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As the number of Christian books grew, so did the need for the Catholic Church to discern which were truly authoritative, which were merely helpful, and which were positively harmful. This resulted in a process that gradually clarified which books did and didn’t count as Scripture.The guiding principle for Christians was Jesus Christ himself, so the question became which books he would consider authoritative. Since he presented his ministry as the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, this …

Despite the ruins of the Sexual Revolution being all around us, many Protestants are doubling down—not only continuing to support contraception, but starting to embrace other related practices that have historically been considered grave sins. And as usual, theirsola scripturaapproach is allowing them to re-interpret Scripture to find justification. For example, the debate over homosexuality and same-sex “marriage” in Protestantism is taking an almost identical trajectory to t …

One modern distortion stands out in our approach to revelation: our preference for the written word over (and even to the exclusion of) the spoken word. Another modern distortion is that we think of books as private rather than public. As Mary Mills explains in her commentary on Ecclesiastes, “in the modern world much reading is a private matter in which, through the possession of literacy skills, one individual engages with a text in a direct and personal manner.” The combined effect of those …

Christians claim that, starting with Abraham and culminating in Jesus, God intervened in history. What is the evidence for this claim? Consider:• The unique history of the Jewish people. This small shepherd people has survived for millennia despite constant attacks and despite constant pressure to assimilate. In the ancient world, they introduced entirely new ways of understanding the divine, and their claims about the oneness, justice, and mercy of God transformed the world. They have be …

Before we get into the text of Acts, there are two very important questions that must be asked and that are often overlooked in this discussion: “Who wrote the Book of Acts?” And, “Why is that important?”Well, the first question has an easy answer: “St. Luke wrote the Book of Acts.” It was basically a “part II” picking up where his Gospel leaves off.But the second question is the more important question for our purpose: “Why is this important?”It’s important because we know from Scripture that S …