OK, this is a new idea for me. First, I am never one to throw cold water on being "moved to do" something, it happens to all of us, all the time. Whenever I think of "moved to do", I think of moved by God. If I was only moved by my free will personal choice, independent of God, then it certainly would be subject to being sin, yes? Does God move people to pray to not Him, but rather to a dead person for intercession between the one who is praying and God? I can't get passed this. Why would God reroute a prayer He deserves? We both know He can handle the volume. :)
At any rate, intercessory prayer is just another form of worshiping God, by Whose sovereign grace the saints were elected, and for Whose sovereign grace we plea.
A good example of intercessory prayer is the miracle at Cana where the servant addresses Mary and she intercedes for him with Christ.
I see these two ideas as potentially conflicting with one another. When I think of a "prayer", I generally think of two kinds. One is a worship-type prayer, with worship, praise, confession, supplication, etc. The other is a type of prayer one might hear in a courtroom: "I pray the court will take judicial notice of such and such". The latter is simply a fancy way of making a request.
Your first example is identified as being an intercessory worshiping prayer. However, the second does not appear to be so both because it is not even clear that Mary fully knew the divinity of Jesus at that time because of her language, and also that it may not have been an intercession by Mary at all.
The only knowledge I have of the miracle at Cana is found in John 2. Here it is:
John 2:1-9a : "1 On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus' mother was there, 2 and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. 3 When the wine was gone, Jesus' mother said to him, "They have no more wine." 4 "Dear woman, why do you involve me?" Jesus replied, "My time has not yet come." 5 His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you." 6 Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons. 7 Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the jars with water"; so they filled them to the brim. 8 Then he told them, "Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet." They did so, 9 and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew...."
From my NIV, we see no evidence that anyone approached Mary about the wine problem and that she interceded. Further, Mary only says: "They have no more wine.". Nothing else to Jesus. Is this an intercessory prayer?
Back to Mary's state of mind, since this was the first miracle of Jesus, did Mary really think Jesus was going to snap His fingers and magically produce more wine? Or, did Mary perhaps believe that in all His wisdom, Jesus could procure more wine through conventional means? As far as we know for sure, Mary had never seen Jesus perform a miracle along the lines of altering matter. It seems an odd place to expect to see it for the first time.
Maybe I could understand better if I knew what a typical intercessory prayer looked like. Of keen interest to me is how it ends. My prayers always end along the lines of "...and in Jesus' name I pray, Amen". Is there a Church-decreed structural difference along this line in how you pray to a saint and how you pray to God directly?
Are you familiar with the parable of an unmerciful debtor? His debts are forgiven because of his plea for mercy and he is released from slavery. That is salvation by faith granted by Christ. Next, through his own lack of mercy he is condemned again. But the second time he is condemned till his debt is paid in full. ... Thus, the second condemnation is temporary and does not negate the absolute pardon received initially. The second condemnation is to prison, which suggests lack of will, i.e. death. This parable described the intermediate state of payment of debt, or purification, which the Catholics (but not the Orthodox) call purgatory.
I am familiar with it, but until you brought it up I never would have thought this was a basis for the idea of purgatory. (All that means is that I don't know much about purgatory :) Sorry for the length, but here is the passage:
Matt. 18:23-35 : 23 "Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24 As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. 25 Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt. 26 "The servant fell on his knees before him. 'Be patient with me,' he begged, 'and I will pay back everything.' 27 The servant's master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
28 "But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii. He grabbed him and began to choke him. 'Pay back what you owe me!' he demanded. 29 "His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, 'Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.' 30 "But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31 When the other servants saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed and went and told their master everything that had happened.
32 "Then the master called the servant in. 'You wicked servant,' he said, 'I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33 Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?' 34 In anger his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed. 35 "This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart."
I read this as God imposing upon us the importance of our forgiving the sins of others against us. Everything in the Lord's prayer is actually very important, etc. The whole thing was Jesus' answer to Peter's question of how often should he forgive. I don't see how a purgatory extension is reasonably drawn here.
To address your analysis, how do you get salvation from a guy begging for the lives of himself and his family to avoid all of them being sold into (further?) slavery? All he said was "please, give me a break." He didn't show any sort of faith, how is this salvation?
