Idolatry Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ====Catholicism==== {{multiple image | align = right | image1 = Blessed Virgin Mary and Jesus, Marija Bistrica.JPG | width1 = 121 | alt1 = | caption1 = | image2 = Santa Maria di Licodia Madonna del Carmelo Procession.jpg | width2 = 180 | alt2 = | caption2 = | footer = The veneration of Mary, Jesus Christ, and the Black Madonna are common practices in the Catholic Church. }} The Roman Catholic and particularly the Orthodox Churches have traditionally defended the use of icons. The debate on what images signify and whether reverence with the help of icons in church is equivalent to idolatry has lasted for many centuries, particularly from the 7th century until the [[Reformation]] in the 16th century.<ref name="Halbertal1992p39">{{cite book|author1=Moshe Halbertal|author2=Avishai Margalit|author3=Naomi Goldblum|title=Idolatry |url= https://archive.org/details/idolatry00halb |url-access=registration|year=1992|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-44313-6|pages=[https://archive.org/details/idolatry00halb/page/39 39]β40, 102β103, 116β119}}</ref> These debates have supported the inclusion of icons of Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, and the Apostles, the iconography expressed in stained glass, regional saints and other symbols of Christian faith. It has also supported the practices such as the Catholic mass, burning of candles before pictures, Christmas decorations and celebrations, and festive or memorial processions with statues of religious significance to Christianity.<ref name="Halbertal1992p39"/><ref name="Craighen1914">{{cite book|author=L. A. Craighen|title=The Practice of Idolatry|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=K4tbAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA21|year=1914|publisher=Taylor & Taylor|pages=21β26, 30β31}}</ref><ref name="Vance1989p5">{{cite book|author=William L. Vance|title=America's Rome: Catholic and contemporary Rome |url=https://archive.org/details/americasrome00vanc |url-access=registration|year=1989|publisher=Yale University Press|isbn=978-0-300-04453-9|pages=[https://archive.org/details/americasrome00vanc/page/5 5]β8, 12, 17β18}}</ref> St. [[John of Damascus]], in his "On the Divine Image", defended the use of icons and images, in direct response to the [[Byzantine iconoclasm]] that began widespread destruction of religious images in the 8th century, with support from emperor [[Leo III the Isaurian|Leo III]] and continued by his successor [[Constantine V]] during a period of religious war with the invading [[Umayyad Caliphate|Umayyads]].<ref>{{cite book|author=Stephen Gero|title=Byzantine Iconoclasm During the Reign of Leo III: With Particular Attention to the Oriental Sources |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xIEwAAAAYAAJ |year=1973|publisher=Corpus scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium: Subsidia|pages=1β7, 44β45|isbn=9789042903876 }}</ref> John of Damascus wrote, "I venture to draw an image of the invisible God, not as invisible, but as having become visible for our sakes through flesh and blood", adding that images are expressions "for remembrance either of wonder, or an honor, or dishonor, or good, or evil" and that a book is also a written image in another form.<ref>{{cite book|author=Saint John (of Damascus)|title=St. John Damascene on Holy Images: (pros Tous Diaballontas Tas Agias Eikonas)|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ibnUAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA5|year=1898|publisher=T. Baker|pages=5β6, 12β17}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Hans J. Hillerbrand|title=A New History of Christianity|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pmBUIcGW4T4C&pg=PA367|year=2012|publisher=Abingdon|isbn=978-1-4267-1914-1|pages=131β133, 367}}</ref> He defended the religious use of images based on the Christian doctrine of Jesus as an [[incarnation]].<ref>{{cite book|author=Benedict Groschel|title=I Am with You Always: A Study of the History and Meaning of Personal Devotion to Jesus Christ for Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant Christians|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3Usg9r1NZjcC&pg=PA58|year=2010|publisher=Ignatius|isbn=978-1-58617-257-2|pages=58β60}}</ref> St. [[John the Evangelist]] cited John 1:14, stating that "the Word became flesh" indicates that the invisible God became visible, that God's glory manifested in God's one and only Son as Jesus Christ, and therefore God chose to make the invisible into a visible form, the spiritual incarnated into the material form.