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Truthseeker
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| Joined: | Wed Oct 4th, 2006 |
| Location: | Costa Mesa, California USA |
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| First Name: | Laura | | Gender: | Female | | Faith History: | lapsed and returned CATHOLIC!!!!!! |
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Posted: Sun Jan 14th, 2007 05:43 pm |
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During a discussion with my dad, I mentioned that the bible was put together by the catholic church. He said it was put together by a group of many differnet faiths, and I said the catholic hcurch was the only faith at the time. Why would he think there were differnet faiths involved? I also saw an ad for a book that claimed that catholics putting the bible together is a misconceprtion. Why that belief?
I know my phrase "catholics put the bible together" is very simplistic, not taking into account the two old testaments and such, but i do know they chose the new testament based on existing beliefs. Why do people believe that more than one "denomination" was involved?
Thanks, Laura
____________________
Lord, please make my will your Will!
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CajunRick
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Posted: Sun Jan 14th, 2007 06:05 pm |
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Truthseeker wrote: Why do people believe that more than one "denomination" was involved?
Because if they acknowledge that the bible is a creation of the Catholic Church, they are admitting their belief in scripture is contingent on the Church. The fact is without the Church there would be no bible as we know it today.
Ask anyone who disagrees to provide evidence.
What they'll probably tell you is that the Catholic Church was created by Constantine, and that the prior "Christian Church" is the group that created the bible. Of course, this is false, but it is basic Protestant "doctrine". The Church was known as the Catholic Church very early in its existance.
One good reference is "Where We Got the Bible: Our Debt to the Catholic Church" by Rt. Rev. Henry Graham. It was written while he was a Protestant, but he later converted, and his conversion story is included in the book.
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Juan
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Posted: Sun Jan 14th, 2007 09:06 pm |
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Why do people believe that more than one "denomination" was involved?
Hi Laura,
I think its a misreading/misunderstanding of Scripture. I can associate with this misunderstanding because I used to think that John the Baptist was the first Baptist.
Many people believe that Jesus formed an invisible Church made up of many denominations because Scripture speaks of churches:
Romans 16:16
Salute one another with an holy kiss. The churches of Christ salute you.
They believe the Christian Church was made up of these separate Churches with separate organizations. For instance, the Corinthian Church, the Ephesian Church and all the others mentioned in the Bible are considered separate Churches along the lines of the Protestant situation today.
Therefore, they believe that Christians from these various Churches put the Bible together and that the Catholic Church did not come into being until the time of Constantine. They believe that the Catholic Church then added pagan influences to the Bible (the deuterocanonicals/apocrypha) and to the Christian rituals (the Holy Eucharist, Marian doctrines, prayer to saints, purgatory).
I've had discussions with many people who hold this view and it is very difficult to dissuade them that there is only one Church.
The best I've been able to do is provide them with these verses:
Ephesians 4:5
One Lord, one faith, one baptism,
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.
Matthew 18:17
And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.
1 Timothy 3:15
But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.
Romans 16:17
Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them.
Ephesians 4:14
That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive;
1 Timothy 1:3
As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine,
Here's a more comprehensive list:
http://www.scripturecatholic.com/the_church.html#the_church-V
The main reason why it is so difficult to persuade these people of the truth is because they don't accept historical data. If they do, it is very persuasive to point out to them that no one held their view of Christian history before the Protestant Revolution. A good tactic is to provide them the teachings of the Church Fathers which are thoroughly Catholic.
However, if you remember from my conversations with Bob, some have these also and they have edited them to sound as though the Church Fathers believe Protestant doctrine. So you have to get them from a Catholic source.
