Bible talk: Praying with Scriptures

(photo source)

in celebration of national bible week, i shall be sharing some of the lessons from my high 1 cle classes at xavier school last year, particularly about the sacred scriptures.
As we conclude our Bible talk series, we as Catholic Christians are challenged to do the following:

1. Read and interpret the Scriptures in the way the Church teaches us to do it.
The Bible is the written record of the memory of God’s people. As such, it must be read and understood in the context of time and space when it was written. To understand God’s message for us, it is important sometimes that we know the author’s intention at the time the message was written. But in reading the Bible, we must always make a constant effort to focus on its faith message.

2. Show reverence and respect in the way we handle it.
The Bible is not an ordinary book. It should be accorded the reverence and appreciation it deserves. It is a Holy Book, a book that can transform us and lead us to God.

3. Pray with it.
For the Bible to help us really understand God’s message in faith, we need to establish a certain pattern in reading the Scriptures. We do this in the spirit of prayer, since it is God who speaks to us. The following are some steps in doing this:

• Read the text. What does it tell? Paraphrase it in your mind
• React to the text. What is it telling you in particular? What words or verses or phrases in the text struck you?
• Talk to God about this word/phrase/verse that struck you. Tell Him about your difficulty if you are to live out His Word.
• Read the text again slowly. Go into quiet. Simply listen. Allow God to give you spiritual thoughts and insights about the text.
• Discern what God wants you to do based from His message in this particular text. And resolve to do something concrete about this.
• End with a simple formula prayer.

4. Live out its message.
To live by the Word of God is really the ultimate goal of our reading, praying and studying the Bible. The more we apply the message of the Bible in our daily lives, the more we can really understand and appreciate it. This will help us see the true meaning and value of our life in relation to God who loves us and who transforms us into His loving children.

Bible talk: The Scriptures and the Liturgy

(photo source)

in celebration of national bible week, i shall be sharing some of the lessons from my high 1 cle classes at xavier school last year, particularly about the sacred scriptures.

The Church holds this book in high regard because it is the primary source where we draw the foundation of our faith as God’s people. This is concretely expressed in the Church’s prayer life, especially in the Liturgy. During the Mass, God’s Word is celebrated in the Liturgy of the Word. Bible readings are taken from the Old and the New Testaments. The priest, in his homily, helps the faithful to interpret God’s message in the present time and context. Several gestures are likewise done to show reverence to God’s Word during the Mass. (e.g. standing position during the Gospel reading, incensing the book of Gospels before reading the Gospel, etc.)

Tomorrow: Praying with Scriptures

Bible talk: Old and New Testaments

(photo source)

in celebration of national bible week, i shall be sharing some of the lessons from my high 1 cle classes at xavier school last year, particularly about the sacred scriptures.
 
The Old Testament
The Old Testament is a collection of inspired books which present the story of God’s original covenant/agreement with His chosen people and the many consequences of this covenant on their lives not only as individuals but especially as a nation. “Old” should be understood as original when referring to the Old Testament. These books bear witness to God’s loving plan of salvation for man as manifested in the history of the chosen people, the Israelites. The Old Testament was deliberately so oriented that it should prepare for and declare in prophecy the coming of Christ, the Redeemer of all men. The 46 books of the Old Testament are divided as follows: the Pentateuch/Torah/Law; the Historical Books; the Wisdom Books and the Prophetic Books 

The New Testament
The New Testament deals with the new covenant of God’s people with Jesus Christ, God’s only begotten Son who became man to save humankind from sin. The New Testament is a collection of inspired books about the life, teachings, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and the life of the early Church. The New Testament fulfills what has been prophesied in the OT about the Messiah. Jesus Christ is the ultimate truth of God’s revelation, the central figure in God’s plan of salvation. He is the Word Incarnate, the Unique Word of the Sacred Scriptures. The 27 books of the New Testament include: the 4 Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the Epistles or letters to the Christians and the Book of Revelation.

The Old Testament and the New Testament are distinct, yet closely linked. We are to read each one in light of the other. The Old Testament should be read in the light of Christ in the New Testament. St. Augustine used to say that: "The New Testament lies hidden in the Old, and the Old Testament is revealed/unveiled in the New." What he meant is that Jesus showed us how the things that God says and does in the Old Testament pointed to what He says and does in the New. In turn, what Jesus says and does in the New Testament sheds light on the promises and events we read about in the Old Testament.

