Does the Catholic Church Practice Idolatry in its Worship?

Christianity originated in ancient Jerusalem rather than in Rome. Though Jerusalem is a city of idolatry now, Rome has historically been a hub of idolatry. It makes a lot of sense that a mass counterfeit Christian entity would originate in Rome. The mysterious woman, who is called in Revelation 17:5 “Mystery, Babylon The Great, The Mother Of Harlots And Abominations Of The Earth”, is said to sit on seven mountains a short time later in Revelation 17:9 (or, on seven hills- the word in the Greek text could mean either). It is common knowledge that Rome is built on seven hills.

There is one true God, the God of the Bible- the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; the Father of Jesus Christ. Any and all other gods are idols. To attempt to represent Him with a graven image or any created thing also qualifies as idolatry.

It is also clear from the 2nd commandment in Exodus 20:4-6 that to bow down before graven images or statues qualifies as idolatry. Claiming that the statues and images are an aid to worship, like the Catholic Church claims concerning the statues and images used in its worship, doesn’t change that bowing before them is idolatry.

Exodus 20:4-6: “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.”

The Catholic Church permits and encourages bowing before statues and images. The Lord made it clear that this qualifies as idolatry. It should not be considered surprising that the Catholic Church has subtracted from the Word of God by eliminating the 2nd commandment and tried to compensate for that by dividing the 10th commandment into two.

The Lord commanding the Ark of the Covenant and a bronze serpent to be fashioned did not mean it was ever okay to bow down before them. The bronze serpent was eventually destroyed by King Hezekiah because the people were burning incense to it. The people doing this were not surely not admitting to making an idol out of the bronze serpent- yet that is what they were doing. They were not even going to the length of bowing down before it. They were still using it to commit idolatry since they were ascribing divine attributes to it.

It is obvious that destroying the bronze serpent and labeling it as a mere thing of brass is an especially notable example of why Hezekiah was a righteous king.

2 Kings 18:2-6: “Twenty and five years old was he (Hezekiah) when he began to reign; and he reigned twenty and nine years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name also was Abi, the daughter of Zachariah. And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that David his father did. He removed the high places, and broke the images, and cut down the groves, and broke in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made: for unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it: and he called it Nehushtan (i.e. a piece of brass or a thing of brass). He trusted in the Lord God of Israel; so that after him was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor any that were before him. For he clave to the Lord, and departed not from following him, but kept his commandments, which the Lord commanded Moses.”

Bowing down to statues and images is simply idolatry no matter who or what they are intended to represent.

Bowing before a statue which is said to portray Jesus is even worse. Since Jesus is God, to simply represent Him by a statue at all fits the Biblical definition of idolatry.

The Catholic church teaches that Mary was conceived immaculately and never sinned. Yet if Mary had never actually sinned, she would not have offered a sin offering for herself at the Temple when she presented Jesus there. By comparing Luke 2:21-24 with Leviticus 12:6-8, it is obvious that Mary offered a sin offering for herself at the Temple. Jesus never had to offer a sin offering for Himself. He offered Himself as a sin offering for sinners. He was able to do this because He was the Perfect Lamb of God who never sinned. Mary offering a sin offering for herself was her own testimony that she was not immaculate and had rather sinned like other people have. This is proof in itself that the Catholic Church cannot be trusted.

The Bible does not even teach that Mary is the mother of God. It rather teaches that Mary was Jesus’ earthly mother. The point of significance in Jesus’ life which makes this distinction crystal clear is His baptism. Mary’s requests towards Jesus ceased to be binding upon Him when He entered into public ministry. We see in Luke 2:51 that Jesus was subject to His parents growing up in Nazareth. Yet in John chapter 2, after His baptism, things were different. He did turn the water into wine, yet His words to Mary “Woman, what have I to do with thee? mine hour is not yet come” make it clear that He didn’t do this because she wanted Him to.

Read through the Book of Revelation, with all the prayer and praise which it features to the Father and Son in heaven, and see if you can find one reference to Mary being prayed to, praised, or adored there. Such things are not recorded there because they are not happening. It is a form of humanistic, feel-good false religion to imagine that there is a sympathetic mother in heaven whom we can make our pleas to and thereby obtain favor with God.

1 Timothy 2:5-6: “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.”

The Jesus of the Bible can justify anyone who comes to Him through the narrow gate of true repentance and surrender to Him in order to walk in His narrow way of truth which leads to eternal life. Neither Mary nor any other so-called saint is able to help anyone. To think that they can help is idolatry since it is ascribing power to them which only Jesus has.

