Avoid Intellectual Suicide: Do Not Interpret the Bible Like a Fundamentalist

Holy Scripture, despite all appearances, will not always be easy to interpret. We can be lulled into thinking our “common sense” and “by the letter” interpretation of a text is what God intends us to get out of it. However, if this is the case, there would be little to no debates about its meaning; there would be little confusion as to its purpose and how it applies to us today. St. Peter would not have needed to tell us that no prophecy of Scripture is to be interpreted privately, because all interpretations of Scripture would end up the same. We need to understand and heed the warning of St. Mark the Ascetic: “Do not let your heart become conceited about your interpretations of Scripture, lest your intellect fall afoul for the spirit of blasphemy.” [1] Why would he be warning us of this? Because Scripture, in its most external, simplistic level, could easily lead people to a perverted understanding of God and the Christian faith.

For an interpretation of Scripture to be acceptable (which does not mean it is necessarily correct), it must at least conform to the basic dogmatic teachings of the Church. If God is love, this must be manifest from one’s understanding of Scripture. If one’s interpretation of a text would lead to God doing or commanding something which runs against the law of love, the law by which God himself acts, then one has indeed committed blasphemy. If one really believes God commands some intrinsic evil, such as genocide, one has abandoned the God who is love, and has at least committed unintentional blasphemy by something evil about him. One cannot get out of this by saying, “whatever God wills, is now good,” or that “the very nature of right and wrong has changed through time,” because both would contradict not only the fundamental character of love, but also the fact God has provided us a positive means by which we can understand something of him via analogy; we know what love is, we know what the good is, and therefore we know something about God when we see he is love or that he is good. While we must understand our concepts are limited in relation to God, it is not because God is less than our concepts, but more and their foundation. Thus, Pope Benedict wisely says:

In contrast with the so-called intellectualism of Augustine and Thomas, there arose with Duns Scotus a voluntarism which, in its later developments, led to the claim that we can only know God’s voluntas ordinata. Beyond this is the realm of God’s freedom, in virtue of which he could have done the opposite of everything he has actually done. This gives rise to positions which clearly approach those of Ibn Hazm and might even lead to the image of a capricious God, who is not even bound to truth and goodness. God’s transcendence and otherness are so exalted that our reason, our sense of the true and good, are no longer an authentic mirror of God, whose deepest possibilities remain eternally unattainable and hidden behind his actual decisions. As opposed to this, the faith of the Church has always insisted that between God and us, between his eternal Creator Spirit and our created reason there exists a real analogy, in which – as the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 stated – unlikeness remains infinitely greater than likeness, yet not to the point of abolishing analogy and its language. God does not become more divine when we push him away from us in a sheer, impenetrable voluntarism; rather, the truly divine God is the God who has revealed himself as logos and, as logos, has acted and continues to act lovingly on our behalf. Certainly, love, as Saint Paul says, “transcends” knowledge and is thereby capable of perceiving more than thought alone (cf. Eph 3:19); nonetheless it continues to be love of the God who is Logos. Consequently, Christian worship is, again to quote Paul – “λογικη λατρεία”, worship in harmony with the eternal Word and with our reason (cf. Rom 12:1).[2]

Christianity affirms both the transcendence and immanence of God. The second allows us to say something positive and true about God, while the first reminds us that positive assertions are limited, that they are at best analogous pointers to something beyond the statements themselves. Our teachings truly say something about God. They must be used as the guideline by which we read Scripture. Moreover, as the Church makes abundantly clear, Scripture is itself an ecclesial document, to be interpreted in and by the Church. It must be interpreted in such a way that dogmatic teachings about God (such as his unchanging goodness) are in accord with our understanding of Scriptural text. If reason suggests a disconnect between an interpretation and dogma, we must follow dogma and dismiss the interpretation. Richard Gaillardetz explains this well:

The apostolic witness would be preserved both in the canonical Scriptures and in the ongoing paradosis or handing on of the apostolic faith in the Christian community. The unity of Scripture and tradition is grounded then in the one word whose presence in human history comes to its unsurpassable actualization in Jesus Christ. Scripture and tradition must be viewed as interrelated witnesses to that word. Furthermore, neither Scripture nor tradition can be separated from the Church. The unity of Scripture, tradition and the living communion of the Church itself is fundamental.[3]

Revelation, therefore, is centered upon Jesus Christ – and through Christ, the whole of the Holy Trinity:

