Sacred Scripture and the Modern Catholic Part 5

5. Faith of Our Fathers: Analogy of Faith

"So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught, whether by word of mouth or by letter from us" (2 Thes. 2:15).

A final interpretive principle allows us to experience the breadth and length and height and depth of the fullness of the Roman Catholic Faith. This principle is called the analogy of faith, and is described in the : "Read the Scripture within 'the living Tradition of the whole Church.' According to a saying of the Fathers, sacred Scripture is written principally in the Church's heart..." (, no. 113). The analogy of faith is based on the fact that "sacred Tradition and sacred Scripture make up a single sacred deposit of the Word of God, which is entrusted to the Church" (, no. 10). This deposit of faith is given by God and entrusted to the Church, "the pillar and bulwark of the truth" (1 Tim. 3:15). The analogy of faith is the secret weapon of the Catholic Church. If we as Catholics were to realize in our lives the analogy of faith, we would become suitable laborers in the work of authentic Christian unity.

The unity among Christians willed by God can be attained only by the adherence of all to the content of revealed faith in its entirety. In matters of faith, compromise is a contradiction with God who is Truth (Pope John Paul II, , no. 18).

It was the discovery of this interpretative principle which led me back to the Roman Catholic Church. Although the Bible is the very Word of God given in the words of men, there is still room for human error and misinterpretation. In the book of Acts, the deacon Philip comes across an Ethiopian eunuch who is reading a passage from the sacred Scriptures, and Philip asks him, "Do you understand what you are reading?" and the eunuch replies, "Well, how could I unless someone guides me?" (cf. Acts S:30-31). There are more than 25,000 different Christian denominations, each claiming the Bible as their rule of faith. So without someone to guide us, we would be unable to discern the authentic meaning of the sacred page. St. Jerome illustrates this point, stating: "What I have learned I did not teach myself-a wretchedly presumptuous teacher!-but I learned it from illustrious men in the Church" (, no. 36).

Many sincere Christians disagree on biblical interpretation. For example, should our Lord be taken literally when He says, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you" (Jn. 6:53)? Imagine how much insight we could gain if we could speak with St. John himself and ask him what he understood our Lord to mean. Well, this is exactly what the Fathers of the Church were able to do. St. Ignatius of Antioch was a disciple of St. John, and St. Ignatius is not silent on the subject. He writes in his letter to the church of Antioch, "They [the heterodox] do not confess that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior, Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for our sins in which the Father in His goodness raised up again. They who deny the gift of God are perishing in their disputes."

When I discovered the analogy of faith, I realized that I was no longer left to my own devices and subject to my own limitations in trying to discover the fullness of faith. Rather, I was able to enter into a "dialogue" with other faithful followers of Jesus Christ. And I also had the wise and anointed leadership of the Magisterium, the servant and teacher of God's word. For the Catholic, the riches of the Bible are open completely. We have the very word of God, in Tradition and in Scripture, as preserved and proclaimed by the Teaching Church. This means that Catholics among all Christians should be the most biblical.

Some people are concerned that by reading the Bible we may fall away from the Church. But what I have seen is quite the opposite. Catholics who read the Bible within the Church help others to come into the Church. Catholics who are ignorant of Scripture are easily drawn away to a "Bible church," which rightly focuses on the importance of the Word of God, but does so outside of its God- given context, the family of God, the Church.

TWO WAYS TO START

There are many styles and methods of studying the sacred Scriptures. The most basic is an inductive Bible study: to go to the very words of Scripture and allow them to teach you. As a Catholic, this must be done in light of the five principles of interpretation already mentioned. These principles allow us to read the Bible with freedom and confidence, knowing that if we encounter something that we do not understand or that seems to contradict the Church, we will humbly defer and allow the Church to guide us into the right interpretation. The Gospels may be the most fruitful subject for this inductive approach. In them, we are confronted by the very words and person of Jesus Christ, who invites us to repent and believe, and challenges us to live, not for the sake of this world, but for the sake of the world to come.

Seemingly, every passage of Scripture is an invitation to have our lives transformed by God. St. Paul writes, "I appeal to you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect" (Rom. 12:1-2).

Another type of study is a deductive study, in which we allow a topic or a teaching to lead us into the Scriptures to show us its foundation and its biblical principles. Perhaps the most useful guide for a deductive study is the . The is filled with scriptural references, so much so that one modern theologian accused it of citing the Bible in a "fundamentalist way" (E. A. Johnson, "Jesus Christ in the Catechism," , p. 208, 3/3/92).

Taken from www.ewtn.com/library/SCRIPTUR/SSMODCAT.TXT

Sacred Scripture and the Modern Catholic Part 4

4. The New in Light of the Old: Analogy of Scripture

"God, the inspirer and author of the books of both Testaments, in His wisdom has so brought it about that the New should be hidden in the Old, and that the Old should be made manifest in the New" (, no. 16).

The complete canon of Scripture includes 73 books. But as the teaches, there is an inner unity which also allows us to refer to the Bible as a single book:

"Be especially attentive 'to the content and unity of the whole Scripture.' Different as the books which comprise it may be, Scripture is a unity by reason of the unity of God's plan, of which Christ Jesus is the center and heart, open since His Passover" (, no. 112).

This principle of interpretation is called the analogy of Scripture. The analogy of Scripture allows us to see how the plans, promises, and covenants of the Old Testament salvation history are realized and fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ and the foundation of the Roman Church. Salvation history, viewed in this light, allows us to see that "His story" becomes "our story." This realization allows us to read the Scriptures with a new-found interest. What may have appeared to be an obscure story now becomes our family history. St. Paul states: "For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that by steadfastness and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope" (Rom. 15:4).

When viewed in this light, the Scriptures invite us in and provide us with a God-given worldview. We become acquainted with "the eternal purpose which he carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Eph. 3:1 1). We have become "fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone" (Eph. 2:19-20). It is with this knowledge and through the life of prayer which must accompany it that we may begin to make sense of our lives and our role in the modern world. Vatican II provides that "Christ fully reveals man to himself" (, no. 22), and without this Christ-centered knowledge of self we have no hope of living the life that God intends for us.

Sacred Scripture and the Modern Catholic Part 3

3. For the Sake of Our Salvation: The Purpose of Sacred Scripture

"The Church ... has always regarded, and continues to regard, the Scriptures taken together with sacred Tradition as the supreme rule of faith" (, no. 21).

