So Why Aren't You Catholic Yet?

[tinytherese]

[quote name='Light and Truth' timestamp='1311992583' post='2278401']
I don't think the Catholic Church would accept me because I disagree with it on certain things such as below.

I not agree with papal infallibility or the leadership of a single pope. All of that power in one man is illogical (and this differs from Jesus in that a savior is a philosophical necessity for humanity to have any hope). I do not find the interpretation of scripture to be sound. I may have another reference to support this but I need to do other work and look for it later. Either God is logical, or the atheists are right about us not thinking-I think we can agree which is more likely.

There are a few other reasons, but they take more time to dig up.
[/quote]

[b]Three Guidelines for Reading Scripture[/b]
People who are approaching the Bible for the first time may be surprised to discover that the Church offers us only three basic guidelines for reading it. These are:[indent]
1. Be especially attentive “to the content and unity of the whole Scripture”;
2. Read the Scripture within “the living tradition of the whole Church”; and,
3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith.[/indent]
In these deceptively simple guidelines are enfolded, like the oak tree in the acorn, the entire pattern for reading Scripture in a healthy way. Let's unpack them a bit.

[b]1. Be especially attentive “to the content and unity of the whole Scripture”.[/b] Scripture is often treated as a sort of "Treasury of Golden Quotes". It's not. In fact, as a general rule, the books of Scripture are coherent wholes. As in any book, each passage of Scripture relates to the passage preceding it and following it. Likewise, each paragraph and chapter. Moreoever, biblical writers will often have in mind other books of Scripture as they write. And so they will often allude to these other books with the expectation that we, as readers will "get" what they are referring to. So, for instance, when John the Baptist says, "Behold the Lamb of God" as he points to Jesus, he expects us to be completely familiar with the story of the Exodus and of the Passover Lamb, whose blood saves Israel from death. If we don't know that connection, we won't "get" what John means or, worse, we will think we understand him when we don't.

In other words, Scripture (because God is the Author) has a more-than-human unity to it. If you will, think of it as a single organism rather than as a collection of separate books, just as you think of a goldfish as a single thing and not as a collection of organs that happens to be fish-shaped.

[b]2. Read the Scripture within “the living tradition of the whole Church".[/b] Goldfish do not live in a vacuum. Neither does Scripture. Many people have the notion that the only way to get at what Scripture "really" means is by "peeling away Tradition". This is exactly like thinking you will get to know your goldfish better by peeling away all that interfering water and holding your fish in your hand. What you will find very soon is that your fish is dead. Same with Scripture, and for the same reason. Scripture is the result of the Sacred Tradition of the community that made it under the inspiration of the Spirit. Some people ask, "What right does the Church have to decide what goes in the Bible?" You may as well ask what right you have to decide what goes in your family photo album. Because Scripture is nothing other than the written testimony of what that Church believes and has experienced. Books that reflect those beliefs and experiences were (under the guidance of the Spirit) written and then preserved by the Church. Books that don't reflect this were not. Because of this, you can no more read Scripture apart from Tradition than you can talk to a person without air. Scripture is simply the written aspect of the Church's Tradition. It is written with the assumption that you are already eating, sleeping and breathing that Tradition. Which brings us to the last point:

[b]3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith.[/b] The Church has a genius for cloaking commonsense ideas in difficult jargon such as "the analogy of faith". Continuing our discussion from above, perhaps the best way to explain that "analogy of faith" means is to describe it as the "goldfish bowl of doctrine". Fish gotta swim and to do that, something has to hold the water. For the Church, doctrine does this. In other words, the "analogy of faith" refers to those doctrinal statements that summarize and symbolize what we believe.

After all, what's an "analogy"? It's a thing that's like something else. "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed" is an analogy. Likewise, a photo of my wife is an analog of my wife. It looks like her, but it's not her.

In the most famous instance of an "analogy of the Faith"--the Creed--we find that the Church has summarized the basics of what we have to confess if we say we are Christians. It's called the "analogy of faith" because, like all analogies, it looks like the object it describes but is not the same thing as that object. For when we say we "believe the Creed" we don't mean we think the Creed made us or redeemed us, but that the Creed describes the God who did.

With these three tools, then, we are set to begin looking at Scripture. However, as we will discover next week, these tools are going to enable us to see not just the surface of a vast ocean, but to peer into its unguessable depths.

