The discussion of today’s topic is an important one in all of our lives; our origin and basis of our foundation – the Bible, word of God. There is a difference between our religion and other religions in a special way.

Let’s understand the difference between Christianity and other religions. All religions have their own sacred books. The Qur’an is the holy book of Islam. In Islam, they believed Mohammed their prophet was given this book by an angel who came down, dictated to him and he wrote every word of it.

What constitutes Christianity’s foundation?  “The word became flesh.” The “word” arrived before the book. The foundation is God who became human. Christianity will continue unaffected even if the Bible were to disappear. There was no doubt about Jesus’ arrival as the Saviour. The two periods of human history are the year of Christ (AD) and the period before Christ (BC). Without a doubt, we can believe that Jesus entered this world, both in the spiritual and secular realms. It was not until the fourth century that the Bible was composed and delivered to the Christians as scripture.

Prior to that time, all of the little gospels’, saints’ writings, and revelations were dispersed over various locations. They were considered sacred. Four centuries passed following the death of Jesus Christ. Thousands of Christians suffered under the persecution and execution of Emperors such as Nero, Diocletian, and Caligula. Early Christians received their traditional revelation of God’s word through the teachings and preaching’s of the apostles and disciples. They received and adhered to the teachings of Jesus Christ, the cornerstone of our faith.

Unknowingly or not, new age Christians have a propensity to treat Christianity as a book religion, which is why the Church cannot accept the Protestants’ “sola scriptula” interpretation of the Bible. The Bible’s many volumes were dispersed throughout many locations until the fourth century, when they were collected and made available to us.

The Church believes the foundation is Jesus, from whom comes traditions followed by the bible.

Let’s read

All the words written in the new testament from the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke are repeated as each of them wrote about their experiences and John tried to write what the other three had missed out. Majority of narrations are about incidents that happened in the life of Jesus. Matthew elaborated on the 5 discourses/preachings of Jesus.

Put all of Jesus’ teachings on paper, begin reading them aloud, and in three to four hours, we will be able to finish the readings. Throughout his thirty-three year life, Jesus constantly preached to the disciples day and night, especially during the final three years he spent with them. The Bible only records three hours of preaching out of the three years; where are the other sermons? All that Jesus said and taught is inspired by God.

Let’s read:

Luke 21:33 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

John 21:25 But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

John 22:30-31 Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

Bible claims, Jesus is the son of God and the Messiah. Where are the rest of the preaching’s of Jesus? The bible points out these preaching’s will not be lost, so where is it available?

Isahia 40:8 The grass withers, the flower fades; but the word of our God will stand forever.

Isahia 59:21 And as for me, this is my covenant with them, says the LORD: my spirit that is upon you, and my words that I have put in your mouth, shall not depart out of your mouth, or out of the mouths of your children, or out of the mouths of your children’s children, says the LORD, from now on and forever.

Bible prophecies states that God’s teachings that Jesus delivered are preserved in writing, the majority have been transmitted orally or via customs and traditions. The only books that have survived are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. However, Jesus also imparted knowledge to the other apostles and disciples who had heard the word of God and had attended all of Jesus’ teachings, such as Andrew and Bartholomew. Since they were not skilled writers, they preached to the people while the Holy Spirit helped them gather all the wisdom that was contained in their bodies, minds, and souls.

While St. Andrew and St. James travelled to Europe, St. Thomas proceeded to India, and St. Peter travelled to Rome to preach. Because of this, the Catholic Church believes in the traditions as well as the Holy Scriptures. Then, indeed, we shall have unrestricted access to the real Jesus Christ. Tradition and the Bible should always be complementary to one another rather than conflicting with one another. We should research the customs and teachings if there are any passages in the holy book that we don’t comprehend. Together, they comprise Jesus’ teachings.

Isahia 59:21 explains – my spirit that is upon you, the holy spirit. Jesus through the power of the holy spirit put the word of God in the mouths of all the twelve apostles and through them the next generation after generation. It is handed over to us forever.