In its dogmatic constitution , literally "the Word of God," the Second Vatican Council provides the gemstone of official Church teachings on the sacred Scripture. Building upon the firm foundation of other magisterial teachings, the Council Fathers remind us of the ultimate reason for God's gift of sacred Scripture: "It pleased God, in His goodness and wisdom, to reveal Himself and to make known the mystery of His will. His will was that men should have access to the Father, through Christ, the Word made flesh, in the Holy Spirit, and thus become sharers in the Divine Nature" (, no. 2).

All of the truths about Scripture and each of the truths contained in the Scripture lead to the Gospel, the good news, that the almighty and ever living God has freely chosen first to create us and then reveal himself to us as a loving Father, through the work of our divine Savior Jesus Christ, and desires to draw us back into his divine favor through the sanctifying power of the Holy Spirit. All of the wisdom and insights which may be gleaned from the Scriptures pale in comparison to this over-arching truth. In a beautiful and central passage of , the Church teaches: "Since, therefore, all that the inspired authors, or sacred writers, affirm should be regarded as affirmed by the Holy Spirit, we must acknowledge that the books of Scripture, firmly, faithfully, and without error, teach that truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided to the sacred Scriptures" (, no. 11).

This passage has one of the longest footnotes of any of the Vatican II documents. This footnote bears witness to the rich tradition upon which the Catholic perspective of the Word of God is based. The footnote contains references to St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, the Council of Trent, Pope Leo XIII, and Pope Pius XII, each affirming the inspiration, inerrancy, and importance of the sacred Scriptures for the Church and the individual Christian.

These truths provide the framework within which we understand the Bible within the Church. It is inspired by God, literally "God- breathed," and therefore completely trustworthy. It is rich in content and meaning, and deserves our zealous and diligent study. It is an expression of the gift of God of His very self to humanity, and is provided to us for the sake of our salvation.

Taken from www.ewtn.com/library/SCRIPTUR/SSMODCAT.TXT

Sacred Scripture and the Modern Catholic Part 2

2. As You Sow, So Shall You Reap: The Importance of Sound Interpretation

"[S]o shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and prosper in the thin" for which I sent it" (Is. 55:11).

The prayerful and careful reading of the Scriptures will always prove itself to be a profitable use of time. This does not mean, however, that reading the Bible is easy or simple. The sacred Scriptures are like a large lake, sufficient for anyone to come and drink fully, but deep enough for anyone to drown. This is the way God has designed the Bible, to encourage us to dig deep and to dig humbly. While the Church encourages us to read the Bible, it calls us to read carefully. Special attention should be paid to the text so that we might discern the intention of the sacred writer. This includes noting the literary form, or genre, of the text: Is it poetry, a parable, or a narration? The nature of the text will affect the meaning of the passage:

"[I]t is the duty of the exegete, to lay hold, so to speak, with the greatest care and reverence of the very least expressions which, under the inspiration of the Divine Spirit, have flowed from the pen of the sacred writer, so as to arrive at a deeper and fuller knowledge of his meaning" (, no. 15).

Proper care and willingness to always examine our understanding in light of the teachings of the Church will help us to avoid the opposing errors of fundamentalism and skepticism.

The Bible works something like a chamois, a leather cloth used to dry a car when washing it. A chamois needs to be moist in order to absorb moisture. This is the paradox for the biblical student: We need to know the Bible in order to get to know the Bible better. This means that in our first reading we may miss many elements and aspects which a later reading will show us. But God has designed the Scriptures so that the faithful reader will be able to get something every time he studies it.

One helpful hint may be to begin on more familiar ground. The ideal starting place for devotional reading may be the Gospel of St. John in the New Testament. The Gospels are more familiar to us. We hear them at Mass every week, even daily if we attend. The characters of the New Testament are also more familiar to us, such as Mary and the apostles. A commitment to read a portion each day will lead us quickly through the New Testament, and then we may be ready to go back to the beginning.

The Old Testament is admittedly more difficult. The names, places, and events can be foreign to the modern reader. I recommend a tape series by Dr. Scott Hahn entitled "Salvation History." In these tapes Dr. Hahn provides a framework within which we can begin to make sense of the Old Testament salvation history. This framework offers a "filing cabinet" in which we can begin to store the information as we read it, almost like a computer disk which needs to be formatted before information can be stored on it.

Most of all, we must avoid the temptation to become frustrated. There will be things we will not fully understand. When we encounter these difficulties, we should realize we are in good company: "Whosoever comes to [Scripture reading] in piety, faith, and humility, and with determination to make progress in it, will assuredly find therein and will eat the 'Bread that comes down from heaven' (Jn. 6:33 ); he will, in his own person, experience the truth of David's words: 'The hidden and uncertain things of Thy Wisdom Thou hast made manifest to me!"' (Ps. 51:6) (, no. 43).

Pope Benedict XV also acknowledges: "[St.] Jerome was compelled, when he discovered apparent discrepancies in the sacred books, to use every endeavor to unravel the difficulty. If he felt that he had not satisfactorily settled the problem, he would return to it again and again, not always, indeed, with the happiest results" (ibid., no. 15, emphasis added).

As with any craft, there are many tools which can be used to maximize the profitability of our reading. First and foremost among these tools is the regular and consistent reading of the sacred page itself. St. Jerome taught, "Read assiduously and learn as much as you can. Let sleep find you holding your Bible, and when your head nods let it be resting on the sacred page" (ibid., no. 42).

Only after we have read and reread the sacred page ourselves can we effectively make use of other tools. There are modern commentaries on all of the New Testament put out through the Navarre Study Series by Scepter Press. Dr. Hahn has a number of commentaries on audiotape on various books of the Bible. There are several official documents put out by the Magisterium on the topic of sacred Scripture (Pope Leo XIII, Pope Pius X, Pope Benedict XV, Pope Pius XII, Vatican II, and the Pontifical Biblical Commission before Pope Paul removed its magisterial status). There are also a number of other study guides available for more serious investigation, such as concordances, Bible dictionaries, biblical encyclopedias, etc. But these tools, while helpful, can never replace the daily, personal reading of sacred Scripture. The Word of God is that pearl of great price which deserves all of our attention.

Taken from www.ewtn.com/library/SCRIPTUR/SSMODCAT.TXT

Sacred Scriptures and the Modern Catholic Part 1

1. The Truth Will Make You Free: Biblical Inspiration and Inerrancy

All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work (2 Tim. 3:16-17).

