Is it true that Catholics were discouraged from reading the Bible years ago?

A couple of different people that go to my church that are now saved say they left the Catholic church years ago because they were hungry for truth. They said that they were discouraged from reading the Bible and that it was a dangerous book.





Is this true.Is it true that Catholics were discouraged from reading the Bible years ago?
It is true, Jim:





In fact, Tyndale's English translations were purchased and burnt on arrival into Catholic England.





And it was not until Vatican II in the 1960's that Mass was allowed in a language other than Latin; in fact, Rome is famous for killing translators who attempted to furnish the Bible in common language.





Charles Wycliffe died of old age, but they dug his bones up, burnt them, and threw them in the river--he gave us the first English translation, a forerunner of the Geneva Bible and KJV.





Let me suggest you read a book written over a hundred years ago that tells of a young boy who memorized scriptures, then the priest demanded they surrender his Bible for burning: http://www.biblebelievers.com/chiniquy/i鈥?/a>





Did you know the Bible code identifies the ';Abomination of Desolation'; that Jesus warned us of? http://abiblecode.com





Shalom, peace in Jesus, Ben YeshuaIs it true that Catholics were discouraged from reading the Bible years ago?
It is not uncommon for myths about Catholicism to be reported as fact . The particular myth that Catholics were discouraged from reading the Bible stems, I believe, from the centuries old Protestant claim that Catholics received their beliefs exclusively from the clergy by means of a liturgy that was celebrated in a language 鈥?Latin 鈥?that they did not understand. Still, one wonders what, according to the myth, was done to discourage people from reading the Bible. Perhaps if word got out that a Catholic was sneaking some Bible reading, the Church saw to it that the rack was wheeled past that Catholic鈥檚 home so as to send the message?


How quickly a lie can take off.


ignorance is all that seperates the body of Christ.
The scriptures were always held sacred from the time of Christ. They did not leave the temple, but were kept in the holy of holies.





I think that there was a misunderstanding of what that really meant, however, since most people did not know how to read, they depended on the upper class to give them proper information (not just scriptural things).





The Vulgate being the first western version of the bible, is called so because it was written in the common language, so from the outset, the Catholic church wanted to share the good news. This does not mean that everyone had a copy, since the bible was hand written.





I'm Catholic..sort of...and when I was growing up, we had a bible in our home. In fact, you couldn't come into our house without seeing it. We read from it daily from the time I could remember.





Your friends may well have been thirsting for such a familial tradition, which they did not have when they were growing up, since every family is different and has different priorities and emphases on religion.
100% scatology.





who invented the printing press ?


guy was a Catholic too.


guess what he printed ? now why would a nice Catholic guy print the Bible for easier distribution ???








total nonsense as you are supposed to spend time prayerfully reading the Book of Life.





Seems to be a good source of MISINFORMATION on catholicism,and these questions should not even be posted on any boards.





go google catholic apologetics and find the truth


or


google scott hahn,a former protestant theologian and biblical scholar who through years of prayer finally ';figured'; it all out and converted..when he saw with his own eyes and research that the Catholic Church is not a bunch of superstitious tradition and heresy.
Yes. Generally speaking, even other churches are not encouraging their congregation to read in a sense of teaching them, rather than forbidding them. Everyday life and reading newspaper and watching TV takes the priority over reading the Bible.





Bible is dangerous to those who dislike God's kingdom and the devil knows that if people ever get to truely know God through the Bible, his kingdom will fall.
No that is not true at all. That is an old misconception, that anti-Catholics use as ';proof'; that Catholicism is false. Even ex-Catholics will fall for this thinking because Catholics don't typically carry a Bible to Church, and since they are leaving the faith because of misconceptions, they are quick to agree with their new found group. But in reality it is not true at all. In fact in the Catechism of the Catholic Church we read:





V. SACRED SCRIPTURE IN THE LIFE OF THE CHURCH





131 ';And such is the force and power of the Word of God that it can serve the Church as her support and vigor, and the children of the Church as strength for their faith, food for the soul, and a pure and lasting fount of spiritual life.';Hence'; access to Sacred Scripture ought to be open wide to the Christian faithful.';





132 ';Therefore, the study of the sacred page should be the very soul of sacred theology. The ministry of the Word, too - pastoral preaching, catechetics and all forms of Christian instruction, among which the liturgical homily should hold pride of place - is healthily nourished and thrives in holiness through the Word of Scripture.';





133 The Church ';forcefully and specifically exhorts all the Christian faithful. . . to learn the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ, by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures. Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ





So, you see Catholics are encouraged to read scripture. A Catholic can certainly bring a Bible to Church, and every Catholic I know owns one.





