Have any one of you ever attended a catholic mass? It would be more expedient to resolve the "confusion" boatbums claims I have caused by comparing an example of prayer from our respective places of worship. I am not familiar with how protestants pray. If you would be so kind as to each post an example of a prayer used by your faith community, I will respond with examples of catholic prayer.
Other than some additional comments from Faith ... silence. EagleOne, you seemed surprised in an earlier comment, that Catholics read scripture. Now it is my turn to be surprised. I fully expected that your immediate response would be from scripture. In both Luke 11 and Matthew 6, our Lord was in a certain place, praying. When he had finished, his disciples asked him: Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples. And he taught them the prayer we Catholics (and I presume you too), call the "Our Father". That prayer is the pre-eminent one that Catholics pray, alone or in community.
If you have ever attended a Catholic mass, you would probably be surprised how all the prayers derive from scripture. For example, The Gloria.
Glory to God in the highest, (Lk. 2:14)
and peace to his people on earth. (Rev 19:6)
Lord God, heavenly King, almighty God and Father, (Rev 22:9; Eph 5:20; Rev 7:2)
we worship you, we give you thanks,
we praise you for your glory. (2 Jn 3; Phil 2:11; Jn 1:29)
Lord Jesus Christ, only Son of the Father, Lord God, Lamb of God, (Rom 8:34)
you take away the sin of the world, have mercy on us; (Lk 4:34; Lk 1:32, Jn 14:26)
you are seated at the right
hand of the Father, receive our prayer.
For you alone are the Holy One,
you alone are the Lord,
you alone are the Most High,
Jesus Christ, with the Holy Spirit
in the glory of God the Father. Amen.
To the above, I would add one of the most ancient prayers in the Church (both Catholic and Orthodox). It is the Trisagion (Gr) or "thrice holy" prayer:
Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us.
It originated from Nicodemus. While taking the body of Christ off the cross with Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus saw Christ's eyes open then shouted "Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal". Around the globe, in every Eastern Catholic and Orthodox Church, this prayer is chanted at every Divine Liturgy ... every day of the week. Even the Latin (Roman) Church retains this prayer on Good Friday. It is also part of the Divine Mercy Chaplet, that many of us pray each dat at 3pm, the hour at which our Lord died on the cross, for us.
Spiritual growth requires us to form a consistent habit of prayer. Because prayer is a relationship with Jesus, we need to find the ways of praying that fit our personality and our relationship with our Lord. These include:
Charismatic: based on an active, experienced relationship with the Holy Spirit. It is often characterized as emotional prayer, and there is definitely a more emotional dimension to it. But the focus of charismatic prayer is on relationship.
Meditative: Also known as the Divine Office, Liturgy of the Hours is the traditional prayer that priests and religious are required to pray throughout the day. Many lay people, myself included, follow this daily approach that consists of prayers, psalms, and readings from both the Old and New Testaments.
Contemplative: thinking about the mysteries and truths of our faith in a way that leads us to greater intimacy with God. For example, meditating on a scene in scripture and placing yourself there. In meditative prayer, you are both an eyewitness and participant to the events unfolding. (Ex: John 5 - the Pool of Bethesda)
There are many methods to pray. Ultimately, the goal remains the same for Catholics and Evangelicals, and that is to draw closer to Jesus, and hopefully, model our lives after His.
Your thoughts and examples of prayer in your faith denomination. Pax et Bonum
He did? Chapter and verse?
Whatever "confusion" you think I claimed you caused, was simply your own contradiction of yourself by claiming Catholics don't pray to Mary and the saints but then turning around and defending that they do indeed pray to Mary and the saints. The confusion wasn't mine.
I am Catholic.
I would have been happy to discuss different things like if I’ve been to a mass and more about prayer, but your question was a tangent to the discussion going on, so that what you’ve written on prayer would be fine to discuss, except none of it addressed those subjects at all, which primarily had to do with prayer to Mary and those identified as “the Catholic saints.”