A reader writes:
If Heaven is beyond time and space, and the Angels and Saints can hear our prayers as the book of Revelation shows, then are the prayers the saints hear ones that are made after their death?
Angels don’t have death, but yes, saints in heaven do hear prayers made after their deaths. Thus in A.D. 2006 I can pray to St. Paul, who died in the A.D. 60s. That doesn’t require heaven to be beyond time and space, though. Even if St. Paul is still fully within the flow of time, so that for him it’s also 2006, he can still hear the prayer as long as he has a way to perceive it.
The standard thought is that it is God who communicates to the saints the fact that someone is praying to them, so if I am in 2006 and St. Paul is in 2006, God can simply pass on my prayer to St. Paul. God, of course, is outside of time, but St. Paul doesn’t have to be for him to learn about my prayer long after his death.
If, because Heaven is beyond time and space, I could hear prayers from all times, then if I pray now, die and go to Heaven, will I be able to hear my own prayers that I made before I died?
Possibly. There are a few caveats, though:
1) While God is outside of time, it is not at all clear that human souls are outside of time. Or at least they are not outside of time in the same way that God is. God does not experience any sequentiality; he lives in an "eternal now" in which all of history happens at once (or, to put it more precisely, every moment in the history of the world is equally present to God).
Souls, however, clearly do experience sequentiality. There is the point at which they die, experience the particular judgment, are purified (if needed), and fully glorified, are restored to their bodies at the Resurrection, experience the general judgment, experience the eternal order, etc. Even if you want to say that this sequentiality doesn’t take place in time as we experience it (and I’m open to the proposition that it does take place in time as we experience it), you at least have to say that it takes place over something analogous to time that allows things to happen in sequence rather than all at once in an eternal now.
2) You don’t need to posit heaven being outside of time, though, in order to get your prayer request to your future, sainted self. As we mentioned, God is outside of time, and so if you are alive in 2006 and praying to yourself in heaven then God could tell you about that prayer in 2306, when you die and arrive in heaven (let’s assume that medical technology discovers something really fabulous that lets you live for more than three centuries).
3) It’s not clear that this would be necessary, however, since Scripture seems to indicate that we will have a whole-life review at some point–possibly at more than one point (i.e., both the particular and the general judgments) and we may have constant, continuous access to the events of our own lives in the form of memory (unimpeded by our brain’s faulty retrieval system). If that’s the case then, or whenever the whole-life review takes place, we could come across our former prayer request and be able to fulfill it.
4) On the other hand, there may be limits to what we can pray for on behalf of our former selves. One thing that it does not make sense for us to pray for is something that we know was not God’s will. For example, even today–with me still being alive–I could not ask God to make it so that I had never been born. I already know that it was God’s will for me to be born, and I cannot legitimately pray for something that I know to be contrary to God’s will.
(I could pray that God create an alternate timeline in which I was never born, but I cannot pray that I never existed in this timeline.)
Once we’re in heaven and have had our whole-life review and know everything that happened to us, we wouldn’t be able to pray that things turn out differently for us–at any particular moment of our lives–than they did, for to do so would be to pray contrary to God’s will for us.
5) We could, however, pray for things to turn out as they did. Since God is outside of time, I can ask him in 2306 to allow something to happen to me in 2006 that I know did happen to me in that year. In this case, I’m praying in harmony with God’s will–and such a prayer of mine in 2306 might (hypothetically) be a contributing factor to why God allowed the event to happen to me in 2006.
6) It is not clear, however, whether God would respond to this type of prayer. First, he might judge that the purpose of the Communion of the Saints is to build up the body of Christ by praying for each other. Praying for our own past selves might not be what he has in mind. For example, I’m not sure what God would think of me praying–now, in 2006–that he allow me to be born back in the 1960s.
In fact, I rather suspect that God might take a dim view of me making that request of him, at least while I’m in this life. Given that I already know what his will was on that matter, I suspect he would rather have me spending my time and energy praying for things where I don’t know his will–like my present needs or the needs of others.
In this life I have limited time and energy to devote to things, and God might well deem it more productive for me to devote my petitionary prayer to matters that are not yet settled from my temporal perspective. I might praise and thank him for allowing me to be born, but in terms of what I should be asking for, he might want me to ask that he bless me or my loved ones or the pope or the poor of the souls in purgatory or someone who I don’t already know it was his will to bless.
Here’s one way God might want us to handle things in prayer:
* If we know it’s his will, praise and thank him for it.
* If we don’t know if it’s his will, ask that he will grant the request if it’s his will.
* If we know it’s not his will, don’t ask him for it.
