Being Bad

There are these videos on youtube done by a man with a great sense of humor (though sometimes he can be a bit crude). It is called "bad lip reading" and he records over the audio in clips from movies, t.v. etc. to make it appear like he is lip reading, but it is always things that are crazy funny. It made me think the other day about a similar experience that I have had. I would like to call it "bad Scripture interpretations".

It is not uncommon for me to encounter protestants who resist the faith because of some confused explanation of Scripture that they have been taught, or some twisted connection between a couple of unrelated Scripture passages. It is not as common among Catholics (since most people know Catholics do not read the Bible--oops, I said it), but it does show up and when it does it can be very problematic.

How do you interpret Scripture? When you read the Bible (and you had better read the Bible regularly since the Church says it is needed for your spiritual health) and you come across a passage of Scripture that confuses you, how do you work through it? Do you presume that your interpretation is correct and reject what the Church has said? Or, do you say to yourself, "I clearly do not understand God's word well enough and need to make sure that I seek the wisdom of those who know Scripture better than I do?" Only the latter is what we can call faithful.

If we are the faithful people of God who have been given the fullness of the Word of God--written and verbal--then we should be the best at interpreting Scripture, should we not? Thus, I am going to outline for you some interpretations of Scripture that are bad (some really bad), but that continue to show up in Christian circles of one type or another. Hopefully this will help you to spot any other interpretations that are contrary to the truth.