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History: Salvation History | Scripture | Covenant
The Canon of Scripture and Salvation
By Frederick P. Pogorzelski, Catholic Catechist
Page 3 of 3.
[Comment: The author, Frederick P. Pogorzelski, is a Licensed General Journeyman Electrician. I hope other Licensed Electricians and Electrical Inspectors will see and appreciate this brief analogy I have included below.]
The Holy Bible
And
The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA 70)
And
The National Electrical Code (NEC) 2002 EditionThe process of recognizing the written word of God involved a human process of discernment by the Magisterium (teaching authority) of the church over many centuries of time. Quoting from one of the 16 documents of Vatican 11, Dei Verbum (Word of God) "...but the task of authentically interpreting the Word of God, whether written or handed down, has been entrusted exclusively to the living teaching office of the church, whose authority is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ. This teaching office is not above the word of God but serves it, teaching only what has been handed on... with the help of the Holy Spirit; it draws from this one deposit of faith everything it presents for belief as divinely revealed." [14]
Like the Holy Bible, the National Electrical Code (NEC) is not a self-interpreting book. It is the "authority having jurisdiction" that shall be permitted to render interpretations of this code. This "authority having jurisdiction" is defined in the NEC. [15] If everyone was an authority unto himself, interpreting the NEC, we would have chaos in the electrical industry, an in the country. It would be like playing with fire. The Bible also needs an "authority having jurisdiction" to interpret it. And it has just one: The Catholic Church. Without divine guidance (authority) to keep them from falling into error, we have well over 20,000 Protestant denominations with a wide variety of doctrines, each claiming to be correct (or more correct) than the other on interpreting the Bible. For example, Martin Luther, John Calvin, and other early Protestant reformers condemned contraception. In 1930, at the Lambeth Conference, the Anglican Bishops of the Church of England decided to no longer consider contraception sinful, leaving the matter up to individual consciences. Again, this is like playing with fire. Soon thereafter, most Protestant denominations followed the Anglican Bishops and allowed contraception. The Protestant reformation (deformation) was a turning away from the unity and fullness of the truth in the One True Catholic Church. It was a turn towards chaos, cascading divisions, a shorter Bible, and a lesser truth in many Protestant churches. Just recently (Nov. 2003), a major Protestant church ordained an openly homosexual bishop. This may result in yet another cascading division, another "truth". We now have growing moral chaos and moral backsliding (contraception, abortion) in the United States.
Footnotes:
[14] The Sixteen Documents of Vatican II, By Pauline Books and Media, Boston, Massachusetts
[15] National Fire Protection Association, (NFPA 70); National Electrical Code 2002 Edition, Articles 80, 90, 100, Pages 70-23 through 70-33, One Batterymarch Park, Quincy, Massachusetts 02269