Source [url="http://www.mark-shea.com/scrip2.html"]http://www.mark-shea.com/scrip2.html[/url]


[b]Making Sense Out of Scripture: the Four Best Kept Secrets in Biblical Studies Today[/b]


ISSUE: What are the four senses of scripture?

RESPONSE: Traditionally, there are four senses of Scripture, which are outlined in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, nos. 115-119:

1. Literal Sense: “[T]he meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture” (Catechism, no. 116), the actual event, person, thing described in the biblical text. The literal sense gives rise to the following three “spiritual senses.”

2. Allegorical Sense: How those things, events, or persons in the literal sense point to Christ and the Paschal Mystery.

3. Moral Sense: How the literal sense points to the Christian life in the Church.

4. Anagogical Sense: How the literal sense points to the Christian’s heavenly destiny and the last things.

DISCUSSION: Understanding the four senses of Scripture provides an interpretive key for unlocking many spiritual treasures in the Word of God. They can help one make vital connections between the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Catholic Faith, and individual spiritual life. With this approach, we see more clearly that the events and people mentioned in the Bible are intimately linked to our own Christian lives and serve as models for us to follow.

Although humans communicate primarily through words and actions, God communicates not only through His words and deeds (cf. Catechism, no. 1103), but also through the very things He has created. As St. Thomas Aquinas explained, “That God is the author of Holy Scripture should be acknowledged, and He has the power not only of adapting words to signify things (which human writers can also do), but also of adapting things themselves [to signify other things]” (Summa Theologiae I, 1, 10). In other words, because He is the Creator and the Lord of history, God not only communicates through the words of Scripture but He also gives special meaning to the things, people, and events mentioned in Scripture. He uses them as signs to tell us something about his plan of salvation. Because He inspired the human hand, this may occur even without the human author’s awareness.

A study of the Jerusalem temple provides a classic example to demonstrate the four senses of Scripture. In the literal sense, the temple was the actual building that once stood in Jerusalem. There, the Israelite priests offered sacrifice, the people worshipped, and God dwelt in the Holy of Holies.

This temple of the Old Testament has greater importance because God uses it as a sign to reveal important realities in the New Testament: Jesus and the Christian life. Allegorically, the temple points to Jesus, Who said He was the true temple which would be destroyed and raised up in three days (Jn. 2:19-21). Just as the Jerusalem temple was the place of sacrifice for the Jews, so does Jesus’ body house the everlasting sacrifice on Calvary for all humanity.

The moral sense of the temple is found in the Christian, whose body is “a temple of the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor. 6:19). Just as the temple contained the amesome presence of God, so do the bodies of Christians hold the presence of the Holy Spirit by virtue of their Baptism.

Anagogically, the Jerusalem temple finds its eschatological meaning in the heavenly sanctuary, where God will dwell among us in our eternal home, as described in Book of Revelation (e.g., Rev. 21:22).

This method of uncovering the four senses of Scripture is sometimes called spiritual exegesis, typology, or sensus plenior. Rooted in Catholic Tradition, many saints, doctors, Fathers of the Church, and even Jesus and the New Testament writers themselves used this method. Unfortunately, this spiritual exegesis has become somewhat of a lost art, with many modern scholars either downplaying or ignoring it. Nonetheless, with the Catechism of the Catholic Church and the Pontifical Biblical Commission recently calling our attention to the four senses of Scripture, there is likely to be a renewal in this rich approach to biblical interpretation.

“Something Greater is Here”: How Jesus Interpreted the Scriptures

Jesus Himself often viewed people and things of the Old Testament as signs which point to Him and shed light on His mission and identity. For example, Jesus refers to Jonah and the whale as prefiguring His own death and resurrection. “For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth…. Behold, something greater than Jonah is here” (Mt. 12:40-41).

Similarly, the New Testament writers understood how God uses things, people, and events of the Old Testament to tell us something about His saving plan. For example, St. Paul describes Adam as a “type” of Christ (Rom. 5:14)—a sign telling us about Jesus: “For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by one man’s obedience many will be made righteous” (Rom. 5:19). Indeed, Jesus is the “new Adam,” the father of a new humanity in grace, righteousness, and life (cf., Rom. 5:15-19).