The principal purpose to which the plan of the old covenant was directed was to prepare for the coming of Christ, the redeemer of all and of the messianic kingdom, to announce this coming by prophecy (see Luke 24:44; John 5:39; 1 Peter 1:10), and to indicate its meaning through various types (see 1 Cor. 10:12). Now the books of the Old Testament, in accordance with the state of mankind before the time of salvation established by Christ, reveal to all men the knowledge of God and of man and the ways in which God, just and merciful, deals with men. These books, though they also contain some things which are incomplete and temporary, nevertheless show us true divine pedagogy.[4]

If the vision of God that one gets out of Scripture is not one which reveals his justice and mercy, the reader of the text has missed something about the text itself. Perhaps the mistake lies in their interpretive scheme, where they assume the text follows the contours of modern historical writings. This is not the case; indeed Christians since the beginning of Church history have understood a very different scheme for the Biblical text: one which presents a kind of history but uses that history to present a deeper, more fundamental understanding of the world. Texts which are seen as impossible, if interpreted as history, nonetheless must be accepted, not because they are historical, but because they reveal something theological. St. Neilos the Ascetic, for example, takes 2 Samuel 4:5-8[5] as being historically absurd. This, he thinks, should be obvious. But if this is the case, does it make the text meaningless? By no means:

It is clear that this story in Scripture should not be taken literally. For how could a king have a woman as door-keeper, when he ought properly to be guarded by a troop of soldiers, and to have round him a large body of attendants? Or how could he be so poor as to use her to winnow the wheat? But improbable details are often included in a story because of the deeper truths they signify. Thus the intellect in each of us resides within like a king, while the reason acts as door-keeper of the senses. When the reason occupies itself with bodily things – and to winnow wheat is something bodily – he enemy without difficulty slips past unnoticed and slays the intellect.[6]

This scheme was in accord with what Origen taught. Indeed, he believed that the writers were inspired to put in statements which were absurd so as to remind us not to take the text so simply, but to look for the deeper, spiritual nourishment we can get from them, even for those texts which also have a real historical basis:

But since, if the usefulness of the legislation, and the sequence and beauty of the history, were universally evident of itself, we should not believe that any other thing could be understood in the Scriptures save what was obvious, the word of God has arranged that certain stumbling-blocks, as it were, and offenses, and impossibilities, should be introduced into the midst of the law and the history, in order that we may not, through being drawn away in all directions by the merely attractive nature of the language, either altogether fall away from the (true) doctrines, as learning nothing worthy of God, or, by not departing from the letter, come to the knowledge of nothing more divine. And this also we must know, that the principal aim being to announce the spiritual connection in those things that are done, and that ought to be done, where the Word found that things done according to the history could be adapted to these mystical senses, He made use of them, concealing from the multitude the deeper meaning; but where, in the narrative of the development of super-sensual things, there did not follow the performance of those certain events, which was already indicated by the mystical meaning, the Scripture interwove in the history (the account of) some event that did not take place, sometimes what could not have happened; sometimes what could, but did not. And sometimes a few words are interpolated which are not true in their literal acceptation, and sometimes a larger number.[7]

Scripture, of course, was written by various people. While they were inspired by God to write what they wrote, and God inspired the Church to collect the texts it did, in the form it did, we must also understand that the people behind the texts are not mere puppets being forced by God to write as they did. Thus, when patristic authors, or the Church, asserts God as the author of the text, we must not take this as fundamentalists do, but rather recognize that God works with authors based upon their ability and through their cooperation with his intended purposes: “The fathers look upon the Bible above all as the Book of God, the single work of a single author. This does not mean, however, that they reduce the human authors to nothing more than passive instruments; they are quite capable, also, of according to a particular book its own specific purpose.”[8] Indeed, God can inspires people to reveal something about him without their knowing of it, or knowing the meaning behind their words, as St Edith Stein masterfully explains:

Must the inspired person who is the instrument of a divine revelation be aware of the fact? Must he know that he has been illuminated, must he himself have received a revelation? We may well imagine cases where none of this is true. It is not impossible that someone utter a revelation without realizing it, without having received a revelation from God, without even being aware that he is speaking in God’s name or feeling supported by God’s Spirit in what he says and how he says it. He may think he is only voicing his own insight and in the words of his choosing.
Thus Caiphas says in the Sanhedrin : ‘You know nothing and do not consider that it is better for you that one man die for the people and not the whole people parish.’ And John adds: ‘but his he said not of himself but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the people…’ Hence Caiphas spoke in God’s name and followed divine instructions without either knowing it or wishing to do so. John, however, knows that Caiphas was speaking God’s word and perhaps that he was himself enlightened by God as he wrote this. Does John know the prophetic meaning of Caiphas’ words through a revelation accorded him? Quite possibly. But it may also be that the fulfillment of those words in the death of Jesus and John’s view of the overall work of salvation made him realize their prophetic nature.[9]

Now this is not to say it is the norm, nor common, but, as we see, a person inspired by God does not have to understand the meaning of their words, nor that they are actually saying something that will be collected together as being inspired by God. The intention of God as the inspired author of Scripture does not have to be one with the intended meaning of the human author, and indeed, could be one which runs contrary to what such a human might have thought (as, for example, we find in the case of Jonah).