See this one:
http://www.catholicsource.net/church_history.htm
Sincerely,
Juan
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Esther
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Posted: Tue Jan 16th, 2007 11:20 pm |
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Juan,
Thank you for such a wonderful list of verses! That is really helpful. I actually have had several conversations lately about the council of Hippo and Carthage. It reminded me of a frustrating experience I had with my father. I asked him how he could accept these councils and reject the Catholic Church. (He has real problems with Vatican II.) We discussed how it had been hundreds of years and passed down by Tradition as to what belonged in the Bible. How could he trust these councils if he was so against the Church. He stated that the Catholic Church had it right for this, but "They lost their first love" (I think referring to the Churches in Revelation). It seems so irrational to me. If he can pick and chooses that councils that he believes, why can't I? Say I didn't think that Hippo was right and I was going to choose my own cannon because I don't think the Church was acting in the guidance of the Holy Spirit. I suppose this is the flaw with Sola Scirptura anyway. I just found myself frustrated.
I have to admit I really didn't know how to respond to that. Although my dad isn't speaking to me right now, I would like to be prepared if this argument ever came up. Any ideas on how to deal with this sense of logic? He pointed to this denomination called "True Catholic" to prove that there was more then one Catholic Church. This site is basically rejecting anything during or after Vatican II. Declaring JPII an anti-pope. I know this proves nothing (I can call myself a chair all day long, but I am not a chair. Nor are they the Church Christ founded), but in his mind it undermines the authority of the Church.
I guess the bottom line is the belief in authority and unity. I don't know how to convey the importance of these things.
God bless,
Esther
I am so thankful to be apart of One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
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mg57
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Posted: Wed Jan 17th, 2007 12:36 am |
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Esther -
Unfortunately it's often a matter between 1. not having good information, 2. personal bias - for any number of reasons, 3. or a combination of both.
The Holy Spirit will give us the grace to know where the particular person we're in contact with falls in these categories, - He will show us what to do, or if we're to do anything at all.
All the same, it can't hurt to study early Church history anyway. If you have a genuine interest and cultivate your knowledge of it, then it will overflow into your daily life, - as St. Thomas Aquinas says " grace builds upon nature".
If you haven't already begun, you might like to start with something like "Dissent From The Creed" by Fr. Richard Hogan OSV Publ., and then go on to the 4 volume set by Jurgens - "The Faith Of The Early Fathers".
God bless.
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Juan
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Posted: Wed Jan 24th, 2007 12:46 pm |
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Hi Esther,
I can't say it any better than Mg. Sounds like you're doing enough. Keep it up, keep studying, keep praying and when he speaks to you again, God will put the words in your mouth.
And of course, always remember that actions speak louder than words. Love covers a multitude of sins.
Sincerely,
Juan
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Steven Barrett
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Posted: Wed Feb 21st, 2007 01:40 am |
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What I'd like to know is, where did the Protestants, who love to style themselves as "Bible Christians" (as opposed to those you-know-whos) ever get the idea they could cherry pick the original Vulgate? 
____________________
James Michael Curley to a young Thomas “Tip” O’Neill -- “Son, it’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.”
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gmichuta
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Posted: Sun Mar 18th, 2007 10:30 pm |
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| Your father's remarks are so counterfactual that I wonder if he understood your remark correctly. Maybe he's thinking in terms of translations of Scripture rather than the compilation of Scripture? I agree Graham's book is good. Another book that may help is Why Catholic Bibles Are Bigger which will be coming out in a few weeks from Grottopress.org written by yours truly. It shows the concensus of the early Church regarding the Old Testament canon and how Protestantism eventually removed them. I agree with the post above. Part of the problem is the idea of the "invisible church." You need to stress that Christ and the Apostles bestowed the true collection of Scripture to the churches they established. It is through those churches, especially the Church of Rome, that we come to know which books are part of Scripture and what was the teaching of Christ and His Apostles. The canon of Scripture is not a matter of opinion, but it is a gift handed down to the Church.
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Steven Barrett
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Posted: Mon Mar 19th, 2007 01:53 pm |
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 Excellent point, Gmichuta. Long before the Bolsheviks began to master the art of air-brushing (and rubbing) out people they believed weren't true believers, the Protestants got the jump when they broke away and took it upon themselves to erase whatever THEY believed was too sufficiently Catholic or insufficiently Protestant.
