Posted on 06/08/2014 12:58:44 PM PDT by NYer
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis Pope Francis delivered remarks to the Presidents of Palestine and Israel, Mahmoud Abbas and Shimon Peres, along with the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, and delegations representing Jews, ChristiansMuslims, all of whom were gathered in the Vatican Sunday evening to pray for peace in the Middle East and throughout the world. Below, please find the full text of the Holy Father's prepared remarks.
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Distinguished Presidents,
I greet you with immense joy and I wish to offer you, and the eminent delegations accompanying you, the same warm welcome which you gave to me during my recent pilgrimage to the Holy Land.
I am profoundly grateful to you for accepting my invitation to come here and to join in imploring from God the gift of peace. It is my hope that this meeting will mark the beginning of a new journey where we seek the things that unite, so as to overcome the things that divide.
I also thank Your Holiness, my venerable Brother Bartholomaios, for joining me in welcoming these illustrious guests. Your presence here is a great gift, a much-appreciated sign of support, and a testimony to the pilgrimage which we Christians are making towards full unity.
Your presence, dear Presidents, is a great sign of brotherhood which you offer as children of Abraham. It is also a concrete expression of trust in God, the Lord of history, who today looks upon all of us as brothers and who desires to guide us in his ways.
This meeting of prayer for peace in the Holy Land, in the Middle East and in the entire world is accompanied by the prayers of countless people of different cultures, nations, languages and religions: they have prayed for this meeting and even now they are united with us in the same supplication. It is a meeting which responds to the fervent desire of all who long for peace and dream of a world in which men and women can live as brothers and sisters and no longer as adversaries and enemies.
Dear Presidents, our world is a legacy bequeathed to us from past generations, but it is also on loan to us from our children: our children who are weary, worn out by conflicts and yearning for the dawn of peace, our children who plead with us to tear down the walls of enmity and to set out on the path of dialogue and peace, so that love and friendship will prevail.
Many, all too many, of those children have been innocent victims of war and violence, saplings cut down at the height of their promise. It is our duty to ensure that their sacrifice is not in vain. The memory of these children instils in us the courage of peace, the strength to persevere undaunted in dialogue, the patience to weave, day by day, an ever more robust fabric of respectful and peaceful coexistence, for the glory of God and the good of all.
Peacemaking calls for courage, much more so than warfare. It calls for the courage to say yes to encounter and no to conflict: yes to dialogue and no to violence; yes to negotiations and no to hostilities; yes to respect for agreements and no to acts of provocation; yes to sincerity and no to duplicity. All of this takes courage, it takes strength and tenacity.
History teaches that our strength alone does not suffice. More than once we have been on the verge of peace, but the evil one, employing a variety of means, has succeeded in blocking it. That is why we are here, because we know and we believe that we need the help of God. We do not renounce our responsibilities, but we do call upon God in an act of supreme responsibility before our consciences and before our peoples. We have heard a summons, and we must respond. It is the summons to break the spiral of hatred and violence, and to break it by one word alone: the word “brother”. But to be able to utter this word we have to lift our eyes to heaven and acknowledge one another as children of one Father.
To him, the Father, in the Spirit of Jesus Christ, I now turn, begging the intercession of the Virgin Mary, a daughter of the Holy Land and our Mother.
Lord God of peace, hear our prayer!
We have tried so many times and over so many years to resolve our conflicts by our own powers and by the force of our arms. How many moments of hostility and darkness have we experienced; how much blood has been shed; how many lives have been shattered; how many hopes have been buried… But our efforts have been in vain.
Now, Lord, come to our aid! Grant us peace, teach us peace; guide our steps in the way of peace. Open our eyes and our hearts, and give us the courage to say: “Never again war!”; “With war everything is lost”. Instil in our hearts the courage to take concrete steps to achieve peace.
Lord, God of Abraham, God of the Prophets, God of Love, you created us and you call us to live as brothers and sisters. Give us the strength daily to be instruments of peace; enable us to see everyone who crosses our path as our brother or sister. Make us sensitive to the plea of our citizens who entreat us to turn our weapons of war into implements of peace, our trepidation into confident trust, and our quarreling into forgiveness.
Keep alive within us the flame of hope, so that with patience and perseverance we may opt for dialogue and reconciliation. In this way may peace triumph at last, and may the words “division”, “hatred” and “war” be banished from the heart of every man and woman. Lord, defuse the violence of our tongues and our hands. Renew our hearts and minds, so that the word which always brings us together will be “brother”, and our way of life will always be that of: Shalom, Peace, Salaam! Amen.
ealgeone:
Ok, so at lest you are honest enough to clearly state the NT does “NOT” define what and how the Church is to do in terms of worship.
