As Fr. Jim wrote last week, Pope Francis released his Apostolic Exhortation Amortis Laetitia, (in English titled the Joy of Love), the post-Synodal document resulting from the Synods on the Family conducted last year. Although I am still reading through the very tightly-packed document itself - all 264 pages of it - instead of understanding it via New York Times commentary, one thing stands out right away in its structure. Although the footnotes cite many sources - such as homilies given either by Pope Francis himself, other popes, encyclicals, conciliar documents or congregations within the Holy See - there is hardly a paragraph that doesn't contain at least one very specific type of reference: a quote from the Bible. Using both Old and New Testament, drawing heavily on the Psalms, the Holy Father backs up just about everything he writes from Scripture.

A bit of a surprise to those who claim Catholics are discouraged from reading the Bible, isn't it? If you attended the parish mission recently given by Bill Wegner of Good News Ministries, you may have been surprised at how much of the Bible you actually do know!

Before the invention of the moveable-type press by Johannes Gutenberg in the mid-15th Century, which made mass production of books (of which the Bible was the very first) possible, Bibles had to be individually hand-copied, a very time-consuming and expensive process; it has been claimed that the price of making a single Bible in the Middle Ages prior to the printing press was about $30,000 at modern exchange rates! This severely limited how many copies were available to the faithful which, prior to the Protestant Reformation in 1517, was comprised only of the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christian churches. Direct access to Scriptures was simply beyond the reach of most people due to economics and education: most people, with the exception of the rich, may have been illiterate. 

How about today? Are Catholics still largely discouraged from opening up the large family Bible and reading more than the important family dates inside the front cover? An examination of the Mass may help to provide an answer. A Catholic who attends Mass every weekend for three years is exposed to a three-year cycle in the First, Second and Gospel readings, known as Cycle "A" (predominant with the Gospel according to Matthew), Cycle "B" (Gospel according to Mark) and Cycle "C" (Gospel according to Luke). The Gospel according to John is interspersed during Sundays of the Easter season and during a number of weeks over the summer during Cycle "B" (St. Mark's Gospel is somewhat shorter than the others, so St. John's is used for its famous "Bread of Life" discourse found in chapter 6 of that Gospel). A person who goes to Mass on weekdays will hear some additional readings based on a two-year cycle (creatively called "Year I" and "Year II"); although there is some overlap with the weekend readings, there are some unique to daily Mass. Simply by going to Mass every day for three years, one will hear about 30% of the Old Testament and 74% of the New Testament. Although it isn't the entirety of Scriptures, it's not a bad start! In addition, if one prays the "Prayer of the Church" also known as the Liturgy of the Hours or the Divine Office, which is obligatory for clerics and religious- but certainly encouraged also for laity who wish to benefit from it-one can benefit with further readings from Scripture as well as an in-depth recitation from the Old Testament book of Psalms.

Far from being discouraged from reading the Bible, Catholics are actually encouraged to read and reflect on as much as possible. This is found in literature written both before the Second Vatican Council (e.g., Pope Pius XII's encyclical Inspired by the Divine Spirit , in Latin Divino Afflante Spiritu) and since through the Council's Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation (in Latin Dei Verbum). When used in concert with the teaching Office of the Church (known as the Magisterium), there is no better way to have a well-informed conscience (which Pope Francis does say is a necessary requirement in his Apostolic Exhortation) and the tools we need to make good, moral and right decisions that are the basis for the human act. 

So take that Bible off the coffee table, dust it off, and start reading!