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To: NYer
Whenever I contemplate the "intercession of the Saints", or the practice of praying to them - (You can guess my stance on this) - it is exactly one of the Scriptures you quoted which gives greatest pause.

Revelation 8:3-4

Others you noted can be argued, but this one cannot.

I am thus always left knowing that I am wrong in some way.

Thanks, NYer.

7 posted on 02/08/2007 5:05:07 PM PST by Enosh
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To: Enosh; Mad Dawg; Nihil Obstat; trisham; Alex Murphy; thiscouldbemoreconfusing
The 'intercession of the saints' can be a challenging belief for many. It is a contradiction of sorts since we have been taught that Christ died once for all our sins. As we have often seen posted in the forum - "why not pray directly to Jesus"? The response, as we all know, is that we can, of course, pray directly to him. But even the Early Church Fathers recognized that we are members of the Communion of Saints and when you have a 'friend' on high, it doesn't hurt to ask their help. A good example of this, in human terms, would be an individual hoping for a pay raise. Where to begin? The boss, of course! But he reports to someone, higher up the corporate ladder.

To render this in more contemporary terms, let's take a closer look at Philip McCord. Fearful that he faced possible blindness in his right eye, Philip McCord, a Baptist went into the Church of the Immaculate Conception one day and prayed.


Phillip McCord

“I need some help,” he said in his quiet conversation with God in the fall of 2000.

Looking up, he saw a picture of Mother Guerin (now deceased), the foundress of the Sisters of Providence at St. Mary-of-the-Woods. He decided to pray to Mother Theodore and ask for her assistance.

If you see fit and have any influence, maybe you could speak [to God] on my behalf”, he said to her.

McCord had undergone cataract surgery on both eyes that fall, and while the surgery was successful on his left eye, it was not successful for the right eye. He had swelling in his cornea.

He could only see shapes and light with his right eye, which drooped. “It was really not what you would call vision,” he said. It affected his depth perception and gave him headaches.

A specialist in Indianapolis had told him he would need a cornea transplant, which had a 60 percent success rate.

He worried about the risks and feared permanent damage, including possible blindness, in his right eye.

He was upset and afraid. “I was not making a lot of headway in dealing with it,” he said.

One day, when he was returning from a meeting at Providence Center, he heard organ music from the church and decided to go inside and pray.

He told God, “I try not to bother you with a whole lot of things … but I’m not going to get through this. I need some help.”

Read More

This is not some event from the distant past. This is now! The media always love the 'unexplicable' and jumped all over McCord's story. CNN even took it to a new level by producing a mini documentary in which their professional consultants interviewed McCord on videotape, while re-producing the blurred images of McCord prior to the 'intervention' of Mother Theodore.

This is just one of countless miracles attributed to the intervention of those on the path to sainthood and others who have already arrived.

8 posted on 02/08/2007 5:42:16 PM PST by NYer ("Where the bishop is present, there is the Catholic Church" - Ignatius of Antioch)
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To: Enosh

Remember, we pray to the saints and ASK THEM to intercede for us -- pray for us. They are much closer to Christ than we are.

You are so right about the description of the incense and prayers rising to heaven from Revelation. Isn't that a powerful picture?


12 posted on 02/08/2007 6:49:53 PM PST by Salvation (†With God all things are possible.†)
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