New Britain herald., 1923-12-10

i their message to dead book, which
 might perish and be destroyed and be misunderstood and misinterpreted, and corrupted. but adopt the more safe and natural way of presenting the truth to them by word of mouth, and of training others to do the same, after they themselves were gone, and so by q living tradition
 preserving and handing down the word of God as they had received it to all generations.
 This is exactly what the apostles did. Only five out of the 12 wrote down anything at all that is preserv- ed to us, and of that not q line was penned till at least 10 years after the death of Christ, for Jesus Christ was crucified in S3 AID. Now it logically the New Testament books was not written till 45 AID. Now it logically follows that the church and the faith founded by our Lord existed before the Bible. Thousands of people be- came Christians. through the work of the apostles and missionaries of Christ in various lands. and believed the whole truth of God, as we believe it now, and became saints, before ever they saw or read single sentence of inspired scripture of the New Testa- ment for the simple reason that such scripture did not exist.
 How then did they become Chris tians? In the same way that pagans become Catholics nowadays, by hear ing the truth of God from the lips of Christs missionaries. When the 12 apostles met together in Jerusalem, and portioned out the known world among themselves for purposes of evangelization, allotting one country to one apostle Gas India to St. Thom- as), and another to another, how did they propose to evangeize these peo- pie? By presenting each one with a New Testament? Such a thing did not exist, and I may safely say was not even thought of. Why did our Lord promise them the gift of the Holy Ghost and command them to be witnesses of Him? And why, in fact, did the Holy Ghost come down upon the twelve and endow them with the power of speaking in various lan- guagcs? Whq but that they might he able to preach the gospel to every creature in the tongue of every crea- ture.
 At first the apostles never thought of writing the New Testament; tho books of the New Testament were pro- duced and called forth by special cir cumstances that arose, were written ,n moot partaio Jamopds ond a,,,a. gencies. Nothing was further from the minds Of the apostles and evan gelists, than the idea of composing works, which should be collected and formed into one volume, and so con stitute the Holy Book of the Chris tians
 And we can imagine St. Paul staring in amazement if he had been told that his epistles and st. Peters and st. Johns and the others would be tied ID together and elevated into the position of complete and ey- haustiye statement Of the doctrines of Christianity, to be placed in each mans hands as an easy and infallible guide in faith and morals, independ- ent Of any living and teaching author ity to interpret them.
 No one would have been more shocked at the idea of his letters usurping the place of the anthorata. tive teacher. the church, than the great apostle who himself said How shah they hear without a preacher? How shall they preach unless they be sent? Faith cometh by hearing. and hearing by the word of Christ
 ''Such is tho proper perspective in the study Of the Holy Scripture. The church has preserved and guarded the sacred writing from the beginning and ir WI have the Bible today then we must thank her for this priceless treasure.
 ''Thc Bible was written uhe New TcstamcntD by the church, by mem. bcfs tapostles and evangeists, her first priestsl, if is her book par rNcellcncc. and hence it belong to her 10 interpret and declare what it means. II is intended for instruc. ton. meditation. spiritual reading. en. couragement. devotion and also serves as proof and testimony of the church's doctrine and divine authority; but as 2 complete and exclusive guide to heaven. in the hands Of every man tbfs il t1et+rr Nag and nnxrr coNtd bp i"