<ref>{{cite book|author=Jeffrey F. Hamburger|title=St. John the Divine: The Deified Evangelist in Medieval Art and Theology|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5S0lDQAAQBAJ |year=2002|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-22877-1|pages=3, 18β24, 30β31}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Ronald P. Byars|title=The Future of Protestant Worship: Beyond the Worship Wars|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Yu_jMWKICzcC&pg=PA43|year=2002| publisher=Westminster John Knox Press| isbn=978-0-664-22572-8|pages=43β44}}</ref> [[File:August Kraus Pius V verehrt den Gekreuzigten.jpg|thumb|right|[[Pope Pius V]] praying with a crucifix, painting by August Kraus]] The early defense of images included exegesis of Old and New Testament. Evidence for the use of religious images is found in [[Early Christian art]] and documentary records. For example, the veneration of the tombs and statues of martyrs was common among early Christian communities. In 397 St. [[Augustine of Hippo]], in his [[Confessions (St. Augustine)|Confessions]] 6.2.2, tells the story of his mother making offerings for the tombs of martyrs and the oratories built in the memory of the saints.<ref>{{cite book|author=Kenelm Henry Digby|title=Mores Catholici : Or Ages of Faith|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=joxbnoov0EkC&pg=PA408| year=1841|publisher=Catholic Society |pages=408β410}}</ref> {{Quote box |quote = <poem> Images function as the Bible for the illiterate, and incite people to piety and virtue. </poem> |source = β [[Pope Gregory I]], 7th century<ref name="Seaman2012p23"/> |bgcolor=#ccccff |align = right }} The Catholic defense mentions textual evidence of external acts of honor towards icons, arguing that there are a difference between adoration and veneration and that the veneration shown to icons differs entirely from the adoration of God. Citing the Old Testament, these arguments present examples of forms of "veneration" such as in Genesis 33:3, with the argument that "adoration is one thing, and that which is offered in order to venerate something of great excellence is another". These arguments assert, "the honor given to the image is transferred to its prototype", and that venerating an image of Christ does not terminate at the image itself β the material of the image is not the object of worship β rather it goes beyond the image, to the prototype.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Horst Woldemar Janson|author2=Anthony F. Janson|title=History of Art: The Western Tradition|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MMYHuvhWBH4C&pg=PT386|year=2003|publisher=Prentice Hall|isbn=978-0-13-182895-7|page=386}}</ref><ref name="Seaman2012p23">{{cite book|author1=Natasha T. Seaman|author2=Hendrik Terbrugghen|title=The Religious Paintings of Hendrick Ter Brugghen: Reinventing Christian Painting After the Reformation in Utrecht|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LngM5fhurbMC&pg=PA23|year=2012|publisher=Ashgate|isbn=978-1-4094-3495-5|pages=23β29}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Henry Ede Eze|title=Images in Catholicism ...idolatry?: Discourse on the First Commandment With Biblical Citations|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2h3gcuWJTlcC&pg=PA11 |year=2011|publisher=St. Paul Press|isbn=978-0-9827966-9-6|pages=11β14}}</ref> According to the ''[[Catechism of the Catholic Church]]'': {{Blockquote|The Christian veneration of images is not contrary to the first commandment which proscribes idols. Indeed, "the honor rendered to an image passes to its prototype," and "whoever venerates an image venerates the person portrayed in it." The honor paid to sacred images is a "respectful veneration," not the adoration due to God alone:}} {{Blockquote|Religious worship is not directed to images in themselves, considered as mere things, but under their distinctive aspect as images leading us on to God incarnate. The movement toward the image does not terminate in it as image, but tends toward that whose image it is.<ref>{{cite book |title=Catechism of the Catholic Church - Paragraph # 2132 |url=http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/para/2132.htm |access-date=26 May 2021}}</ref>}} It also points out the following: {{Blockquote|Idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons (for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money, etc.<ref name=Catechism>''Catechism of The Catholic Church'', passage 2113, p. 460, Geoffrey Chapman, 1999</ref>}} The manufacture of images of Jesus, the Virgin Mary and Christian saints, along with prayers directed to these has been widespread among the Catholic faithful.<ref name="Jones1898p1">{{cite book|author=Thomas W. L. Jones|title=The Queen of Heaven: MΓ mma Schiavona (the Black Mother), the Madonna of the Pignasecea: a Delineation of the Great Idolatry|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TEQQAAAAIAAJ|year=1898|pages=1β2}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. 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