“Thou shalt not have strange gods before me. Thou shalt not make to thyself a graven thing, nor the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, nor of those things that are in the waters under the earth. Thou shalt not adore them, nor serve them” (Exodus 20:3–5). This passage, the First Commandment, has been used throughout history as the chief justification for iconoclasm, the destruction of sacred images. However, the magisterial teaching of the early ecumenical councils such as Second Nicaea¹ and Fourth Constantinople²—which was reaffirmed repeatedly in history, including at the Council of Trent³—as well as the witness of the Fathers, Doctors, saints, and the popular piety of the faithful, have all consistently attested to the validity and great profit of venerating the icons and relics of Christ, the Virgin Mary, and the saints. Thus, to understand the proper role of icons in the liturgical and spiritual life of Catholics today, the First Commandment requires a fuller, more nuanced interpretation in light of the spiritual and sacramental revolution inaugurated by the Incarnation of the Son of God.

Before addressing the issue directly, it is necessary first to define two terms which the Church has developed to help properly understand the role of icons in Christian devotion: latria (Gk. λατρεία) and dulia (Gk. δουλεία). These two terms distinguish what in English is variously called adoration, worship, reverence, or veneration, into two categories of honor: one which applies exclusively to God (latria), and one which can also be applied to the Virgin Mary and the saints (dulia).

Latria and Dulia

The first term, latria, expresses the adoration that is due only to God. As St. John Damascene, one of the foremost patristic defenders of icon veneration, explains in his great work, On Holy Images (early eighth century), “the first kind [of adoration] is the worship of latreia, which we give to God, who alone is adorable by nature, and this worship is shown in several ways, and first by the worship of servants. All created things worship Him, as servants their master. All things serve Thee, the psalm says.”⁴ Adoration given to God is an act of submission to his supreme excellence and is therefore an act of the virtue of religion, according to St. Thomas Aquinas.

The second type of adoration, dulia, is, strictly speaking, honor given to superiors due to some excellence in them,⁵ which is a finite participation in God’s divine excellence and a gratuitous sharing in his gifts: “Reverence is due to God on account of His excellence, which is communicated to certain creatures not in equal measure, but according to a measure of proportion; and so the reverence which we pay to God, and which belongs to latria, differs from the reverence which we pay to certain excellent creatures; this belongs to dulia.”⁶ In this way, while latria may be given to God alone, dulia is permissible for creatures in honor of the gifts God has given them, thereby adoring God through his creatures.

In ordinary Latin Catholic usage, the term “adoration” tends to be associated with the devotion of Eucharistic Adoration, which could cause “adoration” to be understood exclusively in the first sense as latria. However, as we have seen, in its technical sense “adoration” has a wider meaning, encompassing both latria and dulia. The Catholic practice of “praying to” saints (ad-oratio) is one example of this lesser, derivative form of adoration, one which is still always referred to God as the source of every perfection honored in his creatures. Damascene provides a succinct summary of this distinction, showing that Scripture itself clearly distinguishes between latria toward God and dulia given to creatures: “Worship is the symbol of veneration and of honour. Let us understand that there are different degrees of worship. First of all the worship of latreia, which we show to God, who alone by nature is worthy of worship. Then, for the sake of God who is worshipful by nature, we honour His saints and servants, as Josue and Daniel worshipped an angel, and David His holy places, when he says, ‘Let us go to the place where His feet have stood.’ Again, in His tabernacles, as when all the people of Israel adored in the tent, and standing round the temple in Jerusalem, fixing their gaze upon it from all sides, and worshipping from that day to this, or in the rulers established by Him, as Jacob rendered homage to Esau, his elder brother, and to Pharao, the divinely established ruler. Joseph was worshipped by his brothers.”⁷

St. Thomas also adds that, in other instances, Scripture shows creatures refusing adoration when it could be confused as latria: “it was the reverence due to God with which Mardochai refused to adore Aman fearing ‘lest he should transfer the honor of his God to a man’ (Esther 13:14),” and “it was with the reverence due to God that John was forbidden to adore the angel (Revelation 22:9).”⁸

