Author: Thomas à Kempis

4 min read

Struggles

Responding to Criticism or Slander

Thomas à Kempis

January 24, 2020 5:44 am January 24, 2020

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Thomas à Kempis (c. 1379-1471) was a priest of the Canons Regular of Windesheim in Holland. He took part in the Church renewal movement known as the “Brothers and Sisters…

Thomas à Kempis (c. 1379-1471) was a priest of the Canons Regular of Windesheim in Holland. He took part in the Church renewal movement known as the “Brothers and Sisters of the Common Life,” who sought to imitate the life and virtues of the early Christians. This excerpt is taken from his most famous work, “The Imitation of Christ,” which is quite possibly the world’s most popular Christian spiritual book after the Bible.

My child, says Our Lord, stand firm and trust faithfully in Me when someone speaks against you. For what are words but wind? They may fly through the air, but they never hurt a stone on the ground.

If you are guilty of accusations leveled at you, consider how you would gladly change your ways. If you are not conscious of any fault, remember that you should gladly bear this slander for the sake of God. It is little enough for you occasionally to endure hastily spoken words, since you are not yet strong enough to bear hard blows.

Why do such small matters pierce you to the heart, unless it is because you are still worldly and pay more heed to pleasing other people than you should? Because you are afraid of being despised, you are not willing to be reproved for your faults. Instead, you search studiously and busily for excuses.

If you examine yourself more closely, however, you will learn that the world is still alive in you, and a vain desire to please others. For when you shrink from being rebuked and punished for your failings, it is plain indeed that you are not truly humble or truly dead to the world, and that the world has not yet been crucified to you (see Gal 6:14).

Listen to My word, and you will have no need to worry about even ten thousand words of others.

Look: If every false and malicious accusation that could possibly be invented were uttered against you, what harm could they do if you ignored them all and let them pass away? Truly, no more hurt than a straw under your foot. Such words could not so much as pluck one hair from your head!

Whoever does not have a stout heart within him, and does not hold God constantly before the eye of his soul, is easily moved by a sharp word. But the one who trusts in Me, who refuses to trust in his own judgment, will be free from the fear of others.

For I am the Judge and Discerner of all secrets. I know how all things happen. I know who causes injury and who suffers it. I allowed those words to be spoken. I gave My permission for them to be said so that the thoughts of many hearts might be revealed when the time comes.

I judge the guilty and the innocent. But first I test them through a just examination.

Human testimony often deceives, but My judgment is true; it will stand and not be overthrown. And even though sometimes it is hidden from many and made known to but a few, yet it is always true and never mistaken. In fact, it cannot be mistaken, even though it may not seem right in the eyes of the unwise.

Whenever you are in doubt, then, you should come to Me, not relying on your own judgment. You must be content with whatever I send your way. For a righteous man will not be disturbed, no matter what may befall him.

Even if an unjust charge is made against him, he will not be much troubled. Neither will he exult vainly if through others he is justly acquitted. He considers that it is I who search the human heart and its inmost thoughts, that I do not judge according to mere appearances. For what the judgment of others considers praiseworthy is often worthy of blame in My sight.

O Lord God, most just of judges, strong and patient, knowing human frailty and malice, be my strength and comfort in all my needs. My own conscience, Lord, is not sufficient for me.

You know in me what I do not know. So I must always humble myself whenever I am accused, bearing all things patiently in charity, according to Your pleasure.

Forgive me my failures in this regard. Give me again the grace of greater endurance in the time to come. Your mercy is a more sure and profitable way to obtain pardon and forgiveness than any attempt to trust in the defense offered by my own darkened conscience.

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9 min read

Saints

What Happens At A Canonization?

Simply Catholic Staff

January 24, 2020 5:01 am January 24, 2020

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9 min read

One of the happiest days in the life of the Church is the proclamation of new saints. The celebration of the proclamation, of course, is the final moment of a…

One of the happiest days in the life of the Church is the proclamation of new saints.

The celebration of the proclamation, of course, is the final moment of a long process of investigation, scrutiny and prayer that can last years and even many decades. But what actually takes place at a canonization?

What is a canonization?

A canonization is a statement by the Church that a person certainly enjoys the Beatific Vision — in other words, that particular someone is in heaven. There is a common misunderstanding that the Church somehow “creates” or “makes” saints. Through the process of beatification and canonization, a deceased member of the Church is granted definitive recognition of his or her heroic sanctity.

