Why do Catholics pray to the dead? Or do they? Is the common claim true that states “Catholics practice necromancy”? Nope.
Deacon Frederick Bartels
September 14, 2009
One area of misunderstanding between Catholics and our Protestant brethren is the subject of praying to the saints. Catholics are occasionally charged with “praying to the dead,” which gives rise to dark images of seances and Ouija boards. On a lesser but sill serious note, Catholics are accused of “unbiblical” behavior as they “conjure up relationships” with the dead.
These ideas, though, are simply the result of misunderstanding, anti-Catholic propaganda, and a lack of awareness of those areas of Scripture which clearly show that Christians maintain a relationship with others who have already passed into eternal life with Christ. There are several facts that need be established:
1) When Catholics pray to a saint in heaven they are not worshiping him.
Rather, they are simply communicating their prayer requests, through Christ, as living members of Christ’s Mystical Body. Certainly our Protestant brethren will agree that Catholics know the difference between worshiping God and asking some favor, through Christian prayer, of the saints!
Read: why I left the Catholic Church.
St. Paul asked the saints to pray for him: Rom 15:30; Col 4:3; 1 Thess 5:25; Eph 6:18-19; 2 Thess 3:1. Certainly we too can ask the saints to pray for us.
Christ is the vine and we are the branches, both the living and the dead in Christ are connected to each other (see Jn 15:1-5).
2) Catholics ask the saints to intercede for them; i.e., pray to the Triune God on their behalf.
The saints are not dead, but alive in heaven. Further, they see God face to face. Is it not wonderful that they can pray to God for us and with us? What Christian would deny others from praying on his behalf? None, of course. We all ask others to pray for us. Why is it considered “unbiblical” when Catholics ask their Christian brothers and sisters in heaven to pray for them?
The saints are alive in heaven: “He is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Mk 12:26-27).
The angels and saints place the prayers of the holy ones at God’s feet (Tob 12:12; Rev 5:8; 8:3-4).
Christians are bound in a community of mutual love (Rom 12:10; 1 Thess 5:11; Gal 6:2).
3) The tradition of praying to the saints dates to the very first Christians.
Therefore we can be certain that it has always been considered an integral, normal part of life as a Christian. It is mainly since the Reformation, when protestors against the Catholic Church in communion with Rome sought to attack Catholic doctrine and Tradition, that praying to the saints was rejected.
As one example among many, Origen (185-254 A.D.), wrote: “But not the high priest [Christ] alone prays for those who pray sincerely, but also the angels . . . as also the souls of the saints who have already fallen asleep” (Prayer 11 [A.D. 233]).
4) Most Protestants recite the Apostles’ Creed, in which we state, “I believe in . . . the communion of saints.”
Yet, unfortunately, most of our Protestant brethren do not know that “communion of saints” means simply that committed followers of Christ exist as a community of believers, both the living on earth and the living in heaven. Catholics understand this bond of unity as the Mystical Body of Christ.
Some say . . .
“Catholics practice necromancy, communicating with the dead, which is condemned by Scripture” (Dt 18;10-11).
Not so. Necromancy means to summon forth spirits from the underworld in order to converse with them. Thus, to practice necromancy is to call forth demons. Catholics are not conjuring forth the spirits of the underworld or attempting to communicate in any “spiritualistic” way; i.e., as with New Age, non-Christian “spirituality.”
Further, the saints are not the dead of the underworld, but the living in heaven with Christ (see Mk 12:26-27). Jesus conversed with Elijah and Moses, certainly they were not the dead of the underworld! (Mk 9:4).
“1 Tim 2:5 states there is one mediator between God and man, Christ Jesus. Prayer to the saints is in violation of Christ as the one mediator.”
However, St. Peter tells us that Christians share in the one, eternal priesthood of Jesus Christ (1 Peter 2:5). To share in Christ’s priesthood is, also, to share in his mediatorship. We share Christ’s priesthood both in heaven and on earth.
“The saints in heaven can’t hear us.”
They most certainly can hear us. Heb 12:1 tells us that we are surrounded “by a cloud of witnesses.” The saints in heaven are not bound by the constraints of time and space, as are we. They see God face to face in heaven: it is through the Beatific Vision that they are aware of the prayers from the earthly faithful. (see 1 Cor 13:12; 1 Jn 3:2).
Catholics say . . .
“The Tradition of intercessory prayer to the saints is biblical and appropriate.”
