Two of the most bizarre teachings of the Catholic Church are that (1) saints can be beatified and then canonized by the pope and (2) then these saints can be prayed to for their intercession, since that is the veneration that they deserve. And the two things are connected. But you must be a dead saint to begin with!
According to the New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia (with all quotations from the same article) "The true origin of canonization and beatification must be sought in the Catholic doctrine of the worship (cultus), invocation, and intercession of the saints... The reason of this veneration lies, doubtless, in the resemblance of the confessors' self-denying and heroically virtuous lives to the sufferings of the martyrs..."
So if you want to be a Catholic saint you must be *heroically virtuous*. And here is the meaning of that term: "In order to be heroic a Christian virtue must enable its owner to perform virtuous actions with uncommon promptitude, ease, and pleasure, from supernatural motives and without human reasoning, with self-abnegation and full control over his natural inclinations..." In other words, a super-spiritual Christian (although in reality they may have been different).
Who would determine whether you were heroically virtuous? “Towards the close of the eleventh century the popes found it necessary to restrict episcopal authority on this point, and decreed that the virtues and miracles of persons proposed for public veneration should be examined in councils, more particularly in general councils...” In other words Catholic bishops would make that decision, and this would be a “decree of beatification”.
However the Pope would be the one to canonize a Catholic saint: "Canonization, generally speaking, is a decree regarding the public ecclesiastical veneration of an individual... In the ancient discipline of the Church, probably even as late as Alexander III, bishops could in their several dioceses allow public veneration to be paid to saints, and such episcopal decrees were not merely permissive, but, in my opinion, preceptive. Such decrees, however, could not prescribe universal honour; the effect of an episcopal act of this kind, was equivalent to our modern beatification. In such cases there was, properly speaking, no canonization, unless with the consent of the pope extending the cultus in question, implicitly or explicitly, and imposing it by way of precept upon the Church at large..." [Please note the connection between "cultus" and "cult"]
Along with “heroic virtue” the saint would have to be well-known for bringing about miracles through his or her intercession: "Equivalent canonization occurs when the pope, omitting the judicial process and the ceremonies, orders some servant of God to be venerated in the Universal Church; this happens when such a saint has been from a remote period the object of veneration, when his heroic virtues (or martyrdom) and miracles are related by reliable historians, and the fame of his miraculous intercession is uninterrupted..."
But a pope would have to have papal infallibility in order to declare you to be a saint. So now we come to another false doctrine of the RCC: "Is the pope infallible in issuing a decree of canonization? Most theologians answer in the affirmative.... In Quodlib. IX, a. 16, St. Thomas says: "Since the honour we pay the saints is in a certain sense a profession of faith, i.e., a belief in the glory of the Saints [quâ sanctorum gloriam credimus] we must piously believe that in this matter also the judgment of the Church is not liable to error." These words of St. Thomas, as is evident from the authorities just cited, all favouring a positive infallibility, have been interpreted by his school in favour of papal infallibility in the matter of canonization, and this interpretation is supported by several other passages in the same Quodlibet..."
So what would be the reason for the beatification, canonization, and veneration of the saints? So that you could pray to them! From the article on “The Communion of Saints”: "That the Anglo-Saxons held the doctrine of the communion of saints may be judged from the following account given by Lingard in his "History and Antiquities of the Anglo-Saxon Church." They received the practice of venerating the saints, he says, together with the rudiments the Christian religion; and they manifested their devotion to them both in public and private worship: in public, by celebrating the anniversaries of individual saints, and keeping annually the feast of All-Hallows as a solemnity of the first class; and in their private devotions, by observing the instructions to worship God and then to "pray, first to Saint Mary, and the holy apostles, and the holy martyrs, and all God's saints, that they would intercede for them to God". In this way they learned to look up to the saints in heaven with feelings of confidence and affection, to consider them as friends and protectors, and to implore their aid in the hour of distress, with the hope that God would grant to the patron what he might otherwise refuse to the supplicant."
Does the Bible categorically refute this doctrine and practice? Absolutely.
