Easter: A Denial of the Honor and All-Sufficient Work of Christ

Since Jesus is a complete Savior, it is wrong to invoke the aid of the saints. (To invoke is to call upon in prayer.)

This was commonly done prior to the Reformation.
In the bull “Injunctum Nobis”, issued by the Council of Trent in 1564, the church of Rome defended this practice and encouraged its members to continue it.

In this declaration, the members of the church of Rome were to profess,

“I hold that the saints reigning together with Christ should be honored and invoked,
that they offer prayers to God on our behalf.”

In another decree from the same council we read,

“It is a good and useful thing to invoke the saints humbly
and to have recourse to their prayers and to their efficacious help to obtain favors from God
through His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord who alone is our Redeemer and our Lord.”

The invocation to saints is a denial of the honor and all-sufficient work of Christ as Mediator.

The Roman Catholics vehemently deny this in words.
Yet when we look closely at their teaching concerning the “efficacious help”, it becomes clear that they are able to intercede with God on our behalf where we are not able.
Thus they are more powerful than we, mere mortals.
And when we look at the history of the veneration of saints in the Roman church, we find that Mary certainly becomes a rival for Jesus Christ.

Just as Christ was born without sin,

Just as Christ remained free from sin all His life,

Just as Christ sacrificed Himself,

Just as Jesus was taken up after death to heaven,

Rome also teaches that Mary has been raised and taken into heaven like Christ (the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary).

To be continued...

Adapted Excerpt From

Only By True Faith

A. VanDelden

Commonplaces