I liked your mention of the so-called "invisible church." If a church or any organization, for that matter, can be rendered "invisible" or diminished from its original intent and structure, it's fair game for any thing else to come into play. We saw that when the South seceded in 1860-61. First the rebels tried to convince the nation that the ties that bound it weren't as strong as the Unionists contended (and even past Southerners as Andrew Jackson and Thomas Jefferson.) Then it was only a matter of time for the real diminution of the Union to occur when the states seceded.
Protestantism originally began as a legitimate protest by Luther against very real abuses by the Church. But, as the momentum raced past the Church's ability to deal with the initial protests, it was only a matter of time for the real revisitionists to take matters into their (minds) and hands. One of the "matters" was Biblical Text.
But I think it's rather odd that the more hard-core Calivinist types didn't seek to erase any of John's Gospel dealing with the Eucharist. Yet, many of the same adherents to the take-it-word-for-word biblical views, still follow the (mistaken) Reformed line that Jesus was speaking allegorically in John Chapter 6 when He first mentioned anything to do with what we now call the Eucharist.
Such scriptural confusion and paradox is what we should always expect to find in a movement dedicated to "sola scriptura" and a slavish mis-application of personal interpretation of scripture, to the point where the "priesthood of believers" began to resemble a theological version of "every man a priest, every priest a man." Let's just keep it at "every priest a man."
____________________
James Michael Curley to a young Thomas “Tip” O’Neill -- “Son, it’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.”
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RCWarrior
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Posted: Tue Mar 20th, 2007 07:13 pm |
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Open a Protestant Bible, and you will find there are seven complete Books awanting---that is, seven books fewer than there are in the Catholic Bible, and seven fewer than there were in every collection and catalogue of Holy Scripture from the fourth to the sixteenth century. Their names are Tobias, Baruch, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, I Macabees, II Macabees, together with seven chapters of the Book of Esther and 66 verses of the 3rd chapter of Daniel, commonly called 'the song of the Three Children', (Danieliii., 24-90, Douai Version). These were deliberately cut out, and the Bible bound up without them. The criticisms and remarks of Luther, Calvin, and the Swiss and German Reformers about these seven books of the Old Testament show to what depths of impiety those unhappy men had allowed themselves to fall when they broke away from the true church. Even in regard to the New Testament it required all the powers of resistance on the part of the more Conservative Reformers to prevent Luther from flinging out the Epistle of St. James as unworthy to remain within the volume of Holy Scripture---'an Epistle of straw' he called it, 'with no character of the Gospel in it'.
In the same way, and almost to the same degree, he dishonoured the Epistle of St. Jude and the Epistle to the Hebrews, and the beautiful Apocolypse of St. John, declaring they were not on the same footing as the rest of the Books, and did not contain the same amount of Gospel (i.e., his Gospel). The presumptuous way, indeed, in which Luther, among others, poured contempt, and doubt upon some of the inspired writings which had been acknowledged and cherished and venerated for 1000 or 1000 years would be scarcely credible were it not that we have his very words in cold print, which cannot lie, and may be read in his Biography, or be seen quoted in such books as Dr. Westcott's The Bible in The Church. These Books did not suit his new doctrines and opinions. He had arrived at the principle of private judgement---of picking and choosing religious doctrines; and whenever any book, such as The Macabees, taught a doctrine that was repugnant to his individual taste---as, for example, that 'it is a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead that they may be loosed from sins', 2 Macc xii, 46--well, so much worse for the book; 'throw it overboard', was his sentence, and overboard it went. Luther wasn't pleased with St. Paul's doctrine 'we are justified by faith', he added the word 'only' after St. Paul's words, making the sentence run 'We are justified by faith only', and so it reads in Lutheran Bibles as of today.
He thought no Pope, no Council, no Church shall enlighten you or dictate or hand down the doctrines of Christ. And the result we have seen in the corruption of God's Holy Word.
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I know God won't give me anything I can't handle; I just wish he didn't trust me so much---Mother Teresa
If you invoke The Blessed Virgin when you are tempted, she will come at once to your help, and Satan will leave you----St. John Vianney
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Darlene
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Posted: Wed Mar 28th, 2007 04:25 am |
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Can someone give me an explanation as to why the Protestant reformers tossed out these books? I never knew they tossed out verses in the book of Esther. Did this "tossing out" occur immediately after the schism or did it take several years for that to happen? What were the criticisms of Luther, Calvin and Zwingli regarding these 7 books that they did away with? Can you point me to any reliable resources that would be enlightening to this regard?
