The Pope and The Bible

I just finished a great article over at The Catholic Free Press about the upcoming Synod of Bishops in October.  While, sure, as a protestant I have issue with a handful of Catholic doctrines, however, whenever I hear something about Pope Benedict XVI I always get a little excited because of his passion for the scriptures.  My excitement was peaked this morning as I read that the upcoming Synod will focus on the Bible.  I recommend you check out the whole article, but here are some highlights (Bold is mine).

The pope’s concern touches several levels. For one thing, despite an upsurge in biblical interest after the Second Vatican Council, only a minority of Catholics read the Bible regularly. The pope views the lack of scriptural formation as part of a wider crisis of catechetics in the church.

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So in convoking some 250 bishops for the Oct. 5-26 synod, the pope did not intend to host a forum for scriptural analysis. His primary interest is pastoral, and a main challenge is to lead more Catholics to the Bible.

As he told synod planners earlier this year, reading, interpreting and living the words of Scripture are fundamental to the faith life of Christians. Without that, the church’s great works in the modern age — including evangelization and ecumenism — are bound to stall, he said.

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And while specialists are needed, he said, “the real and essential meaning of the Bible is something the simple believer can grasp just as well.”

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One of Pope Benedict’s primary convictions is that the New Testament offers the key to understanding the Old Testament and that, as a whole, the Bible necessarily leads to Christ.

But he believes this traditional Christological approach has been threatened by some modern schools of interpretation that would limit the meaning of any biblical book to the author’s historical context.

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Instead, he said, his method takes the conviction of faith — faith that Jesus truly was God — as a starting point for reading Scripture. This approach allows for a proper theological interpretation of the Bible, yet does not sacrifice the church’s “serious engagement with history,” he said.

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What’s important, he once said, is to “read the Bible regularly, to let it keep us company and guide us.”

Man, there is some seriously good stuff in there.  I truly hope that the our Catholic brothers and sisters will heed the Pope’s words and pick up their Bibles and begin to read!