For our future selves, things that we know did happen to us would go in the first category and things that we know didn’t happen would go in the third. Once we’re in heaven, presumably nothing about our past lives would fall in the middle category. If that’s the case then praying for our past selves would not be in harmony with God’s will.
That’s assuming, of course, that God handles things according to the three categories mentioned above. He may not. As noted before, he might act on the prayers of our future selves in granting blessings to our present selves.
The Book of Revelations i.e. The Apocalypse of John, (not that of St. John based on the views of most contemporary biblical scholars) which is noted by the questioner:
Let us see what others have to say about the Book:
“Revelation is considered one of the most controversial and difficult books of the Bible, with many diverse interpretations of the meanings of the various names and events in the account. Protestant founder Martin Luther at first considered Revelation to be “neither apostolic nor prophetic” and stated that “Christ is neither taught nor known in it”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Boo…k_of_Revelation. See also the reference for added commentary.
From Father Raymond Brown’s book, An Introduction to the NT, (Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur) (See Amazon.com for added details. See pp.809-811 for Father Brown’s cautions about the literal use of Revelations.)
“Written 92-96 AD, by a Jewish Christian who was neither John Son of Zebedee nor the writer of the John’s Gospel”.
Another good reference: http:// http://www.earlychristianwriting…revelation.html
I also like the following analysis:
“Indeed most of the material is secondhand, being borrowed liberally from the Old Testament books of Isaiah, Ezra, Ezekiel and, in particular, Daniel (which also has fantastic images of the End Time and refers to ‘one like a son of man’). Revelation essentially is Jewish scripture. ”
With this in mind are we reading too much into the power of the Saints in Heaven?
Considering the low return on investment in prayer, is not a positive result actually only the result of the randomness of the God-given laws of Nature?
And don’t the God-gifts of Free Will and Future also make Heavenly action very questionable?
IMHO, the key phrase is “actions speak louder than words”. If a relative or friend needs help, clean and cook for them and help them with their bills. Forget the Litany of Saints and become a Saint yourself.
And I leave the discussion as per the new Rule 1.
Jimmy wrote: “(I could pray that God create an alternate timeline in which I was never born, but I cannot pray that I never existed in this timeline.)”
Hmmm, ‘fraid you got me on that one, Jimmy. I see the distinction, but not the difference.
I don’t think we know enough about how any “alternate timelines” would work in order to know whether there WOULD be any difference. But given that, I guess we could pray for an alternate timeline in which we imagine the physics to be such that there would be a difference . . . I’m not a physicist, so I guess that’s where I have to stop.
My brain hurts.
IMHO, the key phrase is “actions speak louder than words”. If a relative or friend needs help, clean and cook for them and help them with their bills. Forget the Litany of Saints and become a Saint yourself.
It’s not either/or, it’s both and. Praise be to the saints!
It would be rather presumptuous to assume that we will even be in heaven to answer our own prayers! Personally, I don’t really buy what seems to be a misapplication of relativity theory to the “physics” of heaven. We can understand how time works in this world (sort of), but we have no experiential knowledge of time in either heaven or hell. (Though I think Catherine of Genoa waxed philosophical about the change of time in purgatory.) Just thinking about eternity makes my head cave in.
But hey, what do I know? St. Gimp, pray for us.
Jimmiy you state in #2) we woulnd’nt be able to pray that things turn out differently for us–at any particular moment in our lives–then they did,for to do so would be to pray contrary to God’s will for us. Are we to assume that all things that happend in our life were God’s will. I thought much in this world that happens is contrary to God’s will ie. sin, and although He may allow things,it doesn’t mean it was his will. Or does it?
In response to #2), are we to assume that everything that happens to us in life is Gods will? Or are we to understand that some things happen as result of sin, are not Gods will at all,( altough he may allow them to happen.)? If so, why could we not pray that things turn out differently for some particular event.
“It would be rather presumptuous to assume that we will even be in heaven to answer our own prayers!”
I’m with St. Gimp. Even assuming I get to heaven, of all the saints to which I can direct my prayers, I can’t think of anyone better than ME?
I guess if you want something done right…
Hypothetical situation:
X died ten years ago.
I have no idea whether he was in a state of grace when he died or not.
Can I pray for his salvation now, hoping that God might respond to my prayers before X’s death?
Can I pray for his salvation now, hoping that God might respond to my prayers before X’s death?
There was a similar question posed in some ancient Jewish writings (in the Talmud, maybe?), but concerning the sex of an unborn child. The rabbis considered it sinful for parents to pray for either a boy or a girl after the woman had conceived, because God had already chosen the child’s sex. This makes sense to me, and I likewise think it would be useless to pray for someone’s salvation after his death. Judgment has already been made on his soul, and just because we don’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not set in proverbial stone. This isn’t like Schroedinger’s cat, which supposedly could be either alive or dead depending on how you observed it, “collapsing” into a certain state out of an uncertain quantum fuzziness. God does not play dice, at least not with our souls.
