesy and one no one ever seems to think much about, if at all. St Vincent Ferrer, 'The Angel of the Apocalypse'::