The first point is to realize that sacred Scripture is the very Word of God. As the substantial Word of God became like to men in all things, "except sin," so the words of God, expressed in human language, are made like to human speech in every respect, except error (Pope Pius XII, , no. 37, 1943).

The Bible is different from all other books because it is inspired by God. But it is important to understand what the Church means by this "inspiration." She does not mean that the Bible is necessarily inspirational, although it often is. Rather, the Scriptures are referred to as inspired because they are literally God-breathed. "For the sacred Scripture is not like other books. Dictated by the Holy Spirit, it contains things of the deepest importance" (, no. 5). As the book of Hebrews says, "the Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword" (Heb. 4:12).

The fact that Scripture is God's very words becoming the words of men gives it an inner dynamism which differentiates it from all other books. The Scriptures possess a reliability in which we may place our trust about what we are to believe and how we are to act. This reliability is based upon what the Church calls inerrancy. "[H]aving been written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, [the books of the Bible] have God for their author and as such were handed down to the Church herself.... [This is a] Catholic doctrine by which such divine authority is claimed for the 'entire books with all their parts' as to secure freedom from any error whatsoever" (, introduction).

The Bible's inerrancy is based on God's trustworthiness, who can neither deceive nor be deceived. This trustworthiness distinguishes the Bible from all other books (cf. , no. 12).

Typically, we as readers stand in judgment over the books we read, deciding for ourselves whether to accept or reject the assertions that we encounter. But the Scriptures- because they are written by God-stand in judgment over the reader, calling us into a life-transforming relationship with the ultimate Author, our Heavenly Father. The sacred Scriptures, read in light of sacred Tradition and with the guidance of the Magisterium, provide that firm foundation on which we can build a life of faith and support for our daily lives (cf. 1 Tim. 3:15).

Biblical inspiration and inerrancy are the fundamental principles upon which biblical interpretation rests. The Lord's words are true; for him to say it, means that it is. Again, "'Scripture cannot lie'; it is wrong to say Scripture lies, no, it is impious even to admit the very notion of error where the Bible is concerned" (Pope Benedict XV, , no. 13, 1920). An example of this commitment to the sacred page not only extends to all the saints, but to our Lord himself, who quoted from all parts of the Scripture with solemn testimony: "The Scripture cannot be broken" (Jn. 10:35). This is the commitment we too will need if we want to experience the fruits that Our Lord has intended for "hearers of his Word."

Taken from www.ewtn.com/library/SCRIPTUR/SSMODCAT.TXT

No Contradictions in Sacred Scripture

The impossibility of any contradiction existing in the Bible itself flows from the fact that God is the author of Sacred Scripture , and would be responsible for any such discrepancy. But how are we to remedy apparent contradictions in Scripture, the existence of which cannot be denied?
In some cases it is practically certain that our present text has been corrupted. 1 Samuel 13:1 says that Saul was a child of one year when he began to reign, and he reigned two years over Israel, though, according to Acts 13:21 (and Joseph., Antiq., VI, xiv) Saul reigned forty years, beginning at the age of twenty-one. In the former case, the letters of the Hebrew text denoting forty and twenty respectively must have been lost. A similar corruption must be admitted in 1 Kings 4:26 , which grants to Solomon 40,000 stalls of chariot horses instead of the 4000 assigned to him in II Par., ix, 25 (Hebrew text).
In other cases the apparent contradictions in the Bible are due to an erroneous exegesis of one or both of the passages in question. Such wrong interpretations are easily caused by the change of the meaning of a word; by the assumption of a wrong nexus of ideas (chronological, real, or psychological ); by a restriction or an extension of the meaning of a passage beyond its natural limits; by an interchange of figurative with proper, of hypothetical with absolute, language; by a concession of Divine authority to mere quotations from profane sources, or by a neglect of the difference between the Old and the New Testament. Thus the word "tempt" has one sense in Genesis 22:1 , and quite another sense in James 1:13 ; the expressions "faith" and "works" have not the same sense in Romans 3:28 , and James 2:14, 24 ; the "sincere companion" of Philippians 4:3 , does not mean "wife", and does not place this passage in opposition to 1 Corinthians 7:8 ; the "hatred of parents " inculcated in Luke 14:26 , is not the hatred prohibited by the commandment of the decalogue ; the nexus of events in the First Gospel is not chronological and does not establish an opposition between St. Matthew and the other Evangelists ; in 1 Samuel 31:4 , the inspired writer testifies that Saul killed himself, while in 2 Samuel 1:10 , the lying Amalecite boasts that he slew Saul ; in John 1:21 , the Baptist denies that he is "the prophet :, without contradicting the statement of Christ in Matthew 11:9 , that John is a prophet ; etc.
Apparent contradictions in the Bible may have their source in an erroneous identification of distinct words or facts, in a neglect of the difference of standpoint of different writers or speakers, or finally in an erroneous assumption of opposition between two really concordant passages. Thus Genesis 12:11 sqq. , refers to facts wholly different from those related in Genesis 20:2 and 26:7 ; the healing of the centurion's servant related in Matthew 8:5 sqq. , is entirely distinct from the healing of the king's son mentioned in John 4:46 sqq. ; the multiplication of loaves in Matthew 14:15 sqq. , is distinct from that described in Matthew 15:32 sqq. , the cleansing of the temple related in John 2:13 sqq. , is not identical with the event told in Matthew 21:12 sqq. ; the anointing described in Matthew 26:6 sqq. , and John 12:3 sqq. , differs from that told in Luke 7:37 sqq. ; the prophets view the coming of Christ now from an historical, now from a moral, and again from an eschatological standpoint, etc.
No Opposition between Biblical and Profane Truth
Proof -- Thus far we have considered apparent contradictions between different statements of Sacred Scripture ; a word must be added about the opposition which may appear to exist between the teaching of the Bible and the tenets of philosophy, science, and history. The Bible student must be convinced that there can be no such real opposition. The Vatican Council declares expressly: "Though faith is above reason, still there can never be a true discrepancy between faith and reason, since the same God, who reveals mysteries and infuses faith, implants in the human mind the light of reason " (Sess. III, Constit. de fide cath., cap. iv). The same truth is upheld by Leo XIII in the Encyclical "Providentissimus Deus": "Let the learned maintain steadfastly that God the creator and ruler of all things is also the author of the Scriptures, and that therefore nothing can be gathered from nature, nothing from historical documents, which really contradicts the Scriptures." Consequently, any contradiction between Biblical and profane truth is only apparent. Such an appearance of opposition may spring from one of three sources: Scripture may be wrongly interpreted, there may be a mistake in reputed profane truth, or finally the proof establishing the opposition between profane and Biblical truth may be fallacious.
Apparent Opposition -- Any statement resting on a faulty text, or an exegesis neglecting one or more of the many hermeneutic rules, cannot be said to be a Biblical truth. On the other hand, a mere theory in philosophy, or a mere hypothesis in science, or again a mere conjecture in history, cannot claim the dignity or right of a profane truth. Many mistakes have been made by Scriptural exegetes, but their number is not greater than scientific blunders. But even in cases in which the sense of the Bible is certain, and the reality of the profane truth cannot be doubted, the proof of their mutual opposition may be faulty. It is all the easier to go wrong in the proof of such an opposition, because the language of the Bible is not that of philosophy, or of science, or of the professional historian. The Scriptures do not claim to teach ex professo either philosophical theses, or scientific facts, or historical chronology. The expressions of Scripture must be interpreted in the light of their own age and of their original writer, before they are placed in opposition to any profane truth. There are expressions even in the language of today (for instance, the rising and the setting of the sun, etc.) which contradict acknowledged scientific truths, if no attention be paid to the conformity of such language with "sensible appearances".
Relation between Hermeneutics and Profane Learning -- What is, therefore, the relation between the interpreter and the scientist ?
· It would be wrong to make Scripture the criterion of science, to decide our modern scientific questions from our Biblical data. In certain historical controversies this course may be followed, because some of the books of Scripture are truly historical works. But in scientific questions, it suffices to hold that "in matters of faith and morals " Scripture agrees with the truths of science ; and that in other matters, Scripture rightly understood does not oppose true scientific results.
· Towards the use of profane truths in Biblical exegesis, the attitude adopted by commentators is not so uniform. The ultra-conservatives are inclined to explain Scripture without any regard to the progress of profane learning. This method is opposed even to the warning of St. Thomas (I:68:1). The conservatives are prone to adhere to traditional scientific views until such are evidently superseded by modern results; these exegetes expose themselves to the danger of at least seeming defeat--a disgrace that reflects on Biblical exegesis. It is well, therefore, to temper our conservatism with prudence ; prescinding from "matters of faith and morals " in which there can be no change, we should be ready to accommodate our exegesis to the progress of historians and scientists in their respective fields, showing at the same time that such harmonizing expositions of Scripture represent only a progressive stage in Bible study which will be perfected with the progress of profane learning. To repeat once more, with regard to "matters of faith and morals " there is no progress of the faith in the faithful, but only progress of the faithful in the faith ; with regard to other matters, the progress of profane knowledge may throw additional light on the true sense of Sacred Scripture.