Jimmy,
I truly admire your profound intellect!
However, isn’t ‘time’ limited to our temporal world here (as it is an aspect of our temporal world here) and does not apply to Heaven where it is eternal there and where we (God-willing) and all the Saints will exist for all eternity?
Take for example these excerpts from St. Augustine:
“Therefore, there is a certain created wisdom that was created before all things: the rational and intelligible mind of that chaste city of thine. It is our mother which is above and is free and “eternal in the heavens”–but in what heavens except those which praise thee, the “heaven of heavens”? This also is the “heaven of heavens” which is the Lord’s–although we find no time before it, since what has been created before all things also precedes the creation of time. Still, the eternity of the Creator himself is before it, from whom it took its beginning as created, though not in time (since time as yet was not), even though time belongs to its created nature.”
“For when they read or hear these words, O God, they see that all times past and times future are transcended by thy eternal and stable permanence, and they see also that there is no temporal creature that is not of thy making.”
“In eternity, God is before all things; in the temporal process, the flower is before the fruit;”
Although, I’ve got to admit it seems that your statement “Or at least they are not outside of time in the same way that God is” kind of concurs with Augustine’s “Still, the eternity of the Creator himself is before it.”
I think that the church has already delved into the question of eternity and answered that eternity as a state of being belongs to God alone.
Humans and Angels exist in a state called aeveternity according to the medeival and some modern theologians.
“Aeviternity is the proper sphere of every created spirit, and therefore of the human soul.”
-Frank Sheed in Theology and Sanity.
It would seem that the state of living eternally means that in God there is no past or future but a continual or eternal ‘present’.
Wait a minute. I’m confused.
I pray to, say, St. Therese of Lisieux. The prayer goes to God, who refers it to St. Therese, who then intercedes on my behalf with God?!
Don’t get me wrong – if that’s the way God has it set up, far be it from me to criticize Him. However, it seems a little redundant. I thought (and I’m only a candidate, so I could very well be wrong) that praying to the saints was asking them to present our petitions to God. Why would they funnel through Him only to be re-presented to Him by the saint in question?
Kasia,
Well, the fact is, we do pray to them but that has to be understood properly and a great verse of Scripture that you might want to look at is Revelation 5:8 which shows us a great example.
It says that John here is receiving a vision of Heaven and he sees: “And when he had taken the scroll, the 4 living creatures and 24 elders (now this is 4 angels and 24 human beings) fell down before the Lord before the Lamb, each holding a harp and with golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the Saints” and they take those prayers to God.
That’s a great verse of Scripture there because notice that it says each one of them had multiple prayers from multiple saints coming up from the earth and they are receiving these prayers and taking those prayers to God. That’s a great example of the intercession of the Saints in Scripture.
Kasia:
Another thing that you may consider is God shares His power with those in Heaven. The saints have the power of God in listening to your prayers, so really God is not first funneling the prayers and then back to Himself. I think this is more consistent and logical, and more supported in Scripture. Check out 2 Peter 1:4.
Hypothetical situation:
X died ten years ago.
I have no idea whether he was in a state of grace when he died or not.
Can I pray for his salvation now, hoping that God might respond to my prayers before X’s death?
Posted by: Varnata | Nov 3, 2006 9:13:53 AM
VERNATA:
St. John Vianney was approached by a family that had a father that had committed suicide and jumped off a bridge. God gave St. John Vianney a Word, if you will, and upon whcih the person repented on the way down and actually made it to Purgatory. Now, that’s a private revelation and this isn’t definitive Catholic teaching. I share that with you only to say this: we never know the state of that soul. We pray a lot of rosaries in our life “Pray for Us Sinners Now and at the Moment of Our Death – At the Hour of Our Death.” We pray every day so many times because we believe in the mercy of God.
Now, the state of a person’s soul is determined at the point of death. There is no more chances after death. You either go to Heaven or to Hell. When you die over the age of seven, it’s either Heaven or Hell; purgatory, of course, being the clean-up on the way to Heaven for those who are not fully sanctified. The fact is we don’t know the state of a person’s soul when they die. Even though externally, it may have looked like the person may have died in a state of mortal sin, when, in fact, there may have been in that person’s last moments of consciousness the grace of God. I encourage folks to pray for such people because God is outside of time. God, even now, can affect – it’s hard for us to fathom this – but our prayers now can even affect things in the past. Well, how can that be? Well, we can always pray and hope because it may well be that such folks, due to our prayers and because God is outside of time, may now reside in Purgatory because of it.