For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time. Whereunto I am ordained a preacher, and an apostle, (I speak the truth in Christ, and lie not) a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and verity. I will therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting. (1 Tim 2:5-8)
According to the New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia (with all quotations from the same article) "The true origin of canonization and beatification must be sought in the Catholic doctrine of the worship (cultus), invocation, and intercession of the saints... The reason of this veneration lies, doubtless, in the resemblance of the confessors' self-denying and heroically virtuous lives to the sufferings of the martyrs..."
So if you want to be a Catholic saint you must be *heroically virtuous*. And here is the meaning of that term: "In order to be heroic a Christian virtue must enable its owner to perform virtuous actions with uncommon promptitude, ease, and pleasure, from supernatural motives and without human reasoning, with self-abnegation and full control over his natural inclinations..." In other words, a super-spiritual Christian (although in reality they may have been different).
Who would determine whether you were heroically virtuous? “Towards the close of the eleventh century the popes found it necessary to restrict episcopal authority on this point, and decreed that the virtues and miracles of persons proposed for public veneration should be examined in councils, more particularly in general councils...” In other words Catholic bishops would make that decision, and this would be a “decree of beatification”.
However the Pope would be the one to canonize a Catholic saint: "Canonization, generally speaking, is a decree regarding the public ecclesiastical veneration of an individual... In the ancient discipline of the Church, probably even as late as Alexander III, bishops could in their several dioceses allow public veneration to be paid to saints, and such episcopal decrees were not merely permissive, but, in my opinion, preceptive. Such decrees, however, could not prescribe universal honour; the effect of an episcopal act of this kind, was equivalent to our modern beatification. In such cases there was, properly speaking, no canonization, unless with the consent of the pope extending the cultus in question, implicitly or explicitly, and imposing it by way of precept upon the Church at large..." [Please note the connection between "cultus" and "cult"]
Along with “heroic virtue” the saint would have to be well-known for bringing about miracles through his or her intercession: "Equivalent canonization occurs when the pope, omitting the judicial process and the ceremonies, orders some servant of God to be venerated in the Universal Church; this happens when such a saint has been from a remote period the object of veneration, when his heroic virtues (or martyrdom) and miracles are related by reliable historians, and the fame of his miraculous intercession is uninterrupted..."
But a pope would have to have papal infallibility in order to declare you to be a saint. So now we come to another false doctrine of the RCC: "Is the pope infallible in issuing a decree of canonization? Most theologians answer in the affirmative.... In Quodlib. IX, a. 16, St. Thomas says: "Since the honour we pay the saints is in a certain sense a profession of faith, i.e., a belief in the glory of the Saints [quâ sanctorum gloriam credimus] we must piously believe that in this matter also the judgment of the Church is not liable to error." These words of St. Thomas, as is evident from the authorities just cited, all favouring a positive infallibility, have been interpreted by his school in favour of papal infallibility in the matter of canonization, and this interpretation is supported by several other passages in the same Quodlibet..."
So what would be the reason for the beatification, canonization, and veneration of the saints? So that you could pray to them! From the article on “The Communion of Saints”: "That the Anglo-Saxons held the doctrine of the communion of saints may be judged from the following account given by Lingard in his "History and Antiquities of the Anglo-Saxon Church." They received the practice of venerating the saints, he says, together with the rudiments the Christian religion; and they manifested their devotion to them both in public and private worship: in public, by celebrating the anniversaries of individual saints, and keeping annually the feast of All-Hallows as a solemnity of the first class; and in their private devotions, by observing the instructions to worship God and then to "pray, first to Saint Mary, and the holy apostles, and the holy martyrs, and all God's saints, that they would intercede for them to God". In this way they learned to look up to the saints in heaven with feelings of confidence and affection, to consider them as friends and protectors, and to implore their aid in the hour of distress, with the hope that God would grant to the patron what he might otherwise refuse to the supplicant."
Does the Bible categorically refute this doctrine and practice? Absolutely.
For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time. Whereunto I am ordained a preacher, and an apostle, (I speak the truth in Christ, and lie not) a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and verity. I will therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting. (1 Tim 2:5-8)