As for Mary, the Catholic Church does not worship Mary nor does the Orthodox Church. Mary is among the Saints, the most important yes, she is highly venerated, yes, but not worshiped. The Mother of God is an English phrase that has to be understood in its theological context. Nestorianism was a heresy in the early 5th century that stated only the Human person Christ was born of Mary. Well if that is true, then when did Christ become Divine, at is presentation in the temple, at his baptism at Jordan, or was it on the Cross, or was it after his resurrection. All of this hints at the broader heresy known as adoptionism and what it also does is implies that Chris was 2 Persons, 1 Divine and 1 Human, which of course also conflicts with earlier Dogmatic Teachings at the Council of Nicea and Constantinopile, 325 and 381, respectively, that God is One but in terms of a communion of persons, he is 3 distinct persons [Latin term] or 3 hypostasis [to use the Greek term, I think I have the Greek correct]. So who did Mary give birth to, Christ Jesus, the 2nd Person of the Most Holy Trinity and thus the Divine Person Jesus Christ was incarnate and born of the Virgin Mary and he thus has 1 True Divine and True Human Nature. Mary accordingly as the Council of Ephesus in 431 declared in response to the heresy of Nestorius was correctly referred to as the Most Holy Theotokos [Greek] which in Latin was Mater Dei which we get in English as Mother of God. As such, this dogmatic definition actually has direct Christological implication and once you move away from it, all types of Christological heresies follow.
For the record, I have been here 7 years and there are quite a few Nestorian heretics on this site among the FR Protestant brigades.
The Assumption of Mary was a dogmatic teaching, its is rooted in the early Church and comes from the Eastern Liturgical Tradition [called the Domition of Mary I think in the Orthodox Liturgy]. There is Patristic theology that does state Mary was taken up to Heaven [Later Church Fathers].
As for the Mormons, they go off the rails on much more important issues. They are in conflict with every Trinitarian Doctrine of the Catholic Church and Orthodox as well who hold to the 4 Great Councils of the early Church Nicea, Constantinopile, Ephesus and Chalcedon and their Christology is also flawed.
Doctrine has not changed. The belief that Mary was assumed into Heaven is one held in the early Church, although doesn’t really start to get written about probably until the 4th century. There are numerous theologians that point to Revelation 12 as having multi layered meanings, one of which is pointing to Mary as representing the Church.
I have read John 3 and to put salvation into 1 line of Scripture is the typical Protestant approach, although most of them go down a few lines of Saint Paul from Romans and thus the entire NT is actually interpreted that way, which is back rear end backwards. The entire Bible, for a Catholic perspective speaks of Christ the OT, to use Saint Augustine’s image is a prefigurement of the NT, thus the NT lies hidden in the Old and the NT brings to fulfillment what was in the OT. Christ is the heart of the Bible thus the 4 Gospels hold a place of centrality in the Biblical canon and thus all of the NT Epistles that follow have to interpreted in light of the person of Christ.
The Didache when read in light of the Church’s faith does not contradict the Bible. It contradicts what you think the Bible says. There was no contradiction to the early Church Fathers who read the Scriptures and Didache as part of the same Apostolic Faith.
Ok, so you are a Bible alone. Not surprising. I reject the Protestant notion of Sola scriptura for history has shown it is unworkable. Christ founded a Church and the Church and the Bible all have their source in that same person of Christ. I do not put them against each other like two armies fighting each other, i.e the Knights watch and the Wildlings last night in Game of Thrones.
So if I were on my knees and praying to Zeus or Apollo.....am I worshipping them or just venerating them?
Worship requires sacrifice, it is possible you could be adoring a false god by praying but in order to actually worship one you'd need a sacrifice of some type.
Not sure I understand what you mean by a "sacrifice" to worship someone.
A lot of people claim the Holy Spirit Pope is their guide. Heck, every Protestant Roman Catholic here on FR makes that claim. Sola Scriptura Sola Ecclesiastica meets sola ego blind allegiance to rote and tradition and every FR Protestant Roman Catholic is searching working for their own Pope salvation.
There, fixed it for you...
Ephesians 1; ... 17 I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. 18 I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, 19 and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength 20 he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, 21 far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. ...
Worship, properly so called, requires something be "offered up" to the object of devotion. It could be anything from incense (as in the cult of Roman Emperor worship) to a human being... or even a divine Person (as in the worship of Almighty God).
Adoration, for instance, requires that the object of devotion be acknowledged to be the source of his/her own power, authority, beauty, etc.. So Almighty God may be adored but the BVM may not be adored because she is the not the source of her attributes.
And just where do we have an example of Peter or Paul or James or any of the disciples doing this??
We have no command from them to do this.
As far as Mary, there are catholics who build shrines to her....burn incense to her...pray for her to do things for them....sounds like worship by your definition.