Kasia,
I have read (and could be wrong) that Eastern rite Catholic theology explains that the saints see our needs in the reflection of God’s eyes. That has always been a beautiful image to me that in experiencing the beatific vision God reveals our needs to them and they loving intercede on our behalf. Not sure if that makes sense or helps.
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Can I pray for his salvation now, hoping that God might respond to my prayers before X’s death?
There was a similar question posed in some ancient Jewish writings (in the Talmud, maybe?), but concerning the sex of an unborn child. The rabbis considered it sinful for parents to pray for either a boy or a girl after the woman had conceived, because God had already chosen the child’s sex. This makes sense to me, and I likewise think it would be useless to pray for someone’s salvation after his death. Judgment has already been made on his soul, and just because we don’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not set in proverbial stone. This isn’t like Schroedinger’s cat, which supposedly could be either alive or dead depending on how you observed it, “collapsing” into a certain state out of an uncertain quantum fuzziness. God does not play dice, at least not with our souls.
Posted by: St. Gimp | Nov 3, 2006 9:40:16 AM
St. Gimp:
Orthodox Jews to this day believe in the final purification, and for eleven months after the death of a loved one, they pray a prayer called the Mourner’s Kaddish for their loved one’s purification. (hence, the ancient practice of prayer for the dead and the idead of Purgatory)
Relevant passage in an excerpt from Catholic Answers:
Prayers for the dead and the consequent doctrine of purgatory have been part of the true religion since before the time of Christ. Not only can we show it was practiced by the Jews of the time of the Maccabees, but it has even been retained by Orthodox Jews today, who recite a prayer known as the Mourner’s Kaddish for eleven months after the death of a loved one so that the loved one may be purified.
“In doing this he acted in a very excellent and noble way, inasmuch as he had the resurrection of the dead in view; for if he were not expecting the dead to rise again, it would have been useless and foolish to pray for them in death. But if he did this with a view to the splendid reward that awaits those who had gone to rest in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin”
(2 Macc. 12:43–45)
Also, as mentioned in my previous post, we can never know exactly the state of the person’s soul at death; like the Scripture says, only God knows the hearts of man. (Luke 16:15 the idea that only God knoweth our hearts)
God Bless!
“And don’t the God-gifts of Free Will and Future also make Heavenly action very questionable?” – Posted by Realist
For the sake of simplicity, and for those new to JA.O, here is a short synopsis of Realist’s comments on just about any subject;
1) The Bible is nothing more a collection of “faith stories” with no basis in historical fact. He knows this because the Jesus Seminar says so, and they are infallible in matters of doctrine.
2) The *Official Version* of Church history is a lie made up by the hierarchy so that they can continue scamming all of us.
3) Miracles – that is supernatural events of any kind – are impossible because in reality, nothing exists outside of nature. This means we have to re-think our idea of “God”.
3) “Catholic” is, apparently, a word with no fixed meaning… this means that all Catholics are equal, especially dissidents. There is, of course, no absolute Truth, but the *Official Catholic Version* of anything is ESPECIALLY rejected.
None the less, Realist assures us that he REALLY IS a Catholic, which is like me insisting that I am REALLY a committed Communist, even though I think communism gets everything wrong and that Karl Marx never existed, but was an invention of Joseph Stalin.
Tim J.,
Thanks Tim for reciting to us The Gospel According to ‘Realist’ ;^)
(Only kiddin’ folks…Blessings!)
“Considering the low return on investment in prayer, is not a positive result actually only the result of the randomness of the God-given laws of Nature?”
“low return”? My mirror tells me otherwise.
“positive result”? I’d call eternal salvation a “positive result”.
“only the result of the randomness of the God-given laws of Nature’? No, it’s the result of the God-given laws of Grace.
Actually, the laws of nature are not random; if they were, we wouldn’t recognize them as laws.
Esau: I believe in Purgatory and the necessity of prayers for the dead. We cannot know who is in hell (except perhaps Judas), so it’s commonly considered best to assume that even the worst person made it into at least the lower levels of Purgatory. Fair enough. I do not, however, believe that we can pull anyone out of hell by our prayers.
“Considering the low return on investment in prayer…”
“…low return…”
Should I be thinking of investing in Heavenly mutual funds then? How do I ensure that I am well diversified and also how do I achieve a decent return on my current Salvation portfolio?
Do you know if the earnings report will be positive for YWH?
It seems to be trading a billion times earnings. Seems to be heavily inflated if you ask me!
God bless ya, Realist! ;^)
Esau: I believe in Purgatory and the necessity of prayers for the dead. We cannot know who is in hell (except perhaps Judas), so it’s commonly considered best to assume that even the worst person made it into at least the lower levels of Purgatory. Fair enough. I do not, however, believe that we can pull anyone out of hell by our prayers.
