RicOlie_2

My move is P-9d.

Thank you for your apology, it was accepted. It is a very sad day for me, as I thought I would have the unanimous support of this forum *sniff*, but what's done is done and I am not the new Ric Olie.

^Sorry for the formatting errors, I'm not sure why half the text is black.

The answer to your first question is that all the Catholics in the world go to one huge church the size of New York (up the street from the Anglican Church) called the Catholic Church, every Sunday. ;)

The second question is a trickier one to answer, so bear with me as I might take a little while to explain it. :)

We pray to saints in a different way than we pray to God. When we pray to God we know that our prayers are answered through his own power. When we pray to the angels/saints, we ask them to intercede between God and us on our behalf. Praying to the saints is like asking someone to pray for you. We are not praying in the sense that we are worshiping them or expect them to use their power to answer our prayers, because they cannot answer our prayers except with God's power working through them. So when we pray to the saints and angels we are not asking them to help us or thanking them for help received, but rather asking and thanking God through them.

You might ask what the point of that is, as it isn't as if the saints help with the backlog so that God can catch up later, and he can hear our prayers anytime. The reason for that is because the more prayers there are on our behalf, the more likely God is to answer our prayers. Again, this is not because God is hard of hearing and might miss us the first time, but because we believe in what is called the "Communion of Saints" which includes the saints in heaven, those in purgatory, and those on earth who are still working towards heaven. Communion means "union" and is related to the word community and that is sort of what the Communion of Saints is. Because all these people are in communion with each other (not meaning that we are all telepathically communicating with each other or are some kind of hive collective or anything like that ;) ), we pray for each other. (Praying for others is beneficial to those on earth because we believe that those on earth and in purgatory receive graces for prayer.) We believe the prayers of the holy (the saints) have more effect (James 5:16–18 gives the example of Elijah) than the prayers of other people. If you think about it, that makes sense because you are more likely to help someone who cares about you than an enemy. Of course God is not human and we believe he is infinitely merciful, but I don't want to get to deep into things right now so I will just leave it at "Scripture says that the prayers of the righteous are more powerful than the prayers of sinners" for now.

As Catholics we are encouraged to pray to God as well, and often, but since there is nothing wrong with asking the saints to pray for us, we do so.

Regarding veneration of images, we do not worship the images or the people of which the images are representative, but honour them as being examples which we should strive to imitate. When we make a shrine to venerate a saint and place flowers and other objects at the shrine, it is equivalent to placing flowers on the grave of someone who has died, in respect to their memory, but you wouldn't say we worship that person. If you lose a loved member of your family, you may have a picture of them in a prominent place to show your respect for that person, but you wouldn't say that it is idolatry. It is the same way with the saints. Because they were so close to God on earth we venerate them in a special way, so it is just a glorified version of what people do for deceased loved ones.

It can become idolatry though if you pray to a saint with the expectation that they will answer your prayers personally, or if you treat a statue or image as if it were alive and able to answer your prayers (i.e. if you pray to the statue and not the saint). When we honour an image we are just showing respect to that person, but should in no way think of the image as having power of its own.

Hopefully that makes sense and I didn't reiterate too much, as I am known to do that. :P

Silly is my middle name (one of them anyway).

In case you didn't catch on pretty quick, I was referring to Bingo's statement, but thanks for the vote. Unfortunately, it is no longer possible to vote, and even if it were, your vote would only serve to tie my support with the opposition.

You can vote for me next year though, as I intend to hold a yearly election until I am elected or the situation is resolved in some other way.

That's a tough one to answer, and to answer your question in the simplest way possible: no. This doesn't mean that I don't think that my religion is true, or that it is incomplete, but what it does mean is that I am still learning about my religion and I have yet to find/read the answers to some of the trickier questions posed against it. Some of the questions can't be answered with the knowledge/resources/evidence we have on earth, so there are some questions that will never be answered, or not in my lifetime. I believe that I will find the answers after I die, but meanwhile on earth I can't honestly say I'm satisfied with the hypothetical/speculative answers from all sides to many of these questions.