As always, thanks for all of your comments.
Love in Christ,
Darlene
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The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. II Corinthians 13:14
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RCWarrior
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Posted: Wed Mar 28th, 2007 10:00 am |
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Darlene, your information can be found in Martin Luther's Biography and the book that Dr. Westcott wrote entitled "The Bible in The church".
Luther did this because they did not suit his new doctrines and opinions. And whenever any Book taught a doctrine that was repugnant to his individual taste, he would say 'throw it overboard' and overboard it went.
What surprises us all is the audacity of this man that could coolly change by a stroke of a pen a fundamental doctrine of the Apostle of God, St. Paul, who wrote, as all admitted, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. But this was the outcome of the Protestant standpoint, individual judgement; no authority outside of oneself. However ignorant, however stupid, however unlettered, you may, indeed are bound to cut and carve out a Bible and a Religion for yourself.
Yet, in spite of all the reviling of the Roman Church, the Reformers were forced to accept from her those Sacred Scriptures which they retained in their collection. Whatever Bible they have today, disfigured as it is, was taken from us. That the Reformers should appropriate unabridged the Bible of the Catholic Church (which was the only volume of God's Scripture ever known on earth). What staggers us is their deliberate excision from the Sacred Volume of some of the inspired Books which had God for their Author, and their no less deliberate alteration of some of the texts of those books that were suffered to remain.
Now I ask you...Which Christian Body really loves and reveres Scriptures most? Which has proved, by its actions, its love and veneration? And which seems most likely to incur the anathema, recorded by St. John, that God will send upon those who shall take away from the words of the Book of Life? (Apoc xxii, 19). The Catholic church.
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I know God won't give me anything I can't handle; I just wish he didn't trust me so much---Mother Teresa
If you invoke The Blessed Virgin when you are tempted, she will come at once to your help, and Satan will leave you----St. John Vianney
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gmichuta
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Posted: Wed Mar 28th, 2007 10:42 am |
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Darlene wrote: Can someone give me an explanation as to why the Protestant reformers tossed out these books? I never knew they tossed out verses in the book of Esther. Did this "tossing out" occur immediately after the schism or did it take several years for that to happen? What were the criticisms of Luther, Calvin and Zwingli regarding these 7 books that they did away with? Can you point me to any reliable resources that would be enlightening to this regards.
I agree with RCWarrior. Let me add a little bit to this answer. We now know, through the discovery of various manuscripts, that some of the books of the Old Testament circulated in different forms prior to and during the time of Christ. For example, we now know that the Book of Jeremiah circulated in both a long and short form. The same is true for not only Esther, but also the Book of Daniel (which includes two chapters). Some manuscript traditions included these longer versions (e.g. the LXX had longer Esther and the Theodotion had longer Daniel). Other manuscript traditions included only the shorter form (e.g. the Masoretic Text, which also did not include the rest of the Deuterocanon). Protestants, following St. Jerome, opted for the Masoretic Text and consequently adopted the shorter forms of these two books. The ultimate question is "What form did the Apostles hand on to the churches they established to be read as Scripture." The answer is clearly the longer forms w/ the Deuterocanon. As an interesting factoid, the shorter form of Esther is almost entirely devoid of any religious content, while the longer form adds a lot of religious content (e.g. prayers, fasting...).
RCWarrior's suggestion of Westcott is ok. I used Westcott in my new book on the Deuterocanon called Why Catholic Bibles Are Bigger: The Untold Story Of The Lost Books Of The Protestant Bible. Since it is the first book written by a Catholic on this subject in over a hundred years, you won't find a lot of good Catholic material in book form. Other suggestions for reading would be A. E. Breen - A General and Critical Introduction to Sacred Scripture (which is good, but outdated). Another one would be Francis Gigot's An Introduction To Holy Scripture (out of print). The best of Protestant scholarship, in my opinion is Daubney's The Use Of The Apocrypha In The Christian Church (very good, but almost impossible to find in print) and more recently Lee McDonald's The Formation Of The Christian Biblical Canon (1996). McDonald can probably be purchased on http://www.Amazon.com . My book is available through http://www.GrottoPress.org.
