I’ve been thoroughly enjoying a blog series over at Reformation 21 called “The Vatican Files,” written by an evangelical Italian. You can read the whole post (the fourth installment, and they’ve all been good) at: The Vatican Files N. 4
He’s writing about a new document emitted by the Pope, called Verbum Domini (VD). The following paragraph really struck me as pointing out a huge problem for the Catholic Church, especially the sentences I highlighted in blue.
Secondly, the "eccesial" [sic] reading of the Bible. According to VD, Scripture must never be read on one’s own. Reading must be always an "ecclesial experience", i.e. something done in communion with the Church. The issue at stake is not only methodological, as if private readings were to be replaced by study groups at a parish level presided over by a priest, but also hermeneutical. "An authentic interpretation of the Bible must always be in harmony with the faith of the Catholic Church" (30). Reading the Bible needs to be an exercise done in accordance with the institutional church, both in its forms and outcomes. Apparently, there is much wisdom in these statements, especially considering the real risks of fancy, individualistic, awkward interpretations by isolated readers of the Bible. Yet, there is something missing here. For a Church that has forbidden for centuries the reading of the Bible in vernacular languages, it is at least unfortunate that not a single word of repentance is offered. For a Church that has prevented the people from having access to the Bible until fifty years ago, it is at least puzzling that not a single word is spent to underline the Church’s need for self-correction and vigilance. Moreover, if reading the Bible must always be done under the rule of the institution, what happens if the institution itself is caught in error, heresy or apostasy? How does the Spirit correct a sinful church if not by the biblical Word? In the history of the Church, the teaching of the Bible had to sometimes be played against the institutional church and against its consensus. Only a self-proclaimed indefectible Church can ask total submission to "the watchful eye of the sacred magisterium" (45) without having a final, ultimate bar. Here at stake is the question: Who has the final word? The Bible or the RC Church? Since the Church is "the home of the word" (52), VD responds: the latter!
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi!
I’m a swedish guy that stumbled accross your site since I’ve been planning
to go to the area you live in now through my work, Santa Marta, right?
Anyway, as I’m brought up in a protestant country and many of my friends
are biblical scholars I’m kind of interested in the way you read,or rather-the
way this italian guy reads- Dei Verbum.
If we are talking about the same document, then it really isn’n new at all.
It was published in the 1960-ies.
Nevertheless, some things are interesting.
One thing is, what do we lay in our biblical understanding of what the
Church is, another, what is intended with the institution,also what does this
italian guy mean when he depicts institution and church.
See, I think ou have to look carefully here so you don’t draw conclusions
that aren’t really warranted by our Bible.
Hope you have a good time down there, I remember when my kids were
about the same age as yours-we had such a good time.
All the best,
Matthew
Hi Matthew,
Thanks for your comment. You were right about Dei Verbum… I made a mistake, and it should be Verbum Domini. It’s now changed in the post.
To understand the paragraph I copied from the article you really need to read the whole original article. What he’s saying is that the Roman Catholic Church says that the Church as institution is the final authority about matters of faith or practice (a position they’ve held for a long time… at least since the Council of Trent). The problem that he points out is what can they do when the Church as institution needs to be reformed? They have no other authority with which to judge the authority. In contrast, the Protestant or evangelical position says that the Bible is the ultimate authority because it is God’s Word. Therefore, it can always correct our errors. It serves as a “norming norm” to use the technical term. We shouldn’t throw out church history, but any theological or practical position is always open to review in light of God’s Word.
Blessings,
Jonathan
Hey guys!
I’ve identified the document you were referring to, a recent one from 2010, a what they call an ” Exhortation “, following some sort of meeting which carries some weight for them.
You have to watch it though, they differ from each other as documents and my lawschool years tell me to pay attention to these details as they might turn up later unexpectedly in an evaluation of matters discussed.
Thanks for the tip on reading the whole article.
I think one paramount question is here how they see their relation to the Bible.
Church is there when the Bible isn’t, if I’m not misrepresenting their teaching.
Anyway, it certainly isn’t the Bible we know in protestant Scandinavia.
Take care,
Matthew
Another straw man argument against those big bad Catholics. If you are going to rant against the Church, at least have the courtesy to rant about what they actually believe and teach, not some bogeyman invented by twisting a few quotes to make it sound like something you wish it did.
Catholics do NOT believe the Word should be interpreted under the authority of a human institution. They believe and teach that we stand under the Word and hear the Word under the guidance of the speaker Himself. Catholics believe that Christ Himself gave us a guide to prevent us from interpreting the Word wrongly. We accept Christ’s authority and joyfully interpret His word, knowing he will correct us if we, though our own sin, mess it up.
