I took a Bible course at the Catholic Theistic Unit. You may have heard of it. It is on the south side of Malodoroso, Florida. 

Anyway the course I took was very confusing.  We had to learn a lot of verbs in some language called Ugaritic and we studied the priestess tradition that runs through Deutero-canonical books, comparing them to Zoroastrian literary forms.

I didn't have a clue and had to pay three hundred dollars tuition, but I did get a certificate and we had a very nice affirmation ceremony in a Navajo sweat lodge at the end of the course, though I must admit that it set my allergies off pretty badly. 

Then I found this really simple Bible course called The Great Adventure written by Jeff Cavins. It was great and I could actually understand it and it didn't cost much money. It quoted the Catechism of the Catholic Church a lot and talked about Sacraments. 

I  told my other Bible teacher, Dr. Gutrun Von Geheimnis, about this great course I was taking and she was horrified. She said that it was not approved by the church and the author neglected form critical studies and was not a real scholar, but heaven fore fend, a fundamentalist who should be stopped by competent authorities! 

The study and teaching of Scripture should be left to experts like those at Catholic Theistic Unit. Is this true?

Yours truly,

Thomas D'Autin

Let me guess. Your former teacher, Dr. Von Geheimnis, is a liberal, no? 

You've heard the old saying that no one is so conservative as a liberal. 

I have met Mr. Cavins once or twice and his big mistake, according to the folks at places like the Catholic Theistic Unit, is that he actually believes the story told in the Bible, and that it is, in some sense, true; that it is written ultimately by God's Holy Spirit, thus having a cohesive story and eternal message. 

The people at places like the above mentioned Malodoroso school don't teach Bible. They teach Hebrew Literature in translation. 

Dr. Scott Hahn makes the same mistakes that Mr. Nevins makes, but still worse, he adds to them the idea that the author of the bible, the Holy Spirit, is a wonderful poet who weaves prophetic symbols in and out of the text, enriching the New Testament with the symbols and history of the Old. 

How dare he believe that the Bible is an integral whole written by a divine author to communicate a coherent message of love to every age? 

No, the folks at your former Florida school think that the Bible is just a collection of books that have some vague relationship to each other and you darn well better not read too much into them or you will become (GASP!!) a fundamentalist!!  

I don't know, but the Catholicism I grew up with sure sounds like what the Grand Expedition teaches. I know quite a number of bishops who think it's the best thing to come along in quite a while. So enjoy!

The thing that amuses me most about all this nonsense is that I have heard avant-garde Biblical scholars and schools complain about Bible studies of this type saying that Scripture study should be left to the experts. To have everyone reading the Bible is just plain dangerous.  These same scholars who are unflinchingly progressive, regularly ignore the Bishops' authority. 

I guess they are opposed to anyone squelching the right of the common man to read the Scriptures, unless they are doing the squelching. 

Remember the proverb: No one is so conservative as a liberal.

Yours truly,

Rev. Know-It-All