Catholicism is 2000 years old. When it began there was no Bible. When the Bible was canonized, and it became the book of the Word of God, there were no printing presses. Bibles were hand written and it took years to produce just one. Most people could not read and no common person could afford one anyway. So the Catholic Mass brought the Word of God to the people. No one was encouraged to read the scriptures really...because they couldn't and because they didn't own a Bible. Not because the Church wouldn't let them but because it was just not practical.





During the Reformation, the Church did burn Bibles. Tynsdales translation was full of errors. This was to protect the people from poor translations that could possibly lead them into personal error. It is a responsibility of the Church to protect the faithful. At the time of the Reformation, there were Church approved Bibles written in the venacular, that were also beginning to be printed and distributed.





The Church has never kept the Word of God from the people. She was and is the custodian of the Word of God for the people.





ADDED: Latin was the language of the Mass for a long time because that was the language many DID understand. Additionally, it is a ';dead language'; which means the words used cannot be given new meanings. They always mean what they mean. Whereas in the English language words are constantly being added and old ones can take on different meanings....take the word ';gay'; for instance. It has lost it original meaning. This does not happen with Latin and it therefore kept the Mass and Scripture pure. Latin words do not evolve or change over time.





ADDED: You really have to take into account how old the Catholic faith is. Protestant denominations are a mere 500 years old at best, and most of the non-denominational sects are not even 100 years old. They all came along after the mass production of the Bible. They cannot imagine a time when there was no Bible, or the Bible was not available to all, but for centuries this was the case. The Catholic service was not structured around the idea that everyone had a Bible, because everyone did not.
When I was a kid in the 1960s I went to Catholic church school, I was an altar boy and I had lots of Catholic relatives. During my career as a Catholic I never even saw a bible. We had prayer books called missals which had excerpts from the bible. They would also read excerpts during the Mass but we didn't have bibles. I don't know why. They never told us and I didn't think to ask.
';Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.'; -- St. Jerome, A.D. 340-420





';To get the full flavor of an herb, it must be pressed between the fingers, so it is the same with the Scriptures; the more familiar they become, the more they reveal their hidden treasures and yield their indescribable riches.';-- St. John Chrysostom, A.D. 347-407





Does this sound like a Church that discourages it's members from reading the Bible?





I don't think so.
I was raised Catholic, left for awhile when I became an adult, and then came back. I've never been told NOT to read the bible. I've always been encouraged to read the bible both by church members and my own parents.





The missal at mass is so that you don't have to bring your bible and then spend time looking up the readings for the day. The missal contains readings right from the bible for the specific date, and it's not a replacement for the bible (we don't take it home with us).





What most people don't realize (even many Catholics) is the Mass has more scripture included in it than any Protestant service I've ever been to. Towards the beginning of mass we sing ';Glory to God in the Highest'; which is from the bible when the Sheppards heard the angels in Luke 2:14. We have two readings, one from the Old Testament and then one from the letters of the Apostles in the New Testament. Between these two readings we sing a hymnal psalm (in the Missal the psalms used from the bible are referenced). After the first two readings we read from one of the four Gospels. During the celebration of the Eucharistic, we hear the words our Lord said when he gave us the sacrament (which is found in the Bible).





So Catholics hear and read plenty of the bible, if not MORE than many other denominations. In fact, if every day you read the daily liturgical readings you will find that in three years you would have read almost the entire bible!