Catholics do NOT claim to know everything. We believe that God’s promise to never leave us is partly fulfilled by Christ guiding us by His Spirit, internally and partly, (as all true Christians confess in the creeds), through His “one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.”
Ironically, Catholics explicitly say that the Pope has no authority to change anything. He can only define, clarify or confirm things that were believed from the very beginning. Things that were believed and practiced before the words of the New Testament even hit the page! Evangelicals, on the other hand, denounce the Church’s restrained claim to authority and declare themselves a far greater authority than any pope has ever claimed.
Evangelicals can justify all manner of new foolishness with their interpretations without the slightest concern that their interpretations contradict 1500-2000 years of Christian interpretation. No pope has done so, no pope claims the authority to do so.
The reason people despise the pope’s claim to authority so much is NOT that he contradicts the word, but that he is the voice fo Christ that calls them back to listen to what it ACTUALLY says, and has said for 2000 years or more, rather than what they would LIKE it to say.
Hi Peter,
Thank you for leaving your comment on our website. I was a little surprised by a few of your comments. For example, I don’t see anywhere where I am ranting against the Church. I was only pointing out what seems to be a problem with their view of the authority vested in the hierarchy of the Church. I admit that I am not an expert in Catholicism, but I do read the Catechism and have read works by Catholic theologians. I also work in a country that is predominantly Catholic, so I understand something of the Catholic faith from personal experience. I would mention that I have many Catholic friends whom I care about deeply. I will make a few comments about your comments below.
I take the Catechism as a faithful representation of Catholic theology. In section 85, it says:
In your opinion you may say that this is the authority of Christ, but according to the Catechism that authority rests in the bishops and the Pope. As the author of the blog I quoted asks, what happens if there’s a problem in the interpretation of those men? Since they hold the final authority, it seems to me that they cannot be legitimately questioned from within the Catholic system of thought.
You say:
I am interested in this claim. There are many doctrines I could ask you about, but I’ll choose one. How do you explain the development of Marian devotion and her role in redemption over the course of the centuries? As far as I understand, the dogma of the Immaculate Conception came in the year 1854 and the dogma of the Assumption of Mary in 1950. I would argue that there is not a shread of evidence for these dogmas in Scripture or in the early centuries of the Church. I think that these dogmas arose from a belief in the “fittingness” of these doctrines (Colombians have asked me, “Wouldn’t you want the best for your mother?”). Again, what controls does the Catholic Church have on their interpretation of God’s revelation?
You say:
As an evangelical, I agree that we can TRY to justify all manner of foolishness, but we have an enduring authority outside of ourselves, the Scriptures, which continually critique our theology. I agree that many evangelicals have not paid attention to church history and for that reason have fallen into errors. Others have tried to be Lone Ranger interpreters, but our interpretation should come within the context of a relationship with our local church, and pastors should be in contact with the work of biblical scholars, church historians, etc. to arrive at a better understanding of the Word of God. The point is that churches can fall away from faithful obedience to God’s Word, but since we believe in the sufficiency and authority of Scripture we can always be convicted and corrected by it.
At any rate, these theological divides are great, but the most important matter is found in what Paul tells Timothy:
The Bible teaches that salvation comes when we understand the gospel. As Tim Keller says, the gospel is good news, not good advice. It is not “do this and do that,” but “It is done!” Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, was buried, and rose again the third day. He lived a perfect life and died in our place on the cross. If we recognize our sin and repent of it, placing our faith in the perfect, once for all sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we will be saved.
Thanks again for writing,
Jonathan
Thank you for your thoughtful answer Jonathon. As is often the case in eccumenical dialogue the problem is more about confusion in translation than actual willful misrepresentation. I was raised an active evangelical, served as an ordained minister in the Lutheran Church and have now been a Catholic for a decade so I have the benefit of ‘speaking the lingo’ of a wide range of Christian traditions. The trouble is that, when Catholics use certain key words and phrases, Evangelicals understand them to mean something different. We are using the same words but working with different dictionaries.
An example is the quote you picked from the Catechism (there are a number of other quotes that would better explain the Catholic position). You insist that it places human or institutional authority over Christs. Let us look at the quote again.
“Its authority in this matter is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ.” This means that the task of interpretation has been entrusted to the bishops in communion with the successor of Peter, the Bishop of Rome.”
Firstly, in ALL ancient theology, beginning a millenia and a half before the Protestants were a twinkle in Martin Luthers eye, and even to this day in mainstream theology, to exersize authority “in the name of” Christ is a specific theological phrase which encapsulates the entire idea that Christ’s authority has been given (in some small part) to His apostles, who passed on this grave responsibility (with the grace of God that goes with it) on to selected others by laying on of hands. In other words, this is Christ’s authority, exersized through a human agent. Not the human agent presuming to act as God.