The word canonization means quite literally that, in canonizing a person, the pope speaks infallibly and for the whole Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, that the person’s name should be entered in the canon of the saints, listing all who are to receive veneration universally in the Church. Canonization is an earthly decision, which means that it has nothing to do with the actual entry of a saint into heaven.

Liturgical law definitely determines the acts of public cult by which a canonized saint may receive veneration. Specifically, the saints may be invoked in the public and official prayers of the Church offered for them; churches may be built in their honor; altars dedicated in their honor; the Mass celebrated; the Divine Office recited; a feast day set aside to their memory; and they may be designated as special patrons.

The formal declaration is made by the pope at a ceremony, celebrated with a Mass, called the Rite of Canonization.

Why is there a process first?

No saint shall be named without the laborious and highly regulated process of canonization. The steps by which a person becomes a saint are carefully executed by the Church and follow a meticulous investigation. This scrutiny is called the process of canonization. It is an ancient custom and has undergone many changes and reforms through the centuries. Today, it begins on the local level, with the approval of the Holy See, and includes a careful study of the candidate’s life and writings and ends with the recognition of miracles. The validation of miracles is customarily necessary for beatification and then canonization.

What is the rite of canonization?

The canonization rite takes place in the wider setting of a Papal Mass. This is important as it means that the proclamation of a new saint or saints is still within the setting of the celebration of the Eucharist, the source and summit of the Christian life.

The first part of the rite begins with prayers and hymns and proceeds with the chanting of the Litany of Saints, the long and beautiful roll call of the Church’s saints.

Each name is recited, followed by the refrain “Ora pro nobis” (“Pray for us”). The pope then processes to the altar and the rite continues with the prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints (the Vatican office in charge of the investigations) making three petitions to the pope to proclaim the blessed or blesseds among the saints. In the rite for a beatification, there is only one petition, and the three petitions are used to emphasize the great significance of the canonization.

What are the petitions?

The prefect for the Congregation of the Causes of Saints makes three petitions to the pope asking him to enroll the blessed or blesseds among the saints.

First Petition

“Most Holy Father,

“Holy Mother Church earnestly beseeches Your Holiness to enroll Blessed ______ among the Saints, that they may be invoked as such by all the Christian faithful.”

Second Petition

“Most Holy Father,

“Strengthened by unanimous prayer, Holy Church more earnestly beseeches Your Holiness to enroll these, her children, among the Saints.”

Third Petition

“Most Holy Father,

“Holy Church, trusting in the Lord’s promise to send upon her the Spirit of Truth, who in every age keeps the supreme Magisterium immune from error, most earnestly beseeches Your Holiness to enroll these, her elect, among the Saints.”

At what point or words during the canonization Mass do the saints become officially declared?

The pope responds to the three petitions by pronouncing the canonization formula: “For the honor of the Blessed Trinity, the exaltation of the Catholic faith and the increase of the Christian life, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and our own, after due deliberation and frequent prayer for divine assistance, and having sought the counsel of many of our brother bishops, we declare and define Blessed __________ be a saint and we enroll him (or her) among the saints, decreeing that he (or she) is to be venerated as such by the whole Church. In the name of the Holy Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”

With the canonization formula, the pope has officially declared the new saints. The canonization formula is an irrevocable decree issued by the pope prescribing universal veneration. The act removes all doubt about the validity of honoring the saint.

Why are the relics of the saints presented during the canonization for veneration?

With the completion of the Rite of Canonization, the relics of the new saint or saints are brought forward. They are incensed and presented to the faithful for veneration. This moment tells the faithful that they are now permitted to venerate the relics of the new saints universally, in keeping with the tradition in the Church. As the Second Vatican Council taught in the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (Sacrosanctum Concilium): “The saints have been traditionally honored in the Church and their authentic relics and images held in veneration” (No. 111).

The presentation of the relics is also the last part of the canonization rite. The prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints then thanks the pope and asks that an apostolic letter — an official document attesting to the canonization — be drawn up. The pope responds, “Decernimus” (“We so decree”). The canonization rite ends with the singing of the Gloria, and the Mass proceeds as usual.

Are there special Mass readings for the canonization?

No. During the Liturgy of the Word for the Mass, the readings for the Sunday are used. For example, at the canonization of Popes St. John XXIII and John Paul II on April 27, 2014, celebrated by Pope Francis, the readings for Divine Mercy Sunday were used. The pope also reflects on the readings in his homily.

