We have all been misled

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dcdurel

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The old Catholic Encyclopedia, written by experts, says

“The word Gospel usually designates a written record of Christ’s words and deeds.”

This idea has been spread everywhere, and it is the prevelant belief by all Catholics today, layman, bishops and cardinals, and was believed by ME.

But, the more I read the writings of the Popes, and those authorized and approved by them, such as the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and especially the General Directory for Catechesis I began learning that this is NOT the understanding of the Church
The Church teachs that the Gospel is handed down in scripture and Tradition and it is EVERYTHING Jesus taught to His apostles, even the teachings He explained privately and even everything He taught through the Holy Spirit.

Mr 4:34 “He did not speak to them
without a parable, but privately
to his own disciples he explained
everything.”

Joh 14:26 “But the Counselor, the
Holy Spirit, whom the Father will
send in my name, he will teach
you all things,”

Since “everything” and “all things” are not written anywhere in scripture, it is obvious that the Gospel is much more than what is written in the Gospels, as the writers in the Catholic Encyclopedia believed.

In other words, when the apostles or their successors came to a pagan land, and the people asked them who this Jesus was, the apostles or bishop did not start reading scripture. He did not start reading

“1 The book of the genealogy of
Jesus Christ, the son of David, the
son of Abraham.
2 Abraham was the father of Isaac,
and Isaac the father of Jacob, and
Jacob the father of Judah and his
brothers,
3 and Judah the father of Perez and
Zerah by Tamar, and Perez the father
of Hezron, and Hezron the father of
Ram,…”

The pagan would then ask, who is David, who is Abraham, and again, who is this Jesus and why do you worship him?
No matter how hard you try, it is impossible to teach about Jesus
and who He was, who His Fathers is, who the Holy Spirit is, and teach about salvation and grace and the sacraments only by reading the Gospels. The reason is that the Gospels are narratives of the life of Jesus. They do not claim to be the Gospel the apostles taught and preached.
 
Obviously when the apostles or their successors preached the Gospel the did not do so by reading the Gospels

So what did the apostles teach and preach? There is no book of the bible that claims to have a summary of the Gospel the apostles taught and preached. But only the apostles were taught “everything” by Jesus and “all things” by the Holy Spirit.
And Jesus said whoever believes this Gospel and is baptized will be saved.

So, how do we know what to believe? How do we know the content of this Gospel they preached and taught since it was not written by them?

Well, we can read what the writings of the first Christians who learned from them, the apostlolic fathers, and from them we can know that they believed the same basic teachings of the Catholic Church today. And they claimed to have learned this Catholic faith from the apostles. Well, if the apostles taugtht them the Catholic faith, then obviously the Gospel the apostles taught and preached was the Catholic faith. And since the apostles learned the Gospel from Jesus in a chronological order, that is, they learned what Jesus taught before He died, then they leared about the kingdom after He died but before He rose into heaven, they had to first organize it before they taught it so the people could understand and remember it. So the apostles organized this Gospel they learned from Jesus, and taught it systematically, otherwise no one could learn it. This was generally organized by teaching the articles of the Creed, teaching the sacraments and liturgy, teaching the commandments and teaching prayer. The Church teaches the entire and full living Gospel was taught like this, that is, handed down in Tradition. But, this Gospel is the Catholic faith. **In other words, the Gospel that apostles taught and preached IS the Catholic faith. ** Certain of these many teachings were later written down in the four Gospels, as the new Catechism says.
So only in Tradition was the full Gospel handed down. And this Gospel was the entire Catholic faith. The Catholic Faith comes to us from the apostles, because the Gospel that apostles taught and preached was the Catholic faith.

To teach and preach the Gospel, we must teach and preach the Catholic faith, that is evangelize and catechize. We cannot teach the Catholic faith by reading the bible, any more than the apostles could teach and preach the Catholic faith only by reading the bible.
The apostolic Church fathers all knew the teachings of the Catholic Church, because that was the Gospel the apostles all taught and preached. If we teach catechism, we are actually teaching the Gospel.

