again proving the point. only a diety can be blasphemed so you do consider Mary part of the godhead. Talk about blasphemy. Please tell me where Christ encouraged anyone to venerate or worship Mary or called her the new ark?
You also state you try to follow the example of Mary to be worthy of Heaven. The only way to be worthy of Heaven is to be covered by the Blood of Jesus freely given as a gift not by your works or intercession or saints or anyone else. Christ alone and His righteousness is the only way to salvation.
I would also appreciate any scripture reference where believers are told to pray to saints, Mary, or anyone but God. I would also like references for the sinlessness of Mary. While you are at it please throw in the Scripture references for the assumption of Mary bodily into heaven? Surely such an important and miraculous event would be recorded in scripture
Every post you make shows the apostasy of the Roman Church more clearly.
“not by your works or intercession or saints”
I’d like “them” to explain the whole “saint” thing. According to them, a person becomes a saint if a pope decrees it, or shakes some chicken bones over someone.
In the New Testament, ALL born-again Christians are “saints”. Epistles are addressed to “to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colosse”, “to the saints which are at Ephesus”, etc. The letters are written to all Christians who make up the body of Christ.
None of the saints had to do something magical. No pope made some decree (which makes perfect sense, since a pope is a made-up title/person).
I’m glad to be a saint.
Mary is the new ark? Never heard that one before. I did hear that she’s an Untier Of Knots, though. That’s cool; I could use her when I’m quilting.
Your comment: “only a diety can be blasphemed so you do consider Mary part of the godhead.”
Yes, you are right, I shouldn’t have used the word blaspheme with the Blessed Mother. My mistake. I should have used disrespectful. I should have referred to your blasphemy (a mortal sin) against Jesus.
God was very specific about every exact detail of the ark (Ex 25-30). It was a place where God himself would dwell (Ex 25:8). God wanted his words—inscribed on stone—housed in a perfect container covered with pure gold within and without. How much more would he want his Word—Jesus—to have a perfect dwelling place! If the only begotten Son were to take up residence in the womb of a human girl, would he not make her flawless?
The Virgin Mary is the living shrine of the Word of God, the Ark of the New and Eternal Covenant. In fact, St. Luke’s account of the Annunciation of the angel to Mary nicely incorporates the images of the tent of meeting with God in Sinai and of the temple of Zion. Just as the cloud covered the people of God marching in the desert (cf. Nm 10:34; Dt 33:12; Ps 91:4) and just as the same cloud, as a sign of the divine mystery present in the midst of Israel, hovered over the Ark of the Covenant (cf. Ex 40:35), so now the shadow of the Most High envelops and penetrates the tabernacle of the New Covenant that is the womb of Mary (cf. Lk 1:35). (Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, The Shrine: Memory, Presence and Prophecy of the Living God)
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/mary-the-ark-of-the-new-covenant
Does the Bible say we should approach the saints with our prayers? Yes, in two places. In Revelation 5:8 John saw the Lamb, Christ Jesus, on a throne in the midst of four beasts and 24 elders. When the Lamb took the book with the seven seals, the 24 elders fell down before the Lamb in worship, “each one having a harp and golden bowls of incenses, which are the prayers of the saints.”
Similarly, in Revelation 8:3-4 we are told that something similar happened when the Lamb opened the seventh seal of the book: “Another angel came and stood on the altar, having a golden censer, and many incenses were given to him, in order that he will give it with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar before the throne. And the smoke of the incenses went up with the prayers of the saints from the hand of the angel before God.”
These texts give us a way to understand how the saints offer our prayers for us. Our prayers are like nuggets of incense. They smell sweet and good. The 24 elders around the throne, who are saints, and the angels offer these nuggets of incense for us. They set them on fire before the throne of God.
This is a beautiful image of how the intercession of the saints works. Because the saints are so close to the fire of God’s love and because they stand immediately before him, they can set our prayers on fire with their love and release the power of our prayers.
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/the-bible-supports-praying-to-the-saints
Jesus exhorts us to pray not simply for ourselves, but for others, including praying for our persecutors (Matt. 5:44), because Jesus knows that intercessory prayers draw us closer together in him, and can also help foster our enemies’ conversion. In that light, there’s no competition when we ask someone to pray for us, including petitioning Mary and the saints, because they are collaborators with God, not competitors. Indeed, apart from Jesus they (and we praying for each other on earth) could do nothing (John 15:1-5). And so we are members of the mystical body of Christ and thus have—or should have—concern for the spiritual well-being of others (1 Cor. 12:25-26).
The doctrine of the Assumption of Mary began with a historical event to which Scripture alludes and that been believed in the Church for 2,000 years. It was passed down in the oral tradition of the Church and developed over the centuries, but it was always believed by the Catholic faithful. Let us examine the facts:
1. Archaeology has revealed two tombs of Mary, one in Jerusalem and one in Ephesus. The fact that Mary lived in both places explains the two tombs. But what is inexplicable apart from the Assumption is the fact that there is no body in either tomb. And there are no relics. Anyone who peruses early Church history knows that Christian belief in the communion of saints and the sanctity of the body—in radical contrast to the Gnostic disdain for “the flesh”—led early Christians to seek out with the greatest fervor relics from the bodies of great saints. Cities, and, later, religious orders, would fight over the bones of great saints.
This is one reason why we have relics of the apostles and so many of the greatest saints and martyrs in history. Yet never was there a single relic of Mary’s body? As revered as Mary was, this would be very strange, except for the fact of the assumption of her body.
https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/the-assumption-of-mary-in-history