Can anyone attend the canonization?

Yes. In fact, literally hundreds of thousands of pilgrims travel to attend canonizations. Often, entry into St. Peter’s Square or St. Peter’s Basilica (depending on the weather or the health of the pontiff) requires a ticket. Pope Francis gave instruction that with the exception of diplomats and other officials attending the canonizations of John Paul II and John XXIII, there should be no tickets, and that entry would be for all.

Is there a special day or particular calendar day on which canonizations must occur?

No. The choice for when a canonization is held is subject to the liturgical calendar. Typically, canonizations are held in the fall and the spring. For example, most of the canonizations in the pontificate of Pope John Paul II were held between April and June or in October and November. Popes will also often choose a date that has special connection to the blessed being canonized. For example, Pope John Paul II canonized St. Faustina Kowalska on Divine Mercy Sunday 2000. Pope Francis then canonized John Paul II on Divine Mercy Sunday 2014.

How many saints are canonized at one time? Is there a maximum?

There is no limit to the number of saints who can be canonized at the same time. Customarily, to assist with the costs of the canonizations (that are paid by the originating dioceses or religious communities), several canonizations are held at the same time. The largest canonization at one time was held on May 12, 2013, when Pope Francis canonized Laura Montoya Upegui (1874-1949), María Guadalupe García Zavala (1878-1963) and the 800 Martyrs of Otranto who were slain in 1480.

Are servants of God and blesseds also announced during a canonization Mass?

Usually, no. The designation of the title of Servant of God is granted after the Congregation for the Causes of Saints completes a preliminary investigation into a candidate and gives permission for a cause to be started. Blesseds are officially beatified in a separate ceremony.

What is an equivalent canonization?

Aside from the public proclamation of a saint by the pope, there is another type of canonization called an “equivalent canonization” (or “equipollent canonization”) in which the pope grants permission for the universal Church to observe the veneration of a servant of God or blessed who has not yet been canonized. Established in 1632 by Pope Urban VIII, an equivalent canonization does not mean that the pope is bypassing the process of canonization or introducing some new cause for canonization. The pope instead acts in recognition of a cause that is long-standing and of someone who is already held in great esteem by the faithful and enjoys fame for miraculous intercessions. For whatever reason, the cause of canonization was never completed. No formal canonization is needed, and the pope only needs to sign a decree to make it official.

Pope Benedict XVI used an equivalent canonization for Hildegard of Bingen in 2012, and Pope Francis has used it for Peter Faber, Angela de Foligno, José de Anchieta, Marie of the Incarnation and François-Xavier de Montmorency-Laval.

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Sacraments

Communion Gestures

Father Reginald Martin

January 23, 2020 7:12 am January 23, 2020

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The General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM) specifies three times during the Mass when the celebrant must genuflect: after showing the host (1) and chalice (2) at the consecration,…

The General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM) specifies three times during the Mass when the celebrant must genuflect: after showing the host (1) and chalice (2) at the consecration, and before Communion (3). The text adds, “If, however, the tabernacle with the … Blessed Sacrament is situated in the sanctuary, the priest…and the other ministers genuflect when they approach the altar and when they depart from it, but not during the celebration of Mass itself” (No. 274).

The GIRM also prescribes appropriate devotional posture for the faithful who wish to receive communion, “When receiving Holy Communion, the communicant bows his or her head before the Sacrament as a gesture of reverence and receives the Body of the Lord from the minister” (No. 160).

What response should we give a communicant — or a celebrant — who feels these gestures are insufficient? We might remark that the GIRM establishes minimum requirements. Should we wish to do more, only the practical limitations of the worship space limit us.

Thus if a celebrant wishes to genuflect before returning consecrated Hosts to the tabernacle, nothing prohibits him. Likewise, a communicant might genuflect or even kneel to receive Communion if this does not impede the progress of others wishing to receive the Eucharist.

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9 min read

Scripture

Mercy In The Bible

Dr. Peter Brown

January 22, 2020 8:32 am January 22, 2020

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What does it mean to say that Yahweh, the God of the Bible, is a merciful God? A good place to start in unpacking the idea is the Hebrew term chesed. Chesed (pronounced…

What does it mean to say that Yahweh, the God of the Bible, is a merciful God?

