The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1918-03-09
Continued from page IL
THE WORD OF GOD

lHE WUKD UF GUD
plane with the Master. 81 have
called you friends because all
things whatsoever | have heard of
| My Father l have made known to
you On. XIV, 15). Faith commune
Gates that greatness by which we
grasp as far as needs be the grandeur
Of God and the glory Of Christ. In
the words of st. Paul, it is the il
lumiEcd eyes Of the mind" Far be-
yond the glance OF the eye or the
flash of the intellect is this penetrat-
ing vision of faith. We see by the
light of the stars and we see. by the
light of the moon, but in such light
al things are only dimly outlined.
Only when the sun rises does all ma
ture put on her gorgeous mantle Of
color. Like to the sunlight in COM
paris0n with other light is the light
of faith in comparison with that OF
reason. In its cffulgence the prophets
saw all the attributes of the Living
God; in this light Peter saw the har-
mOnious blending Of Christ's person,
words and works and confessed:
Thou art Christ the Son of the Liv-
ing God Men of faith are the true
supcTmen of the world.
The Written Word Holy, cut Lifecss.
The greatest seers, Abraham, Isaac,
Jacob, Elias, Our Lord Jesus Christ
wrote nothing. In other cases God
moved His prophet to write and CO.
operated in the writing. Thus we have
the Bible-the written word of God.
This written word is like those relics
Of the saints which are venerable be-
cause the Spirit of God passed through
them and because on the last day they
will put on life again. The Bible like
wise was touched with the breath of
God and, Interpreted by another
prophet, it's words once more live with
truth. But there never was and never
could be any other system Of getting
the fulnoss of the word of God from
the Bible save by a prophet. Moses
the first writer relied on Providence
to raise up another prophet like to
himself to interpret his books. Christ,
the only prophet Who in His Own
right possessed the Spirit, seat His
Holy Spirit on the Church to remain
forever. He thereby made the Church
alone the prophecies of the New Law.
His followers were to visit with the
greatest loathing of all loathing, the
lcathing that the Jews had for the
heather and the publican, those who
would not hear the Church. This pro-
vision in view of the limitless freedom
which God allows to His creatures was
profoundly necessary. If Satan attempt
ed to mis-apply the written word, man
instigated bys Satan would no doubt
make the same attempt. AS a mat
ter Of fact he has made countless such
attempts, but two great systematic ag-
grCssionS against the written word
stand out in history. Let us brief
ly recall them.
The Last Days of the Temple.
On the hill of Sion there arose a
temple, spacious, stately and awe-in-
spring. It's solemn and gorgeous GER
emonial far outstripped all the ,relig-
iOUs solemnities of the pagan
world. Here the law of God was never
more punctiliously observed down
to the most minute detail, as Hebrew
traditions tell us, than when this
stately edifice was on the brink Of
ruin. Never likewise was there a
greater concourse of worshippers,-it
was world-temple. Hither even pa
gan princes and emperors sent their
hccatombs of victims. But it was es-
pecially the loadstoneN of the pilgrims
Of the Jewish Dispersion,-the chill
dren of Israel from every nation under
Heaven. Hither ParthianS and
Modes and Edamites and inhabitants
of Mesopotamia, Judea, Cappadocia,
Pontus and Asia, Phrygia, Pamphilia
and Egypt, the strangers of Rome,
proselytes, Cretes and Arabians came
to offer sacrifice to the true God. Day
and night the light was ever burning,
day after day countless victims were
offered, SO that nothing to the Jew was
SO venerable as his temple. Yet with
all this worship so exact and so conf
plete and so frequented God was ut
terly displeased. Why? Because the
scribe had taken the place of the
prophet, the letter had taken the place
of the Spirit, outward ceremonial
though ordained by God instead OF
manifesting had crushed all inner
worship. The law thus observed was
but an outline, a shadow of the things
to come. The exclusion of the people
from the holy of HOLES was a simili-
tude of this greater exclusion from
God brought about by the loss OF the
Spirit. l say similitude not figure;
for figures are of the better things not
of the worse. The transcendently bet
ter things prefgured by the entrance
of the High Priest into the holy OF
holes had come to pass when beyond
this temple on high Christ the eternal
priest had by His Own blood entered
the tabernacle not made with hands.
Thus the inspiring part of Jewish
worship having been fulfilled in Christ
and the foreboding part having fallen
tbro,,ol, loco IF tho cnirif into dnpOpT