Why do Catholics have idols in their churches?

Question

This breaks the second commandment. “You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; 5 you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me,

Catholics pray to statues of Jesus and Mary, As it was their God. Read the commandment a top again

Check out this tract online http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/0071/0071_01.asp

Answer 1

Because they stopped worshiping God when they stopped reading their Bibles and decided that they needed a Pope to tell them what to do.

Answer 2

Do you have pictures of your loved ones? Have you ever looked at the picture of someone while talking on the phone to them?

Statues and pictures of people we love are not idols.

Statues and paintings of Jesus and the saints are just like pictures of the people we love and respect.

The King James Version of the Bible states in Exodus 20:4: "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth"

Why were the Jews commanded not to make graven images? Graven images were the standard method of pagan worship. They were representations of false gods.

This is a very clear command.

However God commanded the Jews in Exodus 25:18 and 1 Chronicles 28:18–19, "And thou shalt make two cherubims of gold, of beaten work shalt thou make them"

And in 1 Kings chapter 7 Solomon made bulls and other images out of precious metals.

It seems obvious that the Jews did not worship the cherubims and Solomon did not worship the bulls he had made. These images did not violate the command of God. Therefore, an image not made for worship is acceptable.

In Numbers 21:8-9, "And the LORD said to Moses, "Make a saraph and mount it on a pole, and if anyone who has been bitten looks at it, he will recover." Moses accordingly made a bronze serpent and mounted it on a pole, and whenever anyone who had been bitten by a serpent looked at the bronze serpent, he recovered."

And in John 3:14-15, Jesus says in correlation, "And just as Moses lifted up the [image of a] serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life."

How can a statue of our Lord Jesus Christ dead on the cross be considered an idol to a false god? A crucifix is the message of the Gospel without words held up for all to see, a visual reminder of the sacrifice of Jesus, no different from a painting, a play, or a movie.

Catholics do not worship statues but the almighty God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

+ Chick Publications +

I'm sorry but I cannot take anything that Chick Publications says seriously.

If we were to believe all that Chick Publications claims then we would believe the the Catholic Church:
+ Instigated the American Civil War
+ Assassinated Abraham Lincoln
+ Formed the Ku Klux Klan
+ Keeps every Christian's name in a computer in order to make persecution easier

With love in Christ.

Answer 3

Chick tracts are not a credible source.

Praying to a statue of Mary, or even just to Mary as if she were God is clearly a sin in Catholic teaching (which includes the 10 Commandments of course).

The problem with Ex 20:4-5 "You shall not make for yourself a graven image,..." is that it is also followed later on by Ex 25:18-21 " And you shall make two cherubim of gold; of hammere work shall you make them, on the two ends of the mercy seat. Make one cherub on the one end, and one cherub on the other end; of one piece with the mercy seat shall you make the cherubim on its two ends. The cherubim shall spread out their wings above, overshadowing the mercy seat with their wings, their faces one to another; toward the mercy seat shall the faces of the cherubim be. And you shall put the mercy seat on the top of the ark; and in the ark you shall put the testimony that I shall give you."

So, immediately after God tells the Israelites not to carve graven images, He commands the to do just that! God does not violate His own laws. A thing is good because it reflects the nature of who God is, not because of an arbritrary command. If statues and images were intrinsically evil, God would not have had the ark engraved with them.

And how did the Israelites use these? See Josh 7:6-8 "Then Joshua rent his clothes, and fell to the earth upon his face before the ark of the Lord until the evening, hhe and the elders of Israel; and they put dust upon their heads. And Joshua said, 'Alias, O Lord GOD, why hast thou brought this people over the Jordan at all, to give us into the hands of the Amorites, to destroy us? Would that we had been content to dwell beyond the Jordan! O Lord, what can I say, when Israel has turned their backs before their enemies!

Joshua directly violated the command against the use of graven images by bowing before it [Ex 20:5]. Yet God allowed it. Why? Only one answer; the graven images are being used properly. A casual observer might think that Joshua is bowing down to a graven images, but he is merely using the images as a means to focus his worship of God.

It's the same today when statues and images are used properly.

Answer 4

It is just a replica of what is in Heaven. By this you must be saying the Seraphim on the Ark of the Covenant was an idol. Or perhaps the serpent on the pole that God told Moses to fashion? The Holy Spirit, according to the Gospel of John, would be revealing all things to Christians after Jesus went. This is one of those things. It was against the Commandments to make things representing things in Heaven that were not there but, now Jesus is there, his Mother is there, the Saints are there.

