1. The St. Ignatius Catholic Study Bible

2. Ignatius (1491 – 1556) was a Spanish knight, priest since 1537, and theologian, who founded the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) Ignatius emerged as a religious leader during the Counter- Reformation. Loyola's devotion to the Catholic Church was characterized by absolute obedience to the Pope.

3. A good Catholic Bible study will Be in conformity with Catholic doctrine concerning the Bible, its origin, and its interpretation Be open to multiple methods of biblical studies and a judicious application of them

4. A good Catholic Bible study will Quote biblical passages or explain them in their context in the Bible Will not claim to be the only Catholic approach to the Bible

5. A good Catholic Bible study will Never advocate for a single understanding or theory of biblical inspiration, which the church has never definitively settled

6. A good Catholic Bible study will Make no definitive judgments about matters that the church leaves open. This includes the date and authorship of biblical books and translations or interpretations of specific passages of the Bible

7. A good Catholic Bible study will Acknowledge the rare instances when the church has declared a given interpretation as the correct one, or has proscribed specific interpretations such as the passage on the brothers and sisters of Jesus (Mk 3:32), where the church teaches that they are not blood siblings of Jesus.

8. A good Catholic Bible study will Avoid fundamentalist interpretations or improper literal or fanciful interpretations Recognize the complex and dynamic relationship between the Old Testament and the New Testament

9. A good Catholic Bible study will Will “stay-on-track” to cover the assigned material in the allotted time Will inspire participants to read, study, and pray Holy Scripture every day

10. Francis Hook

11. [The Church] holds that the books of both the Old and New Testaments in their entirety, with all their parts, are sacred and canonical because written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author and have been handed on as such to the Church herself. (Dei Verbum)

12. The Bible is… The Inerrant Word of God Written by humans with the total inspiration of God

13. Senses of Scripture Literal – understanding the words used as the writers understood them in their original settings Spiritual – Allegorical – Tropological – Anagogical

14. Interpretation Criteria Unity of the whole Scripture The living Tradition of the whole Church Analogy of faith

15. Perspective Unless we are living a sustained and disciplined life of prayer, we will never have the reverence, the profound humility, or the grace we need to see the Scriptures for what they really are.