Ask a Catholic

[Salacious B. Crumb]

All Christians are called to be mediators or intercessors for one another because we are all members of Christ’s body

This would only fortify my Jam 5:16 argument (I see what you mean by the context of that, but when it says “confess your sins to each other”, I can’t see that being taken any other way). The people wouldn’t need a catholic priest to be forgiven. They would confess to each other and their god.

Hebrews 7:24-25
because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. 25Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.

I’d say that this, again, would be another good verse for your typical, bible-believing christian, but not the catholics. Catholics believe, as you quote from catechism, that mary is the mediatrix. This means she is a mediator, which contradicts 1 Tim 2:5. Also, it says that she is an intercessor. Why do we need an intercessor? Isn’t the savior who died for us, enough? Jn 14:6 says Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. This sentence jesus says, completely destroys the idea that we need saints and mary to intercede for us. This is another example where the catholic church does something that the bible doesn’t quite concur with. This, also, eliminates the necessity of confessing to a catholic priest.

Maybe, after looking closer at the verses you have quoted, and the ones that I have quoted, you should see some problems with them not agreeing with each other. You should be able to see why there are 40,000 sects of christianity as well. There are plenty of cherries to pick from in scripture.

I'll come back to the rosary if necessary

It’s necessary, after what I have had to say about it. This is just one of many vain, repetitious prayers, that the bible forbids, and that the catholic church is known for. I would imagine, that you would say, that you don’t think that all these catholic prayers are vain, but many christians would disagree with you, for good reasons, some of which I mentioned already.

In verse 25, the Greek heôs, “until,” does not necessarily contrast “before” to “after.” It means that up to a certain moment, something happened or not, without considering what happened after that moment. For example, the Greek text of the Septuagint says, in 2 Samuel 6:23, that “Mikal, daughter of Saul, had no children until (heôs) the days of her death.” This obviously does not suggest that she had children after her death. Matthew is interested in underlining that Jesus’ birth and conception were carried out without the intervention of any man.

Fair enough, but don’t you see a problem with god relating a message to someone, knowing that it won’t be translated correctly in the future? Or knowing some of the true ideas will never come to light, because later, the languages would become dead languages?

Also, just some additional basic questions. Especially, with regards to Jn 14:6, why would an omnipotent god need a savior to forgive people? Why does the catholic church insist on intercessory prayers from mary and other saints, when jesus said that the father is only accessed through him? How does a man suffering for a few hours forgive everyone that has ever walked on this planet? There are stories of people getting tortured for much longer periods than that. They could say that they are doing it for you sins too, but that doesn't make it true, not to mention..moral. Why does an omnipotent god need angels? He can do anything he wants.

Reading hundreds of posts in these threads over the past three weeks has led me to realize that there is no one, single "position" shared by all of you.

If you’re referring to some type of belief system, with regards to religion (which atheism is not), then your argument is heading in the wrong direction. All atheists share the same lack of belief in whatever deity being argued for, so we would all agree on that. Atheism isn’t a dogma, so we are going to differ on many issues in life.