Pope Francis: "The Word of God Precedes the Bible and Surpasses It"

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The_Reginator

The_Reginator

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I found the following from the Holy Father on a couple of web sites:
Pope Francis: "The Word of God Precedes the Bible and Surpasses It"

You can also read about his statement here.

From the Pope:
Sacred Scripture is the written testimony of the divine Word, the canonical memory that attests to the event of Revelation. However, the Word of God precedes the Bible and surpasses it. That is why the centre of our faith isn’t just a book, but a salvation history and above all a person, Jesus Christ, the Word of God made flesh.
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And:
It is precisely because the Word of God embraces and extends beyond Scripture that, in order to properly understand it, the Holy Spirit’s constant presence, who guides us “to all truth,” is necessary. It is necessary to place ourselves within the great Tradition that has, with the Holy Spirit’s assistance and the Magisterium’s guidance, recognized the canonical writings as the Word that God addresses to his people, who have never ceased meditating upon it and discovering inexhaustible riches from it.
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God has blessed His Church with a wise shepherd.🙂
 
Love it!

As far as apologetics goes, this presents a whole new angle from which to address the topic of Sola Scriptura vs. Sacred Tradition with my inquisitive Protestant friends. 🙂

Thanks for sharing this.
 
As Saint John said; “But there are also many other things which Jesus did; which, if they were written every one, the world itself, I think, would not be able to contain the books that should be written.” John 21:25
 
This was the deciding factor that drew me away from sola-scriptura Protestantism. It simply does not make any sense, historically. Even if there had been no sacred Scriptures of the New Testament for just a single day after Pentecost, the Oral Teaching would still be the first inspiration. It is the Necessary Thing, the Basis, for the entire Church.

To base the post-apostolic Church upon documents which did not exist at her Founding is to confuse the ontology of existence.
 
We see from the prologue to Luke (Luke 1:1-4) that Luke wrote his Gospel only to confirm the oral Apsotolic teaching that Theophilus had already received. Theophilus learned nothing - zero, zip, nada from the written Gospel. Bible alone seems to state that there was no Church until the scriptures were written. Or, that the scriptures exceed the Church. Or…

The true irony is that many who believe in bible alone settle for less bible than Catholics. 🤷
 
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