Matthew 28:18-20: And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.”
Unlike the Protestant churches, the Catholic Church traces its history all the way back to Christ, himself. Martin Luther, an excommunicated Catholic priest, established his breakaway church in 1517. Thousands of Protestant sects have formed subsequently from his move of rebellion.
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Sometimes anti-Catholics talk as if the Catholic Church is the enemy of the Bible. The contrary is true; the Bible is the Catholic Church’s book! The late Paulist priest, Fr. Alvin A. Illig, CSP, joked, “It is a shame we never got a copyright on OUR book.” The Bible did not suddenly come into existence or out of bondage with Martin Luther. Prior to the invention of the printing press, bibles were produced by hand and could be quite expensive and time consuming to create. For this reason they were often secured in churches with locks and chains. A theft could cost the entire faith community its copy of the Scriptures. Many people were illiterate and thus received their bible instruction in preaching and in religious art. The first book printed with the new technology devised by John Gutenberg was probably the Catholic Bible. This was done under the auspices of the Church. Prior to Luther’s German bible in 1534, some 626 bible editions (or portions thereof) were printed in nations where the Catholic Church held sway. Many of these were in the vernacular languages of the day. Today, the lectionary used at Mass insures a wide exposure to Scripture in our worship. There is a papal indulgence available for faithful bible reading. Every Catholic home probably has a bible, or at least, is supposed to have one. The so-called Catholic hostility to the Bible during the Middle Ages and later to bible study groups or societies is a deliberate distortion of the facts by anti-Catholics. The Church was not against the Bible; rather, she was opposed to faulty and dangerous translations as rendered by the Waldensians, Albigensians, Wycliff and Tyndale. The fact that churchmen may have gone to unnecessary extremes in combating heretical versions of Scripture does not invalidate their overriding concern. Bible societies, just as they can be today, posed a danger in that false interpretations to bible passages were given to proselytize Catholics from the true faith.
In comparison to the fragmentation evident in Protestantism, the uniformity in doctrine as derived from an ultimate teaching authority over Scripture and Tradition has done much to sustain the Catholic faith. There is only one Christian faith— a single flock of Christ— and one shepherd over all. Legend has it that Martin Luther lamented on his deathbed, “My God, what have I done, there are now as many churches as there are heads!” It is sometimes joked that if you get two Protestants together to read the Bible, you will get three different opinions. So much for private interpretation of the Scriptures; it does not work and to suggest that it does might blaspheme the Holy Spirit by denying the facts. The abiding unity in faith is proof enough of Catholic claims and would not be possible without divine intervention.
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