The Catechetical Review - Communicating Christ for a New Evangelization

Three Doors and Three Keys to enter into the Bible, Part 1

Authored by Dr. Waltraud Linnig in Issue #33.4 of The Sower
French catechist and theologian, Waltraud Linnig, offers us three doors into reading and teaching the Bible and three keys for opening these doors. Part 1 follows. three keys in doorIn this article I would like to propose ways of opening the Bible and entering into it. Perhaps you will ask me why I want to do this, because it is so easy to open this book! It’s like all the other books and if you know the language of a book you can read it. This Bible is written in English, so there’s no problem. However… For many Catholics, the sacred book is a closed book, a sealed book. How can we help them? For many people, catechists and many other Catholics, it is not easy to read and to understand the Bible. When I was a student, one of my professors in Belgium told us that when he was young they had a wonderful Bible in his house, ranged high on a shelf, but nobody had ever touched nor read it. As a Catholic, at the beginning of the 20th century, it was often the case that, while you had to have a Bible, you should not necessarily read it at home, because you should not imitate Protestants! That's why so many Catholics now are still not used to reading the Bible personally.

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This article is from The Sower and may be copied for catechetical purposes only. It may not be reprinted in another published work without the permission of Maryvale Institute. Contact [email protected]

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