So the real meaning of the word Gospel, or good news, is that it is the entire Catholic faith.

So evangelize the Gospel simply means procaiming the Catholic faith and living it out.

Catechize means to teach the Gospel, which is the same as teaching the Catholic faith.

Once this teaching of the Church becomes understood then Catholics will evanglized much better for now they will know the entire content of the Gospel, (the Catholic faith) and when priests proclaim the Gospel, they will understand this to mean “proclaim the Catholic faith”. To teach the Gospel, they will simply teach the Catechism, which presents the Gospel and draw nourshment for this teaching from scripture to help the teachings sink in.

Once this is understood, then Catholics will begin to be fed the entire word of God, the living Catholic faith, and they will no longer complain they are not being fed.
 
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dcdurel:
Once this teaching of the Church becomes understood then Catholics will evanglized much better for now they will know the entire content of the Gospel, (the Catholic faith) and when priests proclaim the Gospel, they will understand this to mean “proclaim the Catholic faith”. To teach the Gospel, they will simply teach the Catechism, which presents the Gospel and draw nourshment for this teaching from scripture to help the teachings sink in.

Once this is understood, then Catholics will begin to be fed the entire word of God, the living Catholic faith, and they will no longer complain they are not being fed.
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So in short, we are being mislead into believing…

the Gospel is only in the four books (Matt, Mark, Luke, John),
when in truth the Gospel is contained in the fullness of the Catholic faith.

I’ve never heard that the Gospel was only the four…except by protestants (and even then they usually include the whole Bible as the gospel)…

I’m sorry, I’m confused. :confused:
 
I really don’t know why anyone is confused and certainly nobody has been misled.
The Church cannot mislead you as it is the Deposit of Faith.
If you are Catholics you should be reading the Catechism which answers all your questions.

Please read CCC 74-100 at www.scborromeo.org/index2.htm

Click on table of contents with paragraph numbers and go to 74.
 
This is a very enlightening explaination of Paul’s statement to follow both oral and written tradition. Thank you for such an eloquent explanation of the Catholic perspective on the written word and Tradition. Most protestents and Catholics do not fully understand the importance of oral Truth. By pointing out the the apostles themselves did not yet have the written Gospels when they began preaching is a clear sign that there is more Truth about Jesus than can be contained in the written word alone. Cardinal Newman pointed out that to study Christian history is to cease to be protestent. The fact that he was a convert to Catholocism is point in fact. By studying the early Church Fathers and other historical documents of the time, it is obvious that the Catholic church exhisted from the beginning. The Bible says the Church is the Truth.

Thank you, Thank you for this detailed examination.
 
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dcdurel:
The old Catholic Encyclopedia, written by experts, says

“The word Gospel usually designates a written record of Christ’s words and deeds.”
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Excellent post! The “good news” and the Catholic Faith are one and the same - I get it. My only critique is that this definition above is not complete, doesn’t claim to be and, in fact, acknowledges that it is speaking of what the word Gospel USUALLY means when people use the term. It doesn’t even necessarily agree with that usage. It certainly does not exclude the fuller, more meaningful, theologically and practically relevant thoughts that you provided, but simply presents the COMMON usage of the term. Rather than disagreeing with that characterization, you should simply say that such a use of the word Gospel is simply inadequate and doesn’t convey the fullness of the term.

Again, great post

Phil
 
I always find the best evidence for Church authority to be the Bible itself. I’m not even referring to the verses themselves, but the actual books. Protestants don’t seem to understand that the NT epistles show the early church exercising authority over their subsidiary churches. Basically, each epistle is a bishop, like Paul, directing his diocese. What more proof do they need.
 
