Question: My friend is always telling me about the saints...begs me to pray to Mary....I feel as if ...

Question: My friend is always telling me about the saints, asks me to pray to the saints, begs me to pray to Mary, etc. I tell her, why should I when I have Jesus! I feel as if it's evil just trying to grab me back [into the Roman Catholic Church]. Is it really an attack?

Response: We are always under "attack" by the world, the flesh, and the devil, but that is nothing to be concerned about. Your concern should be (and I know it is) how to win your friend to Christ. Your friend's insistence that you pray to the "saints" flies in the face of the denials by the Roman Catholic apologists that Catholics only ask Mary and the saints to pray for them but don't pray to them. We pointed out in the April TBC newsletter, praying to the saints is exactly what the average Catholic does. So does the pope, and this is the official position of the Roman Catholic Church. Those who deny it are either grossly ignorant or lying. I cover this point in the new tape series we're offering: "Roman Catholicism: A Biblical Perspective."

God repeatedly warns against necromancy (attempted contact with the spirits of the dead: Dt 18:9-12, etc.). There is not one prayer in the entire Bible directed to Abraham, the friend of God, or to Moses, or Daniel, et al., nor any indication that anyone ever prayed to the dead. Prayer is to God. The Holy Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings that cannot be expressed, and Christ is our advocate at the right hand of the Father. So why should Mary have to intercede for us with Christ?