SAINTS

PRAYERS TO THE SAINTS

    1. The saints are all the human beings who have reached heaven.  They enjoy the beatific vision, seeing, directly and intuitively, God in his essence.  They behold in God all that they ought to know about themselves and about their glory.  Now, it is part of their glory to assist others, and help them serve God and reach heaven.  Thus the saints cooperate with God; thus they are made godlike.  But the saints cannot assist others unless they know these others and understand their needs.  Therefore, the saints know in God the devotions,  prayers, and promises of people on earth who pray to the saints. 

     2.  It is right to pray to the saints for their aid.  We pray for one another here on earth.  St. Paul, great apostle as he was, asked humbly for prayers (Rom. 15:30).  Our brethren with God  in heaven are in far better position to offer our petitions to him than are our brethren on earth.   Besides, the Church prays to the saints, as,  for example, in the solemn Litany of the Saints.

    3. The prayers of the saints for us are effective.   The saints pray in complete conformity with God's most loving will towards us, and they ask favors for us according to that will.  Thus, their prayers are always granted.                 

The Church's teaching on the invocation of the saints is thus defined by the Council of Trent. "The saints, who reign together with Christ, offer up their own prayers to God for men. It is good and useful suppliantly to invoke them, and to have recourse to their prayers, aid and help for obtaining benefits from God, through His Son Jesus Christ, who alone is our Redeemer and Savior. Those persons think impiously who deny that the saints, who enjoy eternal happiness in heaven, are to be invoked; who assert that they do not pray for men; who declare that asking them to pray for each of us in particular is idolatry, repugnant to the word of God, and opposed to the honor of the One Mediator of God and men, Christ Jesus" (Sess. xxv.).

The Old and New Testament plainly teach the principle and the practice of asking the prayers of our brethren, especially of the just (James v. 16-18). God commanded Abimelech to ask Abraham's prayers:  "He shall pray for thee and thou shalt live@ (Gen. Xx. 7. 17). God had mercy on the sinful children of Israel in the desert because Moses interceded for them (Ps. xv. 23). God said to the friends of Job: "My servant Job shall pray for you; his face I will accept" (Job xliii. 8). St. Paul in his letters continually asked the brethren to pray for him (Rom.xv.30; Eph. vi.18, 19; 1 Thess. v. 25).

Is it reasonable to suppose that the Christian, who prayed for his brethren while upon earth, will lose all interest in them, once he reaches the kingdom of heaven? The Christian tradition from the beginning declares that the interest of the Saints in heaven will be increased a hundredfold, because they will realize then more fully our needs and necessities, and God's willingness to hearken to their intercession. St. Jerome (340-420) is a striking witness to this fact. He writes: "If Apostles and martyrs, whilst still in the flesh and still needing to care for themselves, can pray for others, how much more will they for others after they have won their crowns, their victories, their triumphs. Moses, one man, obtains God's pardon for six hundred thousand armed men, and Stephen prays for his persecutors. When they are with Christ will they be less powerful? St. Paul says that two hundred and seventy-six souls were granted to his prayers, whilst they were in the ship with him. Shall he close his lips after death, and not mutter a syllable for those who throughout the world have believed in his gospel? (Adv. Vigil, 6.)

That the angels pray for men we learn from the vision of Zacharias (i. 12, 13), and from the words of the angel Raphael to Tobias: "While thou didst pray with tears . . . I offered thy prayer to the Lord" (Tob. xii. 12). Christ Himself tells us that they have an interest in us; for He says: "There shall be joy before the angels of God upon one sinner doing penance" (Luke xv. 10). In another place He warns men not to scandalize little children, for they have angels to intercede for them in heaven (Matt. xviii. 10).

If the angels make intercession for us, certainly the saints, who are united to us by the bond of a common human nature, and by the supernatural bond of the Communion of Saints, have the same power and the same privilege.

The early Fathers unanimously teach the doctrine of the intercession of the saints.

Catholics firmly believe in the unique mediatorship of Jesus Christ (1 Tim. ii. 5), and the Council of Trent emphasizes this very doctrine when declaring her teaching on the invocation of saints.   Catholics believe that Jesus Christ alone redeemed us by His Death upon the Cross, thus reconciling us to God, and making us partakers of His grace here and His glory hereafter.  No divine gift can reach us except through Christ and the merits of His Sacred Passion. Therefore, every prayer we pray, and every prayer in heaven of the Blessed Virgin, the angels and the saints, have their efficacy only through Jesus Christ our Lord.  The saints simply add their prayers to ours, and,  although specially pleasing to God because of their greater holiness, they aid us only through the merits of the one Mediator.