Thus, it is important to discuss inspiration, but as the Pontifical Biblical Commission warns us, we must not follow the simplistic interpretation found within fundamentalism:

Fundamentalism is right to insist on the divine inspiration of the Bible, the inerrancy of the word of God and other biblical truths included in its five fundamental points. But its way of presenting these truths is rooted in an ideology which is not biblical, whatever the proponents of this approach might say. For it demands an unshakable adherence to rigid doctrinal points of view and imposes, as the only source of teaching for Christian life and salvation, a reading of the Bible which rejects all questioning and any kind of critical research.[10]

And, it is especially when people take the Bible as history where this becomes the problem. “Fundamentalism also places undue stress upon the inerrancy of certain details in the biblical texts, especially in what concerns historical events or supposedly scientific truth.”[11] It creates a false, blasphemous view of God through its simplistic understanding of the text, and demand adherence to that simplistic view, with the explanation that if one denies this scheme, one must reject Scripture itself. There is no basis by which one can understand the deeper, spiritual value of revelation. And it is for this reason it ends up creating an evil-looking God, and promotes the acceptance of intrinsic evils such as racism or genocide as being good if and when God commanded them. “Fundamentalism likewise tends to adopt very narrow points of view. It accepts the literal reality of an ancient, out-of-date cosmology simply because it is found expressed in the Bible; this blocks any dialogue with a broader way of seeing the relationship between culture and faith. Its relying upon a non-critical reading of certain texts of the Bible serves to reinforce political ideas and social attitudes that are marked by prejudices—racism, for example—quite contrary to the Christian Gospel.”[12] While simple, it is this simplicity which leads to a letter that kills, because it requires a denial of reason when engaging the faith, and leading to “intellectual suicide”:

The fundamentalist approach is dangerous, for it is attractive to people who look to the Bible for ready answers to the problems of life. It can deceive these people, offering them interpretations that are pious but illusory, instead of telling them that the Bible does not necessarily contain an immediate answer to each and every problem. Without saying as much in so many words, fundamentalism actually invites people to a kind of intellectual suicide. It injects into life a false certitude, for it unwittingly confuses the divine substance of the biblical message with what are in fact its human limitations.[13]

No wonder St Mark the Ascetic warned us to be careful when we interpreted Scripture. He understood how people would confuse the human side of Scripture with its divine meaning, and how that would end up creating a false, humanly constructed, image of God. A God presented in the image of fallen humanity can only be a monster, the monster which we see proclaimed by fundamentalists the world over.

Footnotes

[1] Mark the Monk, “On the Spiritual Law” in Counsels on the Spiritual Life. Trans. Tim Vivian and Augustine Casiday (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2009), 93.

[2] Pope Benedict, Regensburg Lecture, Sept 12, 2006.

[3] Richard R. Gaillardetz, Teaching with Authority: A Theology of the Magisterium of the Church (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1997), 84.

[4] Dei Verbum 15 (Vatican Translation).

[5]“ Now the sons of Rimmon the Beerothite, Rechab and Baanah, set out, and about the heat of the day they came to the house of Ishbosheth, as he was taking his noonday rest. And behold, the doorkeeper of the house had been cleaning wheat, but she grew drowsy and slept; so Rechab and Baanah his brother slipped in. When they came into the house, as he lay on his bed in his bedchamber, they smote him, and slew him, and beheaded him. They took his head, and went by the way of the Arabah all night, and brought the head of Ishbosheth to David at Hebron. And they said to the king, ‘Here is the head of Ishbosheth, the son of Saul, your enemy, who sought your life; the LORD has avenged my lord the king this day on Saul and on his offspring’” (2 Sam 4:5-8 RSV).

[6] St Neilos the Ascetic, “Ascetic Discourse” in The Philokalia. Volume I. Trans. And ed. By G.E.H. Palmer, Philip Sherrard and Kallistos Ware (London: Faber and Faber, 1983), 210.

[7] Origen, “On First Principles” in ANF(4), 364.

[8] Pontifical Biblical Commission, The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church (March 18, 1994), III-B.2

[9] St Edith Stein, “Ways to know God” in Knowledge and Faith. Trans. Walter Redmond (Washington, DC: ICS Publications, 2000), 103.