It is clear that intercessory prayer to the saints is both biblical and appropriate, as well as a traditional, historical practice which links the Catholics of today with those who lived shortly after the Crucifixion of our Lord, Jesus Christ.
The communion of the saints is an element of the fullness of truth found within the Catholic Church which dates back two-thousand years to the Twelve and to Christ himself. For the most part, it is only after the Protestant Reformation that intercessory prayer through the saints became so widely misunderstood. Nevertheless, our relationship with the saints, whose lives offer us wonderful Christian example and who marched in front for Christ, serves to strengthen our own journey toward eternal beatitude. This is accomplished through their prayerful intercessory aid. We are one Body, heaven and earth united under one head: Christ our Lord.
Photo credit: Gunnvor Karita, wikimedia commons.
Deacon Frederick Bartels is a member of the Catholic clergy who serves the Church in the diocese of Pueblo. He holds an MA in Theology and Educational Ministry and is a Catholic educator, public speaker, and evangelist who strives to infuse culture with the saving principles of the gospel. For more, visit YouTube, iTunes and Google Play.
Are you so foolish to think that Paul was asking DEAD saints to pray for him? In the Bible, it is very clear that saints were those who obeyed the gospel as preached by Peter and Paul. Paul asked THOSE LIVING SAINTS TO PRAY FOR HIM – NOT DEAD ONES! They absolutely preached Death, (repentence), Burial (buried in baptism) and Resurrection (the infilling of the Holy Spirit). Paul thought it so important to preach the same as the first Apostles that he said “I went to Jerusalem to confer with those of reputation, lest I was teaching the wrong gospel” (Galatians 1:18 and Acts 15:1-4).. He also said anyone who preaches any other gospel is accursed -even if an angel from heaven preaches any other gospel). You people absolutely put dead saints and even Mary before Jesus since you ask them to intercede for you. Are you so foolish as to not know that when the curtain in the temple was split open, THAT MEANT EVERYONE COULD GO BOLDLY TO JESUS’ THRONE WITH THEIR PETITIONS. To go anywhere else is Idolatry!!
Dear Judy,
You keep using the phrase “dead saints,” as if once a saint has died, they are somehow separated from the rest of the body of Christ, as if Christ’s body is divided between earth and heaven. So, saints (dead?) in heaven have no connection to the faithful on earth? And they could care less about shoring us up by their intercession? Do you think God desires there to be this kind of a disconnect among his living people? Apparently, it seems you’re saying that the people of God are not really one people, but a people shattered by death.
One main element of sainthood is found in participating in the mediatorship of Christ because Christians, whether living on earth or in heaven, are members of his one body. Jesus intercedes for us before the Father. Surely he expects his brethren, including the saints in heaven, to do the same for us sinners on earth.
It’s also telling how you seem to think that praying to the saints for their intercession (which is simply about having a relationship with the heavenly members of Christ and asking them to pray to God on our behalf) equates to idolatry. Idolatry is defined as worshipping something as God that is not God. Catholics do not worship the saints. We honor them (which is just) and we seek their help (which is Christian). Unfortunately, you’re operating from a Protestant mindset and reading into scripture that same mindset. Nowhere does scripture forbid asking the saints to offer prayers to God on our behalf. Nowhere does scripture indicate that the saints do not carry out that role. Nowhere does scripture say that a “dead saint” can no longer intercede for men on earth.
You see, Catholics believe in adhering to the full context of scripture. We believe in more, not less. We believe in a both/and approach, not an either/or approach when it comes to intercession. We do go straight to God. We also go to the saints. After all, we’re all one connected family. That’s what the doctrine of the communion of saints means.
The fact is, Christians (members of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church) have been asking the saints in heaven to intercede on their behalf for centuries before Protestantism ever saw the light of day. Did their practices and historical traditions, supported by scripture, suddenly become “idolatry” after Martin Luther, Zwingli, Calvin and other revolutionaries in the 16th century decided to break from the Church?
A study of history and the teaching of the first Christians will lead you to this fact: the first Christians were Catholic. And they most certainly believed in asking the saints in heaven for their prayers.
In any case, the so-called worship of saints has long been a Protestant objection against Catholicism. Since saintly intercession cannot be proved wrong by scripture (but is supported by it), it boils down to this: who is one’s authority? His own interpretation of the bible, or the one (in the singular) Church Christ founded on St. Peter? (see Matthew 16:17-19).