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.