Blog

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 …

The term word of God refers to God’s divine revelation to humanity, in which he reveals himself to us for the sake of our salvation. The Vatican II document Dei Verbum (DV) explains: Through divine revelation, God chose to show forth and communicate himself and the eternal decisions of his will regarding the salvation of men. That is to say, he chose to share with them those divine treasures which totally transcend the understanding of the human mind (6). Christians generally agree that the full …

Catholicism teaches that the doctrines contained in Sacred Scripture (the Bible) and Sacred Tradition (the Church) are authoritative because God’s revelation is the source of both. The Catechism puts it this way: “Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture make up a single sacred deposit of the word of God” (97).This means that “both Scripture and Tradition must be accepted and honored with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence” (82).To some Protestants, this might sound blasphemous. The idea th …

Leading your Protestant friends into the Catholic Church can seem like a hopeless task. Your friend may seem too far away, too biased against Catholicism, or even too apathetic.I would have loved to have had Jimmy Akin as my wingman in discussions with Protestants about Catholicism more times than I can count, but he is usually busy and, last I checked, hadn’t mastered the art of bilocation.I was sitting at lunch one day with friends: one Catholic, two Protestants, and we were having a seri …