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Steven Barrett
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Posted: Wed Mar 28th, 2007 12:09 pm |
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Stefany, my fellow Bay Stater, I loved your comment about Luther. The audacity of that man! Luther was indeed audacious, but in a negative way.
People now look back and say "What a brave man he was taking on the Church, when he could've been burned at the stake." Well, not exactly because he had plenty of supporters, some of whom possessed sufficient arms to assist him in escaping to a safe castle or two. Tynedale and Hus were the real brave ones, notwithstanding their mistaken theological views.
Luther's audacious example in shaping the Bible to suit his needs also set a horrible example that all too many hard-hearted/hard-headed ideologues were more than happy to follow. Audacity replaced respect for authority.
It's not that I'm against change. But, there's a major difference between change that's brought about in an orderly and respectful manner, (even if by necessity through force of arms, such as our revolution), and change for its own sake and seeing just how far the envelope can be stuffed with new notions, etc. The Reformers took the latter path, but only after seeing Luther get away with making his own changes in the Bible just to suit his purposes that would jive more closely with the newer and more individualistic form of Christian worship. Ironically enough, this revolution within the Church came from a dissatisfied elite, not the masses yearning and striving to get a Bible in their hands. Thus, most of the faithfull, being predominately illiterate as well, were unable to catch on to the fancy finagling of the Bible and this made them easier to manipulate against the Church. Most people in the areas ruled by princes rebelling against the Church (more often than not for selfish reasons) had no clue as to how they were deliberately being duped. That wasn't just an audacious move against the Papacy, it was also against God in the sense that a handful of people undertook it upon themselves to manipulate their respective subjects so as to strengthen their positions against both the Papacy and the Hapsburgs/Holy Roman Empire.
Luther's audacity became precedent for the French & Russian Revolutions because he showed them how easy it was to manipulate a common central guide, spiritual or secular, to which people followed in order to maintain social and spiritual unity/order. So, if laws, scriptural text, and even references to past rulers or party influentials could be rubbed out, it didn't take long at all before spiritually and politically incorrect and suspect people would find themselves rubbed out. The French Jacobins, Russian/Chinese/Vietnamese/Cuban and Nicaraguan, and of course, their Fascist cousins in Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain and assorted Banana Republics were all very adept in following Luther's precedent-setting example.
Audacity. How dreadfully true.
____________________
James Michael Curley to a young Thomas “Tip” O’Neill -- “Son, it’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.”
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RCWarrior
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Posted: Wed Mar 28th, 2007 05:07 pm |
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Why thank you Mr. Barrett, isn't Massachusetts a great state?
Let's talk Tyndale, since you say that he was the brave one. And what about Wycliff?
By the way, is it really the case that Latin countries allowed the Bible to be read and translated and printed before Luther? Listen and judge for yourself what rubbish is crammed into people's heads. Luther's first Bible (or what pretended to be the Bible, for he had amputated some of its members) came out in 1520. Now, will you believe it, there were exactly 104 editions of the Bible in Latin before that date; there were 9 before the birth of Luther in the German Language, and there were 27 in German before ever his own saw the light of day. 626 editions of the Bible, in which 198 were in the language of the laity, had issued from the press, with the sanction and at the instance of the church, in the countries where she reigned supreme, before the first Protestant version of the Scriptures was sent forth into the world.
The simple truth of course is just this, that if knowledge of the Scriptures should of itself make people Protestants, then the Italian and French and Spanish and Hungarian and Belgian and Portugese nations should all have embraced Protestanism, which up to the moment of writing they have declined to do. I am afraid there is something wrong with the theory, for it is in woeful contradiction to plain facts, which may be learned by all who care to take the trouble to read and study for themselves.