Actually, St. Gimp, about your latter remark, since God is outside of time and resides in the Eternal Now, given a ‘temporal flux’-type construct; God can apply those prayers we have for a person that had passed away and apply those to the person while s/he was still alive, and, thus, provide then the necessary grace of ultimately avoiding Hell to him/her.
Of course, this is all but theological thought exercise (if it could even be considered that).
All in all, it’s best we just pray for them since, unlike God, we cannot look into the hearts of people and determine for sure whether they went to Hell just based on the external evidence.
God bless!
Jimmy –
Re: #1 – Pseudomodo mentioned the notion of “aeviternity.” For a thorough consideration of this you may see Question 10 (especially Article 5) of the Summa Theologica. I suppose it must be a description of how a creature can participate in the eternity of God while still being a creature and not God.
St. Thomas says that aeviternity is a “mean” between time and eternity. It has the “simultaneous whole” quality of eternity, but it is compatible with accidental change because the saints and angels can experience “successive affections and intelligences.” Time has “before” and “after;” aeviternity in itself has no “before” and “after,” but they can be “annexed” to it; eternity does not have “before” or “after” nor is it compatible with these in any sense.
Actually, St. Gimp, about your latter remark, since God is outside of time and resides in the Eternal Now, given a ‘temporal flux’-type construct; God can apply those prayers we have for a person that had passed away and apply those to the person while s/he was still alive, and, thus, provide then the necessary grace of ultimately avoiding Hell to him/her.
This doesn’t sound particularly logical to me. We cannot change the past. What is done is done, regardless of God’s eternal “now-ness.” (In fact, it is God’s eternal perspective which guarantees that reality does not change.) We live in time, not in eternity, and we cannot pray as though we are in some kind of “temporal flux.” Moments of grace come and go, never to return; this is our nobility and our tragedy, to be bound to time and to opportunities that present themselves only once. Like the man who is praying that his in utero child will be a boy, those who pray for a change in a dead man’s eternal destiny are tempting God. No pseudo-science can change that.
All in all, it’s best we just pray for them since, unlike God, we cannot look into the hearts of people and determine for sure whether they went to Hell just based on the external evidence.
That we should pray for the dead whose eternal judgment is uncertain, I agree. Aside from a revelation, we cannot know with absolute certainty that anyone is in hell. Still, the words of St. John seem oddly ignored by those who would charitably assume that everyone at least makes it into Purgatory: “There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it.” This is why the Church did not traditionally offer requiem masses for the excommunicated or for those who caused public scandal by their sins. It would be wrong, I think, to assume that such persons died in a state of grace if they remained unrepentant until death. There’s always the possibility of a miraculous intervention by Christ at the last moment of life, but we have no reason to presume such a thing. Our general prayers for the souls in Purgatory should suffice to cover anyone we’ve missed.
It seems vaguely arrogant to be praying to one’s future self anyway?
I’ve wondered about Varnata’s question, too. I pray for their souls at the very moment of their death, figuring God has always known I would do this, including that moment of death.
St Gimp –
You quoted a passage from St John’s 1st letter – in case you were interested, or perhaps you’re unaware of this, but Jimmy responded to a reader’s question on that very passage back on October 17 of this year. It’s under the “Bible” heading. Just a friendly “in case yer interested”, nothing more.
This doesn’t sound particularly logical to me. We cannot change the past. What is done is done, regardless of God’s eternal “now-ness.” (In fact, it is God’s eternal perspective which guarantees that reality does not change.) We live in time, not in eternity, and we cannot pray as though we are in some kind of “temporal flux.” Moments of grace come and go, never to return; this is our nobility and our tragedy, to be bound to time and to opportunities that present themselves only once.
St. Gimp:
Please re-read Jimmy’s article and pay particular attention around this paragraph in his article:
Since God is outside of time, I can ask him in 2306 to allow something to happen to me in 2006 that I know did happen to me in that year. In this case, I’m praying in harmony with God’s will–and such a prayer of mine in 2306 might (hypothetically) be a contributing factor to why God allowed the event to happen to me in 2006. In this case, I’m praying in harmony with God’s will–and such a prayer of mine in 2306 might (hypothetically) be a contributing factor to why God allowed the event to happen to me in 2006.
