The default Bible on Catholic Central is the Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition. Previously we used the King James Version; we have discontinued our use of the KJV as it it not a translation that the Catholic Church generally accepts. On this page I compare the DRA to the New Revised Standard Version in order to prove a point.
Bookmark the following links to start your virtual Bible library. The keywords provided are only suggestions feel free to use something else if you prefer.
If you don't know how to pray the Bible (aka pray scripture) The proceeding paragraph outlines the way that I do it. Not to say that this is the only way or the best way, but it works for me and may work for you too. If you find a way that works better for you by all means use it! You will not hurt my feelings.
Ask the LORD to speak to you through his word and ask the Holy Spirit to open your heart in order to receive whatever it is the LORD has to say. Then open your Bible, it doesn't matter to where, and start reading until something "clicks" or speaks to your heart. Ask God why this particular passage is so important to you and write down whatever explanation comes to mind. Read back in your head what you have written and let it sink in. Then Go back and read the passage again and read some of the surrounding chapters and or verses to put it in context. Then be still and wait for God to speak. You have now just prayed scripture! If you keep the explanation in a handy journal and date all your entries then you can easily refer back to them later and let it penetrate even deeper in your spirit.
"Then came Peter unto him and said: Lord, how often shall my brother offend against me, and I forgive him? till seven times? Jesus saith to him: I say not to thee, till seven times; but till seventy times seven times. (Matthew 18:21-22 DRA)
"Then Peter came up and said to him, "Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?" Jesus said to him, "Not seven times, but I tell you seventy-seven times." (Matthew 18:21-22 NRSV)Seventy times seven works out to 490, a difference from 77 of 413! Clearly we are to forgive people neither 77 nor 490 times both these numbers simply mean a great number of times. Another interpretation is that in bible times 7 was considered a perfect number. This explains why both Peter's question and Jesus' answer were based around the number 7.
The main reason that scripture alone is not enough to govern a church is that the Bible must be defined by tradition. This is one of the instances where The Catechism of the Catholic Church, for example, comes into effect.
It was by the apostolic Tradition that the Church discerned which writings are to be included in the list of sacred books.90 This complete list of books is called the canon of scripture. It includes 46 books for the Old Testament (45 if we count Jeremiah and Lamentations as one) and 27 for the New.91 (CCC 120)This quote makes it very clear that the Catholic Church relies on tradition in order to define the canon of scripture. The interesting thing is all other churches rely on tradition for this as well, whether they admit to it or not. At one time in the history of every church some people in positions of earthly authority decided whether the Deuterocanonical books were part of the Bible their church would be using. The church's upholding of this decision is nothing less than tradition.
90 Cf. DV 8 3
91 Cf. DS 179; 1334-1336; 1501-1504
Matthew Bohrn Senior Web Disciple