We continue our deep dive into THE HEART OF CATHOLIC PRAYER.
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Prayer to the saints is sharply distinct from “consulting the dead” precisely because it does not attempt to make an end run around God, nor treat a creature as God, nor acquire from the dead forbidden knowledge or power. The theology behind prayer to the saints is, in fact, straightforward and solidly biblical. It is centered in the Light of the World, of which the “angel of light” is a cheesy imitation. It rests on the thoroughly biblical fact that the blessed dead, connected with us in Christ, are indeed aware of earthly doings (cf. Hebrews 12:1). Scripture promises that those in Christ shall, in glory, “be like him,” conformed to his image in every way (1 John 3:2; Rom. 8:29). Even on this earth, we are given the glorious task of carrying out his work by praying for one another and exercising spiritual gifts for the building up of the Body of Christ (Romans 12). The Church, believing the reality that we go from one degree of glory to another (2 Corinthians 3:18), has always believed that this glorious participation in the saving work of Christ will be ours in even fuller measure when we enter into Heaven. Since we are “members one of another” (Romans 12:5) we can, in Christ and only in Christ, seek the prayers and help of fellow members of the Body, both here and in Heaven.
The bottom line is that séances are not the same as prayer to the saints, for the same reason magic is not the same as miracles, and horoscopes are not the same as prophecy. Séances, magic, horoscopes, and divination are parodies of a reality which God offers us, the reality of our connectedness in Christ. In contrast to the teaching of Christ, the obvious goal of the medium or diviner is not union with God, nor communion with “the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints” (Ephesians 1:18) but “becoming as gods, knowing the difference between good and evil” (Genesis 3:5).
It is a different thing, therefore, if a person asks a member of the body of Christ whether living or dead to pray for us. It’s not idolatry because prayer to a saint is not worship, any more than bowing to an audience or kneeling to propose marriage is. “Pray” is simply an old-fashioned word for “request,” as in “I pray thee, do thou get me another ale, sirrah, and I shall reckon it an act of kindness withal.” Thus, in asking me to pray for you, you are “praying to” me in the sense the Catholic Church means it. To “pray to” the saints is likewise not to adore them as gods. Rather, it is simply to address them as fellow members of the Body of Christ. This is very significant, for it is to consciously place both oneself and the saint addressed in the communion of saints, which is united with the Blessed Trinity and, in the Trinity, with us. In other words, Catholic prayer to the dead fully acknowledges our connectedness entirely within Christ.
This is supremely so with the Queen of the Saints, Mary, because she has been given to us as our Mother by Christ himself. That is why John records the incident at the foot of the cross when he tells Mary “Behold your son” and the Beloved Disciple “Behold your mother” (John 19:27). It is also why he speaks in language that blends Marian imagery into a figure who also recalls the Virgin Daughter of Zion and the Church—the Woman clothed with the Sun in Revelation 12—and tells of the great red dragon that seeks not only to devour her Son but who “went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus” (Revelation 12:17).
That dragon has a name, according to John. He is “that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world” (Revelation 12:9) and the two figures John sees opposing him are the Archangel Michael and the Woman. Both act with the power and authority of Jesus Christ. The dragon is defeated, not by our own strength, but by joining in the suffering of Christ crucified:
And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death. (Revelation 12:10-11)
That is why we ask for Mary to pray for us—because we are commanded to pray for one another and to ask prayer of one another. Mary, the icon of the Church, does for us what any member of the Church would do; she intercedes for us as Christ commands us to intercede for one another. She does it as a Mother because she is our Mother, given to us by Jesus Christ himself as his final gift to us from the cross.
It is telling, and beautiful, that the prayer is not merely “pray for us” but “pray for us sinners.” We come to our Mother in Christ as we come to Christ himself: as sinners and slobs, not as shiny happy people. There’s no question of having to be good enough. We are told to come now, without delay and without combing our hair or washing our faces. To be sure, there will be time and occasion to get washed up (in the sacraments of Baptism and Reconciliation) and, to be sure, seeking Christ means doing what we can to change and conform our lives to him. But first, we come to him through the intercession of Mary and the Church for whom she stands and ask for grace rather than try to earn the love of God and put him in our debt. We simply come—as sinners—and trust that God, in his love and mercy, will receive us. The promise is that he shall. Every single time. No matter what.
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