[CarrotAndStick]

There’s a big difference between praying before a statue of Mary(or Jesus, or Buddha or Krishna or...) and thronging to kiss a vial of dried blood/ preserved bodies, pieces of wood, nails, etc.

I can’t understand how you claim one thing as idolatrous, and the other as not, yet doing both, claim you do neither!

The practises others and I mentioned, fits the definition of idolatry to the T.

[netmilsmom]

Has anyone looked at the exact quote from the Vatican or are we all just taking Reuters and AP’s word for it?

If this was a quote from GWB we’d all be screaming for the actual reference.

[marsh_of_mists]

I can’t understand how you claim one thing as idolatrous, and the other as not, yet doing both, claim you do neither!

It's a matter of what's in the heart. If a Catholic actually believes that they are worshipping Mary or a statue of Mary, they are indeed committing idolatry, and are also in error according to the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. As for "thronging" to kiss a vial of dried blood, if you believed it was the blood of Christ Himself, wouldn't you at least be intrigued by it? Kissing it, again, is a way of showing reverence to the man the relic come from. It is also a way of getting as physically near as possible to Christ as we can on Earth.

[grey_whiskers]

Not so fast there, you lovable troll.

Idolatry as defined (say) by the Ten Commandments, or the Churches, would involve actual trust in the statue, relic, or the person represented by the statue or relic, "under its own steam" so to speak, rather than on the basis of its being a channel or conduit *by means of which* God communicates power or blessing--so that the faith remains ultimately in God.

By analogy, is it a lack of faith in God to ask another beliver to pray for you, or to trust in a ladder to hold you up absent divine providence?

Nice try, again, I say to you.

And now I really *have* to go and make my hotel reservations.

Cheers!