A good place to start in unpacking the idea is the Hebrew term chesed. Chesed (pronounced with a guttural sounding ch) is one of those delightfully untranslatable terms one finds in the Bible. It has the idea of “the giving of a break” but means much more than that. It combines the notions of “kindness,” “faithfulness,” “truth,” “persistent and steadfast loyalty” and, most of all, “love.”

We see it frequently in the context of the “unfailing love” God shows for Israel in the context of the covenant.

Though untranslatable, chesed captures an important dimension of divine mercy: steadfast and true kindness based on the covenant. Chesed is a wonderful word, but one that still fails to capture the fullness of mercy. Its relational dimensions make it too powerful to convey the idea of the seemingly random act of kindness toward someone you don’t really know well or who doesn’t deserve it. For that we need the term rachamim (again with the guttural ch sound). This one has a near English equivalent: “pity” or “compassion” — something akin to the sentiment that causes you to fall for the three-legged puppy who is neither cute nor potty-trained, but whose attraction is precisely that no one else wants him. In some cases rachamim even extends to family members.

Joseph is overcome with it in dealing with his brothers with whom by all rights he should have been angry (see Gn 43:30). God was furious with Israel, too, after the creation of the golden calf. Yet in one of the Bible’s most famous declarations of mercy, God turns away from his anger declaring in his sovereignty, “I who grant mercy [rachamim] to whom I will” (Ex 33:19).

The Greek New Testament unsurprisingly talks a great deal about “mercy,” too — using different language, of course. The most common term is eleeos, made famous in the Kyrie Eleison rite at Mass right before the Gloria where Catholics say, “Lord, have mercy.” Eleeos truly does mean something very close to what English speakers mean by “mercy,” combining the Hebrew ideas of chesed and raham. It is precisely because he is the “Son of David” with all that implies in terms of God’s covenant that Jesus is asked to take pity on blind Bartimaeus (see Mk 10:47-48; Mt 9:27; 20:30-31; Lk 18:38-39).

What the New Testament adds to “mercy” is splankna, another term difficult to capture perfectly in English, which suggests warm feelings from the deepest innards of the human person. The “deepest innards” is often translated “heart,” although splanknonpoints anatomically to the “guts” below the rib cage. Confusion on this point led to the Douay Rheims’ famous translation of Philemon 1:7 as “the bowels of the saints have been refreshed” when the idea is that the innermost being of the people of God was being renewed. When it comes to God, splankna is a “tenderizer” seasoning added to God’s mercy. The famous Canticle of Zechariah’s “tender mercy of our God” (Lk 1:78) combines the terms splankna and eleeos together.

So now with a little philology under our belt, we are now in a position to do a little biblical theology. We know roughly what God’s mercy is, but who gets it and how?

One central idea advanced by Our Lord is the connection of divine mercy for people with people’s mercy for one another.

This is the message of the parable of the debtor (see Mt 18:21-35) as well as the Lord’s Prayer — “forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors” (Mt 6:12). Our reception of divine mercy is wholly contingent on our ability to show mercy to others. This is not only because of the social dimension of chesed; by making God’s forgiveness contingent on our forgiveness we become a channel of divine mercy, which flows through us to others.

Another crucial aspect to the flow of mercy is based on the humanity of Jesus Christ. His humanity enables him to become our High Priest who is able to identify with our fleshly weaknesses, since he took on frail humanity himself, yet without sin. It is through the humanity of Jesus that we can approach the throne of grace confidently and receive mercy (see Heb 4:14-16).

But let’s not fall into the trap that mercy and forgiveness is an attribute of the New Testament while the God of the Old Testament remains a deity of wrath and judgment. Even a cursory knowledge of the Bible reveals that there are many times when mercy is shown in the Old Testament and many times when divine wrath and judgment are threatened in the New.

Old Testament Prophets

And the Year of Mercy, emphasized the scope of mercy, particularly for those on the margins or the periphery. This is a question actually of great salience for the Old Testament writers in terms of avoiding wrath or receiving mercy, but also in defining the boundaries to which mercy could extend. Does it extend to Israel alone even if Israel is just as culpable as the other nations? Or can the nations receive it, too? And in no place were these very difficult questions more discussed than in the Book of the Twelve, aka the twelve minor prophets from Hosea through Malachi.

The Book of Joel is all about God’s judgment and who can avoid it when it seems that it is in store for everyone. The prophet says in Joel 2:14, “Perhaps he [Yahweh] will again relent and leave a blessing.”