The other thing is, why do you think the second condemnation was only temporary? He was thrown in prison to be tortured until his debts were paid, right? How many debts is he going to be able to pay while being tortured in prison? It seems to me like this was more of a permanent condemnation, and that this guy was never getting out. Jesus says this is the fate of anyone who does not forgive his brother. All the better to make the point to us, etc.
Apparently he does. This is, I speculate, why. The saints are people we can become ourselves. We cannot become the Third Person of the Trinity. For examples, many saints are martyrs for the faith. The martyrdom os St. Stephen is described in the Acts; other, numerous cases are known from solid historical records, and some from tradition. Other saints had extreme intellectual fortitude of conviction and knowledge, or extreme strength of character. But these are qualities we can develop ourselves. As we focus a prayer on a Christian martyr, for example, we make his example vibrant for us in our own situation.
A classic intercessory prayer is Hail Mary:
Hail Mary, full of graceWhat is happening here? First we honor Mary as mother of our Lord and the divinely chosen to bring Him forth. We marvel over the miracle of Incarnation, and we praise Jesus. This allows us to contemplate moments in our life where we had agreed to follow God's will like Mary did; or perhaps the moments that we regret when we did not. The entire sections from the Gospel of Luke, the Annunciation and the Visitation, are compressed in the first part of the prayer (less so if you are only familiar with the Protestant translations that all mangle Luke 1:28). The second part is intercessory. In it we recall that as Christ was dying on the cross he asked Mary to adopt his beloved disciple St. John the Theologian. Being disciples of Christ ourselves, we place ourselves in the person of St. John and consider ourselves children of Mary. We imagine our own death an ask her to be present at the time of our death just like she was present at the time of Christ's death. We fear that at that moment, like the Evil Thief, we would fail to turn to Christ, perhaps wracked with pain. We know that we want to be like the Good Thief, and we ask Mary to ask Christ to have mercy for our sins. The most memorable scenes from two gospels, the story of the Incarnation and the Good Friday, race through our mind as we say Hail Mary. It is a profound experience.
The Lord is with you
Blessed art thou among women
And blessed is the fruit of thy womb JesusHoly Mary, Mother of God
Pray for us sinners
Now and in the hour of our death
Amen
it is not even clear that Mary fully knew the divinity of Jesus at that time because of her language, and also that it may not have been an intercession by Mary at all.
Mary knew the divinity of Jesus because the archangel told her. We can of course speculate that she merely observed the lack of wine, rather than was asked for help, but even so she still interceded, moved by a human want. It is significant that her intercession did not take a form of a command, but rather left it to her Son to exercise -- or not -- His divine power. This is what any intercession of a saint is, -- a humble request for help, tha thumility illustrated by the evangelist by meek and faith-filled "do as He tells you". In case you are wondering if she even meant her remark to be a request, evidently it was understood as a request by Jesus, and indeed in a context of a wedding running out of wine is the worst embarrassment, so not much needed to be said.
Is there a Church-decreed structural difference along this line in how you pray to a saint and how you pray to God directly?
A good form is to begin and end the prayers with "in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit". I don't know if there is any difference depending on the content. A short prayer, for example, a single Hail Mary or "Christ have mercy" would often be said without the necessary preambles. I don't think there is any mandated form of prayer, generally, although as you know Catholics are big on memorized and poeticized prayers, such as the Rosary.
The whole thing was Jesus' answer to Peter's question of how often should he forgive. I don't see how a purgatory extension is reasonably drawn here.
The answer to the question is short, "seventy times seven". The parable is preceded by "Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened to a king, who ..., etc.", so it is clear that it gives us an extensive explanation about the Kingdom of Heaven.
He didn't show any sort of faith, how is this salvation?
To humbly ask for mercy is the foundation of faith. He also promised to pay back the debt, that is to repent. He did all the essentials.
why do you think the second condemnation was only temporary?
Because the parable concludes (Matthew 18:34) "And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers until he paid all the debt". It expressly says that the punishment was temporary. Also, in v. 25 repayment is made a part of the condemnation, and in v. 26 it is promised. The fact that the payment is to be made out of prison indicates that the time to make material payments in goods and money is past, and this time the payment is made through suffering.
It is of course true that the parable teaches forgiveness, but the elaborate story with the debtor being called two times, and two punishments being meted out, tells us much more than verse 22, "I say not to thee, till seven times; but till seventy times seven times" would have told alone.