Taken from http://www.catholic.org/

Profile of the month Archbishop Fulton Sheen

Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen

Fulton John Sheen (born Peter John Sheen May 8, 1895—December 9, 1979) was an American archbishop of the Roman Catholic Church. He was Bishop of Rochester and American television's first religious broadcaster of note, hosting Life Is Worth Living in the early 1950s, first on the old DuMont Television Network and later on ABC, from 1951 to 1957. He later hosted The Fulton Sheen Program in syndication with a virtually identical format from 1961 to 1968; these later programs, many of which were taped in color, are still frequently rebroadcast today.
Sheen was born in El Paso, Illinois, the oldest of four sons of a farmer. Though he was known as Fulton, his mother's maiden name, he was baptized as Peter John Sheen. As an infant, Sheen contracted tuberculosis. After the family moved to nearby Peoria, Illinois, Sheen's first role in the Roman Catholic Church was as an altar boy at St. Mary's Cathedral.
Education
After earning high school valedictorian honors at Spalding Institute in Peoria in 1913, Sheen was educated at St. Viator College, Bourbonnais, Illinois. Making the debating team in his freshman year, his coach called him aside the night before a major debate with the University of Notre Dame, and told him bluntly: "Sheen, you're absolutely the worst speaker I ever heard."
Sheen attended Saint Paul Seminary in Minnesota before his ordination on September 20, 1919, then followed that with further studies at The Catholic University of America Washington, D.C..[1] His youthful appearance was still evident on one occasion when a local priest who was unable to celebrate Mass asked Sheen to substitute for him. Arriving at the parish, the pastor curtly told him, "Get over to the church. The other altar boys are dressed already."
Sheen earned a doctorate in philosophy at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium in 1923.[1] While there, he became the first American ever to win the Cardinal Mercier award for the best philosophical treatise.
Sheen then taught theology at St. Edmund's College, Ware in England. In 1926, the Bishop of his hometown in Peoria asked him to take over St. Patrick's Parish. After eight months, Sheen returned to Catholic University in Washington, D.C., to teach philosophy.
Radio and television
A popular instructor, Sheen wrote the first of some 90 books in 1925, and in 1930 began a weekly Sunday night radio broadcast, The Catholic Hour.[1] Two decades later, the broadcast had a weekly listening audience of four million people. Time magazine referred to him in 1946 as "the golden-voiced Msgr. Fulton J. Sheen, U.S. Catholicism's famed proselyter" and reported that his radio broadcast received 3,000–6,000 letters weekly from listeners.[2] During the middle of this era, he conducted the first religious service broadcast on the new medium of television, putting in motion a new avenue for his religious pursuits.
Sheen was also credited with helping convert a number of notable figures to the Catholic faith, including writer Heywood Broun, politician Clare Boothe Luce and automaker Henry Ford II.
Sheen was ordained a bishop on June 11, 1951[3] . He served as an Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of New York from 1951 to 1965. In 1951 he also began a weekly television program on the DuMont network, Life is Worth Living. The show, scheduled for Tuesday nights at 8:00 p.m., was not expected to offer much of a challenge against ratings giants Milton Berle and Frank Sinatra, but surprisingly held its own, causing Berle to joke, "He uses old material, too." In 1952, Sheen won an Emmy Award for his efforts, accepting the acknowledgement by saying, "I feel it is time I pay tribute to my four writers -- Matthew, Mark, Luke and John."
The program consisted of Sheen simply speaking in front of a live audience, often speaking on the theology of current topics such as the evils of Communism or the usage of psychology, occasionally using a chalkboard. One of his best remembered presentations came in February 1953, when he forcefully denounced the Soviet regime of Joseph Stalin. Sheen gave a dramatic reading of the burial scene from Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, substituting the names of Caesar, Cassius, Mark Antony, and Brutus with those of prominent Soviet leaders: Stalin, Beria, Malenkov, and Vishinsky. He concluded by saying, "Stalin must one day meet his judgment." On March 5, 1953, Stalin died.
The show ran until 1957, drawing as many as 30 million people on a weekly basis. In 1958, he became national director of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, serving for eight years before being appointed Bishop of Rochester on October 26, 1966. Sheen also hosted a nationally-syndicated series, The Fulton Sheen Program, from 1961 to 1968 (first in black and white and then in color). The format of this series was basically the same as Life is Worth Living.
Later years
While serving in Rochester, he created the Sheen Ecumenical Housing Foundation, which survives to this day. However, his continuing celebrity status led to travels outside the Diocese, preventing him from establishing a close relationship with parishioners. He also spent some of his energy on political activities, such as his denunciation of the Vietnam War in August 1967. On October 15, 1969, one month after celebrating his 50th anniversary as a priest, Sheen resigned from his position and was then appointed Archbishop of the Titular See of Newport (Wales) by Pope Paul VI. The largely ceremonial position allowed Sheen to continue his extensive writing. Archbishop Sheen wrote 73 books and numerous articles and columns.
On October 2, 1979, two months before Sheen's death, Pope John Paul II visited St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York and embraced Sheen, saying, "You have written and spoken well of the Lord Jesus Christ. You are a loyal son of the Church."
Sheen is buried in the crypt of St. Patrick's Cathedral, near the deceased Archbishops of New York. The official repository of Sheen's papers, television programs, and other materials is at St. Bernard's School of Theology and Ministry in Rochester, New York [4]
Posthumous appeal
In 2002, Sheen's Cause for Canonization was officially opened, and so he is now referred to as a Servant of God.
Re-runs of Sheen's various programs continue to be aired on the Eternal Word Television Network, introduced by Joseph Campanella. Re-runs are also aired on the Trinity Broadcasting Network. In addition to his television appearances, Archbishop Sheen can also be heard on Relevant Radio.
On February 2, 2008 the archives of Archbishop Sheen were sealed at a ceremony during a special Mass at the Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception in Peoria, Illinois. The archive will be shipped to Rome to be used in the investigation that might result in beatification and subsequent canonization of Archbishop Sheen.

Taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulton_J._Sheen

The Black Legend

The "Black Legend": The Spanish Inquisitionby Robert P. Lockwood(from Catalyst 4/2001)

Most of the myths surrounding the Inquisition have come to us wrapped in the cloak of the Spanish Inquisition. It is the world of Edgar Allen Poe’s The Pit and the Pendulum, with vivid descriptions of burning heretics, ghastly engines of torture with innocent Bible-believers martyred for their faith. In many ways, the reality of the Spanish Inquisition has its own human tragedies, but it is not the tragedy presented in the common caricatures.
It is a curiosity of history that the medieval Inquisition of the 13th and 14th centuries was little utilized in Spain. It was only after the mid-fifteenth century that the Spanish Inquisition would develop, and its target would not be heretics in any traditional sense, but rather those whose Jewish ancestors had converted to Christianity and were accused of secretly practicing their old faith. To many contemporary historians of the Spanish Inquisition, the story unfolds not as a "religious" persecution, but rather a racial pogrom.
Spain was unique in Western Europe for the diversity of its population. In addition to a large segment of Muslims, medieval Spain had the single largest Jewish community in the world, numbering some one hundred thousand souls in the 13th Century. For centuries Jews and Christians had lived and worked together in a more or less peaceful though generally segregated co-existence.
In the 14th Century, however, anti-Jewish attitudes were on the rise throughout Europe. In 1290, England expelled its Jews and France followed in 1306. Spain began to experience an increasing anti-Jewish sentiment. It exploded in the summer of 1391 with angry anti-Jewish riots. These riots led to major forced conversions of Jews to Christianity. These Jewish converts would be called conversos or New Christians, to distinguish them from traditional Christian families. The converso identity would remain with such families for generations.
To the converso families, such conversions were not without benefit. They were welcomed into a full participation in Spanish society and they would soon become leaders in government, science, business and the Church. Over the years the Old Christians saw these converso families as opportunists who secretly maintained the faith of their forefathers. It was a strong mixture of racial prejudice against the conversos that would stir-up the Spanish Inquisition.
Spain in the 15th century was in the process of unifying the two traditional kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, while engaging in the final defeat of the Muslim stronghold of Granada. Isabella of Castile had married Frederick of Aragon in 1469. She came to the throne in 1474. When Ferdinand became king of Aragon in 1479, the two kingdoms were effectively united. War was waged with Granada beginning in 1482, with its final defeat coming 10 years later.
In his book "The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision" (Yale University Press) Henry Kamen writes, "From the mid-Fifteenth Century on, religious anti-Semitism changed into ethnic anti-Semitism, with little difference seen between Jews and conversos except for the fact that conversos were regarded as worse than Jews because, as ostensible Christians, they had acquired privileges and positions that were denied to Jews. The result of this new ethnic anti-Semitism was the invocation of an inquisition to ferret out the false conversos who had, by becoming formal Christians, placed themselves under its authority."
In 1478, Ferdinand and Isabella requested a papal bull establishing an inquisition, a bull granted by Pope Sixtus IV. In 1482 the size of the inquisition was expanded and included the Dominican Friar Tomas de Torquemada, though Pope Sixtus IV protested against the activities of the inquisition in Aragon and its treatment of the conversos. The next year, Ferdinand and Isabella established a state council to administer the Inquisition with Torquemada as its president. He would later assume the title of Inquisitor-General.
This allowed the inquisition to persist well beyond its initial intention. The papacy would continue to complain about the treatment of the conversos, but the unity of the Spanish Inquisition with the State would remain a distinguishing characteristic, and a primary source of post-Reformation European hatred.
The stated reason for the inquisition was to root out "false" conversos. There seems to have been an allure to the claim that many conversos secretly practiced their old Jewish faith and, as such, were undermining the Faith. For centuries, such legends would persist in Spain, though most evidence shows that there were few "secret" Judaizers and that most conversos, particularly after the first generation of forced conversions, were faithful Catholics.
In March, 1492, Isabella and Ferdinand ordered the expulsion – or conversion – of all remaining Jews in their joint kingdoms. The purpose of the declaration was more religious than racial, as Jewish conversion rather than expulsion was certainly the intent. While many Jews fled, a large number converted, thus aggravating the popular picture of secret Judaizers within the Christian community of Spain. Up through 1530, the primary activity of the inquisition in Spain would be aimed at pursuing conversos. The same would be true from 1650 to 1720.
The Spanish Inquisition had been universally established in Spain a few years prior to the expulsion of the Jews in 1492. Records show that virtually the only "heresy" prosecuted at that time was the alleged secret practice of the Jewish faith. Through 1530, it is estimated that approximately 2,000 "heretics" were turned over to the secular authorities for execution. Many of those convicted of heresy were conversos who had already fled Spain. These were burned in effigy.
The most famous period of the Spanish Inquisition, under the legendary Torquemada, had little to do with the common caricature of simple "bible-believing" Protestants torn apart by ruthless churchmen. The true picture is unsettling enough: it was a government-controlled inquisition aimed at faithful Catholics of Jewish ancestry. The papacy, under Sixtus IV (1471-1484) and Innocent VIII (1484-1492), rather than controlling the Spanish Inquisition, protested its unfair treatment of the conversos with little result.
With the outbreak of Luther’s Reformation in Europe and the spread of its ideas in the 1520s, the Inquisition was entrenched to protect Spain from Protestant "infiltration" and as a further means to buttress the royal power of Charles V, the successor to Ferdinand and Isabella.
The Reformation would have little impact in Spain. As Kamen explains: "Unlike England, France and Germany, Spain had not since the early Middle Ages experienced a single significant popular heresy. All its ideological struggles since the Reconquest had been directed against the minority religions, Judaism and Islam. There were consequently no native heresies (like Wycliffism in England) on which German ideas could build."
The image of a Spanish Inquisition burning hundreds of thousands of Protestant heretics has no basis in historical fact. There were so few Protestants in Spain that there could be no such prosecution. During the Reformation period, the inquisition in Spain certainly searched for evidence of Protestantism, particularly among the educated classes. But before 1558 possibly less than 50 cases of alleged Lutheranism among Spaniards came to the notice of the inquisitors.
The discovery of a small cell of Protestants – about 120 – in late 1550s, however, generated concern in the highest quarters in Spain. Charles V from his monastery retirement wrote in an infamous letter to his regent daughter Juana that so "great an evil" must be "suppressed and remedied without distinction of persons from the very beginning." Though Spain braced for a tidal wave of revelations and discoveries – with finger-pointing and accusations of pseudo-Protestants everywhere – in all, just over 100 persons in Spain were found to be Protestants and turned over to the secular authorities for execution in the 1560s.
In the last decades of the century, an additional 200 Spaniards were accused of being followers of Luther. "Most of them were in no sense Protestants...Irreligious sentiments, drunken mockery, anticlerical expressions, were all captiously classified by the inquisitors (or by those who denounced the cases) as ‘Lutheran.’ Disrespect to church images, and eating meat on forbidden days, were taken as signs of heresy," Kamen reports.
The last major outburst in activity of the Spanish Inquisition was aimed once again at alleged Judaizing among conversos in the 1720s. The Inquisition was formally ended by the monarchy in 1834, though it had effectively come to an end years prior.
Edward Peters in "Inquisition" (University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA, 1989) explains how the myth of the all-embracing inquisition developed in European thought. The creation of the myth of the Inquisition was tied to the creation of an image of a Catholic Spain in the consciousness of the West. "An image of Spain circulated through late sixteenth-century Europe, borne by means of political and religious propaganda that blackened the characters of Spaniards and their rulers to such an extent that Spain became the symbol of all forces of repression, brutality, religious and political intolerance, and intellectual and artistic backwardness for the next four centuries. Spaniards and Hispanophiles have termed this process and the image that resulted from it as ‘The Black Legend,’ la leyenda negra." It is this post-Reformation anti-Catholic "black legend" that created the myths surrounding the Spanish Inquisition. Serious historical studies in the 20th Century have debunked these myths, but they continue to persist in popular imagination.

Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen - The Woman I Love - Part 1 of 4

Heresies against the Catholic Church

The Historical Accuracy of the Infancy Narratives

Reflections of the Infancy Narratives of Matthew and Luke

Recently the class examined the historical inaccuracies of the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke. I found the arguments were lacking depth and so I investigated further. Please read the response to the criticisms of the infancy narratives of jesus below.

The Historicity of Gospel Accounts of the Nativity

Issue: What does the Church teach about the historical nature of the Gospel accounts of the Nativity?

Response: The Church unambiguously affirms the historical nature of the four Gospels, including the first two chapters of St. Matthew’s Gospel and the first two chapters of St. Luke’s Gospel, which discuss the Incarnation, Nativity, and childhood of Jesus Christ.

Discussion: As Christmas approaches each year, articles about the Nativity appear with greater frequency in newspapers and magazines. These articles, on the one hand, are welcome signs that our secularized culture continues to take an interest in Jesus Christ. On the other hand, such articles tend to quote scholars who deny the historicity of the Gospel (while ignoring scholarship of two millennia that has upheld its historicity). This air of scholarly authority sows doubt in the minds of some believers and makes it more difficult for nonbelievers to come to faith in Our Lord and in the Church.

This FAITH FACT reviews Catholic teaching on the historicity of what English-speaking biblical scholars generally call the "infancy narratives" (Mt. 1:1-2:23 and Lk. 1:1-2:52). It then examines popular objections to the infancy narratives’ historical nature.

Catholic Teaching and the Infancy Narratives Catholic teaching on Sacred Scripture is summarized succinctly and authoritatively in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (nos. 101-41). The teaching of the Catechism is the culmination of a century-long magisterial journey from that has five important reference points:

• Pope Leo XIII, Providentissimus Deus (Encyclical on the Study of Holy Scripture; November 18, 1893) • Pope Benedict XV, Spiritus Paraclitus (Encyclical on St. Jerome; September 15, 1920) • Pope Pius XII, Divino Afflante Spiritu (Encyclical on Promoting Biblical Studies; September 30, 1943) • Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Dei Verbum (Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation; November 18, 1965) • Catechism of the Catholic Church (first edition, October 11, 1992; second edition, August 15, 1997)
Drawing upon Sacred Scripture and the teaching of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, these five documents are the indispensable texts for understanding Catholic teaching on Sacred Scripture.[1]

Popular objections to the infancy narratives’ historical nature spring from the rationalism criticized by Pope Leo XIII in Providentissimus Deus.