This is key to the biblical idea of mercy — maybe we will get it, but God certainly doesn’t owe it to us. Therefore, we have no right to presume it. On the other hand, if we repent and show our repentance with prayer and fasting, maybe there is hope (see Jl 2:15-18).

In fact, God is merciful (see Jl 2:18-27) and will pour out his Spirit upon all flesh in advance of the judgment (3:1). Paradoxically, “all flesh” do not escape judgment. The nations will be destroyed as God’s people will be exalted (Chapter 4), because they did not call on the name of the Lord (3:5) and accept his mercy. Joel’s view is a somewhat hopeful picture that God’s wrath on the Day of the Lord can be escaped by the few who have the Spirit.

But Amos’ take on judgment is strikingly different. He makes it crystal clear that the various judgments against the nations are fixed; Yahweh, in fact, will not repent (“revoke the punishment” is the translation in the Revised Standard Version; see 1:3,6,9,11,13; 2:1,4,6). The punishments are coming and there is nothing that the nations, or Judah and Israel, can do to avoid them.

And those who have read Joel and actually want the Day of the Lord (see Jl 2:1-2) are in for a rude awakening (Am 5:17). For Amos it will be darkness and not light, with no hope — none at all.

Amos’ message is almost wholly negative. Jonah, however, turns Amos’ message on its head. Due to the reluctant prophet’s preaching, the Gentile king of Nineveh dares to perceive the same prospect of mercy for his people that Joel had for Judah (see Jon 3:9).

And he received it! God did what Amos said he would not do — he “repented” of the judgment he would inflict (see Jon 3:10). The same God, “slow to anger” in his dealings with his covenant people (Ex 34:6), shows himself “slow to anger” with a wicked Gentile nation as well (Jon 4:2).

On the other hand, Nahum rejoiced with sadistic glee that despite its slowness, God’s judgment eventually did fall upon Nineveh after all (see Na 1:3a). But the pendulum swings back again with Habakkuk. Yes, God may punish the Assyrians, but his chosen instrument for doing so is Babylon, and they are about to come down to destroy God’s people in Judah as well (Hb 1:5-6).

Zechariah finds a way for the nations to benefit from God’s coming kingdom after all — the reign which is the main subject of his book (see Zec 14:9). The nations that fight against God will be vanquished, of course (Zec 14:1-4), yet, paradoxically, the portions of the nations who survive the war and become loyal to the true worship of God will experience divine blessing (14:16-21).

On the other side of the Cross, Paul, in Romans 9-11, wonders how it can be that God is showing so much mercy to mostly Gentile Christians while non-Christian Jews seem to have lost the mercy they once possessed. Will God once again withdraw the mercy shown to Gentiles and return it to the Jews? It is hard to say!

Mercy is deeply paradoxical.

Mercy will fall next where we least expect it. God will exalt His people and punish His enemies both in history and at the end of history, but He has enemies both inside and outside the visible boundaries of Israel/Church, and even His people within Israel/Church need purification and have done things worthy of divine chastisement, as have others outside Israel/Church who stand nonetheless to benefit from the purification and be restored to God’s friendship afterward.

Mercy is understandable only against the background of sin and imminent judgment from which no one is exempt. Everyone must repent and show mercy to others, and the greatest hope for mercy is in the humanity of Jesus Christ.

Repentance does not guarantee that one will avoid suffering and chastisement, but it is the constant condition necessary to receive God’s mercy that He stands forever prepared to offer to everyone.

Dr. Peter Brown is the Academic Dean for Catholic Distance University.

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3 min read

The Church

Colors Worn By Cardinals and Bishops

Msgr. William J. King

January 22, 2020 7:19 am January 22, 2020

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3 min read

A look at artwork through the centuries shows that attire for the clergy has changed greatly over the two millennia of the Church. However, the color purple is of ancient…

A look at artwork through the centuries shows that attire for the clergy has changed greatly over the two millennia of the Church. However, the color purple is of ancient origin and has traditionally been used mostly by royalty since it was among the most difficult of colors to produce, and hence expensive and affordable only to royalty.

Within the Church, an overlay of theological or spiritual meaning is often added to practices or customs centuries after those customs arise out of convenience or common usage. For instance, it is almost certain that the use of purple attire by bishops was originally intended to show that the bishops possessed religious and spiritual authority equal to the temporal and civil authority of princes and kings. Pious commentators later came to suggest that bishops wore purple in imitation of the purple cloak placed on the shoulders of Jesus during his trial on Good Friday.

