Fr. Todd Bulletin Article 9/13/26

Dear St. Mary on the Lake and Sacred Heart,

It is a joy to have our students back for the new school year. Our first week I made the rounds of all the classrooms and was again inspired by the great questions the kids were asking. One was about the authorship of the books of the Bible. Who wrote them and when? How did that work? We know quite a few specifics in regards to the authors of the books of the New Testament but not nearly as many in regards to the Old Testament books. But, regardless of the Old or New Testament, the truth remains about the Holy Spirit inspired the authors as true authors. The Bible didn’t fall from Heaven and God didn’t turn people into robots to make them write each book. This is a great question and one you may have been wondering. Here is how the Catechism describes Inspiration and the Truth of Sacred Scriptures:

“II. Inspiration and Truth of Sacred Scripture

105 God is the author of Sacred Scripture. "The divinely revealed realities, which are contained and presented in the text of Sacred Scripture, have been written down under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit."69

"For Holy Mother Church, relying on the faith of the apostolic age, accepts as sacred and canonical the books of the Old and the New Testaments, whole and entire, with all their parts, on the grounds that, written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author, and have been handed on as such to the Church herself."70

106 God inspired the human authors of the sacred books. "To compose the sacred books, God chose certain men who, all the while he employed them in this task, made full use of their own faculties and powers so that, though he acted in them and by them, it was as true authors that they consigned to writing whatever he wanted written, and no more."71

107 The inspired books teach the truth. "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."72

108 Still, the Christian faith is not a "religion of the book". Christianity is the religion of the "Word" of God, "not a written and mute word, but incarnate and living".73 If the Scriptures are not to remain a dead letter, Christ, the eternal Word of the living God, must, through the Holy Spirit, "open (our) minds to understand the Scriptures."74” https://www.vatican.va/content/catechism/en/part_one/section_one/chapter_two/article_3/ii_inspiration_and_truth_of_sacred_scripture.html

The Catechism is divided up into numbered paragraphs (2865 to be exact). They make an easy reference for finding a particular paragraph even if you don’t know what part of the catechism it is from. Let us continue to be open to the Holy Spirit who fills us as we encounter Jesus in the scriptures.

God Bless, Fr. Todd