I was just merely conjecturing something in that same vein. I wasn’t saying that this is how it acutally is. Merely that when we pray for the deceased person, since God is outside of time, he can perhaps apply our prayers to the critical moments of the deceased person’s life when s/he was actually still alive (mind you, we don’t know everything that happens in a person’s life and all the things they actually experience or did in his/her life; there may be something that, as a result of our prayers, God may have allowed something particular — unknown to us — to happen in that person’s life at a certain crucial moment that we aren’t actually aware of) and, thus, may contribute to that person’s final salvation in his/her last moments (or perhaps even at the very time of his/her death, in fact; certainly, the story that was brought up concerning St. John Vianney and how he saved the soul of the deceased person who committed suicide shows hints that even at the point of death, there may be the prevailing mercy of God that saves by the power of our prayers; though, as I mentioned, it is private revelation).
Needless to say: For God, anything is possible.
Yes, God, even now, can affect – I know it’s hard for us to fathom this – but our prayers now can possibly affect things in the past. I’m not saying God actually does this, but that he can and, if he chooses to, who are we to say he can’t in order to save the souls of some folks?
As God Said in Exodus 33:19: … I will have mercy on whom I will, and I will be merciful to whom it shall please me.
Since God is outside of time, for all we know, our very prayers may have been the very reason why, at the final moments of that person’s death, God presented that person with the necessary grace so that s/he may experienced perfect contrition and like the famous “thief” who was crucified along side with Christ allowed entrance into Paradise!
Are we going to dictate to God what he can’t do (just because our minds are unable to comprehend it), who God chooses to save and by what means he saves them? We’re not God. We have finite minds and, therefore, cannot know exactly the mind of God.
It would be wrong, I think, to assume that such persons died in a state of grace if they remained unrepentant until death. There’s always the possibility of a miraculous intervention by Christ at the last moment of life, but we have no reason to presume such a thing.
Similarly, we have no right to assume that such persons — due to our faulty human judgment of them — died in the state of mortal sin. Just like in that St. John Vianney story, we ourselves have no reason to presume (and, thus, act in the place of God and cast such harsh judgment with merely our human eyes that cannot even look into the hearts of men unlike God who can) that just because in our own eyes it seems that that deceased person seemed to have died in mortal sin, therefore, we shouldn’t pray for that person and just assume the worst.
No — we should never ever assume that a person died in a state of mortal sin since we cannot look into the hearts of men like God does and do not actualy know the final state of one’s soul when s/he passed away. Instead, we should pray for these folks and leave this to God and His Mercy.
God Bless!
St Gimp:
Regarding your specific statement: We cannot change the past.
Yes – we ourselves cannot change the past.
However, God can.
Also, it’s not really changing the past when the event itself is actually a part of the past. Perhaps, it might not be something in that person’s past we’re not aware of, maybe.
Besides, where God is concerned, there is no such thing as ‘the past’.
Remember what Jimmy said:
God does not experience any sequentiality; he lives in an “eternal now” in which all of history happens at once (or, to put it more precisely, every moment in the history of the world is equally present to God).
Allow me to reiterate that, as I’ve mentioned:
We don’t know everything that happens in a person’s life:
God can allow something to happen in a deceased person’s life when s/he was actually still alive — that’s unknown to us — that might actually affect his/her final salvation at death which, consequently, may have been a result of our prayers after they had died.
If this helps: God actually knew of our prayers for that dead person even before that person had in fact died and, therefore, as a result, God may have allowed something particular to occur as far as that person is concerned so that s/he might ultimately be saved in the end or, at the very least, contribute to the good of that person’s final end.
Corrigendum:
If this helps: God actually knew of our prayers for that dead person even before that person had in fact died and, therefore, as a result, God may have allowed something particular to happen to that person while s/he was still alive so that s/he might ultimately be saved in the end or, at the very least, contribute to the good of that person’s final end because of our very prayers for that person after s/he passed away.
5) We could, however, pray for things to turn out as they did. Since God is outside of time, I can ask him in 2306 to allow something to happen to me in 2006 that I know did happen to me in that year. In this case, I’m praying in harmony with God’s will–and such a prayer of mine in 2306 might (hypothetically) be a contributing factor to why God allowed the event to happen to me in 2006.
If we know it already happened, what is the point of praying for it (petition prayer)? Wouldn’t it make more sense to thank Him for the things that have happened according to His will (thanksgiving and praise prayer)?
Also, I assumed when we go to Heaven that we will not only know the past but the future outcome of things, as well, since we will be sharing in God’s knowledge when we get there. So, when we are up there, instead of actually praying for a certain outcome, again, I’d think we would be praying praise and thanksgiving for the divine will that is going to happen.
Jesus and Mary both give us examples of this perfect prayer: Not mine by Thy Will be done; and Let it be done according to Thy Word. Maybe that is how we’ll be praying in Heaven because we’ll be perfect?
Jesus and Mary both give us examples of this perfect prayer: Not mine by Thy Will be done; and Let it be done according to Thy Word. Maybe that is how we’ll be praying in Heaven because we’ll be perfect?
