Given from the Catholic Broadcasting Station 2SM Sydney Australia
Choose a topic from Vol 2:
They read the Bible with the conviction that any sense whichwould be opposed to the express teaching of the Catholic Churchwould undoubtedly be an erroneous interpretation. And they knowthat their Church alone is the only ultimate and infallibleinterpreter of its pages. Individual readers are ever liable to bemistaken; but the Catholic Church cannot fall into error in anyexpress definitions concerning the contents of Sacred Scripture.Our conviction is that God confided the inspired writings to theguardianship of a living and infallible Church. The written pagescannot explain themselves. The living voice of an authenticinterpreter is necessary. And God has provided that in the CatholicChurch.
How many men have the capacity to read and understand the law ofour country? An ordinary man might manage some of the easier andsimpler laws; but highly trained lawyers could wrangle for weeksover individual laws, and even then differ as to their rightinterpretation. Yet even though the average man could fullyunderstand human legislation, the Bible is God's revelation ofa supernatural order of truth far deeper than the product of humanthinking; and conflicting conclusions are proof that men have notmanaged to understand it.
Not always by them. Priests have made mistakes again and againin the interpretation of Scripture. In many cases the only reallysafe guide is the authentic ruling of the Catholic Church, to whichpriests and laity alike must submit. The ordinary priests do notconstitute the teaching authority of the Church. The Bishops collectively and in union with the Pope constitute theauthoritative Catholic teaching body. And their guidance is oftenneeded, even in what would seem to be most obvious. For example,the few words, "This is my body," seem clear enough. Yetmen have proposed a dozen conflicting interpretations of thosewords!
To that I must say that even God could not make written words soclear that no one could doubt their meaning. But the fault is noton God's side. It is due to the limitations of men. I havestudied Aristotelian philosophy for years, and have taught thatsubject. Whose fault would it be if I could not write a treatise onthe metaphysics of Aristotle totally devoid of obscurity for aclass of children whose ages ranged from eight to ten years old?The fault would lie in the lack of capacity in the children. Andthe distance between the supernatural mysteries of revelation andthe highest natural wisdom is infinitely greater than between themetaphysics of Aristotle and the mind of an untrained child.
No. The establishing of a teaching Church was not a consequenceof the obscurity of Scripture, as if God had really intended theBible to be the guide of men, but found that it would not work, andthen decided to establish the Church. Scripture was never intendedto be the final guide of men. God primarily intended to have a bodyof men appointed to teach in His name. Thus, in the Old Law, Hesays, "The lips of the priest shall keep knowledge, and theyshall seek the law at his mouth." As long as the Old Lawobliged, Christ referred the people to that authority. In Matt.XXIII., 2, He says, "The Scribes and Pharisees have sitten onthe chair of Moses. All things whatsoever they shall say to you,observe and do." In the New Law He substituted the Apostolicbody and their successors as teachers in His name. Some years afterthe Catholic Church had commenced her work of teaching mankind, asecondary record of some of the events of Christ's life, and ofsome of His teachings and of those of the Apostles was made. Thatsecondary record is contained in the New Testament; and itscollected Books are the "family papers" of the CatholicChurch. She owns them, and alone has the right to give theauthentic interpretation of their meaning.