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I know God won't give me anything I can't handle; I just wish he didn't trust me so much---Mother Teresa
If you invoke The Blessed Virgin when you are tempted, she will come at once to your help, and Satan will leave you----St. John Vianney
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Steven Barrett
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Posted: Thu Mar 29th, 2007 01:48 pm |
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You're welcome Stefany. Massachusetts is a great state, especially the more scenic western half. Well, I could qualify the "great" adjective because scenery alone isn't enough to help people get by in a very expensive area that seems hell-bent to discourage the middle class yet holds its arms out for the wealthy and/or tenured set.
As for the Bible, I agree with you about Luther and the nonsensical notion that if people would've only read their bibles more, why it would be inevitable (" ") that they'd turn from Rome, etc.
The Reformation was anything BUT a true rebellion of the people from the bottom up. Quite the opposite. Protestant princes were all too happy to take advantage of their feudal privileges for the purpose of pulling their fiefdoms and the subjects who lived under their rule out of the Church so long as they could get away with it. Sure, the masses were tired of excesses and scams such as the one Tetzel was called on by Luther.
But wholesale revisions of scripture, disemboweling long held Catholic teachings on the Eucharist, holy orders and confession, not to mention baptism, and the sacking of monasteries/convents (for stealing and redistributing the Orders' properties among favored underlings to solidify feudal loyalties, wow weren't those acts uplifting? Somehow I don't think you, I, or even Billy Graham could find any scriptural justifications for such atrocities (which also gave precedence to the Cromwellites, Jacobins, Spanish Republicans and Bolsheviks to justify their crimes.)
One of my favorite raps is the shibboleth that the Church wanted to keep the Bible out of the peoples' hands so badly that the Bible was chained to the stone walls of many churches. Oh, that's a toughie. I sweated bullets whenever a Protestant would bring that beauty up for a perfunctuary remark so as to add a level of raised significance to the discussion(s). Well, ho-hum. What these people need is at least one remark about any parallels with the Church "chaining the Bible" (helped, of course, by long sighs, calls for oxygen and fainting spells for stressing their "points") with none other than their local Ma Bell chaining telephone books in booths.
If the telephone companies can justify chaining their books so as to ensure usage by a continued sequence of individuals -- without any sense of alarm voiced by anyone -- why do the Catholics, to this day, find themselves having to answer for a very practical solution to a pressing problem that would cost each diocese and/or parish a fortune to replace its Bibles? We wouldn't even blame a Protestant rector for doing the same thing. Bibles were costly books, very costly, indeed. And, if a local parish or diocese had to replace a bible back in the Middle Ages, or even a Renaissance early printed version, that would represent an outlay of many thousands of today's dollars that could have been spent to assist the poor.
I brought this example up to illustrate some of the ridiculous extents some hard-core, take no-excuses, and no prisoners, Protestant evangelicals will go to justify their contentions that Protestantism is the true Bible branch of the Christian tree, so to speak. Never mind the butchering they've done to the Bible, or even the butchering they've done to others who stood in their way, most notably the Lutherans who sacked Rome and of course, my favorite, Oliver Cromwell, these hard core biblioalters (sp ?) will forever stand by their myths and half-truths so long as they serve the purpose of denigrating Catholics as small-c christians (at best, of course) or semi-pagans that worship the pope and don't read the Bible.
The "chaining of the Bible" is one-half truth among other insults to our intelligence that we must unfortunately weigh upon our crosses. But it's a featherweight in comparison to any justification whatsoever made by any Protestant during the Reformation or today, for the butchering of the original Scripture, and long-held Christian doctrines formerly (as well as formally agreed to) by Luther, Zwingli and Calvin -- all former priests.
They'll need a lot of Simon of Cyrenes (and all the size of the Patriot defense front line) to help carry that cross.
As for my leaving Wycliff off my list of early reforming "bravehearts," I'll make a deal with you. I'll promise not to ever let anyone in heavily Polish Hadley know you left Poland off your list. Imagine the loss to the Church, and humanity in general, if Poland went Protestant!
Let's spare everyone the agony of even having to think about that for a second. Oh,h,h, no.
(And I haven't a drop of Polish blood in me!)
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James Michael Curley to a young Thomas “Tip” O’Neill -- “Son, it’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.”