Does that make sense?

Happy in what way? As in satisfied with my beliefs, or happy with what has been done in the name of my religion or by members of my religion, or what?

Jaitea said:

Are you happy?

J

 Um...yes, I suppose. I don't believe that anyone can ever be entirely and truly happy in this world, but I would say I am a fairly happy guy. I'm certainly not unhappy.

@Bingowings

LOL, I get it now! But you know what I mean and the purpose of this thread is not to be a joke, but to clarify and inform, just like darth_ender's thread. :)

Are you being serious, or just pulling my leg? If you're being serious, then I'm sorry for my mistake, I thought it was some kind of reference or joke.

LOL :)

I said:

this thread is an opportunity for you to clear up any questions you have about Catholicism

That doesn't have much to do with Catholicism, so in order to keep this thread from derailing from the first reply, I am going to ask that you stay fairly serious and on-topic on this thread.

Taking after the example of darth_ender, I have decided to start my own thread with the same intention. My religion is often misunderstood, and this thread is an opportunity for you to clear up any questions you have about Catholicism with a practicing Catholic. I have a pretty good grasp on my religion, though I don't know enough to delve into some of the more intellectually stimulating debates. I will do my best to answer whatever questions you might have, however.

EDIT: Please be respectful in this thread. I will do my best to show respect in turn, but I would appreciate if you did not belittle my religion, and please, if you are going to make jokes, consider that you may be joking about what I consider to be holy and sacred and that may have the same effect as directly insulting my religion. So just show the same respect towards my beliefs as you would want me to show to yours.

Thank you.

FURTHER EDIT: Please try not to be ambiguous with your questions as I would like to be able to answer them correctly on my first try.

Are you referring to the first, or the second statement? I don't know you well enough to say for sure whether or not that is what is meant by your title if that is what you are referring to.

So is that what it means? I'm still trying to figure out your sense of humour, and if it's a reference, then I don't get it. I'm fairly certain it isn't literal if that translation is correct. :)

I vote that I don't do that.

On a completely unrelated note, what does your title translate as Bingo? I know "Magister" means "teacher" or "master" and "Maximus" means "great" or "grand", but I don't know any definitions of "Pontifex" besides "pope". The translation yielded by Google Translate is "Master Pope" but I don't think that's it. :)

No thanks Bingowings, but I will go to the sink and shower (to wash my hands and the rest of me).

I vote against that. Right now we're tied and I shall continue doing as I did before unless someone else votes against me and shifts the vote in your favour. If that happens, then I will have to have the toilet brought to me instead.

Hey, that's not nice! Well, it's pointless if I don't get more positive votes...oh, wait, it's been more than three days since the last vote.

The election of RicOlie_2 (that's me) as chief observer, booster of self esteem, handsomest man in the galaxy, and successor/temporary replacement for Ric Olie is now officially over. The result is as follows:

8 votes for me

9 votes against me.

Crap, I didn't make it. Well, instead of officially taking on the position, I will unofficially do so and take after the great Ric Olie.

I lied. It has been more than three days since the last vote and I have been voted out of the position. :(

No, that's what darth_ender did. It is pointless though, but whatever.

I've figured out how to use the software, and it looks like it's a good one for beginners. I need to get a better feel for how the pieces move, but that will come with practice. So, I guess I'm ready enough to begin a game.

The election is not yet over, so I am bumping this thread.

In other words you abstain from the vote. Thank you for telling me that anyway. ;)

The reason there are two threads is that my computer was acting up and I just thought my first click hadn't registered, so I clicked the post button again and ended up with a second thread.

Oh, I see. But Ric was just Ric Olie. Not Rick, or Richard, or Dick Olie, or anything like that.

Jaitea said:

Ric was also a Dic

J

 How dare you!! Ric was a handsome, observant man. You don't catch on very quick at all.