The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1903-05-23
CHURCH AND BIBLE.


The old and untrue claim that the
Catholic church has kept the Bible
from the people is still heard from
Professionals despite the fact that his
tory as it is beginning to be written
in the twentieth century is giving us
some of the truth so long withheld. |
catholic scholarship has been under
rated in the past, and some OF the ar
guments that have been used against
the church's relation to the Bible now !
appear to be so ridiculous that Catho-
lies are content to ignore them and
permit Professionals to do all the refu-
tation Atheists and agnostics of the
present day are doing some good in
the world The history they are
writing is free from Protestant preju |
dices, and the Catholic church is be-
ginning to come into its own.
To begin with the church's relation
to the Bible, it is necessary to go back
to the fifteenth century. Printing was
not invented until 1888, and prior TO
that time the number of Bibles in the
world was necessarily small. The
church is doing it's utmost, however,
to increase the number. The ceaseless
work in the scriptorium of the early
monasteries testifies to this fact. Men
and women we're kept copying Bibles
from morning till night, the beautiful
story being told of a German nun
whose feat of writing out two whole
Bibles was regarded with such ven
Grafton that it was inscribed on her
tombstone. If the church in the be-
ginning was opposed to the Bible,
why did it take such pains to have it
preserved?
The Bible, however, has never been
regarded by the church as the only
source of truth, and it is on this point
that it differs with the teachings of
Martin Luther. When Christ came to
earth, he came to teach a message
from the Father, and the early Chris
tians received the faith long before
the New Testament was written. II
Christ wanted the Bible to be made
the foundation of the faith, he would
have been forced to invent printing
several centuries earlier than it was.
This was clearly not his desire, yet
Luther ordained to his followers that
! if they wanted to know what Christ
taught they would have to have re-
course to the Bible.
A STACY and melodramatic story is
told by French historian of Luther's
discovery of the Bible-how he came
upon it hid away among dusty tones
in the library of his monastery, how
he exclaimed fervently, "This is the
word of God, and it is being kept from
the people," and how finally he
launched his reformation with the
principal object in view of dissent
mating the word of God among the
people. That this story is pure fic-
ton l will attempt to prove to you by
the following prospectus sent out by
the firm which published Jacobs
Life of Luther" firm which has al
ways been regarded as eminently a
partisan in Protestant way.
The prospectus said that the work
would have none of the eulogistic
narrative on Luther which figured in
D'Aubigne's history, the one referred
to, but would be critical biography.
Statutes enacted during the reign of
Henry VIII. forbid ANY woman, ex-
cepting gentlewomen, journeymen ar
tificers or apprentices" from reading
the Bible. Buckingham's "The People
in the Middle Ages" tells how st. Dun
stan, as penance for an offense COM
mitted by King Edgar, made him dis
tribute 108 copies of the Bible in the
Ivernacular among his people
History, as said before, is begin
ming to tell the truth, and facts like
these are becoming known. The most
interesting affair in some time was
the recent sermon of a Protestant
clergyman of Brooklyn, who quoted
the Pope's opinion in support of the
Bible. Imagine Protestant clergy
man holding up the Pope of Rome as
an authority on the Bible, the book
that the church had hitherto always
been accused of suppressing! 1t is
enough to make Martin Luther turn
! in his grave.
AS matter of fact, it is the
Protestant church that is daily be-
coming more hostile to the Bible In
different sects are tearing it apart
page by page, and if they keep on
little will be left between the covers
The Rev. DR.. de Costa made this his
principal reason for renouncing Prot
estantism. The Catholic church, on
the other hand, while it has never ac-
cepted the Bible as the foundation of
faith, has ever been ready to defend
it. Christ told his diciples to go forth
and preach, and there was no st. Pc
ters printing company organized
when they began the propagation of
the faith. The clergy of the Catholic
church, as the lawful successors of
these disciples, are carrying on the
same propagation.-Rev. Father Par
dow, in Catholic Home COMPANION.