DO CATHOLICS WORSHIP IMAGES?

Do Catholics practice idol worship?

In Exodus 20:4-5 we read:

You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them or serve them; for, I the Lord your God, am a jealous God....

Upon reading such a command from God we would wonder why Catholics would have statues or any art work for that matter.

Again when we interpret the Bible we need to interpret it within the context of the whole Bible. It is in interpreting a passage within the context of the whole Bible that we are able to come to the correct understanding of what is meant by a particular Scripture passage. When taken in the context of the whole, this passage refers to worshiping a “graven image” as a god. In other words, worship which is only due to God is being given to a man-made object. Most Christians today understand this, and virtually all scholars, with the exception of--unfortunately—some ill-informed anti-Catholic writers.

Let us look at the Scriptures. In Exodus 25:18-22 we read where God spoke to Moses and instructed him to do the following:

[You] shall make two cherubim of gold; of hammered work shall you make them, on the two ends of the mercy seat. Make one cherub on the one end, and one cherub on the other end. The cherubim shall spread out their wings above, overshadowing the mercy seat with their wings, their faces facing one another. Toward the mercy seat shall the faces of the cherubim be (RSV).

Isn’t this a graven image? There it is right in the Bible! God had commanded the making of statues. In Numbers 21:8-9 we read how God commanded Moses to “make a bronze serpent and mount it on a pole.” In the fabrication of the tent cloth covering the “Dwelling” the artisans were commanded to embroider cherubim on the cloth (Ex. 26:1). In the building and furnishing of the temple (1 Kings 6:23-28; 7:23-45) images and carved figures abound—images of cherubim, trees, flowers, oxen, lions, pomegranates, and so on.

Archaeological evidence of the first centuries demonstrates that Jewish synagogues were adorned with murals depicting all sorts of things found in nature. The burial grounds of the Christians, the Catacombs, also illustrated various symbols for Christ as well as various biblical images—the most popular being the
woman at the well.

This is no wonder since images, icons, and statues were the books for those who could not read. The ability to read was primarily the domain of the well-to-do, the clerics, the aristocrats and the scholars. The common classes saw stories (i.e., two story churches; that is, two levels of stain glass windows depicting biblical stories) as opposed to reading stories. Preachers would often point to stained-glass windows, icons, frescoes and all forms of art to help the faithful understand the message of the Gospel. Churches were “visual libraries” for the faithful in a time when people could not read.

What is forbidden by the commandment expressed in Exodus 20:4-5 is the worship of anything which is not God. Only God is due worship.

In many ancient pagan cultures it was thought that after a statue of a god was made, the god would come to dwell within or around the object created. So pagans would worship the object for they believed their god was dwelling in the object.

As Catholics, and as most Christians today recognize, we do not see statues or any object as worthy of worship. Statues and other forms of art are simply reminders of the true God we worship. Statues and art help us to move our hearts to love the true God that is not found in any statue or work of art. It is just like a husband who has not seen his wife for a long period of time; he looks at a picture of his wife and his emotions are stirred and comforted in his love for her. He does not love the picture; he loves the person represented by the picture. As Cyril of Alexandria (ca. 429) explains:
Even if we make images of pious men it is not so that we might adore them as gods but that when we see them we might be prompted to imitate them; and if we make images of Christ, it is so that our minds might wing aloft in yearning for him (On Ps. 113B (115):16).

For John Damascene (ca. 645), in Jesus Christ, in the Incarnation, the Son of God has ushered in a new “economy” of images. As he stated:

Previously God, who has neither a body nor a face, absolutely could not be represented by an image. But now that he has made himself visible in the flesh and has lived with men, I can make an image of what I have seen of God…and contemplate the glory of the Lord, his face unveiled (De imag. 1,16: PG 96:1245-1248).

Because of the Incarnation, a new era entered into the world. Images representing Christ and therefore the Gospel would take on a new veracity: The words communicated by the Scriptures are illuminated by the image, and the image in turn is illuminated by the words. (Interestingly enough Paul refers to Jesus as
the ikonos, the icon, of the living God). The second Council of Nicea (787) stated:

We declare that we preserve intact all the written and unwritten traditions of the Church which have been entrusted to us. One of these traditions consists in the production of representational artwork, which accords with the history of the preaching of the Gospel. For it confirms that the incarnation of the Word of God was real and not imaginary, and to our benefit as well, for realities that illustrate each other undoubtedly reflect each other’s meaning (Council of Nicea II(787): COD 111).

Artwork which was common among Christians and Jews would now take on a new and more powerful significance. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church states: “Christian iconography expresses in images the same Gospel message that the Scriptures communicate by words. Image and word illuminate each other (1160). The word on the written page serves as one means of communication and the image on the canvas serves as another.

Catholics do not worship statues or images. We worship God.

Fr. John J. Pasquini, ECCE FIDES (Pillar of Truth), pp. 105-107.