May the blessings of our Lord Jesus Christ be upon you all the days of your life.
Of course not! This happens to be one of the most ridiculous lies about Catholic teaching ever propagated. The Catholic Church wrote the New Testament and canonized the entirety of the Christian Scriptures. Ask yourself this, why would someone write a book and then forbid anyone from reading that book? The fact is we are quite pleased with our book and encourage everyone to read it. Most of the Popes through history have issued statements encouraging people to read the Bible even though they get so much Scripture in the Mass itself. There is much more Scripture in the Catholic Mass than in a Protestant service and all the Bible is taught in the Catholic Church and not just sellected passages like Protestants.


However, we did not write the book to be studied outside of the community of the Church. After all, we wrote in the book that not all of what Jesus taught is contained therein. In fact, if our writing was all inclusive all the books in the world could not be a complete record of His teachings. The fullness of His teachings is preserved and contained in His Church, the Catholic Church, through apostolic succession. As Jesus and St. Paul taught both the oral and the written Sacred Tradition are equally important as it is the Church that has the authority on faith and morals. Jesus made this clear when He said while instructing the disciples,(DRB Luke 10:16) ';He that heareth you, heareth me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth me; and he that despiseth me, despiseth him that sent me.'; He also said that those who are not obedient to the Church are outside of God's will.





The fullness of truth is in the Catholic Church and no other. Those that leave the Church are not hungry for the truth but are seeking teachers that satisfy their itching ears. They are those that can no longer endure sound doctrine that the Bible prophesies about.God bless!





In Christ


Fr. Joseph





NOTE:





Some have ignorantly said that the use of Latin was to discourage people from understanding Scriptures. The truth is that Latin is the language of the Church and all educated people throughout the history of the Church could read Latin if they read at all. If they could not read Latin they probably could not read. The advantage of the Latin Mass is that wherever one is in the world they can understand the Mass. Even people who could not read understood Latin.
46 years ago when i was 10 nuns in my Catholic school gave me the New Testament to read and expected us all to read it





Anyone who claims that the Catholic Church these last 50years banned reading the Bible is wrong





We get the Bible every day at Mass and more on Sunday Mass than many Baptists do( and I've been to a lot of Baptist services) at an average service
First, I know from personal experience (Catholic School 'way back in the '70s) that the Roman Catholic (RC) Church promoted bible reading. In fact, we were required to read large portions of the bible for classes. More: older RC bibles (I used one from the early 60s) included a note that indulgences would be earned from reading it. That's right: even before Vatican II, the RC Church was making considerable effort to promote the reading of the bible. Finally, if you attend the Sunday services of several different sects (I have attended over 20 different sects), you will probably discover, as I have, that more is read from the bible during an RC service than in any other sect.





In 1943, the pope issued an ';encyclical'; which instructed that bibles should depend upon the original languages and should be studied in a critical manner. Already in the process of producing the Confraternity Bible, the RC Church ';switched horses in midstream'; and began to produce a new English translation - one from the original languages. The result of that is the 1966 Jerusalem Bible, still used in England and Wales in lectionaries. At the same time, the Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition was published, and it also was approved by the RC Church.





We can see from these things that promoting reading of the bible in English goes back at *least* to the early 60s and - it seems obvious to me - at least back to the 40s. (Why otherwise insist on original language bible study?) I suspect that you will find any RC bible from the 20th century has a note in the front indicating that indulgences will be earned from its reading.





Now, as for earlier centuries, I *have* done some research in this direction. I can't claim to be an expert on Roman Catholic Church (RCC) history by any means, so please - if someone offers credible evidence that is contrary to what I write here, let me know.





From what I have read the only thing I could determine to be factual is that the (RCC) outlawed the personal use (by non-officials, what is known as ';lay people';) of unauthorized bibles. In other words, only ';Protestant'; bibles were ever prohibited for use by RCs. The first complete authorized English RC bible was published in 1610.





This is from the obverse of the title page of an 1844 edition Rhiems-Douay Challoner Revision





***


The present edition of the Douay version of the Old and New Testament, published by Edward Dunigan, New York, having been revised by our direction, we have great pleasure in recommending it to the faithful, to be read with that reverence and respect which are due to the Word of God, and with that humility of heart and docility which the Church enjoins upon all who would read the Holy Scriptures with advantage to their souls.