Seeking mediation with God through humans on earth is also a form of idolatry. When the Bible says “there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” that is what it means. The Roman Catholic Priesthood is not in line with the Bible and it cannot accomplish what the Catholic Church claims it can. In the Bible, it was the Levitical Priesthood which was appointed under the Old Covenant. This gave way to Christ’s High Priesthood in heaven under the New Covenant. That is it.

To say that the Eucharist in the Catholic Mass is Jesus is also idolatry.

Didn’t Jesus say that we need to eat His flesh and drink His blood in order to have eternal life? Yes, He said that in John chapter 6 before He ever instituted the Lord’s supper. He said that to people already immersed in rituals who would not have been upset to have another ritual imposed upon them.

When it is understood that Jesus Christ is the only means of spiritual life, and that there is no shortcut to eternal life through Him besides dying to self in order to be practically governed by the Word of God which is a testimony of Him, then what Jesus said in John chapter 6 would truly be an offense to the natural man in his alienation from God. John chapter 6 would go on to show this to be the case.

But didn’t Jesus tell His disciples at the Last Supper that the bread was His body and the wine was His blood? In Matthew 26:26-29 Jesus called the liquid in the cup the fruit of the vine after He had called it His blood. He was obviously speaking figuratively about the bread being His body and the wine being His blood.

Section 1367 of the Catholic Catechism says: “The sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Eucharist are one single sacrifice: “The victim is one and the same: the same now offers through the ministry of priests, who then offered himself on the cross; only the manner of offering is different.” “And since in this divine sacrifice which is celebrated in the Mass, the same Christ who offered himself once in a bloody manner on the altar of the cross is contained and is offered in an unbloody manner… this sacrifice is truly propitiatory.”

That is not reality. Since Jesus has already provided a perfect atonement for sin through His blood on the cross and is in heaven until He returns, then He is not physically present in the Mass as an unbloody sacrifice like the Catholic Church teaches.

Hebrews 9:24-28: “For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us: Nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the high priest entereth into the holy place every year with blood of others; For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.”

Hebrews 10:12-13: “But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God; From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool.”

The preceding passages prove that the Catholic Church’s stated purpose of the Mass opposes the Bible’s clear verdict concerning the sufficiency of Jesus offering Himself for sin on the cross. Besides this, there is no established Christian priesthood ordained by God on earth under the New Covenant. Christ is also at God’s right hand in heaven until He returns.

These things mean that what is offered in the Mass could not be the literal flesh and blood of Christ. This also logically means that the doctrine of transubstantiation is unbiblical.

The titles and authority which the Catholic Church assigns to the Pope are also idolatrous.

Section 882 of the Catholic Church Catechism states “The Pope, Bishop of Rome and Peter’s successor, is the perpetual and visible source and foundation of the unity both of the bishops and of the whole company of the faithful. For the Roman Pontiff, by reason of his office as Vicar of Christ, and as pastor of the entire Church has full, supreme, and universal power over the whole Church, a power which he can always exercise unhindered.”

Look at the main verse which those who believe that Peter is the first Pope must go to in making such a claim.

Matthew 16:18: “And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

Peter is “Petros” in the Greek text here. Whether this should be translated as stone or rock is not the main issue. This is because Jesus didn’t say the church would be built upon Petros. Jesus rather used a different word when He spoke of the rock His church would be built upon. That word is “Petra.” Peter was not called Petra. Petra is speaking of a very great rock. Petra is even used again in the Greek text to speak of Jesus in 1 Corinthians 10:4.

The verse that is used by many to justify the office of the Pope, and to claim that Peter was the first Pope, actually shows Jesus telling Peter that he would be a significant stone or smaller rock as Jesus built His church upon the great rock which is Himself.

Look at what Peter himself taught Christians in 1 Peter 2:4-6: “To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious, Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect (chosen), precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded.”

Jesus is the chief cornerstone of His church. Peter and other faithful believers in Him are lively stones built upon Him. It is irrational to claim that Christ’s church is built upon a man who openly acknowledged that Jesus Christ Himself is the chief cornerstone of His own church. Peter never called himself more than an Apostle of Jesus Christ and a Christian elder (see 1 Peter 1:1 and 1 Peter 5:1).

Jesus’ Apostles defined the Christian faith within the pages of the Bible. He told them in John 16:13 that the Holy Spirit would guide them into all truth. That has already been done. There is no need for anyone else to be given the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Anyone who claims that they have them is a fraud whom it would be fitting to call an anti-christ.

When you practically forsake the authority of the Bible and put the sayings of fallible men in its place like the Catholic Church has, it breeds confusion which cannot be solved until you go back to the authority of the Bible. When the authority of the Bible is received, the Catholic Church must logically be rejected.

The Catholic Church has historically been about making Christianity accessible to the masses who are not fully detached from the ways of the heathen. Its longevity means nothing due to how it would crumble if it were to be cleansed of its idolatry.