Christ, our High Priest offered Himself once for all to His Almighty Father on our behalf. The (Holy Sacrifice of the) Mass is the continuation of that one Sacrifice in time. I'm certain you don't believe that but that's what I believe so I'm just explaining my point of view.
Building a shrine to Mary isn't worship or adoration, if people are burning incense to Mary that may be a problem, praying to her isn't worship or adoration because Nobody (at least I HOPE nobody) believes Mary is the source of her attributes.
Let me be sure I'm understanding you....a shrine built to Mary isn't worship or adoration??
Someone on their knees praying to Mary at their shrine isn't worship or adoration??
We obviously have some different understandings on worship and adoration.
As I'm not familiar with this practice how is this a sacrifice on our part?
I understand the part of the sacrifice that Christ made....but no where in the NT do I see a requirement for us to make a sacrifice liek incense, etc, as that was already accomplished on the cross.
That's for sure. As I wrote earlier for an act to be worship (properly) there must be some sacrifice, for an act to be adoration there must be the acknowledgement that the object of devotion is the source of his/her own attributes. Therefore we worship God in the Mass and we adore him when we acknowledge him to be almighty, etc.. For all the flowery (over the top?) language used when addressing Mary, prayers directed toward the Holy Trinity are substantially different. It may come as a surprise to you but Catholics don't believe Mary is God because nothing that Mary possesses in terms of power or glory is her own. She is a creature, not the Creator.
Ok, we're getting somewhere.
Agree Mary was created....so why all of the big fuss about her being sinless, perpetual virgin, all of the study or Mary, etc?
I understand she was the mother of Jesus....but the rest I am completely lost on.
The best I can do is point you toward a link that outlines the Mass at which I assist: Fisheaters Order of the Mass. The right hand column gives an English translation of the Latin, that's the part you'll want to read to get a fuller understanding of exactly what it is that Catholics think they're doing.
You'll see a couple of references to incense, first "Be blessed + by Him in whose honour thou art burnt. Amen." and then later:
"Through the intercession of Blessed Michael the Archangel, standing at the right hand of the altar of incense, and of all His elect may the Lord vouchsafe to bless + this incense and to receive it in the odor of sweetness. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
"May this incense blessed by You, arise before You, O Lord, and may Your mercy come down upon us. Let my prayer, O Lord, like incense before You; the lifting up of my hands, like the evening sacrifice. O Lord, set a watch before my mouth, a guard at the door of my lips. Let not my heart incline to the evil of engaging in deeds of wickedness.
"May the Lord enkindle in us the fire of His love and the flame of everlasting charity. Amen."
I know it's a lot to read and my wife asked "do you think they'll actually read all that?" and I knew the answer was no, but if you'll skim through it at least you'll begin to see the difference between prayers to Mary and the saints in glory and the adoration and worship of God, as Catholics understand it.
Catholics see Mary as our mother first and foremost because she is the mother of Our Lord. I think the best way to explain it is to ask how you feel about your mom. Isn't she the best mom in the world? Don't you have a relationship with her that nobody else can come close to? Isn't her food better than any other food?
So it is with Catholics and Mary... she's the bestest mom in the whole wide world. But don't get me started about her Son or I'll never shut up because He's magnificent, literally God in the flesh.
St. Louis de Montfort is probably the best example of the over the top flowery praise of Mary, he was the author of "True Devotion to Mary" and all I can really say in defense of him is that he was a son gone nuts over his mother.
Why would you either worship or venerate a God from Greek Mythology. The Saints are venerated as they have always been in the Church. It is not Adoration which is for God. Veneration is honoring those saints who have given heroic witness to the Faith, many of them, particularly in the early Church were Martyred. The earliest example can be found around 150 AD when Saint Polycarp was martyred and those believers who were under his care [He was Bishop of Smyrna] marked the cite of his martyrdom and they gathered to pray and remember Polycarp’s heroic witness to the Faith and willingness to not reject CHrist even as the Roman authorities were burning him. Polycarp was a pupil of Saint John the Apostle. Those early Christians venerated Saint Polycarp given he was a Saint and Martyr. They did not worship him. You choose to try to fit your protestant notions on Catholic and Orthodox as well, understanding of the COmmunion of saints. Rather than keep spouting your nonsens, maybe you should read exactly what the Communion of saints entails and what veneration and honoring saints means.
