South Bend news-times., 1914-10-14

10 decide what are and what are not
70 be accepted IS divinelv inspired.
Ihere are p books in the Old and
New Testament which we regard as
sacred and canOnical on the au-
thority Of the church we say these
writing are inspired by the Holy
Ghost
The word sacred used in connec-
ton with the scripture does not mean
merely that they contain holy things,
that they tell US Of Christ and the
prophets and so forth; that they en-
body beautiful moral teaching: but
it means that these books we call
sacred have God for their author.
Briefly put, our belief in the divine
authorship consists in this:
God makes a man write what He
wishes to be written. He gives the
writer an impulse to record certain
matters; secondly. He suggests the
contents of the revelation of the mind
of the scribe.
Spirit Aids Writer.
The writer may not at the time
realize that he is inspired. He may.
as in the case of St. Luke. write what
ing been himself an eyewitness of
what he relates thirdly, we claim
that the Spirit of God assists the writ
er and keeps him from recording
what Is erroneous. At the same time
we do not believe that God dictates
verbally. as one dictates to his
amanuesis, what a man shall write
The evangelists and other sacred
writer's were free. intelligent agents.
n
man wrote in a far different literary
style from another. Take st. Peter
and st. Paul for example The for
mer, pOorly-taught fisherman, could
not bring to his task the grace and
polish of st. Paul. trained in the
school Of Tarsus. There are verbal
differences, likewise, in the accounts
of the evangelists, in the narratives
of the Lords supper, the resurrection
and other events. These minor dis
crepancies do not destroy the integrity
of the sacred volume
Accepts Whole Bible.
The Catholic church accepts in it's
entiretv the contents Of the Old and
New Testament. The church alone
voicing for us the divine, infallible
teaching of Christ, guarantees the au-
thenticity and inspiration Of the p
books that are comprised i'm our bible
OUTSIDE churches have omitted from
the Old Testament seven books. In
the early centuries. even in the time
Of Our Lord, there were differences
among the Jews regarding what con-
Stituted the Old Testament. Books
regarded as inspired by one class
were rejected by another. The He
brew canon of the Jews of Palestine
differed from the Greek version of
the Jews of Alexandria. the latter
containing in addition TO the books Of
Tobias, Judith. Wisdom. EcClesiaStic-
us. Baruch I. and H., Macha bees. The
Jews in Palestine did not look upon
these books as divine. The early
Christians entertained doubts and diff
ferences regarding the sacred char
acter of seven books of the New
Testament that are now included in
the canonical writings. They classed
as doubtful Peters second epistle to
the Hebrews, Johns second and third
epistles, st. James, st. Jude and the
Apocalypse. Other books that the
councils of the church later rejected
were looked upon by the Christians
of those days a sacred as, for ex-
ample, the epistle Of Barnabas. the
Doctrine of the Twelve, and others.
These were most devout books that
men of their own knowledge could
not distinguish from the inspired writ
ings, yet they are not now i'm the
Scriptures"