A few other examples: St. Peter views Noah’s ark, which saved people during the waters of the flood, as shedding light on Baptism, which now saves Christians by our passing through the waters of the New Covenant (1 Pet. 3:20-21). Hebrews describes Israel’s tabernacle, high priest, and sacrifices as “a copy and shadow of the heavenly sanctuary” (Heb. 8:5). First Corinthians emphasizes how Israel’s experiences of trials and failures in the desert were recorded in Exodus, not for mere historical record, but to tell us something about the Christian life: “Now these things happened to them as a warning, but they were written down for our instruction” (1 Cor. 10:13).

Patristic Interpretation

The Church Fathers made constant recourse to the four senses of Scripture. They believed that because the Bible is God’s Word, everything in it must have some significance for readers today. One of the most common themes found in the Fathers’ practice of spiritual exegesis is the relationship between the Exodus event and Christian Baptism. Just as the Israelites escaped from slavery in Egypt, passed through the waters of the Red Sea and headed toward the Promised Land, so are Christians freed from the spiritual bondage of sin and death by passing through the waters of Baptism to begin their journey to the ultimate Promised Land, their heavenly home with Jesus for all eternity.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem beautifully elaborated on this theme in catechetical instructions for early Church “RCIA classes.” For example:

You must know that the symbol of Baptism is found in ancient history. . . . There [in the Exodus] we have Moses sent by God into Egypt; here [in Baptism] we have Christ sent by the Father into the world; there is need to free the oppressed people from Egypt, here to rescue men tyrannized over by sin in this world; there the blood of the lamb turns aside the Destroyer; here the Blood of the true Lamb, Jesus Christ, puts the demons to flight; there the tyrant pursues the people even into the sea; here the shameless and bold demon follows them even to the holy fountains; one tyrant is drowned in the sea, the other is destroyed in the water of salvation (as quoted in Jean Danielou, S.J., The Bible and the Liturgy, Notre Dame, IN, University of Notre Dame Press, 1956, 96).

Cultivating Orthodoxy

Cardinal Newman once said, “It may be almost laid down as an historical fact that the mystical interpretation [of using the four senses] and orthodoxy will stand or fall together.” Why would the four senses be so important to the Catholic Faith?

Discovering the connections between the Old Testament, Christ, and the Christian life shows the continuity in God’s plan of salvation. We see more clearly that from the very beginning—from Adam and Abraham to Moses and the prophets—God has been preparing humanity for Jesus Christ and the Catholic Church. That’s why studying the Old Testament is so important for understanding Jesus and many aspects of the Catholic Faith. Take, for example, the Old Covenant Passover lamb. In the literal sense, the paschal lamb was eaten by Israelite families as the central part of the yearly Passover meal, which commemorated Israel’s deliverance from slavery in Egypt. But the spiritual senses show how God used that lamb as a preparation for understanding Jesus on the cross as the true paschal sacrifice and for understanding the Eucharist as the true Passover meal of the New Covenant, through which God delivers us from the spiritual bondage of sin.

Here we must emphasize that these connections between the Old and the New—between the past, present and future—are not arbitrary. They are rooted in history according to the plan of God. In other words, the four senses of Scripture uncover the way things really are by revealing the great unity in God’s salvific plan as carried out in history.

Indeed, as the Catechism explains, “Thanks to the unity of God’s plan, not only the text of Scripture but also the realities and events about which it speaks can be signs” (no. 116). Cardinal Henri DeLubac affirms:

[I]f, for example, the manna is really the figure of the Eucharist, or if the sacrifice of the Paschal Lamb really prefigures the redemptive death, the reason for this is not extrinsic resemblance alone, no matter how striking this might be. There is actually an “inherent” continuity and “ontological bond” between the two facts, and this is due to the same divine will which is active in both situations and which, from stage to stage, is pursuing a single Design—the Design which is the real object of the Bible (The Sources of Revelation, 37).

You Can Use the Four Senses

No doubt, understanding the four senses of Scripture will transform your reading of the Bible. By using this Catholic approach to the Word of God, you can more easily overcome the distance of time and discover the intimate solidarity that exists between the people of God in the Bible and your life in the Catholic Church today.