These rationalists, he observes, deny that there is any such thing as revelation or inspiration, or Holy Scripture at all; they see, instead, only the forgeries and the falsehoods of men; they set down the Scripture narratives as stupid fables and lying stories: the prophecies and the oracles of God are to them either predictions made up after the event or forecasts formed by the light of nature; the miracles and the wonders of God’s power are not what they are said to be, but the startling effects of natural law, or else mere tricks and myths; and the Apostolic Gospels and writings are not the work of the Apostles at all. These detestable errors, whereby they think they destroy the truth of the divine Books, are obtruded on the world as the peremptory pronouncements of a certain newly-invented "free science"; a science, however, which is so far from final that they are perpetually modifying and supplementing it. (PD, no. 10)

To help counter such errors, Pope Leo set forth important principles of biblical interpretation, some of which can help Catholics respond to contemporary criticism of the infancy narratives’ historicity:

• in matters of faith and morals, the true sense of Sacred Scripture cannot contradict the unanimous agreement of the Fathers (PD, no. 14) • "all interpretation is foolish and false which either makes the sacred writers disagree one with another, or is opposed to the doctrine of the Church" (PD, no. 14) • do not "depart from the literal and obvious sense, except only where reason makes it untenable or necessity requires" (PD, no. 15) • "it is absolutely wrong and forbidden, either to narrow inspiration to certain parts only of Holy Scripture, or to admit that the sacred writer has erred ... all the books which the Church receives as sacred and canonical, are written wholly and entirely, with all their parts, at the dictation of the Holy Ghost; and so far is it from being possible that any error can coexist with inspiration, that inspiration not only is essentially incompatible with error, but excludes and rejects it as absolutely and necessarily as it is impossible that God Himself, the supreme Truth, can utter that which is not true" (PD, no. 20)[2]

It follows from Pope Leo’s teaching that the proper interpretation of the infancy narratives cannot contradict dogmatic Catholic teaching on the Incarnation of the eternal Son of God; nor can it contradict dogmatic teaching on the Blessed Virgin Mary’s divine maternity and perpetual virginity. Proper biblical interpretation cannot oppose the Church’s doctrine on the existence of angels; it cannot assert that St. Matthew’s account of the Nativity contradicts St. Luke’s account. An authentically Catholic reading of the infancy narratives cannot depart from the literal and obvious sense of these passages and cannot hold that they contain errors. Thus, assertions that the Magi never traveled to Bethlehem and that the slaughter of the Holy Innocents (in St. Matthew’s Gospel) and the census (in St. Luke’s) never occurred are not simply offensive to the sense of the faithful; they are "absolutely wrong and forbidden" as contrary to Catholic teaching.
In Spiritus Paraclitus, Pope Benedict XV showed that the teaching of Pope Leo is a modern restatement of the teaching of the Fathers and affirmed St. Jerome’s statement that "belief in the biblical narrative is as necessary to salvation as is belief in the doctrines of the faith" (SP, no. 24). Urging all to uphold the principles taught by Pope Leo, Pope Benedict took particular care to defend "the historical trustworthiness of the Gospels" (SP, no. 27). Quoting Sts. Jerome and Augustine, Pope Benedict taught that "none can doubt but that what is written took place" and that "these things are true; they are faithfully and truthfully written of Christ; so that whosoever believes His Gospel may be thereby instructed in the truth and misled by no lie" (SP, no. 27).

In Divino Afflante Spiritu, Pope Pius XII again upheld Pope Leo’s teaching and discussed its roots in the teaching of the Council of Trent and the First Vatican Council.3 He also exhorted interpreters of Scripture to "endeavor to determine the peculiar character and circumstances of the sacred writer, the age in which he lived, the sources written or oral to which he had recourse and the forms of expression he employed. Thus can he the better understand who was the inspired author, and what he wishes to express by his writings. There is no one indeed but knows that the supreme rule of interpretation is to discover and define what the writer intended to express" (DAS, nos. 33-34). Pope Pius also urged exegetes to consider "to what extent the manner of expression or the literary mode adopted by the sacred writer may lead to a correct and genuine interpretation" (DAS, no. 38).

It is entirely appropriate, then, for scholars to examine these matters. An honest examination, it seems, can only affirm the historicity of the infancy narratives. The foundation of St. Matthew’s account is a genealogy of historic personages who are clearly not fictional literary characters (Mt. 1:1-18). St. Luke’s literary mode is explicitly historical, for he relies upon "those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word," so that Theophilus, for whom the Gospel is written, "may know the truth concerning the things of which you have been informed" (Lk. 1:2-4).

After upholding Pope Leo’s teaching on the inspiration of Sacred Scripture (DV, no. 11; see especially footnote 5), the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council taught in Dei Verbum that
Holy Mother Church has firmly and with absolute constancy held, and continues to hold, that the four Gospels just named, whose historical character the Church unhesitatingly asserts, faithfully hand on what Jesus Christ, while living among men, really did and taught for their eternal salvation until the day He was taken up into heaven. … The sacred authors wrote the four Gospels, selecting some things from the many which had been handed on by word of mouth or in writing, reducing some of them to a synthesis, explaining some things in view of the situation of their churches and preserving the form of proclamation but always in such fashion that they told us the honest truth about Jesus. (DV, no. 19)

To deny the historical character of the Gospel accounts of Christ’s Nativity, then, is to spurn the teaching of the Second Vatican Council.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church authoritatively summarizes the teaching of these four documents and breaks some new ground by highlighting the relation between the literal sense and the three spiritual senses of Scripture (the allegorical, the moral, and the anagogical). The Catechism also places particular emphasis upon three criteria for interpreting Scripture found in Dei Verbum:

• be especially attentive to the content and unity of the whole Scripture • read the Scripture within the living Tradition of the whole Church • be attentive to the analogy of faith: the coherence of the truths of faith among themselves and within the whole plan of Revelation (Catechism, nos. 111-14)

Because the Church’s living Tradition is handed on in her worship (Catechism, no. 78), these criteria lead one to be particularly attentive to the liturgical pairing of certain Old Testament texts with selections of the infancy narratives. Thus, the pairing of Isaiah 60:1-6 (which mentions gold and frankincense brought by "a multitude of camels") with Matthew 2:1-12 (which mentions gold, frankincense, and myrrh) at Mass on the Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord suggests that the presence of camels with the Magi in many Nativity scenes is not without foundation, as some critics charge.