[10] Pontifical Biblical Commission, The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church, I-F.

[11] Ibid.

[12] Ibid.

[13] Ibid.

From your post #43:

Fundamentalist interpretation starts from the principle that the Bible, being the word of God, inspired and free from error, should be read and interpreted literally in all its details. But by "literal interpretation" it understands a naively literalist interpretation, one, that is to say, which excludes every effort at understanding the Bible that takes account of its historical origins and development. It is opposed, therefore, to the use of the historical-critical method, as indeed to the use of any other scientific method for the interpretation of Scripture.

The Pontifical Biblical Commission endorses "higher criticism" and condemns Fundamentalists for rejecting it.

As the fundamentalist way of reading the Bible spread to other parts of the world, it gave rise to other ways of interpretation, equally "literalist," in Europe, Asia, Africa and South America. As the 20th century comes to an end, this kind of interpretation is winning more and more adherents, in religious groups and sects, as also among Catholics.

Translation: the literalism of Pius IX, Leo XIII, Pius X, and their immediate successors (up until Pius XII) was not in line with traditional Catholic Biblical interpretation but the influence of an alien adulteration.

The basic problem with fundamentalist interpretation of this kind is that, refusing to take into account the historical character of biblical revelation, it makes itself incapable of accepting the full truth of the incarnation itself. As regards relationships with God, fundamentalism seeks to escape any closeness of the divine and the human.

Translation: the incarnation implies that the Bible is a mixture of Divine Truth and human error. To insist on an inerrant Bible is to deny the "incarnation" (which is probably true, and another reason why Fundamentalists should be Noachides, though they refuse to rethink their groundless devotion to J*sus).

It refuses to admit that the inspired word of God has been expressed in human language and that this word has been expressed, under divine inspiration, by human authors possessed of limited capacities and resources.

Translation: the writers of the Bible were stone age savages who believed in the supernatural, whereas we now know that stuff like that can't happen.

It fails to recognize that the word of God has been formulated in language and expression conditioned by various periods. It pays no attention to the literary forms and to the human ways of thinking to be found in the biblical texts, many of which are the result of a process extending over long periods of time and bearing the mark of very diverse historical situations.

Ditto. Plus the Torah evolved slowly over time and was not dictated by G-d to Moses.

Fundamentalism also places undue stress upon the inerrancy of certain details in the biblical texts, especially in what concerns historical events or supposedly scientific truth. It often historicizes material which from the start never claimed to be historical. It considers historical everything that is reported or recounted with verbs in the past tense, failing to take the necessary account of the possibility of symbolic or figurative meaning.

Translation: The Bible contains scientific and historical errors.

In what concerns the Gospels, fundamentalism does not take into account the development of the Gospel tradition, but naively confuses the final stage of this tradition (what the evangelists have written) with the initial (the words and deeds of the historical Jesus). At the same time fundamentalism neglects an important fact: The way in which the first Christian communities themselves understood the impact produced by Jesus of Nazareth and his message. But it is precisely there that we find a witness to the apostolic origin of the Christian faith and its direct expression. Fundamentalism thus misrepresents the call voiced by the Gospel itself.

Here the PBC attacks Fundamentalists for believing in the historical truth and inerrancy of the "new testament" itself, which is all right with me. I'm just surprised that it's all right with you. I guess you're more consistent than I gave you credit for.

Fundamentalism likewise tends to adopt very narrow points of view.

Translation: outdated prejudices against homosexuality need to be "re-thought."

It accepts the literal reality of an ancient, out-of-date cosmology simply because it is found expressed in the Bible; this blocks any dialogue with a broader way of seeing the relationship between culture and faith.

The PBC endorses evolution.

Its relying upon a non-critical reading of certain texts of the Bible serves to reinforce political ideas and social attitudes that are marked by prejudices—racism, for example—quite contrary to the Christian Gospel.

Translation: "chr*stian Zionism" is condemned.

The fundamentalist approach is dangerous, for it is attractive to people who look to the Bible for ready answers to the problems of life.

Translation: There is no black and white; there are only shades of gray.

I fail to understand how you can claim that these passages do not almost explicitly attack and reject belief in the facticity of Biblical events. Unless . . . well, you know.

This entire thread began as an attack, posted by a Catholic, on the belief in the facticity of the Biblical events

A misrepresentation.

It is not a misrepresentation. That is exactly what it is.

But again you dodge my thesis:

The literalist approach of the generic American Christian fundamentalist is an approach that you personally reject.

