Ancestor worship

Catholic epologists justify prayer to the saints by drawing an analogy: if we ask the living to pray for us, then why not ask the dead to pray for us-–since they still exist, just not here on earth?

But like so many Catholic arguments, this falters on a fatal equivocation.  The folks we ask to pray for us are generally folks who know us personally. Christian friends and relatives. Our pastor. Folks on the church prayer-chain we attend.

So, for the analogy to hold, if (arguendo) some of the dead intercede for us, those would be Christian loved ones who preceded us to heaven. Those who prayed for us in this life would (ex hypothesi) continue to pray for us in the afterlife, until we’re reunited in the afterlife.

We don’t normally ask perfect strangers to pray for us. An exception would be charismatics who call into a phone bank, under the illusion that the “anointed” televangelist has special pull with God, and their prayer requests will be forwarded to this mighty man of God. But, of course, that, too, illustrates a faulty conception of prayer.

Yet the intercession of the saints is not analogous to asking someone who knows you to pray for you. The comparison breaks down at that very point. Rather, you’re directed to pray to certain designated strangers who lived and died before you were born.

For instance, the church of Rome doesn’t encourage Catholics to pray to their dead parents. Rather, you should direct your petitions to an official list of preapproved dead people who never knew the first thing about you.

Of course, a Catholic epologist can always shore up the analogy with ad hoc qualifications by stipulating that the “saint” enjoys supernatural knowledge of the penitent. But at that point we no longer have a simple analogy between the living and the dead. No, now we’ve customized the dead. And this is using one conjecture to prop up another conjecture. 

Frankly, traditional “ancestor worship” (e.g. Buddhist, African, or American Indian “spirituality”) is more logical than the Catholic cult of the saints. At least your parents and grandparents actually knew you.

I’m not recommending that, of course. Just pointing out that the analogy which Catholics use to justify the veneration and intercession of the saints would more logically warrant ancestor worship.