Catholics ask the saints to pray. The saints no longer need anything for themselves (though they undoubtedly live in prayer of praise); we ask that they also make petition for us, who really do still need everything.
maryz:”We pray for what we need and ask others to pray too, even though it’s not for something they need.”
To better illustrate my point as to the purpose of prayer, let me explain a situation currently going on in our particular church:
There was recently a young woman in our church who has been diagnosed with brain tumors and is receiving medical treatment for this condition. As a church, we are praying for this individual in many ways - one part of the prayer is that she will be healed of these tumors. But we don’t expect that the number of prayers we recite nor the number of people that pray will have a direct impact on God’s will for this woman. He obviously brought the tumors into existence to fulfill a divine purpose and if He chooses for them to be eradicated, then so be it. But if He desires for this woman to continue to suffer or even die of this condition, then all the prayers in the world will not change this.
We realize that God’s sovereign plan is much greater and more perfect that our perceived need or desires. If God answered prayers based on the number of votes or intensity, then outcomes would be based on the desires and wills of sinful men. When we pray with this understanding, we turn the issues faithfully over to God and acknowledge our need and our imperfect understanding.
What do the saints do when we pray fervently (to them) for something that is bad for us which is not in God’s eternal plan? Are these saints able to see into God’s mind and know that this prayer should not be prayed? Or do they echo the prayer as well? Do you think that a prayer prayed to/thru a saint will be more effectual than a prayer to God?