With the four senses in mind, the Biblical narratives become much more than stories from the ancient past. Whether reading the accounts about Abraham, the temple or the flood, these age-old Biblical narratives can no longer be seen as far removed and detached from our lives today. Instead, they are intimately bound up with the present. As we saw above, the Passover is not merely a Jewish feast with little significance for Christians. Rather, it has become the essential backdrop for understanding the Eucharist. Similarly, as many spiritual writers have shown, Israel’s testing in the wilderness for 40 years is a model for the trials and purifications in the “spiritual desert” or “dark night” of the Christian life. Finally, the baptismal liturgy proclaims how the waters of the Red Sea and the Jordan River are not only instruments of redemption for the Israelites under Moses and Joshua, but also serve as preparations for understanding the truly redemptive waters of Baptism.

All these examples point to the fact that the same God who was fathering the ancient Israelites continues to work in similar ways with His children today. By calling our attention to the profound connections between the biblical world and the Christian life, the four senses of Scripture ultimately should lead us to our knees—to a deeper level of praise and thanksgiving for God’s magnificent story of salvation which He continues to write in the fabric of history and in our very lives.

Source [url="http://www.cuf.org/Faithfacts/details_view.asp?ffID=129"]http://www.cuf.org/Faithfacts/details_view.asp?ffID=129[/url]

Edited August 1, 2011 by tinytherese

[Amppax]

[quote name='tinytherese' timestamp='1312240598' post='2280000']

[b]Three Guidelines for Reading Scripture[/b]
People who are approaching the Bible for the first time may be surprised to discover that the Church offers us only three basic guidelines for reading it. These are:[indent]
1. Be especially attentive “to the content and unity of the whole Scripture”;
2. Read the Scripture within “the living tradition of the whole Church”; and,
3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith.[/indent]
In these deceptively simple guidelines are enfolded, like the oak tree in the acorn, the entire pattern for reading Scripture in a healthy way. Let's unpack them a bit.

[b]1. Be especially attentive “to the content and unity of the whole Scripture”.[/b] Scripture is often treated as a sort of "Treasury of Golden Quotes". It's not. In fact, as a general rule, the books of Scripture are coherent wholes. As in any book, each passage of Scripture relates to the passage preceding it and following it. Likewise, each paragraph and chapter. Moreoever, biblical writers will often have in mind other books of Scripture as they write. And so they will often allude to these other books with the expectation that we, as readers will "get" what they are referring to. So, for instance, when John the Baptist says, "Behold the Lamb of God" as he points to Jesus, he expects us to be completely familiar with the story of the Exodus and of the Passover Lamb, whose blood saves Israel from death. If we don't know that connection, we won't "get" what John means or, worse, we will think we understand him when we don't.

In other words, Scripture (because God is the Author) has a more-than-human unity to it. If you will, think of it as a single organism rather than as a collection of separate books, just as you think of a goldfish as a single thing and not as a collection of organs that happens to be fish-shaped.

[b]2. Read the Scripture within “the living tradition of the whole Church".[/b] Goldfish do not live in a vacuum. Neither does Scripture. Many people have the notion that the only way to get at what Scripture "really" means is by "peeling away Tradition". This is exactly like thinking you will get to know your goldfish better by peeling away all that interfering water and holding your fish in your hand. What you will find very soon is that your fish is dead. Same with Scripture, and for the same reason. Scripture is the result of the Sacred Tradition of the community that made it under the inspiration of the Spirit. Some people ask, "What right does the Church have to decide what goes in the Bible?" You may as well ask what right you have to decide what goes in your family photo album. Because Scripture is nothing other than the written testimony of what that Church believes and has experienced. Books that reflect those beliefs and experiences were (under the guidance of the Spirit) written and then preserved by the Church. Books that don't reflect this were not. Because of this, you can no more read Scripture apart from Tradition than you can talk to a person without air. Scripture is simply the written aspect of the Church's Tradition. It is written with the assumption that you are already eating, sleeping and breathing that Tradition. Which brings us to the last point:

[b]3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith.[/b] The Church has a genius for cloaking commonsense ideas in difficult jargon such as "the analogy of faith". Continuing our discussion from above, perhaps the best way to explain that "analogy of faith" means is to describe it as the "goldfish bowl of doctrine". Fish gotta swim and to do that, something has to hold the water. For the Church, doctrine does this. In other words, the "analogy of faith" refers to those doctrinal statements that summarize and symbolize what we believe.