Tomorrow: The Scriptures and Liturgy

Bible talk: Canon of the Scriptures

(photo source)

in celebration of national bible week, i shall be sharing some of the lessons from my high 1 cle classes at xavier school last year, particularly about the sacred scriptures.

If God has revealed Himself by communicating His will to man, man must be able to know with assurance where that revelation lies. Hence, there is the need for a list of books of the Bible.

The official list of Bible books was determined by the believing community which had a “sense” of which books told the truth about who God is. This list is known as the Canon of the Bible. This refers to the books in the Old and the New Testaments, which are recognized by the Church as divinely inspired since they truly reveal God’s love and His relationship with His people then and now.

Guided by the Holy Spirit, the Church determined the inspired books in terms of their apostolic origin, coherence with the essential Gospel teachings and constant use in the Church’s liturgy. (CFC 88) The final list of books of the Bible officially came to us through the Council of Trent in 1546. There are 73 books in the Catholic Bible, 46 from the OT and 27 from the NT.

Tomorrow: The Old and New Testaments

Bible talk: Sacred Scriptures and Sacred Tradition

(photo source)

in celebration of national bible week, i shall be sharing some of the lessons from my high 1 cle classes at xavier school last year, particularly about the sacred scriptures.

The word tradition comes from the Latin tradere which means “to hand over/ to hand down.” Tradition is a term the Church uses to the “living transmission” of the deposit of faith/message given by Christ to the apostles and to the Church. This “living transmission” is accomplished through the power of the Holy Spirit guiding the Church. Church’s Tradition is inseparable from Scripture.

Since Sacred Scriptures is written in a culture, context and language which is very far from our own, we need Church tradition to interpret the Scriptures and to make the message a reality in our present context.

Both Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture come from the same source—God, with the same goal of revealing God. Therefore we cannot draw truth from Scripture alone, or Tradition alone. The Magisterium, or the teaching office/authority of the Church, has the task of giving an authentic interpretation of the Word of God in the name of Jesus Christ.

Tomorrow: Canon as the official list of books in the Bible

Bible talk: How was the Bible formed?

(photo source)

in celebration of national bible week, i shall be sharing some of the lessons from my high 1 cle classes at xavier school last year, particularly about the sacred scriptures.

The Bible took centuries to take shape and many groups and individuals were involved in this long process. The contents of the Bible particularly the Old Testament came from stories/events personally or communally experienced by God’s people that were handed on to succeeding generations through oral tradition which was mostly in the form of story telling and later on compiled, edited, and re-edited through written tradition. Some of the content from the oral traditions dated back to 1900 years before the coming of Christ. These included songs, narratives prayers and poems as well speeches and writings of the prophets and codes or laws. Priests and other trained scribes who were employed by Israelite kings gathered these oral and written materials, edited, organized and compiled them into books. Then they had to decide which books will be included in the final list. These process of gathering, writing, editing, selecting and compiling these materials into books and accepting them as inspired or authoritative took many years. The development of the OT alone must have taken more than 1000 years.

On Biblical Inspiration
Biblical inspiration means that God or the Spirit of God is at work in the community of Israel and in the early Christian community to produce through a number of authors, a series of books that witness to God’s revelation of Himself. This means that God worked in and through the human authors in such a way that they use their skills, ideas and other talents in writing what God wanted them to write for the sake of our salvation. With this, we can say that God influenced the entire formation of the Bible. He inspired and guided the preachers, writers, editors and copyist and other people who selected and compiled the Sacred Scriptures.

Vatican II states further, “ Since all Scripture was written, compiled and edited under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, we must acknowledge that the books of the Scripture firmly, faithfully and without error teach the truth which God for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided in the Sacred Scriptures” (Vat. II Dei Verbum II). Through this, the Church teaches that the religious messages found in the Bible are without error, that the discrepancies and inaccuracies in the details of the narratives do not affect the truths about salvation that teach us who God is and who we are, and God’s ultimate plan for our journey through life.

Tomorrow: Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition

Bible talk: What is the Bible?

(photo source)

in celebration of national bible week, i shall be sharing some of the lessons from my high 1 cle classes at xavier school last year, particularly about the sacred scriptures.

In life...
Why do we read?
What do we usually read?
What constitutes a good reading material?
Reading is a basic skill that needs to be developed and loved. It is a basic tool for communication, expression and understanding. We read different materials for different reasons. Reading enhances individual growth.