The Gospel of Matthew states that the soldiers placed a scarlet robe on Jesus (see 27:28), but the Gospels of Mark (15:16-17) and John (19:2) indicate that the soldiers, mocking Jesus as a king, clothed him in purple. Interestingly, at least one commentary suggests that the robe was probably red when it was new, but had faded and become soiled so that it seemed to be purple.

The wearing of red clothing by cardinals, according to some accounts, arose from a medieval custom in Lyons, France, where the canons of the cathedral wore red to distinguish themselves from other clergy.

The office and title of canon is an honorary appointment by the diocesan bishop, usually conferred on older or retired priests today, but historically the canons were a diocesan bishop’s closest advisers and filled an important role.

In time, probably in the late Middle Ages or very early Renaissance, the cardinals of the Church came to wear red, undoubtedly as a means to distinguish themselves from other clerics. A later, pious explanation led to today’s understanding that the cardinals wear scarlet red as an outward sign of their willingness to shed their blood in defense of the Catholic faith.

The purple worn by bishops today is not a true purple, but rather a magenta color. During liturgical ceremonies a bishop or cardinal will wear the “choir” cassock, which is entirely purple or red; otherwise, the cassock worn is the “house” cassock, which is black with purple or red buttons and fascia, or sash.

Is it incorrect to suggest that bishops wear purple in imitation of the sufferings of Jesus, or that cardinals wear red in witness of their willingness to die for the Faith? No, certainly not, but these pious explanations came centuries after the colors actually began to be worn by bishops and cardinals. Perhaps not the original reasons for selecting these colors, they are today the reasons these colors remain in use.

Rev. Msgr. William J. King is a priest of the Diocese of Harrisburg.

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7 min read

Scripture

Common Myths About Catholics and the Bible

Thomas J. Craughwell

January 21, 2020 7:16 am January 21, 2020

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7 min read

The Catholic Church, so the old stories claim, kept the Bible in Latin so ordinary Catholics couldn’t read it, burned copies of the Bible that had been translated into English…

The Catholic Church, so the old stories claim, kept the Bible in Latin so ordinary Catholics couldn’t read it, burned copies of the Bible that had been translated into English and added books to the Bible that had no business being there.

Like the myth about “Pope Joan,” these stories have been circulating for centuries. In fact, they are so widespread that it’s not unusual to hear churchgoing Catholics repeat them.

So is there anything to them? Is the Catholic Church anti-Bible or afraid of the Bible?

The idea is absurd. It was Christ’s disciples – all members of the Catholic Church -who wrote the books of the New Testament. Catholic bishops, priests and laity kept copies of the Bible safe during the centuries of persecution when Roman emperors decreed that all the sacred books of the Christians should be burned.

Catholic councils identified which books belong in the inspired canon of Scripture, and Catholic monks lovingly preserved the scriptural texts over centuries by handwriting copies.

In every way, then, we actually owe a debt of gratitude to the Catholic Church for the great gift we call the Bible.

Only in Latin?

Let’s begin with the charge that the Church kept the Bible in Latin so that the Catholic laity couldn’t read it.

In the first place, the Catholic Church has never been hostile to vernacular versions of the Bible. It was Pope St. Damasus I (pope 366-384) who commissioned St. Jerome to produce a new Latin translation of the entire Bible that would be faithful to the ancient Greek and He-brew manuscripts.

When he did this, he was in fact ordering a vernacular translation. At the time, Latin was spoken throughout the Roman Empire, from Britain to Persia.

One effect of the collapse of the Roman Empire was the loss of a single unifying language. As a babble of local dialects sprang up across Europe, Asia Minor and North Africa, Latin became the language of the schools, the professions such as law and medicine, and, of course, the Church.

During this period few people could read, but those who could learned to read and write in Latin first, and in their own languages later. Latin, then, was the language of the literate.

Even so, while St. Jerome’s Latin Bible, known as the Vulgate, remained the standard text, a host of vernacular versions of the Scriptures came to be in circulation. By the time of the Protestant Reformation, there were already popular translations of the Bible, or portions of it, in English, French, German, Spanish, Italian and other European languages, some of them in existence for centuries.