After all, what's an "analogy"? It's a thing that's like something else. "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed" is an analogy. Likewise, a photo of my wife is an analog of my wife. It looks like her, but it's not her.

In the most famous instance of an "analogy of the Faith"--the Creed--we find that the Church has summarized the basics of what we have to confess if we say we are Christians. It's called the "analogy of faith" because, like all analogies, it looks like the object it describes but is not the same thing as that object. For when we say we "believe the Creed" we don't mean we think the Creed made us or redeemed us, but that the Creed describes the God who did.

With these three tools, then, we are set to begin looking at Scripture. However, as we will discover next week, these tools are going to enable us to see not just the surface of a vast ocean, but to peer into its unguessable depths.

Source [url="http://www.mark-shea.com/scrip2.html"]http://www.mark-shea.com/scrip2.html[/url]


[b]Making Sense Out of Scripture: the Four Best Kept Secrets in Biblical Studies Today[/b]


ISSUE: What are the four senses of scripture?

RESPONSE: Traditionally, there are four senses of Scripture, which are outlined in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, nos. 115-119:

1. Literal Sense: “[T]he meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture” (Catechism, no. 116), the actual event, person, thing described in the biblical text. The literal sense gives rise to the following three “spiritual senses.”

2. Allegorical Sense: How those things, events, or persons in the literal sense point to Christ and the Paschal Mystery.

3. Moral Sense: How the literal sense points to the Christian life in the Church.

4. Anagogical Sense: How the literal sense points to the Christian’s heavenly destiny and the last things.

DISCUSSION: Understanding the four senses of Scripture provides an interpretive key for unlocking many spiritual treasures in the Word of God. They can help one make vital connections between the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Catholic Faith, and individual spiritual life. With this approach, we see more clearly that the events and people mentioned in the Bible are intimately linked to our own Christian lives and serve as models for us to follow.

Although humans communicate primarily through words and actions, God communicates not only through His words and deeds (cf. Catechism, no. 1103), but also through the very things He has created. As St. Thomas Aquinas explained, “That God is the author of Holy Scripture should be acknowledged, and He has the power not only of adapting words to signify things (which human writers can also do), but also of adapting things themselves [to signify other things]” (Summa Theologiae I, 1, 10). In other words, because He is the Creator and the Lord of history, God not only communicates through the words of Scripture but He also gives special meaning to the things, people, and events mentioned in Scripture. He uses them as signs to tell us something about his plan of salvation. Because He inspired the human hand, this may occur even without the human author’s awareness.

A study of the Jerusalem temple provides a classic example to demonstrate the four senses of Scripture. In the literal sense, the temple was the actual building that once stood in Jerusalem. There, the Israelite priests offered sacrifice, the people worshipped, and God dwelt in the Holy of Holies.

This temple of the Old Testament has greater importance because God uses it as a sign to reveal important realities in the New Testament: Jesus and the Christian life. Allegorically, the temple points to Jesus, Who said He was the true temple which would be destroyed and raised up in three days (Jn. 2:19-21). Just as the Jerusalem temple was the place of sacrifice for the Jews, so does Jesus’ body house the everlasting sacrifice on Calvary for all humanity.

The moral sense of the temple is found in the Christian, whose body is “a temple of the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor. 6:19). Just as the temple contained the amesome presence of God, so do the bodies of Christians hold the presence of the Holy Spirit by virtue of their Baptism.

Anagogically, the Jerusalem temple finds its eschatological meaning in the heavenly sanctuary, where God will dwell among us in our eternal home, as described in Book of Revelation (e.g., Rev. 21:22).

This method of uncovering the four senses of Scripture is sometimes called spiritual exegesis, typology, or sensus plenior. Rooted in Catholic Tradition, many saints, doctors, Fathers of the Church, and even Jesus and the New Testament writers themselves used this method. Unfortunately, this spiritual exegesis has become somewhat of a lost art, with many modern scholars either downplaying or ignoring it. Nonetheless, with the Catechism of the Catholic Church and the Pontifical Biblical Commission recently calling our attention to the four senses of Scripture, there is likely to be a renewal in this rich approach to biblical interpretation.

“Something Greater is Here”: How Jesus Interpreted the Scriptures

Jesus Himself often viewed people and things of the Old Testament as signs which point to Him and shed light on His mission and identity. For example, Jesus refers to Jonah and the whale as prefiguring His own death and resurrection. “For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth…. Behold, something greater than Jonah is here” (Mt. 12:40-41).

