Notes on the Bible study series on Catena Aurea led Br. Thomas Paul.
Episode I

Catena Aurea is a masterpiece by St. Thomas Aquinas presented to the church. He was commissioned by Pope Urban IV to compile the interpretations and the commentary explanations word by word of the gospels by the early church fathers. Its a great treasure. St Thomas Aquinas was a great philosopher, theologian and the doctor of the church. His work Summa Theologiae is one of the greatest works of the church. It is used by the church in the training of her theologians and priests and religious. St Thomas Aquinas, the beoloved son of mother church compiled the teachings and interpretations of the church fathers on the four gospels and created a Catena Aurea which means a ‘golden chain’. The English translation was made possible by Cardinal Newman who was later canonized and became a saint.
This is an introduction class. We must listen attentively and the let the Holy Spirit guide and embed the explanations in our heart. This is what the people on the sermon on the mount did when Jesus taught. Let us follow Jesus and his disciples’ example and only listen with an earnest heart.
Go up to the top of the mountain, thou that preachest glad tidings to in Sion;
Lift up thy voice with might, thou that preachest in Jerusalem: cry aloud, fear not: say to the cities of Judah, Behold your God! Lo, the Lord God shall come with power, and His arm shall have dominion; Lo, His reward is with Him. Isaiah 40: 9-10
We also read Isaiah 40:11
He will tend His flock like a shepherd; He will gather the lambs in His arms; He will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young.
St Thomas goes on to explain the meaning of the word ‘Gospel’
The Prophet Isaiah, a manifest preacher of the Gospel, briefly expressing the loftiness, the name, and the substance of the Gospel doctrine, addresses tge evangelic teacher in the person of the Lord, saying, “Go up to the top of the mountain, ” But to make our beginning with the title, The Gospel.
Isaiah’s book, well known as the 5th Gospel concentrates on the ‘Messiah’. Many of Jesus’ teachings were from Isaiah prophecy. Isaiah says, ‘Go up to the top of the mountain…
This expression has great significance in Isaiah’s prophecy…He often mentions mountain..mountains..which has deep meaning.
‘Go’ is the phenomenal ‘go’…Jesus says ‘Go’. This word echoes throughout the prophecies….’Go up to the top of the mountain’.
Let us now look at the interpretations of the church Fathers.
St Augustine…The word, ‘Evangelium,’ (Gospel) is rendered in Latin ‘bonus nuntius’ or ‘bona annuntiatio,” ( Good News) It may indeed be used on all occasions whenever any goid is announced; but it has come to be appropriated to the announcement of the Saviour.
Gloss: Those who have related the birth, deeds, words and sufferings of the Lord Jesus Christ, are properly styled Evangelists.
‘Good News’ was an ordinary word used to make an announcement of something good and joyful but it then went on to become related to Jesus’ incarnation, his works, passion, resurrection….

St. Chrysostom, Homil. In Matt., i, 2: For what is there that can equal these good tidings? God on earth, man in heaven; that long war ceased, reconciliation made between God and our nature, the devil overthrown, death abolished, paradise opened. These things, so far beyond our merits, are given us with fullness; not for our own toil or labour, but because we are beloved of God.

Good News in its essence is ‘God on earth, man in heaven’. We know that God is in hezven in complete glory but the goid news is that He came to earth and because of that we can go to heaven. Contemplation on this is important. There is nothing in this universe that can compare with the Gospel.
CCC 108 states…
Still, the Christian faith is not a “religion of the book.” Christianity is the religion of the “Word” of God, a word which is “not a written and mute word, but the Word which is incarnate and living”. If the Scriptures are not to remain a dead letter, Christ, the eternal Word of the living God, must, through the Holy Spirit, “open [our] minds to understand the Scriptures.”
Jesus did not come to create a religion. He came as a Saviour to the whole of humanity. The Gospel is hence incomparable to any religion. It is the eternal, living Word…ie. God himself. St. Thomas Aquinas, quoting from the Church Fathers thus stresses upon the importance of the indepth understanding of the scriptures.
CCC 131
“And such is the force and power of the Word of God that it can serve the Church as her support and vigor, and the children of the Church as strength for their faith, food for the soul, and a pure and lasting fount of spiritual life.” Hence “access to Sacred Scripture ought to be open wide to the Christian faithful.”
CCC133
133 The Church “forcefully and specifically exhorts all the Christian faithful. . . to learn the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ, by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures. ‘Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.’ (The well known quote of St. Jerome)
Jesus has already accomplished the victory.
Man is created in the image of God. But man due to his obedience attained a fallen nature. We have free will but our free will has a fallen nature. We have too many questions. We have to be illumined through faith, through the Gospel..with the help of the Holy Spirit …
Reconciliation between God and our fallen nature.The Good News is that Jesus has reconciled us with God. One of the Eucharistic prayer from the Latin rite …
O Lord Jesus Christ, through your incarnation, you reconciled us with the Father, through your passion, you cancelled our sins, through your resurrection, you gave us new life, through your Ascension, you opened heaven for us…therefore with all the choirs of the angels in heaven we acclaim..”Hosanna…”
The Gospel is a mystery and a great victory….the war has ceased…reconciliation between God and our nature has been accomplished and the devil is overthrown.
CCC635
Christ went down into the depths of death so that “the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.” Jesus, “the Author of life”, by dying destroyed “him who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and [delivered] all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong bondage.” Henceforth the risen Christ holds “the keys of Death and Hades”, so that “at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth.”
Jesus destroyed the devil and won the victory for us. It is very important to believe this.
All these are way beyond our merits but it is given to us freely because we are beloved children of God.
We study and read the Bible according to our convenience. But the Church Fathers were completely dedicated and immersed themselves in the study of the Bible. St Jerome spent more than 25years in Jerusalem…lived in a cave…lived amongst the local people to have an indepth understanding of the Bible.
St. Augustine, de vera relug.c. 16: Whereas God in many ways heals the souls of men, according to the times and seasons which are ordained by His (p.2) marvellous wisdom, yet has He in no way more beneficently provided for the human race, than when the Very Wisdom of God , the Only Son of one substance and coeternal with the Father, stooped to taje upon Him perfect man, and the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Hereby He made manifest how high a place among creatures had human nature, in that He appeared to men as Very Man.
St Augustine was a genius…a great interpreter…Jesus came for everyone…the whole of mankind.

John 3:8 states…
The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

St John Paul II in his Redemptoris Missio quotes
John 1:9…
The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.
St. Augustine says that the very Wisdom of God, the Only son came for our salvation.
St Paul in 1Cor 1:24
‘but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.’
1Cor 1:30
‘And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification’…
The heart of the Good News is that God’s nature came down to man in the nature of a human being and glorified humanity. He became man, like any man even being coeternal with God.