Chapter Two: God Comes to Meet Man (50-141)

Part One: The Profession of Faith, Section One: I Believe – We Believe

By natural reason man can know God with certainty, on the basis of his works. But there is another order of knowledge, which man cannot possibly arrive at by his own powers: the order of divine Revelation. Through an utterly free decision, God has revealed himself and given himself to man. This he does by revealing the mystery, his plan of loving goodness, formed from all eternity in Christ, for the benefit of all men. God has fully revealed this plan by sending us his beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit.

Article I: The revelation of God

I. God Reveals His “Plan of Loving Goodness”

God reveled himself to Adam and Eve. This direct connection was broken by the fall.

However, God intends to offer otherwise unavailable access to man through Christ.

II. The Stages of Revelation

1. God makes himself known
2. The Covenant with Noah
   • “The Covenant with Noah remains in force during the times of the Gentiles, until the universal proclamation of the Gospel”
   • Great Gentiles figures
     • Abel the just
     • king-priest Melchizedek (figure of Christ)
     • the upright “Noah, Daniel, and Job” (Gen 14:18, Feb 7:3, Eek 14:14)
3. God chooses Abraham
   • Originally Abram now “the father of a multitude of nations”
   • patriarchs, prophets, and other OT figures will always be honored as saints
     • we don’t refer to them that way but in our liturgy they are included in the unity of saints
4. God forms his people Israel
   • est. by covenant at the Mount of Siani where Moses gave them the law (after freeing them from slavery in Egypt.
   • Israel is the priestly people of God
   • The prophets tell of the hope of salvation
   • List of holy women (Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, Miriam, Deborah, Hannah, Judith and Esther. The purest figure among them is Mary.)

Father Mike takes some time here to discuss possible motives for God’s schedule of revelation, asking the common question, “Why doesn’t God just make himself fully known?” Father Mike suggests this full and complete revelation of God by God may hinder free will, thus going against God’s intention for a chosen relationship. While full revelation may hinder struggle, journey, etc., it also has the possibility of removing the freedom of choice.

III. Christ Jesus — “Mediator and Fullness of All Revelation”

1. God has said everything in his Word
   • The Word is capitalized as it refers to Jesus
   • It has been said that Christianity, Judaism, and Islam are the religions of the book. However, Christianity is not actually of the book, but of the Word.
   • Christ is the fullness of revelation; there should be no search for novelty.
2. There will be no further Revelation
   • Significance is fully grasped over time; this is not new revelation
   • there are private revelations recognized by the church. However, these are not new revelations. They do not contradict previous faith, and they do not create new deposits of faith. They can deepen personal faith and/or point to some significance.

IN BRIEF

68 By love, God has revealed himself and given himself to man. He has thus provided the definitive, superabundant answer to the questions that man asks himself about the meaning and purpose of his life.

69 God has revealed himself to man by gradually communicating his own mystery in deeds and in words.

70 Beyond the witness to himself that God gives in created things, he manifested himself to our first parents, spoke to them and, after the fall, promised them salvation (cf Gen 3:15) and offered them his covenant.

71 God made an everlasting covenant with Noah and with all living beings (cf Gen 9:16). It will remain in force as long as the world lasts.

72 God chose Abraham and made a covenant with him and his descendants. By the covenant God formed his people and revealed his law to them through Moses. Through the prophets, he prepared them to accept the salvation destined for all humanity.

73 God has revealed himself fully by sending his own Son, in whom he has established his covenant for ever. the Son is his Father’s definitive Word; so there will be no further Revelation after him.

Article 2 THE TRANSMISSION OF DIVINE REVELATION

Divine revelation has been handed down in two ways – written and oral

This handing on of revelation is a desire of God so that all may come to know him. Catholics believe that God desires all souls to be saved.

Jesus is the fullness of the revelation; this fullness comes to us through apostolic preaching.

I. The Apostolic Tradition

1. In the apostolic preaching…
2. …continued in apostolic succession
   • in both of these things, God’s desire to connect with the “Spouse of his beloved Son”

II. The Relationship Between Tradition and Sacred Scripture

1. One common source…
   • “Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture, then, are bound closely together, and communicate one with the other.”
2. …two distinct modes of transmission
   • “Both Scripture and Tradition must be accepted and honoured with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence.”
   • Sacred Tradition (church) came before the Sacred Scripture (Christian Bible)
   • sola scripture wasn’t a thing until Luther. This claim is also not found in the scripture.
3. Apostolic Tradition and ecclesial traditions
   • it is important to note the difference between [T]radition and [t]raditions. [T] never changes. [t] can change, i.e. the rosary changes to include the luminous mysteries by Pope John Paul.

III. The Interpretation of the Heritage of Faith

1. The heritage of faith entrusted to the whole of the Church
2. The Magisterium of the Church
   • bishops untied with the Pope
   • not superior to the Word, but the servant of the Word
3. The dogmas of the faith
   • clear beliefs that are essential for belief
4. The supernatural sense of faith
5. Growth in understanding the faith
   • sacred Tradition, Sacred Scripture and the Magisterium of the Church are so connected and associated that one of them cannot stand without the others.

IN BRIEF

96 What Christ entrusted to the apostles, they in turn handed on by their preaching and writing, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, to all generations, until Christ returns in glory.