Answer 5

We have art not "idols",thank you very much. Catholics and Orthodox know very well the commandment not to put anything above,on or beneath the earth above God or tothink that the divine or heavenly or magic force is contained or trapped in an image(which is a representation and psychological focus point like a flag of photo of a loved one).and we teach and observe this command.
Catholicism condemns animistic and superstitious practices (see Catechism of the Catholic Church paras2110-2141) as well as putting the quest for wealth,power,pleasure or fame above seeking Gog andHis justice and holiness. Serving goods like family or country above serving God is idolatry not the creation and honoring of religious art.
God did command the use and honoring of religious art. Please look upEX 25:18-19 where Israel is commanded to make and honor the Ark of the Covenant with its cherubim,angelic heavenly beings,on its top and to flank the Ark with large angelic statues in the most sacred and venerated part of the Temple,which was covered in figred images(1 Kings 6&7).
God commanded Moses to make an image of a seraph serpent ,put it on a pole and the people were to be healed by reverently gazing on it (Numbers21:8-9)in veneration. Images werenot to be used in a manipulative magical fashion as the Egyptians did and when the Bronze Serpent was so abused it was" removed ".
Also, if someone believes that Jesus is the incarnation of God to forbid the making of statues and pictures of Him,His life and family is to deny that He is really human andhas "taken flesh". I use holy images to remind me of Jesus and His grace.

Answer 6

you are obviously unaware of what catholics actually beleive and do. what you consider idols are icons that like pictures call to mind a specific person/event that helps us reflect upon the person/event.

what about the scripture where god commands the making of cherubim etc.........

when read properly we see that not all graven images offend god, this commandment pertains specifically to pagan idols that were used to worship false gods.

to find the truth about the catholic church you need to use catholic sources, here are some that may help

most importantly the bible, which is a catholic book.
a catechism of teh catholic church
www.scripturecatholic.com
www.salvationhistory.com
www.catholiceducation.org
www.fisheaters.com
www.ewtn.com


hope these help and god bless. please take the sites seriously,you don't have to agree with what you read but it will educate you on what catholics actually do and why we do them. the link you added in your additional details is exactly why people are misguided about the catholic faith,that is an anti catholic source,do you really think you will get the truth as opposed to bias ignorant protestant propaganda from someone with an agenda.

Answer 7

First of all to cite CHICK tract is just in bad taste.... That company's tracts are for the most part laughable and a towering pillar of fundamental B.S.

However, I do agree with you that the attention given to the saints is idolatry. Jesus in the bible spoke that there is only one way to the father and that is through him.

In fact I know some churches that do not even hang a cross behind the altar, as they worship God not to ANY graven image.

I do not hate my Catholic brothers and sisters for this. I feel they are as a whole mislead by the heresies that were committed by the earliest of Catholic churches. Namely the group that decided what was going to go into the Holy Bible. (Nicene)

Their religion was built with the bricks of man’s agenda for a thousand of years. All we can do is pray for them and love them in the hopes that God will awaken in them and then they will thirst for the truth.

Answer 8

Catholics "venerate" Mary and the saints by creating statues and images of them. Many Catholics use images of Mary and/or the saints as "good luck charms." Any cursory reading of the Bible will reveal this practice as blatant idolatry (Exodus 20:4-6; 1 Corinthians 12:12; 1 John 5:21). Rubbing rosary beads is idolatry. Lighting candles before a statue or portrayal of a saint is idolatry. Burying a Joseph statue in hopes of selling your home (and countless other Catholic practices) is idolatry.

Answer 9

Catholics use statues, paintings, and other artistic devices to recall the person or thing depicted. Just as it helps to remember one’s mother by looking at her photograph, so it helps to recall the example of the saints by looking at pictures of them. Catholics also use statues as teaching tools. In the early Church they were especially useful for the instruction of the illiterate. Many Protestants have pictures of Jesus and other Bible pictures in Sunday school for teaching children. Catholics also use statues to commemorate certain people and events, much as Protestant churches have three-dimensional nativity scenes at Christmas.

Answer 10

There are no idols. There are statues. An idol involves the idea that God or a god actually inhabits the statue. It is absurd to suggest this is the meaning of religious statuary.

Answer 11

Pastor Billy says: it is extremely sad that people actually look to Jack Chick (crap artist btw) as a spiritual director.

I would offer an answer but in this case pray would be more profitable for this person