JOHN HUGHES, Bishop of New York


Given at the Episcopal residence this 27th of January, 1844.


***





http://books.google.com/books?id=Aghjnvf鈥?/a>





Notice the final phrase, ';read the Holy Scriptures with advantage to their souls';. However, the very fact that the RC Church authorized an English language bible in the 1500s (Douay New Testament in 1582) - and even earlier in other languages - I think proves that they wished their members to read the bible - *their* bible, of course, but still the bible.





Jim, http://www.bible-reviews.com
It's true for some churches. I knew a lady who was discouraged from reading her Bible by her bishop. They still do sometimes.
Not in modern times. Long ago, it was forbidden to print the Bible in the lay language, although you were free to read it as long as you could read Latin, but of course, most people couldn't.
I always had a bible and we have a family bible.
Try CENTURIES ago. And by the way, these people who left the Church were saved as Catholic-Christians!





People did not have personal Bibles to read then because of 3 major reasons.


#1-The Bible is not supposed to be interpreted by each individual differently. Right or wrong, the Church took it upon Herself to interpret for the masses.


#2-There were no printing presses. Printing a single book was an expensive and time-consuming job...one that was not afforded by individuals for the most part.


and #3-Most were illiterate. If you handed them a Bible, misinterpretation would be the least of their problems.





In today's Church, we all have Bibles, we have Bible studies organized by parishes. At my parish, we give a free Bible to every single individual who registers. We are encouraged to read the Bible daily. As a matter of fact, we are taught that in order to fully appreciate the readings at Mass (of which there a MINIMUM of 4 every Sunday Mass-OT, Psalm, NT, and a Gospel), we should have read them BEFORE even entering the Church. If you go to the USCCB website (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops), and click on ';Bible'; located at the TOP of the page, the entire Bible is compiled there for FREE. Would they do this if they were discouraging people from reading the Bible?? So if these people say they were discouraged BY THE CHURCH from reading it, either they lied, or you are.
Back before the Reformation, yes. I've never heard anything like that during modern times.
NO.


That would be the biggest lie I would have ever heard.
nope
Oh yes! the Catholics were discouraged from reading the Bible for many years. In fact, they were not even allowed to for some many years in Europe, but now the Catholics still don't know much about the true word of God. What they are fed is Catholic doctrine most of the time it seems. the children learn what is called ';catecism'; which is about the Catholic church, not the Bible.
yes defanitly! if a catholic accepted a bible. and the priest found out, they were usually kicked outta the church (i cant remember the word that they call it) it meant great perscution. weve read a lot about that time in history. martyrdom by the catholic church. i would suggest you read hidden rainbows by Christmas Carol Kauffman it is a true story of a family that accepted a bible, and gave their live to Christ. and then all the persuction and everything that they went through its really good. but yes it is ture
Actually the Bible was on the Vatican's Index of Forbidden Books from 1229 to at least the 1890's.





The Valencia Council of 1229 first put it in the Index. Clement XI reaffirmed this in his Bull Unigenitus in 1713.





It wasn't until the 1890's that Leo XII allowed the Latin Vulgate version to be read, but the readers were not allowed to interpret it's meaning for themselves.
Yes. And for the most part, Catholics are still required to do confession TO their priest. They can't go to God straight away.


For most of the last 2000 years, Catholics could not own a Bible and if they had one, it was usually written in Latin which most people can't read anyway.


They still do High Mass in Latin and when I ask Catholics for their opinion on this - they just shrug it off.


The history of the Bible is one of power, greed and corruption and hundreds, perhaps thousands, have given their life to find the word of God.
That is my understanding also. Why do you think the mass was given in Latin? The only justification for The Catholic (universal) Church for many of its traditions is in the scriptures: ';Whatsoever ye bind on earth is bound in heaven and whatsoever ye loose on earth is loosed in heaven';. They were given the authority to make the rules as they went along, which is ok until they adopted the doctrine of The Trinity which strips away the Name, blood, and pre-eminence of Jesus in baptism, leaving the subject ';dead in his sins';. Thats where I draw the line. Rev 1:5 ';Unto Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood';.