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CajunRick
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Posted: Thu Mar 29th, 2007 03:00 pm |
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Steven Barrett wrote: One of my favorite raps is the shibboleth that the Church wanted to keep the Bible out of the peoples' hands so badly that the Bible was chained to the stone walls of many churches.
For the record, bibles were chained in the churches. They were handwritten and extremely expensive, and chaining them was the only way the churches could make sure they stayed available to all. Otherwise, they would have been stolen and sold. The chaining ended with the invention of the printing press.
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Steven Barrett
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Posted: Thu Mar 29th, 2007 04:32 pm |
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CajunRick,
Yes, you and I are both right. When I used the words myths and shibboleths, I was really referring to the inferrences made then and now about the reasons behind the "chaining of the Bible by those awful Papists." Looking over my orig quote, I can see where I wasn't precise enough to even back up my own claims. See where an addiction to humor gets you?
Gee, now I'll have to go home and give myself a good old chaining on my back much alike the albino "Opus Dei Monk" in DVC sham.
Ouch, oh, oh 
____________________
James Michael Curley to a young Thomas “Tip” O’Neill -- “Son, it’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.”
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RCWarrior
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Posted: Thu Mar 29th, 2007 06:54 pm |
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Steven, God called you back to Catholicism and I am forever grateful that he did.
If all were true that is alleged against the Catholic Church in her treatment of Holy Scripture, then we should say "How we got", but "How we have not got the Bible". The common and received opinion about the matter, among especially non-Catholics in Britian, for the most part, has been that Rome hates the Bible and she has done all she could to destroy it, that in all countries where she has held sway she has kept the Bible from the hands of the people, has taken it and burned it whenever she found anyone reading it. Or if she cannot altogether prevent its publication or its perusal, at least she renders it as nearly as uselss as possible by sealing it up in a dead language which the majority of the people can neither read nor understand. And all this she does, because she knows that her doctrines are absolutely opposed to and contradicted by the letter of God's Written Word. She holds and propagates dogmas and traditions which could not stand one moment's examination if exposed to the searching light of Holy Scripture.
As a matter of fact, it is not known to everybody that, when the Bible was for the first time brought to the light and printed and put into the people's hands in the sixteenth century, suddenly there was a revolt against the Roman Church---there was a glorious Reformation? The people eagerly gazing upon the open Bible, saw they had been fooled and hoodwinked, and been taught to hold 'for doctrines the commandments of men', and forthwith throwing off the fetters, and emancipating themselves from the bondage of Romanism, they embraced the pure truth of God as set forth in Protestanism and Protestant Bibles. Is not this the tale that history tells about Rome?
The Protestant account of pre-reformation Catholicism has been largely a falsification of history. All the faults and sins that could possibly be raked up or invented against Rome, or against particular bishops or priests, were presented to the people of this unhappy land, and all her best acts misconstrued, misjudged, misrepresented, and nothing of good told in her favor.
God grant that many bible-readers and Bible-lovers may obtain the grace to make an act of faith, and pass from an unreasoning subservience to a Book to reasonable obedience and submission to its maker and defender:
The Catholic Church.
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I know God won't give me anything I can't handle; I just wish he didn't trust me so much---Mother Teresa
If you invoke The Blessed Virgin when you are tempted, she will come at once to your help, and Satan will leave you----St. John Vianney
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gmichuta
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Posted: Sun Apr 1st, 2007 12:44 pm |
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| I suppose in addition to the chained Bibles to help make the Scripture available to all. The Church also used sacred art (stained glass, statues, paints) to provide the poor and illiterate with access to Bible stories. Ironically, when Protestants were destroying these works of art they were, as Arnold Lunn points out, were really smashing the Bibles of the poor.
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RCWarrior
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Posted: Sun Apr 1st, 2007 02:29 pm |
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| Amen to that gmchuta
____________________
I know God won't give me anything I can't handle; I just wish he didn't trust me so much---Mother Teresa
If you invoke The Blessed Virgin when you are tempted, she will come at once to your help, and Satan will leave you----St. John Vianney
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CajunRick
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