97 “Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture make up a single sacred deposit of the Word of God” (DV 10) in which, as in a mirror, the pilgrim Church contemplates God, the source of all her riches.

98 “The Church, in her doctrine, life and worship, perpetuates and transmits to every generation all that she herself is, all that she believes” (DV 8 # 1).

99 Thanks to its supernatural sense of faith, the People of God as a whole never ceases to welcome, to penetrate more deeply and to live more fully from the gift of divine Revelation.

100 The task of interpreting the Word of God authentically has been entrusted solely to the Magisterium of the Church, that is, to the Pope and to the bishops in communion with him.

Article 3 SACRED SCRIPTURE

I. Christ – The Unique Word of Sacred Scripture

I have never thought about it this way, but it makes complete sense, and we discussed this very thing when discussing Milton’s Paradise Lost. God’s time is not linear, his knowledge is complete; neither of these things is conceivable to the human mind, which is constricted by both time and knowledge. God delivered the Sacred Scripture in a single utterance and, in that expressed himself completely.

II. Inspiration and Truth of Sacred Scripture

God is the author of the Scared Scripture

The Christian faith is not a religion of the book, but a religion of the Word

III. The Holy Spirit, Interpreter of Scripture

Interpreting scripture, like other literary formats, must take into account conditions of time and culture, literary genres in use at the time, and the modes of feeling, speaking, and narrating then current

Three criteria for interpreting the Scripture in light of the Spirit who inspired it

1. Be especially attentive “to the content and unity of the whole Scripture” – we do not take text out of context. The Bible is read in unity
2. Read the scripture within “the living Tradition of the whole Church” – Scripture is interconnected to Tradition
3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith – coherence of the truths of faith among themselves. The one unchanging faith of the church

1. The Sense of Scripture
   • There are two senses of scripture: 1. literal 2. spiritual
   • Literal
     • meaning conveyed by the meaning of the word
     • discovered by exegesis, following the sound rules of interpertation
   • spiritual: broken into three parts:
     • allegorical – events are a sign or type of a spiritual truth
     • moral – application to our life to act justly
     • anagogical – viewing realities and events in terms of eternal significance (end times)

The Letter speaks of deeds; Allegory to faith;
The Moral how to act; Anagogy our destiny.

Augustine of Dacia

IV. The Canon of Scripture

The canon consists of 46 (OT) and 27 (NT)

The Old Testament: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah, Tobit, Judith, Esther, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs, the Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Baruch, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zachariah and Malachi.

The New Testament: the Gospels according to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, the Acts of the Apostles, the Letters of St. Paul to the Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, the Letter to the Hebrews, the Letters of James, 1 and 2 Peter, 1, 2 and 3 John, and Jude, and Revelation (the Apocalypse).

1. The Old Testament
   • there is a tendency o blanket state that the OT is void in the New Testament (Marcionism). This would be incorrect
   • The Old Covenant has never been revoked
   • “‘Even though they contain matters imperfect and provisional,’ The books of the OldTestament bear witness to the whole divine pedagogy of God’s saving love: these writings ‘are a storehouse of sublime teaching on God and of sound wisdom on human life, as well as a wonderful treasury of prayers; in them, too, the mystery of our salvation is present in a hidden way.'”
2. The New Testament
   • Central object is Jesus Christ – his acts, teaching, Passion, and glorification, and his Church’s beginnings
   • Gospels are the heart of all Scripture
   • Three stages in the formation of the Gospels
     • The life and teaching of Jesus
     • The oral tradition
     • The written Gospels
3. The unity of the Old and New Testaments
   • “the New Testament lies hidden in the Old and the Old Testament is revealed in the New.”
   • typology – the prefigurations of the New Testament are in the Old
   • also, the Old Testament retains its own intrinsic value
   • Early Christian catechesis made constant use of the Old Testament
   • St. Jerome says that ignorance of scripture is ignorance of Christ

V. Sacred Scripture in the Life of the Church

To know Jesus, we must know the scripture. The study of Sacred Scripture is the soul of sacred theology

IN BRIEF

134 “All Sacred Scripture is but one book, and that one book is Christ, because all divine Scripture speaks of Christ, and all divine Scripture is fulfilled in Christ” (Hugh of St. Victor, De arca Noe 2, 8: PL 176, 642).

135 “The Sacred Scriptures contain the Word of God and, because they are inspired, they are truly the Word of God” (DV 24).

136 God is the author of Sacred Scripture because he inspired its human authors; he acts in them and by means of them. He thus gives assurance that their writings teach without error his saving truth (cf DV 11).

137 Interpretation of the inspired Scripture must be attentive above all to what God wants to reveal through the sacred authors for our salvation. What comes from the Spirit is not fully “understood except by the Spirit’s action’ (cf. Origen, Hom. in Ex. 4, 5: PG 12, 320).

138 The Church accepts and venerates as inspired the 46 books of the Old Testament and the 27 books of the New.

139 The four Gospels occupy a central place because Christ Jesus is their centre.

140 The unity of the two Testaments proceeds from the unity of God’s plan and his Revelation. the Old Testament prepares for the New and the New Testament fulfils the Old; the two shed light on each other; both are true Word of God.

141 “The Church has always venerated the divine Scriptures as she venerated the Body of the Lord” (DV 21): both nourish and govern the whole Christian life. “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Ps 119:105; cf. Is 50:4).