Lucky me

While the Moose has confined all matters religious and moral to gushy emotionalism, he has somehow managed to persuade the world that we need a scientific study to tell us that we have noses on our faces. When the Moose Media try to be objective about things that really matter, the result is a poll:

Survey indicates Bible hard to understand

...A survey commissioned by the Catholic Biblical Federation found that even those who reported reading the Bible said it was not easy to understand.

Well now that's a relief. I make my living teaching Scripture, and if it were a breeze then my children would have no bread on the table. Having spent several years trying to explain Scripture to college freshman, I'm glad to know at last that the Bible is not easy to understand. My students will be glad to hear that, too.

But the disturbing part of the survey was this, the attempt to define "fundamentalists":

Diotallevi described as fundamentalist those who chose the response: "The Bible is the actual word of God, which must be taken literally, word for word."

Would the Catholic position be that Scripture is the potential word of God? Virtually the word of God? Metaphorically the word of God? Not really the word of God?

But a Catholic who had read 1Thess 2:13, or even his Catechism, and wanted to respond that Scripture is actually the word of God, would probably not want to say it "must be taken literally" as a blanket statement. Surely everyone knows there are metaphors in Scripture!

On the other hand, what does it mean to take a text "word for word"? Is the alternative to skip some words? Surely a Catholic would not endorse snipping up the Scriptures.

Wrap these stumpers into one sudden polster's puzzle, undoubtedly sprung in an Italian accent over the telephone during dinner, and what you get is literally this: con-fusion.