Answering Common Objections Critics of the Gospels’ historicity frequently claim that St. Matthew’s and St. Luke’s accounts of the Nativity are irreconcilable. One newsmagazine article, for example, asserts that "Matthew and Luke diverge in conspicuous ways on details of the event. In Matthew’s Nativity, the angelic Annunciation is made to Joseph while Luke’s is to Mary. Matthew’s offers wise men and a star and puts the baby Jesus in a house; Luke’s prefers shepherds and a manger. Both place the birth in Bethlehem, but they disagree totally about how it came to be there."[4]

As discussed above, the assertion that two evangelists can contradict each other is incompatible with Catholic teaching. Common sense can easily reconcile the two accounts. St. Gabriel’s annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary (Lk. 1:26-38) and the unnamed angel’s appearance to St. Joseph in a dream (Mt. 1:18-24) manifestly describe two separate historical events that took place months apart. Likewise, the birth of Jesus on Christmas night and the visit of the Magi are two different historical events whose details can easily be reconciled; in the days and weeks after the Blessed Virgin gave birth and laid Him "in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn" (Lk. 2:7), the Holy Family apparently found a "house" to stay in where the Magi would later adore the Child (Mt. 2:11). There is no contradiction whatsoever (let alone a "total disagreement") between the two accounts on how the birth came to take place in Bethlehem: St. Luke records that the Holy Family traveled from Nazareth to Bethlehem because of the census, while St. Matthew states simply that the chief priests and scribes told Herod that Micah prophesied Christ would be born in Bethlehem (Mt. 2:2-6).

Other critics assert that because St. Matthew and St. Luke did not discuss exactly the same events, the events each relates could not have been true. Some, for example, claim that the Annunciation to Our Lady, the census, and the massacre of the Holy Innocents were so important that if they were historically true, both evangelists would have included them. This objection, of course, fails to take into account that God inspired one evangelist to write about certain events and another to write about others: that He "so moved and impelled them to write-He was so present to them-that the things which He ordered, and those only, they, first, rightly understood, then willed faithfully to write down, and finally expressed in apt words and with infallible truth" (PD, no. 20). This objection also fails to consider that St. Luke may have been aware of what St. Matthew had written and, under divine inspiration, have chosen not to write about exactly the same events.

Similarly, some critics assert that because there is no contemporary secular evidence that corroborates some events discussed in the infancy narratives- for example, the census, the visit of the Magi, the star seen by the Magi, and the massacre of the Holy Innocents-these events are not historical. This standard of proof for the historicity of an event is unrea- sonable. If, two thousand years from now, there is no historical record of the existence of Watergate apart from the existence of the chronicle All the President’s Men, that lack of corroborating evidence would not be proof that Watergate never took place. In addition, these objections ignore the extant nonbiblical evidence from Josephus and Herodotus, among others, that Herod was cruel, that Magi did exist, and that a triple planetary conjunction did appear at that time.

Many critics of the historicity of the infancy narratives also believe (without quite stating this objection so boldly) that the evangelists lied about the facts in order to win over first-century readers. Some critics assert that St. Matthew invented the person of St. Joseph and the flight into Egypt in order to remind Jewish readers of Joseph, who, as the Book of Genesis relates, was sold into slavery in Egypt. These critics also claim that St. Matthew invented the massacre of the Holy Innocents in order to remind Jewish readers of Pharaoh’s massacre of Hebrew boys (Ex. 1:15-16). Others assert that St. Luke invented the angels, the shepherds, and the events in the temple to remind Gentile readers of the lives of prominent Greeks and Romans. These speculations, of course, are incompatible with Catholic teaching on biblical inspiration, and there is no contemporary physical evidence to support them. Such speculations lead one to wonder why St. Matthew would lie about the Nativity when he writes that Jesus repeatedly preached against lying (Mt. 15:19; 19:18), or why St. Luke would launch into a series of lies immediately after stating that he is writing his Gospel "that you may know the truth concerning the things of which you have been informed" (Lk. 1:4).

Perhaps most insidiously, some critics claim that the idea of the virgin birth was unknown to Christians until five decades after the death of Christ; an "invention" so late could not be true. The most important "evidence" for this claim is that the apostolic preaching, as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles and the Letters of St. Paul, emphasized Christ’s Passion and Resurrection, not His birth.

One might reply to these critics that because the Redemption of the human race was the center of Christ’s earthly life-He was born in order to "save His people from their sins" (Mt. 1:21)-the apostles, in their preaching, would naturally emphasize the Redemption, not Christ’s birth and childhood. In addition, in asserting that the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke could not have been written by St. Matthew and St. Luke but were instead written much later by others, these critics set aside not only the teaching of the Church that the Gospels were written in apostolic times (see PD, no. 10 above) but also ignore the testimony of numerous ancient authors to the contrary. [5]

"Always be prepared to make a defense" Catholics should not allow their faith to be shaken by Christmastime articles that question the historicity of the Gospels. A knowledge of Sacred Scripture and Catholic teaching, an acquaintance with the writings of sound Catholic authors on the Nativity, and a healthy skepticism towards the claims made in these articles should prepare us "to make a defense to any one who calls you to account for the hope that is in you" (1 Pet. 3:15).

First, we should make time to read the Gospels prayerfully or hear the Gospel proclaimed at Mass every day. A knowledge of the Gospels allows one to sense almost immediately the falsehood of some assertions of critics of the infancy narratives’ historicity: for example, the assertion that St. Matthew’s Gospel presents Joseph and Mary as permanent residents of Bethlehem before their flight into Egypt.

Second, we should acquaint ourselves with Catholic teaching on Sacred Scripture, which is presented authoritatively in the five texts cited in the first portion of this FAITH FACT. A knowledge of these documents allows one to read Sacred Scripture with the faith of the Church and to realize how perennial and ideological-and unscientific- many of these objections are.

Third, by reading lives of Christ and commentaries on the Gospels from patristic times to our own day, we can not only better know and love Our Lord, but also see that there is no contradiction between the four evangelists. Three resources for further study are the patristic and medieval authors mentioned in Providentissimus Deus, the lives of Christ and commentaries listed in the late Fr. John Hardon’s Catholic Lifetime Reading Plan (available from www.lifeeternal.org), and the resources at the Web site of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology (see endnote 1).

Fourth, while approaching the Gospels with the Church’s faith, we should approach the writings of critics of the historicity of the Gospels with a healthy skepticism. When critics insinuate that the evangelists lied about the facts for the sake of a theological agenda, we might ask a common sense question in return: "Why would men at constant risk of martyrdom lie about Christ’s origins in order to convince others of the truth of His teaching?"

Taken from http://www.cuf.org/faithfacts/details_view.asp?ffID=281