The second sentence claims that this authority “has been entrusted” in Peter and his successors. You seem to assume that the use of the passive voice here refers to the Church or some other human authority entrusting Christ’s authority to another human agent. This makes absolutely no sense within the context of that passage. The Catholic writers here are clearly using a divine passive (after the manner of Sacred Scripture) to indicate that it was Christ Himself who entursted this authority to Peter and the apostles.
Now, we can debate whether Christ did, in fact, entrust any part of his authority to men. It will be a short debate since Christ states it explicitly in the Gospels, and was upheld by all the surviving writings of the early Christians. We might have a longer discussion about how Christ’s authority is manifest among his people in the modern world and THIS, I believe, is a fruitful discussion which both Catholics and Protestants will benefit from.
It is one thing to debate this assumption, yet quite another to assume that it is false and critique the Catholic Church’s position AS IF they believe what you do but consciously continue to assert human authority over Christ.
Catholics are completely open to genuine theological discussion on the matter of Catholic and evangelical assertions. My beef here is with a lack of charity (perhaps by oversight) in the interpretation of Catholic positions which breaks the command not to bear false witness, and undermines the debate.
PS: I have not forgotten your prompt to “explain the development of Marian devotion and her role in redemption over the course of the centuries.” it is an excellent question and will provide a good way of looking at the development of doctrine as Catholics understand it.
The most complete answer would be to refer you to an excellent trilogy written by an ex-Evangelical, Mark Shea titled “Mary, Mother of the Son.” He gathers all the relevant dogmas into one place and manages to provide the Catholic teachings in language both Catholics and Protestants can understand.
Come to think of it, another of Mark Shea’s books “By what authority?” would probably help explain the question of authority we have been discussing so far.
Hi Peter,
I understand the Catholic beliefs that you are mentioning. For example, I know that you believe that the pope and bishops exercise the authority of Christ. I was not trying to say that you believe that the institutional authority is over Christ’s; rather my comment was directed towards a question I asked that you still have not answered. Assuming for the sake of argument that the pope and bishops have the authority of Christ, how does Christ correct them if they go wrong?
I agree that Christ entrusted some sense of delegated authority to the apostles, but I would argue that no where do we find in Scripture that that authority would be handed down to succesors, especially in the church of Rome. It’s interesting to study in church history how the church in Rome came to prominence. It was definitely a gradual process, and if it weren’t for the decline of a number of the other important Christian centers (Alexandria or Jerusalem for example), the Roman church would not have been able to assert her authority so easily. As it stands, the Eastern church never accepted the authority of Rome. What argument would you give to say they are wrong and Catholicism is right?
Thanks for the dialogue,
Jonathan
Would you consider Shea’s book the best I could read? I’ve also been recommended books by Peter Kreeft and Scott Hahn also. Just wondering…
Dear Jonathan,
Bishops can get it wrong. They have done so often. The Catholic teaching is that they can be relied upon ONLY when they teach in accordance with the teachings past down from Christ himself. Which, as far as I can tell, is pretty much the evangelical position on leaders as well.
The Pope can, and has been, wrong in his ordinary teaching or decisions but the whole point of the Petrine office is that, when the Pope speaks on behalf of Christ, in his official role as the successor of St Peter, that Christ himself has promised to prtect him from teaching formal error. It does not mean that the way he communicates the truth cannot be improved on in later generations, nor that he has expressed the entirity of the truth. Only that he has been protected from formal error, as Christ promised.
This is a rarely exersized authority. JPII who was Pope for 26+ years only made 3 such statements. And I suspect two of those would be considered ‘no brainers’ by Evangelicals (never OK to kill the innocent and never OK to do evil to achieve good.) Most of the time (and I really do mean MOST of the them time) we rely on the everyday common sense of the faithful in reading the Word, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, but insisting that God does not change his mind. That is, anything God has revealed to us cannot be undone. What the early Church believed and taught as absoloute must be adhered to and followed now.
As St Ignatius said, want to know what the genuine Christian teaching is? Look to the bishop. Do you have two people claiming to be bishop in your place? Look to the one in communion with the successor of St Peter.
In answer to you questions about Kreeft, Hahn etc. Kreeft puts things in Catholic laymans language, but might be a bit lightweight for you (if my guess at your ability based on your writing is correct). Hahn is good, but comes from a fairly particular Protestant background and has pushes his covenental theology a little too rigidly for my tastes. Shea is a popular communicator with brains. He is no lightweight, nor is he bound to any one theological model. He is not trained as Hahn is, but has a gift fro communicating to Evangelicals and Catholics alike.
Just my 2c worth. I was personally convinced by the document Fides et Ratio, Familiaris Consortio and Lumen Gentium but they are a little more dense theologically.