Tim Maas Retired Quality Assurance Specialist with the U.S. Army

I'm not sure that it would be possible to pinpoint the date. I would say that the practice would not have been uniformly established prior to AD 380 (although it may have been done by Christians before that date), when the Edict of Milan officially declared Christianity to be the state religion of the Roman Empire, and almost 300 years would have passed since the closing of the Scriptural canon. Such institutionalization and passage of time (to me) would have then served as the catalyst or origin for the development of many of the extra-Biblical practices, beliefs, or traditions that came to characterize what then became known as the Roman Catholic Church, which would have had the authority of the emperor to make it uniform throughout Christendom.

The practice itself would have grown out of an initial belief of being unworthy to approach God directly in prayer. Such humility is not by itself a fault. However, as Paul and the unnamed writer of Hebrews noted, there is one mediator (Jesus) between God and man (1 Timothy 2:5), and it is He who gives us boldness (sinners though we may be) to directly approach God's throne (Ephesians 3:12; Hebrews 4:16), without the need for an intermediary such as Mary (who, as blessed by God as she may have been, still acknowledged herself (Luke 1:47) as someone who needed a Savior), or any other being (such as a glorified saint or an angel), to intervene or intercede on our behalf.

September 25 2018 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report