Similarly, the New Testament writers understood how God uses things, people, and events of the Old Testament to tell us something about His saving plan. For example, St. Paul describes Adam as a “type” of Christ (Rom. 5:14)—a sign telling us about Jesus: “For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by one man’s obedience many will be made righteous” (Rom. 5:19). Indeed, Jesus is the “new Adam,” the father of a new humanity in grace, righteousness, and life (cf., Rom. 5:15-19).

A few other examples: St. Peter views Noah’s ark, which saved people during the waters of the flood, as shedding light on Baptism, which now saves Christians by our passing through the waters of the New Covenant (1 Pet. 3:20-21). Hebrews describes Israel’s tabernacle, high priest, and sacrifices as “a copy and shadow of the heavenly sanctuary” (Heb. 8:5). First Corinthians emphasizes how Israel’s experiences of trials and failures in the desert were recorded in Exodus, not for mere historical record, but to tell us something about the Christian life: “Now these things happened to them as a warning, but they were written down for our instruction” (1 Cor. 10:13).

Patristic Interpretation

The Church Fathers made constant recourse to the four senses of Scripture. They believed that because the Bible is God’s Word, everything in it must have some significance for readers today. One of the most common themes found in the Fathers’ practice of spiritual exegesis is the relationship between the Exodus event and Christian Baptism. Just as the Israelites escaped from slavery in Egypt, passed through the waters of the Red Sea and headed toward the Promised Land, so are Christians freed from the spiritual bondage of sin and death by passing through the waters of Baptism to begin their journey to the ultimate Promised Land, their heavenly home with Jesus for all eternity.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem beautifully elaborated on this theme in catechetical instructions for early Church “RCIA classes.” For example:

You must know that the symbol of Baptism is found in ancient history. . . . There [in the Exodus] we have Moses sent by God into Egypt; here [in Baptism] we have Christ sent by the Father into the world; there is need to free the oppressed people from Egypt, here to rescue men tyrannized over by sin in this world; there the blood of the lamb turns aside the Destroyer; here the Blood of the true Lamb, Jesus Christ, puts the demons to flight; there the tyrant pursues the people even into the sea; here the shameless and bold demon follows them even to the holy fountains; one tyrant is drowned in the sea, the other is destroyed in the water of salvation (as quoted in Jean Danielou, S.J., The Bible and the Liturgy, Notre Dame, IN, University of Notre Dame Press, 1956, 96).

Cultivating Orthodoxy

Cardinal Newman once said, “It may be almost laid down as an historical fact that the mystical interpretation [of using the four senses] and orthodoxy will stand or fall together.” Why would the four senses be so important to the Catholic Faith?

Discovering the connections between the Old Testament, Christ, and the Christian life shows the continuity in God’s plan of salvation. We see more clearly that from the very beginning—from Adam and Abraham to Moses and the prophets—God has been preparing humanity for Jesus Christ and the Catholic Church. That’s why studying the Old Testament is so important for understanding Jesus and many aspects of the Catholic Faith. Take, for example, the Old Covenant Passover lamb. In the literal sense, the paschal lamb was eaten by Israelite families as the central part of the yearly Passover meal, which commemorated Israel’s deliverance from slavery in Egypt. But the spiritual senses show how God used that lamb as a preparation for understanding Jesus on the cross as the true paschal sacrifice and for understanding the Eucharist as the true Passover meal of the New Covenant, through which God delivers us from the spiritual bondage of sin.

Here we must emphasize that these connections between the Old and the New—between the past, present and future—are not arbitrary. They are rooted in history according to the plan of God. In other words, the four senses of Scripture uncover the way things really are by revealing the great unity in God’s salvific plan as carried out in history.

Indeed, as the Catechism explains, “Thanks to the unity of God’s plan, not only the text of Scripture but also the realities and events about which it speaks can be signs” (no. 116). Cardinal Henri DeLubac affirms:

[I]f, for example, the manna is really the figure of the Eucharist, or if the sacrifice of the Paschal Lamb really prefigures the redemptive death, the reason for this is not extrinsic resemblance alone, no matter how striking this might be. There is actually an “inherent” continuity and “ontological bond” between the two facts, and this is due to the same divine will which is active in both situations and which, from stage to stage, is pursuing a single Design—the Design which is the real object of the Bible (The Sources of Revelation, 37).