What is the Bible?
• The word Bible originates from the Latin word “biblia” which means “book”
• The Greek word “biblia” which is the plural form of ‘biblion’ means “books”

The Bible is...
• the most translated, most studied and most venerated book in the world;
• known with different names: Bible, Holy Scriptures, Word of God, Good News, Holy Book, Book of Life. These different names are indications of the different ways it is regarded by people through the ages.
• a collection of 73 books or sacred writings about God which come in different literary forms such as poems, historical accounts, prayers, laws and exhortations, narratives, prophetic writings, parables, letters.
• divided into two main parts: the Old Testament and the New Testament. In the Catholic Bible, there are 46 books in the Old Testament and 27 books in the New Testament. The Protestant Bible has only 39 books in the Old Testament and 27 books in the New Testament.
• the 7 books which are recognized in the Catholic Bible are called Deuterocaconicals (books of Christian Old Testament that are not included in the Jewish bible, i.e. Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, 1&2 Maccabees)

What makes the Bible unique?

1. Its Message
God reveals Himself to us as Love. Revelation is God’s self-communication to man. This self-revelation of God took place primarily in history: in the lives of the patriarchs, in the saving events of the Exodus, in the covenant of Israel with God, and finally in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Through the Bible, we are able to read about how God has acted in the lives of the particular figures/people of Israel in the Old Testament to communicate His great love for man. This self-communication is made concrete in the very person of Jesus Christ who is “God-with-us” as we read His life in the New Testament.

Although not always directly expressed, every word of the Scriptures tells us about God’s will for salvation, for the fullness of life for His people and for all creation. This divine will for salvation was fully made clear in Jesus. (Read Col. 1:15-20, Eph 1: 3-6, 3:2-6). This is why the entire Bible is often referred to as the record of “Salvation history”. As such, salvation history is the story of God’s plan of salvation, which began with Israel, reached its climax in Jesus Christ, continues to our present time in the Church and will go on till the end of time. Indeed, the Bible gives us a glimpse of who God is – His character and His purpose in creating, redeeming and sanctifying us.

2. Its Origin
The Bible is the Word of God in the words of men. In the words of Vatican II,
“...the books of the Old and New Testaments, whole and entire with all their parts were written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author and have been handed on such to the Church itself.” (Vatican II, Dei Verbum II) This confirms what has been said by St. Paul in his letter to Timothy. (see 2 Timothy 3:16)

3. Its Purpose and Nature
The Bible is a book of faith, which grew from a believing community. The books of the bible are read in the light of faith. We should read the Bible on its own terms: not as a science or history book but as a religious book about the love story between God and man. The Bible must be read and understood in the sense in which it was intended by God and by the biblical authors. Their purpose was not to write a history book in the modern western sense, but to set forth the history of God’s plan of salvation. In a way, we can analogously compare the Bible to a romance novel than any other form of literature. It is basically a book narrating the love story of God and his people. What is special about the Bible as a romance novel is that the reader is invited not just to read it but to be part of it! The Word of God, when it is read or listened to in the openness of faith can bring God in His self-revelation closer to us and can lead us to a close encounter with Him.

We read the Bible for many reasons. But it is only by reading the Bible with faith and with an open heart that we can experience God’s word in a living way. Ultimately, we read it with the hope that God’s Word will fill up our minds, set aflame our hearts, transform us and draw us to communion with the living God who speaks to us through it. In faith, we accept completely that God Himself is speaking to us through the events, characters and figures we encounter in the passages. When we read the Bible with faith, we allow God’s Word to touch us, to inspire us, to give us hope and to help us find meaning, comfort and strength. (Read Hebrews 4:12) 

Tomorrow: How was the Bible formed?

Bible talk: References

(photo source)

here are the sources, both primary and secondary, for the series entitled "Bible Talk"

Primary Sources:
• New American Bible / New Revised Standard Version
• Catechism of the Catholic Church
• Vatican II – Dei Verbum
• Catechism for Filipino Catholics
• Class notes: Faith and Revelation, Scripture, Tradition and Magisterium (Loyola School of Theology, 2005-2007)

Secondary Sources:
• Called to Discover Our Christian Roots by Frago & Salvosa III (Sibs Publishing House)
• Hanep Biblia by John Aranda Cabrido, SDB (Salesiana Books by Don Bosco Press)
• The Word of God for Us (Sadlier Series)
• XS CLE High 1 Lesson Plans /Syllabus S.Y. 2009-2011