Aaron I.:
I always find the best evidence for Church authority to be the Bible itself. I’m not even referring to the verses themselves, but the actual books. Protestants don’t seem to understand that the NT epistles show the early church exercising authority over their subsidiary churches. Basically, each epistle is a bishop, like Paul, directing his diocese. What more proof do they need.
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Paul was bishop? I did not know that. Why did be write to Rome than?
 
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trumpet152:
Paul was bishop? I did not know that. Why did be write to Rome than?
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Paul was an Apostle, he was writing to the “Churches”, presumably their Ordained Bishops.
 
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Philthy:
Excellent post! The “good news” and the Catholic Faith are one and the same - I get it. My only critique is that this definition above is not complete, doesn’t claim to be and, in fact, acknowledges that it is speaking of what the word Gospel USUALLY means when people use the term. It doesn’t even necessarily agree with that usage. It certainly does not exclude the fuller, more meaningful, theologically and practically relevant thoughts that you provided, but simply presents the COMMON usage of the term. Rather than disagreeing with that characterization, you should simply say that such a use of the word Gospel is simply inadequate and doesn’t convey the fullness of the term.

Again, great post

Phil
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What I was pointing out when I quoted the old Catholic Encyclopedia is that its own definition is faulty, incorrect, misleading. Its own definition has misled people. The Church had never limited the meaning of the word Gospel to only the words and deeds of Jesus in the Gospels. In other words, this is not a recent post Vatican II error, but it starts at least, way back in 1914 when the Catholic Encyclopedia was written. Naturally this error is taken up and believed by Protestants, dissident theologians and everyone who rejects the moral teachings of the Catholic Church. In fact, what better way to reject, ignore and quitely shove aside the moral teachings of the Church, especially sexual morality, than to limit the meaning of the word Gospel only to four Gospels. These dissiendents were probably the source of the error found in the Catholic Encyclopedia. A few influential dissidents have proclaimed this false definition over and over and have used every means to propagate it. I have never read or heard the correct definition in my entire life, and I am 57 years old, until I started studing the writings of the Popes and the documents they promoted, especially the Catechism and ESPECIALLY the General Directory for Catechesis. I never realized the Gospel is everything the Catholic Church teaches, believes and practices.
I now realize the reason most priests don’t teach and preach the Catholic faith is not because they are bad, or afraid of the truth, or ignorant, etc. That is the reason many people give.
I know many priests and the vast majority are excellent, wonderful men, the best men in the community. They all give wonderful talks when they teach to groups outside of mass, such as at RCIA, or Legion of Mary, etc. The reason they don’t teach the Catholic faith at mass is because we and they, all of us, have been misled into believing a false understanding of the Gospel. It took me 9 months of studying the writings and documents put out by the Popes and praying before Jesus in the Eucharist before I finally understood what I was reading. The heresy was so ingrained in me that I could not understand the plain words I was reading. When I was younger I would have simply dismissed the Pope’s writings and thought that they were just writing to express their own thoughts, or just to have something to say when they gave a speech. But, after 57 years of always being wrong and the Pope’s were always right I knew it had to be a lack of understanding on my part. So I persisted in prayer in front the Blessed Sacrament until Jesus finally gave in and cleared up my misunderstanding.
 
These documents of the Pope’s clear many other things. For example, lets take the detailed and clear explanations of moral teachings, with reference to sexual morality, in the Catechism, or even the Pope’s teachings in the Theology of the Body, or of teachings of the person of Jesus, for example that He has two wills, two natures, human knowledge and divine knowledge, etc. I used to think all these teachings are derived from the word of God and thus are separate and distinct from the Gospel. I used to think that we had scripture, tradition and then Catholic Church teachings, which were kind of separate from God’s word in scripture and tradition. Thus, some Catholic Church teachings were not exactly the word of God were not the teachings of Jesus. They were true, but not exactly the pure Gospel, the pure word of God.
That idea is false. These teachings are simply a clearer understanding of Tradition, and of scripture. They are a more explicit understanding of what has already been revealed. Thus, whatever the Church proposes as being divinely revealed is already the word of God. It is simply a clearer understanding of the word of God. But, since scripture cannot change, this clearer understanding becomes part of Tradition. Thus, the Catechism presents a living Tradition and so all its teachings ARE the teachnigs of Jesus. Whatever the Popes or the Church newly proposes as being divinely revealed simply becomes part of Tradition, for it is simply a more explicit understanding of what the apostles handed down. Thus, the Gospel is a living Gospel. It is not a dead Gospel in which we don’t grow in knowledge, but a living Gospel that never changes what has been revealed, but which does grown in understanding of those first truths handed down. Revelation is not added on, but it becomes more clear, and these clearer teachings become part of the living Gospel.
So, as the General Directory for Catechesis says, these teachings ARE the teachings of Jesus.

