Memorial of Saint Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church
(Nehemiah
8:1-4a.5-6.7b-12; Luke 10:1-12)
In today’s
first reading the people discover the wonder of the word of God. Apparently for the first time they grasp the
meaning of what Scripture intends. Ezra reads to them “the book of the law.” This is not primarily a legal code. More substantially, it is the story of how
God brought the enslaved Hebrews into the promised land. They cannot help but weep. Their unfaithfulness to the same God exiled
them to Babylonia until He delivered them again.
More than
just about anyone else, St. Jerome likewise appreciated Scripture. He studied it, commented on it, and
translated it. He knew its
importance. “Ignorance of Scripture,” he
once wrote, “is ignorance of Christ.” He meant that one cannot know about salvation
unless he or she learns the lessons of Scripture. Both Old and New Testaments reveal how God
saves all humans as surely as He rescued Israel.
One way to
learn Scripture is to take to heart the daily Mass readings. They don’t cover all thirty thousand or so
verses found in the Bible. But they do
provide representative passages from each book.
They also emphasize what is sometimes called “the canon within a
canon.” We easily recognize these
inspiring texts. They are passages like,
“God so loved the world…” and “The Lord is my shepherd…”