OTOH, that could continue to mean praying for things, because we know that God wants us to pray for them, and our prayers to be the cause of them.
I believe after death it is not “time” but rather (if the term is correct, as I know it in spanish)
evon or ebon. Different thing. I believe St. Thomas speaks of it. We cannot enter the omnipresent. That would be entering the nature of God to such a degree that we would be God. But we can see a great deal after death. But about prayers to saints, you can make them while the “saint”is still alive. Death is not a requisite. Prayer is greater than time. That is why you can pray for Solomon or while you read the Bible, you see a battle between the good and the bad and you pray for the good, because the merits can be applied by God whenever.
Just like the effects of the Passion were applied to Our Lady and St. John the Baptist before it happend.
I very rarely pray for specific things, I usually just pray for God’s will.
But if I do ask for something specific in prayer, I simply qualify it ‘if it be Your will’.
Christine
TheWorld…IMHO
Yes, God, even now, can affect – I know it’s hard for us to fathom this – but our prayers now can possibly affect things in the past. I’m not saying God actually does this, but that he can and, if he chooses to, who are we to say he can’t in order to save the souls of some folks?
I don’t think that this is good theology, good philosophy, or even good science. What is past is past; what is done is done. Nowhere in the history of Hebrew or Christian religion can I think of any instance where we are called to pray for something that has already happened, and I think that this appeal to God’s eternity is missing the point. We live and move and therefore pray within time, from point A to point Z. Even the souls in heaven experience change in a time-like way; call it aeveternity if you wish, but they still move forward, knowing and loving God more and more throughout the everlasting ages.
God tells us to pray for what is now, and for what may be to come, but not for what is past. The past is a gift that has left our grasp, and we must let it go back to God. To be in the habit of praying for things past would be to give in to anxiety, to try to “fix” what has already been “fixed” in another sense. All we can realistically do is to let go and to stop looking back. “No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.” We cannot, and should not, be worried about the past. It is not ours to mend.
St. Gimp,
I think you may be missing the whole point of what I’ve been saying.
Yes, we, ourselves, are limited to time and sequentiality. God isn’t.
By your statements above, you seem to be subjecting God to the very same limits that we are as far as time is concerned and that God cannot know the future until it happens.
Remember, all moments in past, present and future are all equally known to God; and, really, such terms as past, present and future do not really apply to him since he, in fact, resides in the Eternal Now.
Therefore, God already knows of our prayers for the deceased person even before that person actually becomes deceased.
Let me ask you this, I know this might seem very complicated to you, but maybe this might help:
Do you think God only finds out about our prayers for that deceased person only after that person passes away?
Or, rather, wouldn’t you think that an omniscient being like God would already know what’s to happen in the future and, therefore, would actually already know of our prayers that we would be saying in the future for this deceased person, even while that very person is still alive?
Remember, God is omniscient.
God knows our prayers even before we speak them.
How you are coming off in your statements above is that since we move from A to Z, God also moves from A to Z and, therefore, in order for God to actually know of our prayers for the deceased person, the event of him/her becoming deceased has to occur first in order for God to have any knowledge of the prayers we would be saying on that person’s behalf after s/he has died.
Nowhere in the history of Hebrew or Christian religion can I think of any instance where we are called to pray for something that has already happened…
I think your statement here clearly demonstrates and confirms that you have misunderstood the whole point.
No, we cannot pray and actually ask God: God, please, can you change an event in my past so that another future outcome might happen instead?
No.
Nor do I think the paragraph in Jimmy’s statement — the one which I had asked you to re-read carefully — does as well. It is re-pasted below for convenience:
We could, however, pray for things to turn out as they did. Since God is outside of time, I can ask him in 2306 to allow something to happen to me in 2006 that I know did happen to me in that year. In this case, I’m praying in harmony with God’s will–and such a prayer of mine in 2306 might (hypothetically) be a contributing factor to why God allowed the event to happen to me in 2006.
Let me try to make it as simple as possible for you because I can certainly understand why it might appear difficult to comprehend as far as the point I’m trying to make.
Let me put it another way:
Say there is a man who is un-repentant of his sins. Now, it happens that during the course of his life, an event occurs at a particular moment that happens to somehow cause serious reflection in that man and how he’s lead his life. Actually, this very event is one that God has presented to that man in order that he might seriously consider changing his ways. Of course, ultimately, it’ll be up to him whether or not he does.
Now, this event that God allows to happen in that person’s life; certainly, it might have been a result of folks praying for him at that very point in time.
However, God may have also allowed such an event to occur in his life (that the man might consider changing his ways) as a result of the prayers that would be said after he passed away.