No you didn’t fix it. The Pope is not the guide, the Pope only defends what has been defined by his predecessors. In fact, the more and more you go into time, the less a future Pope matters. No Pope can undue the Council of Nicea, Constantinopile, Ephesus or Chalcedon and the Doctrinal definitions about the Trinity and Jesus Christ. The Pope’s role is to defend Doctrine and ensure that it is passed on what he received. Vatican 2 did not define anything, it only further developed earlier teachings, for example, Dei Verbum was a Document on Sacred Scripture, nothing new, but a more fuller presentation of Scripture in the life of the Church. Lumen Gentium defined more fully the Church, and in particular the Church of Rome having premminent authority. In that sense it more fully defined Vatican 1 which, while defining what Papal Infallibility is, also talked that the Infallibility of the Bishop of Rome is linked to the fact that the Church of Rome has preeminent authority [Vatican 1 quotes saint Irenaeus here] but Lumen Gentium more fully developed the link between the Pope and the Church of Rome and how Primacy is rooted in the authority of the Church of Rome and its connection to both Peter and Paul..
As for throwing Scripture quotes, what does that prove, you can type. They do not mean what you say they mean.
...They do not mean what you say they mean.
As for throwing Scripture quotes, what does that prove ...
It proves Roman Catholic doctrines are not based on Scripture, but only on the minds of (sometimes) evil men!
1 Corinthians 2: 10 these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.
The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. 13 This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words. 14 The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. 15 The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, 16 for,
“Who has known the mind of the Lord
so as to instruct him?”
But we have the mind of Christ.
I don't. I was illustrating the absurd with the absurd.
Why would catholics worship or venerate Mary when the Bible says we are to have no other gods? We have zero record in the New Testament of anyone ever praying to Mary. Nor do we have any commands to pray to Mary in the NT.
When Jesus taught His disciples to pray He taught them the Lord's prayer. If Mary was so special, why didn't He instruct them on a prayer involving her? It's not like Jesus never spoke on future things.
Some definitions before we go on:
adoration: strong feelings of love or admiration
venerate: to regard with reverential respect or with admiring deference
worship: reverence offered a divine being or supernatural power; an act of expressing such reverence; extravagant respect or admiration for or devotion to an object of esteem
The devotion to Mary by the RCC could fit any one of these three definitions. The RCC can play word games all it wants to if it helps them to feel they aren't practicing idolatry.
The Saints are venerated as they have always been in the Church. It is not Adoration which is for God. Veneration is honoring those saints who have given heroic witness to the Faith, many of them, particularly in the early Church were Martyred. The earliest example can be found around 150 AD when Saint Polycarp was martyred and those believers who were under his care [He was Bishop of Smyrna] marked the cite of his martyrdom and they gathered to pray and remember Polycarp’s heroic witness to the Faith and willingness to not reject CHrist even as the Roman authorities were burning him. Polycarp was a pupil of Saint John the Apostle. Those early Christians venerated Saint Polycarp given he was a Saint and Martyr. They did not worship him. You choose to try to fit your protestant notions on Catholic and Orthodox as well, understanding of the COmmunion of saints. Rather than keep spouting your nonsens, maybe you should read exactly what the Communion of saints entails and what veneration and honoring saints means.
Why wouldn't Stephen be considered one of the first martyrs...or possibly John the Baptist? I would say they were around a bit before Polycarp. See the Bible has the answers....always has...always will.
When one practices what the RCC does one gets this kind of false teaching regarding Mary: From the Glories of Mary.
As the mother, then, must have the same power as the Son, justly was Mary made omnipotent by Jesus, who is omnipotent; it being, however, al ways true, that whereas the Son is omnipotent by nature, the mother is so by grace. And her omnipotence consists in this, that the Son denies nothing that the mother asks; as it was revealed to St. Bridget, who heard Jesus one day addressing Mary in these words: Oh my mother, thou knowest bow I love thee; ask from me, then, whatever thou dost desire, for there is no demand of thine that will not be graciously heard by me." And the reason that he added was beautiful: "Mother, when thou wast on earth, there was nothing thou didst refuse to do for love of me; now that I am in heaven, it is just that I refuse nothing which thou dost ask of me. Mary is, then, called omnipotent in the sense in which it can be understood of a creature, who is not capable of any divine attribute. She is omnipotent, because she obtains by her prayers whatever she wishes.
Again...no Biblical support for any of this.
No biblical evidence against it either. And again, I know what the Bible says about no other God. Mary is not God nobody ever claims that.
Catholic Theology is defined in Latin and it sharply distinguishes the reverence accorded to the saints [dulia] from the worship and adoration that are due to God alone [Latria]. Translating those Latin terms into English does not always communicate the theological differences between “veneration of saints” and “adoration and worship due to God alone”. So, you can post all this stuff you want, makes no difference to me, Catholic theology, as well as Eastern Orthodox theology, clearly define what veneration is and what it is not and in no way is it “adoration and worship due to God”.
So no, it can’t fit into what you saying it can fit into because it is clearly defined as to what it is and has been for a long, long, long, time, well before the 16th century.
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