You Can Use the Four Senses

No doubt, understanding the four senses of Scripture will transform your reading of the Bible. By using this Catholic approach to the Word of God, you can more easily overcome the distance of time and discover the intimate solidarity that exists between the people of God in the Bible and your life in the Catholic Church today.

With the four senses in mind, the Biblical narratives become much more than stories from the ancient past. Whether reading the accounts about Abraham, the temple or the flood, these age-old Biblical narratives can no longer be seen as far removed and detached from our lives today. Instead, they are intimately bound up with the present. As we saw above, the Passover is not merely a Jewish feast with little significance for Christians. Rather, it has become the essential backdrop for understanding the Eucharist. Similarly, as many spiritual writers have shown, Israel’s testing in the wilderness for 40 years is a model for the trials and purifications in the “spiritual desert” or “dark night” of the Christian life. Finally, the baptismal liturgy proclaims how the waters of the Red Sea and the Jordan River are not only instruments of redemption for the Israelites under Moses and Joshua, but also serve as preparations for understanding the truly redemptive waters of Baptism.

All these examples point to the fact that the same God who was fathering the ancient Israelites continues to work in similar ways with His children today. By calling our attention to the profound connections between the biblical world and the Christian life, the four senses of Scripture ultimately should lead us to our knees—to a deeper level of praise and thanksgiving for God’s magnificent story of salvation which He continues to write in the fabric of history and in our very lives.

Source [url="http://www.cuf.org/Faithfacts/details_view.asp?ffID=129"]http://www.cuf.org/F...ew.asp?ffID=129[/url]
[/quote]

tl;dr. But amesome. definitely going to go back and read this when i'm more awake.

[RezaMikhaeil]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' timestamp='1311305141' post='2273454']
This can't end well.
[/quote]

That's the truth... so here it goes...

I'm not Roman Catholic becasue I do not agree remotely with the 'Charismatic Catholic' heresy [yes I used that term because I believe it to be so] and because of the Roman Catholic's initial response to Galileo's scientific discoveries.

I'm also not fond of Mother Theresa and Thomas Moore [the patron saint of politicians].

Edited August 3, 2011 by RezaMikhaeil

[Nihil Obstat]

[quote name='RezaMikhaeil' timestamp='1312390633' post='2280904']

That's the truth... so here it goes...

I'm not Roman Catholic becasue I do not agree remotely with the 'Charismatic Catholic' heresy [yes I used that term because I believe it to be so] and because of the Roman Catholic's initial response to Galileo's scientific discoveries.

I'm also not fond of Mother Theresa and Thomas Moore [the patron saint of politicians].
[/quote]
Mother Teresa I can understand. I think I interpret those things differently, and therefore I rather like her, but I think I know where you're coming from.
What don't you like about St. Thomas More though? I don't know a lot about him, to be honest, so I'm just curious.

[RezaMikhaeil]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' timestamp='1312392808' post='2280914']
Mother Teresa I can understand. I think I interpret those things differently, and therefore I rather like her, but I think I know where you're coming from.
What don't you like about St. Thomas More though? I don't know a lot about him, to be honest, so I'm just curious.
[/quote]

I'm a scholar when it comes to Thomas More but from what I know of him, he opposed and persecuted people who wanted to read the bible in their native language. He was made into a Saint by the Roman Catholic Church. He's the patron saint of politicians [go figure]. However he is really a minor point compared to the Charismatic Catholic Heresy. If the Roman Catholic Church took a stand against that, I'd say that I'd probably be 50% closer to, as someone else put it, "joining the tribe".

[Nihil Obstat]

[quote name='RezaMikhaeil' timestamp='1312393033' post='2280916']
I'm a scholar when it comes to Thomas More but from what I know of him, he opposed and persecuted people who wanted to read the bible in their native language. He was made into a Saint by the Roman Catholic Church. He's the patron saint of politicians [go figure]. However he is really a minor point compared to the Charismatic Catholic Heresy. If the Roman Catholic Church took a stand against that, I'd say that I'd probably be 50% closer to, as someone else put it, "joining the tribe".
[/quote]
I'd have to do some serious research before I could address More, unfortunately.
With regards to the "charismatic movement"....... well I'm not going to say too much, but I will say that I'm rather closer to your perspective than some others here. Have you perhaps read the current pope's book Spirit of the Liturgy? He offers what I consider to be an airtight refutation of all the bad aspects of "charismatic worship".

