speter@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU (Peter Osgood) (09/23/86)
Let us get one thing very straight, we Catholics worship one person and one person *only*, God. We pray to Mary and the Saints to intervene for our causes. It is true that those who went before us buried Popes, especially, in the Vatican, St. Peter's, and other places. HOWEVER, by and large, the practice of worshipping these "corpses" is long since past, it is history. Finally, this practice is/was not limited to us, in fact, in Damascus in the the central Mosque, which I visited, there is a crypt where the head of John the Baptist is purported to rest. This, surprise surprise all you crusaders, is the second holiest place in Islam and John the Baptist one of their holiest people. They, Moslems, still go to that crypt to worship. This is the only case of "corpse worship" that I have *ever* witnessed. ---peter osgood--
tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney) (09/24/86)
In article <1190@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU> speter@athena.mit.edu (Peter Osgood) writes: >It is true that those who went before us buried Popes, especially, >in the Vatican, St. Peter's, and other places. HOWEVER, by and >large, the practice of worshipping these "corpses" is long since >past, it is history. > > ---peter osgood-- Well, Peter, I can only assume that you haven't been to the center of your religion, St. Peter's. Corpse fragments are still proudly and openly displayed there. Many European churches have treasyured relics with purported miraculous powers. Remind me to tell you the story of "DON'T KISS THE FEET!" sometime.... Your statement also misses the point - the corpses in question were NOT buried, but torn apart and saved by various individuals and churches, often in prominent places. -- Tim Maroney, Electronic Village Idiot {ihnp4,sun,well,ptsfa,lll-crg,frog}!hoptoad!tim (uucp) hoptoad!tim@lll-crg (arpa) Copy protection violates the basic principle of due process: Every human is presumed innocent until proven to be guilty.
abdali@tekchips.UUCP (Kamal Abdali) (09/27/86)
------------------------------------------------ In article <1190@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU>, speter@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU (Peter Osgood) writes: > Let us get one thing very straight, we Catholics worship one > person and one person *only*, God. > > We pray to Mary and the Saints to intervene for our causes. > > Finally, this practice is/was not limited to us, in fact, in > Damascus in the the central Mosque, which I visited, there is > a crypt where the head of John the Baptist is purported to rest. > This, surprise surprise all you crusaders, is the second holiest > place in Islam and John the Baptist one of their holiest people. > They, Moslems, still go to that crypt to worship. This is the > only case of "corpse worship" that I have *ever* witnessed. > > ---peter osgood-- 1. According to the Muslim consensus, the holiest sites in Islam are the Sacred Mosque at Mecca, the Prophet's Mosque at Medina, and the Aqsa Mosque at Jerusalem, in that order. The Omayyad Mosque at Damascus is just as sacred as any other mosque, no more and no less. 2. There are special prayers to be offered at graves, but they are addressed to God, not to the buried. These prayers should not be construed as corpse worship. 3. The excessive devotional behavior of the kind that you witnessed at the grave of John the Baptist does take place at many shrines, and is even directed towards persons much less holy than John (who is considered a "prophet" in Islam). But the vast majority of Muslims condemns such behavior strongly. The puritans consider as outright un-Islamic any display of devotion that has the faintest semblance of worship of any one but God. In the Prophet's Mosque at Medina, guards are stationed to stop people from clinging to or kissing the fence around the Prophet Muhammad's Tomb.
speter@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU (Peter Osgood) (09/29/86)
In article <3037@sdcrdcf.UUCP> alan@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Alan Algustyniak) writes: > >Interesting. How do you square that with the Catholic dogma that there >are THREE persons in God? > > Al Algustyniak > >Praying is what i'm doing when i don't know what i'm doing. Actually, we believe that their are three beings in one, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. How that happens to be is one of the wonderful mysteries of God. It is not necessary that we can comprehend infinity to give it definition, so too for God and the Trinity. Moses in the Old Testament and John in the New Testament attest to the extreme difficulty they had at looking upon the face of God. This is where true faith comes in, you haven't seen it and would be very hard pressed to prove God's/Jesus's existance by normal physical means. Your mind says "no" but your heart says "yes, absolutely." In reality, praying is a conversation with God, so see, you do believe. ---peter osgood---
tim@ism780c.UUCP (Tim Smith) (10/03/86)
speter@athena.mit.edu (Peter Osgood) writes: > >It is true that those who went before us buried Popes, especially, >in the Vatican, St. Peter's, and other places. HOWEVER, by and >large, the practice of worshipping these "corpses" is long since >past, it is history. > What is the justification for stopping the worship of these "corpses"? The people who did so were closer in time to the founding of the Church, so it seems that they would be more likely to know how people were intended to worship. -- member, all HASA divisions POELOD ECBOMB -------------- ^-- Secret Satanic Message Tim Smith USENET: sdcrdcf!ism780c!tim Compuserve: 72257,3706 Delphi or GEnie: mnementh