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Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults
Images
The Catholic Church condemns the worship of images as idolatry, but she sanctions reverence for the pictures and images of Christ and the saints. She does this not because of the material of which they are composed, but because of what they represent. The notion that a Catholic worships a crucifix or an image of Christ is too absurd for serious refutation.
We should give to relics, crucifixes, and holy pictures an inferior and relative honor, so far as they relate to Christ and His saints, and are memorials of them. We may not pray to relics or images, for they can neither see, nor hear, nor intercede for us. In other words it is strictly forbidden to pray to a statue or a picture.
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