Body and Soul

Due to human nature as a radical union of body and soul—crowned by the latter’s spiritual powers of intellect and will—adoration naturally includes both internal reverence and external signs or expressions of it: “And since in all acts of latria that which is without is referred to that which is within as being of greater import, it follows that exterior adoration is offered on account of interior adoration, in other words we exhibit signs of humility in our bodies in order to incite our affections to submit to God, since it is connatural to us to proceed from the sensible to the intelligible.”⁹ Thus, adoration broadly considered employs various bodily gestures which can be given to God (as latria), or to the angels, saints, and even living human superiors (as dulia), including bows, genuflection, prostration, etc. Nevertheless, one act of adoration is proper to God alone: the offering of sacrifice.¹⁰ For this reason, Epiphanius of Salamis (ironically, though himself a vehement iconoclast) corrected a heresy of his time (fourth century) called Collyridianism, which idolatrously adored the Virgin Mary with latria by offering ritual sacrifices to her.¹¹

The Incarnation Revolution

In the Incarnation, God made it possible for matter to represent him, not only in an indirect way, as all creatures signify and point to their Creator,¹² but through the hypostatic unity of Person into which the human nature of Christ was assumed by the Son of God.¹³ Based on this dogma of the faith, and against a Nestorian “co-veneration” of Christ as two distinct Persons, one divine and one human,¹⁴ the First Council of Ephesus¹⁵ mandated that a single adoration is to be given to the one Incarnate Word. Later, the fifth ecumenical council, Second Constantinople,¹⁶ corrected the opposite Monophysite heresy of a single veneration of Christ’s divine nature alone, “or to an alleged mixed nature,” by adding that Christ “with his own flesh… is the object of the one adoration.”¹⁷ In other words, Christ is not worshiped as God but merely honored as man, which would separate him into two different Persons, one for each nature (the error of Nestorius). Rather, the singular Person of the Son of God is worshiped in both of his natures, as God and as man. This means that even his flesh is worshiped with latria because it is assumed by the Son of God into the unity of Person, so that by adoring his flesh, we adore God.

To clarify further, tradition identifies two ways a person may be honored: absolutely in himself, and relatively through some object directed or referred to him.¹⁸ Accordingly, in Christian devotion, the subsistent Person is the formal object of absolute latria when honor is paid to his individual parts, as with the devotion to the Sacred Heart.¹⁹ He is the formal object of relative latria when honor is paid to things that especially “belong” to him, such as the True Cross and Crown of Thorns which were “saturated” with his blood, as St. Thomas poignantly notes.²⁰ He is also the object of relative latria in artistic representations of his belongings, such as crucifixes and icons portraying him.

God Worshiped through Icons

This leads us to consider more directly the original thesis of this article: even in light of the First Commandment, God may be legitimately adored through icons, particularly in the context of the Mass. To explain, St. Thomas distinguishes two movements which the mind may have toward an image: to the image itself as a material object, and to that of which it is an image, i.e. the thing represented.²¹ In the veneration of icons depicting Christ, these images may be given the adoration of relative latria, both through internal reverence and external gestures of honor, because such adoration is directed not to the images themselves, as in pagan superstition, or to the demonic deities depicted in pagan idols, but to the true God whom they represent,²² just as Christ could be adored even in the hem of his cloak (Mark 6:56). To use St. Basil’s famous phrase as quoted by Damascene, “Honoring the image leads to the prototype.”²³ This worship of the invisible God through icons was not permitted before the Incarnation, but now, “because in the New Testament God was made man, He can be adored in His corporeal image.”²⁴

Hence Damascene wrote, “When the Invisible One becomes visible to flesh, you may then draw a likeness of His form. When He who is a pure spirit, without form or limit, immeasurable in the boundlessness of His own nature, existing as God, takes upon Himself the form of a servant in substance and in stature, and a body of flesh, then you may draw His likeness, and show it to anyone willing to contemplate it…. Of old, God the incorporeal and uncircumscribed was never depicted. Now, however, when God is seen clothed in flesh, and conversing with men, I make an image of the God whom I see. I do not worship matter, I worship the God of matter, who became matter for my sake, and deigned to inhabit matter, who worked out my salvation through matter. I will not cease from honouring that matter which works my salvation. I venerate it, though not as God.”²⁵

Saints in Icons and Relics

Adoration of latria may be given to Christ’s humanity absolutely since it is united to his Person, or it may be given to his relics, icons, and representations relatively. However, it may not be paid to the Virgin Mary, who, like the angels and saints,²⁶ may only be adored with dulia. This is because, although she was even more intimately connected to Christ than his Cross was, she is not an inanimate object representing a person, but a person herself; since she is not God, the honor given to her may only be dulia.²⁷ Nevertheless, St. Thomas notes that, since she is the Mother of God and the greatest of all creatures after Christ’s humanity, she deserves the special reverence of hyperdulia.²⁸