The Church did not object to these translations, but it did insist that Catholics who had no formal training in the Bible be guided in their reading of the Scriptures by the commentaries of the Fathers of the Church or by well-educated priests.

Burning Bibles

It’s sometimes said that the translation of the Bible into English by John Wycliffe (c. 1324-1384) brought the Catholic Church to its knees. But Wycliffe’s English Bible was by no means the first translation for the peoples of the British Isles.

In fact, this Bible is a perfectly orthodox translation of St. Jerome’s Vulgate. It was the “explanatory”material included in later editions of the English Bible by Wycliffe’s followers that caused trouble.

Wycliffe had rejected the doctrine of the Real Presence in the Eucharist and the spiritual authority of the pope. After Wycliffe’s death his followers rejected celibacy of the clergy, religious orders and what they called the “feigned power of absolution.”

These unorthodox opinions, routinely included in the prologue or notes of Wycliffe Bibles, are what disturbed Catholic churchmen and Catholic statesmen in England. They saw clearly that Wycliffe’s followers were not trying to put the plain word of God into the hands of ordinary people; they were trying to lead ordinary people away from the Catholic faith.

A century later, William Tyndale (1492-1536) produced an English translation of the Bible in which he included a large portion of the unorthodox prologue and notes from Martin Luther’s German Bible. St. Thomas More spotted the deception and charged Tyndale with trying to mislead the faithful by misrepresenting “the good and wholesome doctrine of Christ.”

Even England’s King Henry VIII denounced Tyndale’s version for its “many corruptions of the holy text, as certain prefaces and other pestilent glosses in the margins advance and set forth his abominable heresies.” For these reasons Archbishop William Warham of Canterbury had Tyndale’s Bible burned.

To us the idea of burning a Bible is chilling. But we must keep in mind that Archbishop Warham, St. Thomas More and Henry VIII lived in an age when unorthodox religious doctrine was regarded as a difference of opinion not only dangerous to souls, but also potentially dangerous to the stability of the nation.

Non-Catholics of the period thought the same way. For example, John Calvin, one of the fathers of the Reformation, burned copies of the Bible annotated by Michael Servetus, a Spanish theologian who denied the Trinity and the divinity of Christ.

“Extra” Catholic Books

Some non-Catholics claim that at the Council of Trent in 1546 the Church added to the Bible books and texts that do not belong there, specifically Wisdom, Sirach (or Ecclesiasticus), Judith, Tobit, Baruch, and First and Second Maccabees, as well as portions of Daniel and Esther. This charge is not only bad history, it’s plain nonsense.

The technical name for these books is “deuterocanonical” (liter-ally, “second canon”) and they are all found in the Septuagint, the most ancient vernacular translation of the Old Testament. It was created about 250 B.C. for Greek-speaking Jews who no longer understood Hebrew.

This Greek translation of the Jewish Bible was known and used by Jews throughout the Roman Empire. Certainly, the earliest Fathers of the Church regarded the deuterocanonical books as divinely inspired and an authentic part of the Bible. We know that ordinary Christians revered them, too, because some of the oldest paintings in the catacombs depict scenes from these books along with scenes from other biblical books.

Protestants claim that they omit the deuterocanonical books because they do not appear in the Jewish Bible. But consider this: When Our Lord was on Earth the Jews had no canon, or official list, of biblical books.

It is true that a group of Pharisees met at the Palestinian town of Jamnia between A.D. 80 and 100 to create a canon, and they did in fact exclude the seven contested books. But the authority of this particular council to issue such rulings was disputed among the Jews, and many other rabbis of the time rejected the Jamnia list.

In any case, since the Christian Church was already established by this time, the ruling of a group of non-Christian Pharisees certainly had no authority for Christians.

The question of the Jewish canon has never been officially settled. To this day, the Jews of Ethiopia use a Bible that contains all the books found in the Catholic Old Testament.

Clearly, then, the Catholic Church did not add books to the Bible. It preserved sacred texts that were revered by the Jews as well as by the first Christians.

Furthermore, the Catholic canon of 46 Old Testament books and 27 New Testament books was fixed at the Council of Rome in 382. The Council of Trent, responding to Protestant challenges, found it necessary to confirm what had been established almost 1,200 years earlier.

The Church encourages Catholics to study the Bible. But it insists upon reliable translations and the guidance of sound teachers. In this the Church is especially blessed, since it can draw upon 2,000 years of biblical scholarship.

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