No Longer a Forbidden Book

THE attitude of the Catholic Church toward the Bible has changed drastically in some Catholic countries over the past few decades. Older Catholics can still recall the days when Bible reading was frowned upon, if not condemned outright. In many predominantly Catholic countries, the common people viewed the Bible as a Protestant book to be avoided.

Concerning the situation in France during the 18th and 19th centuries, Georges Auzou, professor of Sacred Scripture at the Great Seminary in Rouen, France, wrote in his church-approved book La Parole de Dieu (The Word of God): “Bible reading was not encouraged. . . . In fact, apart from the clergy and some intellectual circles, the holy Book was no longer read by Catholics. It had disappeared from [Catholic] bookstores. The idea was continually fostered that the Bible was a dangerous and even an unhealthy book . . . It was positively proscribed in nuns’ convents and in Christian [Catholic] educational institutions.”

Then things began to change. Mignot, Catholic bishop of Fréjus and Toulon, France, wrote in his preface to Vigouroux’s Dictionnaire de la Bible (1891-1912): “We are truly witnessing an awakening of Bible study in France. Twenty years ago [Bible questions] . . . interested only a very limited circle of initiated ones. . . . Less and less importance was attached to Bible reading and study. Such things were never discussed, and if, perchance, some pious layman quoted Isaiah or Proverbs, people looked at him with surprise and suspected him of having secret leanings toward Protestantism!”

In the face of increasing activities by Protestant Bible societies, encyclicals on Bible study were published by Pope Leo XIII in 1893, Pope Benedict XV in 1920, and Pope Pius XII in 1943. But these papal letters had more effect on theologians and the clergy than on the Catholic public.

The real change came with the Second Vatican Council (1962-65). The council stated: “The sacred Synod also earnestly and especially urges all the Christian faithful, especially Religious, to learn by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures the ‘excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ’ (Phil 3,:8). ‘For ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ’ [said Jerome].”

Thus, in 1966 the authors of the book A Guide to Catholic Reading were able to write: “For centuries now the average Catholic has believed the Bible to be a divinely inspired book and, with tradition, the source of all Catholic teaching. But he has also been admonished to exercise the utmost care in his approach to Bible reading and encouraged to read it preferably under close clerical or religious supervision. . . . Happily the situation has changed radically and today Catholics are urged, exhorted, and entreated on every side to read the Book of Books.”​—Italics ours.

These quotations, all taken from church-approved works, show that the Bible is no longer a forbidden book for Catholics. However, as the last quote mentions, Catholics must also take into account the tradition of their church. This has created a new problem for many sincere Catholics, and even for the church itself, as we shall see in the following article.