In continuity with the uninterrupted Tradition of the Church, the veneration of icons, in all their artistic forms, should be a part of the spiritual and liturgical life of every Christian. For Latin Catholics today, veneration of icons may seem to be a peculiarly Eastern Catholic or Orthodox practice, especially with their elaborate iconostases (icon screens) and the frescoes covering their churches. On the other hand, many of our churches in the West, especially those built in recent decades, tend to be sparsely adorned with holy icons, if at all, and many newer examples of sacred art are not sufficiently “marked by beauty” as the Church calls for in order to inspire our devotion.²⁹ Nevertheless, Latin Catholics can rediscover this ancient practice. At Mass, the Eucharist, far exceeding all icons, deserves our absolute latria, because as the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ, it is intrinsically united to his Person. Moreover, since the Eucharist is a re-presentation by the priest, acting in persona Christi, of the one sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, it may be offered as worship to God alone. Outward bodily signs such as the traditional postures of ad orientem and the faithful kneeling to receive Communion fittingly signify this reality. The celebration of the Passion of the Lord on Good Friday is also a special opportunity to give the adoration of latria to Christ, though only relatively through the Cross which we adore.

Beyond this, however, we can also adore Christ with relative latria in the statues, frescoes, mosaics, or icons of him on the walls or stained-glass windows of our churches. Further, we can let ourselves be reminded that the Mass is our earthly participation in the heavenly liturgy by giving adoration of dulia to the icons of Our Lady and the angels and saints available to us. But if we really want icons to achieve their full spiritual potential for us, our families, our Church, and our society in general, we should learn from the East and bring icons home with us, setting up a home altar or icon corner as our medieval Latin forebears did, wearing religious jewelry or clothing to share our faith with others, and promoting sacred art with our time, talent, and treasure. In this way, icons may serve the Church’s call for the Via Pulchritudinis—the Way of Beauty—to reclaim our culture for Christ and lead all souls to heaven, especially those most in need of his mercy.³⁰

1. Heinrich Denzinger, Enchiridion Symbolorum [DH], ed. Peter Hunermann (San Francisco: Ignatius, 2012), §600-603, 605.
2. DH 653-656.
3. DH 1821-1825.
4. John Damascene, On Holy Images, trans. Mary H. Allies (London: Thomas Baker, 1898), 104.
5. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 103, a. 4.
6. STh, II-II, q. 84, a. 1.
7. John Damascene, On Holy Images, trans. Mary H. Allies (London: Thomas Baker, 1898), 13–14.
8. ST, II-II, q. 84, a. 1, ad 1.
9. ST, II-II, q. 84, a. 2.
10. ST, II-II, q. 84, a. 1.
11. See Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Christ the Savior, trans. Bede Rose (St. Louis: B. Herder Book Co., 1950), 522.
12. John Damascene, On Holy Images, trans. Mary H. Allies (London: Thomas Baker, 1898), 11–12.
13. ST, III, q. 2, a. 1, ad 2.
14. ST, III, q. 17, a. 1.
15. DH 259.
16. DH 430.
17. Ludwig Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma (London: Baronius Press, 2018), 170-171.
18. Edward Pace, “Dulia,” in Catholic Encyclopedia, ed. Kevin Knight, vol. 5 (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1909), at www.newadvent.org.
19. Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, 172-173.
20. ST, III, q. 25, a. 4, ad 3.
21. ST, III, q. 25, a. 3.
22. ST, III, q. 25, a. 3, ad 2.
23. John Damascene, On Holy Images, trans. Mary H. Allies (London: Thomas Baker, 1898), 24.
24. ST, III, q. 25, a. 3, ad 1.
25. John Damascene, On Holy Images, trans. Mary H. Allies (London: Thomas Baker, 1898), 16.
26. ST, III, q. 25, aa. 5-6.
27. ST, III, q. 25, a. 5, ad 3.
28. ST, III, q. 25, a. 5.
29. Pope Benedict XVI, Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation on the Eucharist as the Source and Summit of the Church’s Life and Mission, Sacramentum Caritatis (22 February 2007), 41.
30. Cf. Pontifical Council for Culture, Concluding Document of the Plenary Assembly Via pulchritudinis, Privileged Pathway for Evangelisation and Dialogue (2006).