Another thing I learned and from Yves Congar’s book on Tradition, and later confirmed in the Catechism is that all teachings, the entire Gospel, everything God has revealed, is handed down through Jesus in the Gospel in Tradition. Tradition contains everything. It contains everything, the entire and full Gospel. There is NOTHING in scripture that was not first taught in Tradition. Later on some of those teachings of Tradition were written in scripture.
Thus there is nothing the Church derives from Scripture which is not first handed down in Tradition. When the Church says some teaching is derived from Scripture, it does not mean that Scripture is the original source of the teaching. The Church teaches that the Gospel Jesus taught and the apostles preached and taught (handed down in Tradition) is “the source of all saving truth and moral discipline.” When the Church derives a teaching from Scripture, it simply means that Church finds a teaching implicit in Scripture that was already handed down in the Gospel through Tradition or first made clear by studing that Tradition.
 
Hello! You can downplay the importance of the Gospels if you want, but where I go to Church we have three readings from the Bible at Mass, the third being from one of the Gospels. That reading is done only by clergy - not lay readers - and we stand, make the sign of the cross and praise Jesus Christ for it.

It is true that everything the Church teaches is not in the Gospels but I defy anyone to show me where anything the Church teaches is in opposition to what is taught in the Gospels. Contrary to some protestant claims the Catholic Church is indeed a “Bible believing Church.”

The argument that the apostles didn’t have the Gospels when they started preaching is meaningless. Any scholar will tell you that Paul wrote his letters before the Gospels were written and that none of the New Testament was written until at least twenty years after Christ was crucified. Jesus was a Jew and and his apostles were Jews, and any scriptures referred to in the New Testament are the Jewish scriptures we refer to as the Old Testament.
 
dcdurel, I’m more than a little confused about what your actually trying to say here, is it divide and conquer, or confuse and bewilder. 🙂

I’m in the confused and bewildered category, apart from saying that before the Gospel was written, word was spread by “word of mouth”.
Jesus obviously trusted men to write the word, He quoted it, and what happened in the New Testement was foretold in the Old, and much of what was revealed has yet to happen.
 
The old Catholic Encyclopedia, written by experts, says

“The word Gospel usually designates a written record of Christ’s words and deeds.”

This idea has been spread everywhere, and it is the prevelant belief by all Catholics today, layman, bishops and cardinals, and was believed by ME.
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I wonder if this phenomenon is more prevelent among Catholics who live in nations with a Protestant majority? It seems some Catholics emphasize chapter and verse, and are really trying to hit a home run in the Protestant ball park.
 
If the Old Catholic Encyclopedia told me today was Saturday, I’d go check elsewhere it was indeed Saturday. :rolleyes:
 
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St_Benedict:
If the Old Catholic Encyclopedia told me today was Saturday, I’d go check elsewhere it was indeed Saturday. :rolleyes:
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Care to elaborate?

I’ve read some things in it that seem like they are phased strangely, but I attributed it to being from a different era.
 
I believe that it is fair to say that, from the moment Jesus ascended to heaven, we have been imperfectly led by the humans on earth.

But that doesn’t mean nobody is supposed to try and spread the Gospel.