How did we get to know about the sacrament of confession? Jesus gave the authority to the apostles saying ‘what you bind on earth, will be bound in heaven’; if you forgive the sins of any, it will be forgiven. In James, it’s written – anyone committing sins, should confess to one another and our sins will be forgiven. The elders of the community should absolve the sins of the people.

Writing of the Church fathers, who are there? Those who lived during the time of Jesus, immediately after Jesus, the following century after Jesus and  also those who lived in the first four centuries, they know about Jesus what was practised and preached at that time, more than all of us.

It’s dangerous if any of us try to change Christanity as the religion of the book. The Church didn’t feel the need all these years to inform us about the truth because it was know to us but now it’s required for the Church to stand up and tell the world the truth about Jesus. Now it should be established once again, when the untruth comes and questions us?

Bible is scared, why 27 books of the new testament were selected from among so many others? Some of the books were narrating many unimaginable things from the life of Jesus, miracles performed etc.

Criteria/conditions to be termed as an ‘original’ book – Books should have been written by any of the apostles or those associated with the apostles

27 books that were written by the apostles are authentic, sacred and considered as the holy scripture. It was the Catholic church that formulated these books.

The authenticity of the books of different religions is always questioned, because the content of those books are copied from other books. The authenticity of Christanity is unquestioned as it’s a religion of the  person, and we all accept and believe that Jesus came into the world.

Jesus was born around 3 BCto 1 BC , and died around 30 AD to 33 BC. Islam came into existence almost 500 years later after Jesus. People will claim many things, however we should remember what the bible tells us about all that came into existence after the bible.

Galtians 1:8 But even if we or an angel from heaven should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to what we proclaimed to you, let that one be accursed! 

Bible is the accepted book, by most of the religions in the world. Bible is a living word because all that Jesus preached to us; he lived, walked, shed blood, died and was buried here on earth and rose up after three days. We are believing in a God  who is alive and this God who died for us, will come again and takel us back. The bible is a living word because one who preached this word, is still alive, every word from the bible that was preached 2000 years ago is alive even today, because one who spoke is alive.

Almost 2.5 billion people i.e. 33% of the population in the world believe that Jesus will come again. In Islam 1.5 billion people i.e 22% of the world population also believe Jesus will come back again. It means more than 55% of the world population believes that Jesus is alive. Majority is already there in the world out of 7 billion people. This can’t be claimed by any other religion or God, and we all believe because it’s an unquestionable fact.

From today, when we read the bible we also need to understand our tradition that is handed over to us for the last 2000 years.

God’s words are summarised throughout the whole Holy Mass, during which we pray and observe the Passover.  Let us thank God for what He has accomplished in our lives. There should be a body to interpret the Bible in order to comprehend it.

Father Joseph, for instance, stated that even if he resides in the UK, no one will accept his interpretation of the United Kingdom Constitution, hence he has no right to do so. A judicial body is tasked with interpreting it. An appointed body is tasked with interpreting the meaning of each written statute in the Constitution. In the same manner, not everyone can understand the Bible. In the past, during the first century, it was the council of fathers who interpreted the bible and handed over to the Church, even today. The last council that was conducted was the second vatican council.

Let’s not accept untrue statements that are being made to us. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John wrote the Bible because they were writing about Jesus. When Jesus spoke, he did it with emotion, passion, tone variations, and body language. The Bible has a meaning that we cannot and should not interpret in a way that is inconsistent with that meaning. We must investigate the church’s official teachings, which were provided to us following our study of the Greek original manuscript of the Bible. Many academics who are fluent in Greek have deciphered every word and given their interpretations to the church, which is acceptable.

When someone shares a biblical chapter with us, we should first find out how credible they are and then determine what authority they are using to discuss the scripture.

Only by reading and comprehending the Bible will we be able to know the truth. As the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit and conveys the message of Jesus to us via tradition, let’s accept it as sacred text.

Transcribed by Durriya Alphonso