Remember, God is not bound to sequential time as we are. He doesn’t have to wait for the future to occur in order to know about it. Likewise, he doesn’t have to wait for someone to die in order to find out the prayers of those who would pray for him after his death.
He knows not only the prayers of those praying for him at that very moment while he is still alive, but, at the same time, God also knows the prayers of those that would be said after he passed away.
That is why that perhaps while that person was still alive, our very prayers for him after he’s passed away may be one of the very reasons why God might have presented to him while he was still alive with some sort of grace or experience that perhaps might help contribute to his final salvation.
I hope this helps.
I know how complicated it might all seem since it’s hard to fathom as there are those of us who cannot think outside of a linear perspective.
Prayer is greater than time. That is why you can pray for Solomon or while you read the Bible, you see a battle between the good and the bad and you pray for the good, because the merits can be applied by God whenever.
Just like the effects of the Passion were applied to Our Lady and St. John the Baptist before it happend.
SOME DAY:
You certainly got it!!!! ;^)
Nice touch, by the way, by noting how the effects of Christ’s passion were applied to Our Lady even before it happened!
We can also see that the action of an eternal being like Christ (eternal, that is, in reference to his divine nature, of course) even saves those folks of the Old Testament although it had occured in the future.
The sacrifice of Christ is sometimes explained as being an eternal sacrifice in that Christ in his divine nature is outside of time and you could argue then that because the whole of his human life is linked to his divine nature, the whole of his human life is linked to eternity and, thus, from that perspective, you could argue that his sacrifice is eternal. It applies to past, present and future!
He did not have a human body prior to the incarnation, but it also was not a change and the way that works is that if you are outside of time, that doesn’t stop you from touching time. It’s kind of like I could be outside of a stream but I can put my finger into the stream or my hand or my foot into the stream, if I want. And so, if you were, let’s say, a fish going down the stream and perceiving the stream sequentially (like we perceive time) then there would be a point before you got to my foot (if I’ve stuck my foot in the stream) and then there would be a point where you encounter my foot, and then there would be a point where you passed my foot. And so it would seem as if, from your fishy perspective that (and, indeed, a lot of people do have a kind of fishy perspectives – there are fishy people out there), then it would seem as if there was a time before my foot, and during my foot, and after my foot, but if I have sat there eternally on the streambed with my foot in the stream, then, in reality, my foot has always been there. So, there’s no change. It’s just you have gotten up to the point where my foot exists in the stream and that’s the way it is with the incarnation.
As a being who’s outside of time, Jesus took a human body in, let’s say, 4 B.C. and from the perspective of people prior to that time, they had not yet encountered his incarnation – they hadn’t yet reached the point in history where the incarnation occurs, but that does not mean that there was any kind of a change. Jesus has always, from all eternity, from his ‘outside of time’ perspective, incarnated in 4 B.C. or whatever the actual year was. So, it doesn’t imply a change on his part, it’s just always been there. He’s always incarnated in 4 B.C. It’s just that from our time-bound perspective (like a fish moving down a stream); we may or may not have encountered that point in history where he is always incarnated, yet. It’s natural to perceive things in this fashion.
Yes, I understand that God is eternal and is not “bound” by time as we are; the opposite assertion wasn’t my point. The point is that we are bound by time, and we should not just go around chucking prayers into the Eternal Now with the expectation that they’ll drop in at the appropriate place on the timeline. It’s one thing to pray for something you didn’t know had already occurred; like if you pray that so-and-so receive the grace for a peaceful death, even though he died two minutes ago. Such prayers are made in good faith and with the best knowledge available, and God may have answered it two minutes ago in anticipation of the actual prayer itself. But for us to knowingly pray for something that is already past and finished would be, in my opinion, to tempt God. Time does not shackle the Creator, but it is not for us to break the bonds of sequentiality that God in his wisdom has imposed upon us. God expects us to make good use of our time, which comes and goes, never to return; “thou knewest not the time of thy visitation” (Lk. 19:44). Of course God knows our prayers before we speak them, just as he knows our needs before we pray for them. But we shouldn’t let this morph into a practice of intentionally praying for past events; that is my only real disagreement (if indeed we actually disagree on that).
No prob, St. Gimp!
It’s really a terribly difficult concept to grasp since we ourselves are so bound to linear time and sequentiality that it seems even our very language itself are subject to the same contraints as well.
That is, I found it very difficult to express things otherwise. I had to, for example, in my posts, apply the past, present or future tense in many cases when, in fact, when speaking of God, you really can’t apply the present, past or future tense.
God bless you though and I did enjoy the discussion!
Jimmy has a great insight on these things and that’s why I found it quite appealing and, above all, thought-provoking!