The word “Gospel” means “good news.” and the good news is this:

“The reign of God is at hand.”

This is what Jesus told his disciples to share - first with the lost sheep of Israel, and later with the rest of the world.

Living our lives with God at the center is the way to life. How to do that is not always obvious but certain statements like “Seek first the kingdom of God” and “Treat others the way you would be treated” are clear signposts.

The mission of all members of the church, from the Pope to the newly baptised, and including non Catholic Christians, is to live and to share the Good News - to make God the center of our lives rather than money, power, sex, fame, etc. etc. …

that is how I see it.

Peace

-Jim
 
I think you are making something out of nothing. Gospel can be understood either way. Gospel simply means “good news”. All of the teachings of Christ are included in this “good news”. But the four gospels are the primary source of Christs life.
 
If a or a bishop of the early Church went to a new country to proclaim the Gospel, what would he say to a pagan who asked about this Jesus who the bishop worshipped?

Would the bishop answer by reading the Gospels?

Of course not. No one can explain to a non-Christian who Jesus is, who the Father is, who the Holy Spirit is by reading the Gospels. It just cannot be done. Even Martin Luther, the founder of “scripture alone” had to write a small catechism and a large catechism to teach his Gospel. He found out that reading the Gospels does not teach who God is, what original sin is, how do we receive the grace of salvation, what Jesus meant when He said, “this is my Body”. Even the Protestants who study the scriptures all their lives and study the Gospels can’t agree on the basics on salvation, the Eucharist, the Church etc.
So how in the world do you think an early bishop could explain the basics of Christianity to a pagan simply by reading the Gospels if Protestants cannot understand the basics even though they have been reading them all their lives?
Am I losing anyone here?
Obviously, since the early Christians could not teach the Gospel by reading the Gospels, they must have had another way and much more information available to teach and preach the Gospel.
If the apostles were taught by Jesus for 36 months, but only about 1 months of teachings are contained in the Gospels, then there must be much more to the Gospel then what is written.
If the Gospels themselves said Jesus explained “everything” to the apostles, and God knows quite a bit, then obviously “everything” is not in the Gospels.
If after Jesus died but before He arose, Acts says He taught them about the kingdom, but exactly what is taught is not written anywhere, then there is much more they learned than what is written in the Gospels.
If Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to teach the apostles “all things”
and the Holy Spirit, as God, knows quite a bit, then obviously “all things” are not written in the Gospels.
Thus the Gospels are incomplete.
And the format of the Gospels wrong for teaching the basics of who God is, who Jesus is, who the Holy Spirit is, why God became man, who Adam and Eve are, what grace is, what sin is, why we need to keep the commandments, etc., they do not present any teaching in a fundamental and systematic manner, because the Gospels are in a narrative format, since they narrate the life of Jesus. They are not meant to proclaim and teach the Gospel by themselves, but to narrate the life of Jesus and present the person of Jesus and some of what He taught.
Since no one can teach the Gospel by reading the Gospels, then what did the apostles teach and preach when the proclaimed the Gospels. What was the content of what they taught and preached? Since no book of the bible, no chapter of the Bible claims to be a summary of what the apostles taught, then what was the Gospel the apostles taught? Jesus commanded them to teach and preach the Gospel, and whoever believes this
Gospel would be saved. Then what exactly was the Gospel they taught?
In other words, what is the content of the Gospel they proclaimed? How did they teach the Gospel when a pagan asked them who Jesus was, who God was, what is baptism, how do they worship? None of this Gospel that they taught and preached was written by them in scripture or anywhere. All we have is a little of the beginnings of the creed.
The answer is simple. As anyone who knows the beliefs of the early Christians in the first, second and third centuries, they know that they were thorougly Catholic. Since these early Christians learned their teachings from the apostles, it is obvious that the Gospel the apostles taught and preached IS the Catholic faith.
The apostles did not teach the Gospel, then teach the Catholic faith. They only taught ONE Gospel, the Catholic faith.
 
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