[Lil Red]

there are old threads about st. thomas more, you'd just have to search. i think both winnie and don john addressed st. thomas more's actions.

[RezaMikhaeil]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' timestamp='1312393340' post='2280920']
I'd have to do some serious research before I could address More, unfortunately.
With regards to the "charismatic movement"....... well I'm not going to say too much, but I will say that I'm rather closer to your perspective than some others here. Have you perhaps read the current pope's book Spirit of the Liturgy? He offers what I consider to be an airtight refutation of all the bad aspects of "charismatic worship".
[/quote]

I haven't read it yet and would very much be interested in reading what he has to say about it for sure. I'd very much welcome him to condemn the bad aspects but for me unfortunately that doesn't go far enough. I think that condemning the the practices altogether would be in line and who knows, maybe he will. Maybe he's waiting for a special time to do it, or trying to be gentle about it. I dunno.
[quote name='Lil Red' timestamp='1312393507' post='2280922']
there are old threads about st. thomas more, you'd just have to search. i think both winnie and don john addressed st. thomas more's actions.
[/quote]

If only I had time to search....

[Lil Red]

i'm trying to get ready for a trip, otherwise i'd try to find it. sorry!

[Nihil Obstat]

[quote name='RezaMikhaeil' timestamp='1312393779' post='2280926']
I haven't read it yet and would very much be interested in reading what he has to say about it for sure. I'd very much welcome him to condemn the bad aspects but for me unfortunately that doesn't go far enough. I think that condemning the the practices altogether would be in line and who knows, maybe he will. Maybe he's waiting for a special time to do it, or trying to be gentle about it. I dunno.
[/quote]
Well basically he addresses how Catholics view true worship, and then how certain types of inappropriate or false worship can mistakenly creep in and why they are so inappropriate for Catholicism. He contrasts the Greek cults of Apollo and Dionysus, and why Appolo's cult could be considered a prefiguring of legitimate Christian worship, whereas Dionysus represents false worship and inwardly-focused orientation.

[Lil Red]

here's one: http://www.phatmass.com/phorum/index.php?showtopic=88533&hl=%2Bthomas+%2Bmore&fromsearch=1

[RezaMikhaeil]

[quote name='Lil Red' timestamp='1312393974' post='2280931']
i'm trying to get ready for a trip, otherwise i'd try to find it. sorry!
[/quote]

What kind of Christian are you? Seriously, I demand that you put your trip on hold ...schedule it for another day , so that you can answer my question.

[RezaMikhaeil]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' timestamp='1312394070' post='2280933']
Well basically he addresses how Catholics view true worship, and then how certain types of inappropriate or false worship can mistakenly creep in and why they are so inappropriate for Catholicism. He contrasts the Greek cults of Apollo and Dionysus, and why Appolo's cult could be considered a prefiguring of legitimate Christian worship, whereas Dionysus represents false worship and inwardly-focused orientation.
[/quote]

And that is a very good start. I believe that is one of the central roots of the whole "charismatic" movement. I mean what I have always loved about the early church [weather Coptic like I am or Roman Catholic] is that G-d tells us how to worship. That, in my opinion, is polar opposite from the Charismatic groups, outside of their beliefs not being supported by a single verse in the Bible, early church fathers writings, etc.

[Nihil Obstat]

[quote name='RezaMikhaeil' timestamp='1312395633' post='2280950']
And that is a very good start. I believe that is one of the central roots of the whole "charismatic" movement. I mean what I have always loved about the early church [weather Coptic like I am or Roman Catholic] is that G-d tells us how to worship. That, in my opinion, is polar opposite from the Charismatic groups, outside of their beliefs not being supported by a single verse in the Bible, early church fathers writings, etc.
[/quote]
I'm tending to agree with this, with minor caveats that I don't think are necessary to specify right now.

[RezaMikhaeil]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' timestamp='1312395740' post='2280951']
I'm tending to agree with this, with minor caveats that I don't think are necessary to specify right now.
[/quote]

Yes, my comments will probably open up a can of worms followed by a gigantic backlash that results in my death but what else is new? This is phatmass...