No, I do not reject "the literalist approach" because I also interpret the Bible literally. That's what literalism means: the described events actually happened. "Literalism" does not mean "sola scriptura" or "soul competency" or "Scottish common sense philosophy." All Protestants (including the most liberal) accept "sola scriptura" (it's part of the definition of "Protestant"). When Catholics attack "literalism," "literalists," and "scripture interpreted literalistically" they are attacking nothing other than the facticity and veracity of the Biblical narrative. Period.

You know this approach to the Scriptures to be an insufficient one.

"Sola scriptura" is wrong. "The scripture hath but one sense and that is the plain sense" is insufficient. But neither one of these is the definition of "literalism." Catholics attack literalism, not either of the above two theses.

You also know that despite its self-professed literalism, the entire hermeneutic program of this literalism is to present all of the Hebrew Scriptures as a typological (i.e. not fully literal) prefiguring of Jesus of Nazareth.

Now here's something to cause one pause: you attack Fundamentalist Protestants for accepting "only the plain sense" and then you acknowledge that they do not really do this. So . . . what are you criticizing them for?

Your whole analysis of this issue seems to boil down to: "well, the Catholics and the Evangelical Fundamentalists are both completely wrong about the Bible - but I grew up around the latter and like them a lot personally while the former seem to be largely a bunch of snooty Northeastern types - so I will ignore what I dislike about the latter's Scriptural interpretation while magnifying and exaggerating what I dislike about the former's."

My apologies. I guess being run out of a religion one has converted to and trying one's best to conform with and being unable without violation of conscience and then told to get out can do that to a person. But hey, I'm not Nancy Pelosi.

I'm familiar with this take.

If a Catholic criticizes the generic Fundamentalist interpretation by pointing out its most obvious and inherent flaws: i.e. its tendency to treat Scripture one-dimensionally and simplistically - well such criticism is by nature vicious, mean-spirited, ethnically offensive etc. etc. etc.

If you're not attacking the facticity of religious truth, don't condemn "fundamentalism." If you're not attacking the historical veracity and facticity of the Bible, then don't condemn "literalism." Because that's all these terms mean.

Any Fundamentalist critique of Catholic Scriptural interpretation - no matter how crudely and offensively expressed - well, that's just good, honest people telling the good, honest truth. If you're offended because someone calls you an idolater, or a pagan, or godless or decadent or what have you - well it must be because you really are all those things and the truth hurts.

It doesn't help that Fundamentalist attacks on Catholicism come from the Right (idolatry, going to hell) while Catholic attacks on Fundamentalism come from the Left (simple-minded, anti-intellectual, etc.).

The double standard is palpable.

As is the Catholic hostility to the facticity of the Bible.

Rather than your whining about offensive Catholics and my whining about offensive Fundamentalists, let's get down to brass tacks:

The flaws of the Fundamentalist approach are real.

The flaws of "sola scriptura" are real. The flaws of "scripture hath but one sense" are real. The "Fundamentalist approach" (ie, that religious truth is factual truth and not an ever-evolving time-conditioned ethno-mythology) is not flawed at all. It is correct.

The very fact that you are a Noachide and not a Fundamentalist indicates that you have voted on their analysis with your feet.

Excuse me; I am still a Fundamentalist. I believe religious Truth is true in the same sense that mundane facts are true; I believe G-d dictated the Torah to Moses letter-for-letter; I believe all the events it describes actually happened. The only alternative to fundamentalist religion is liberal religion. And I am not liberal.

You are confusing "Fundamentalism" with "Protestantism." A "Fundamentalist Protestant" is a Protestant who is also a Fundamentalist. Some Protestants are not Fundamentalists. "Sola scriptura" is part of the "Protestant" definition (as is "scripture hath but one sense"). A Fundamentalist Protestant is a Protestant who actually believes Protestantism. By attacking "Fundamentalism" (and never attacking "Protestantism") Catholics leave Protestantism uncriticized and instead condemn Protestants who actually believe what they profess to believe; and imply that Catholics do not actually believe what they profess to believe (otherwise they'd be "fundamentalists" too).

You know this approach is flawed. You know it is incorrect.

No. "Sola scriptura/one sense only" is flawed. "Sola scriptura/one sense only" is incorrect. Fundamentalism is correct. The only alternative to Fundamentalism in religion is liberalism. By attacking Fundamentalism, Catholics implicitly endorse liberalism.

You know that if the rabbinical teaching on the Sefirot were as widely publicized as the Catholic teaching on the Immaculate Conception it would be as reviled among the Fundamentalists you champion as surely as Mariology is.

Perhaps, though Fundamentalist Protestants have a soft spot for Orthodox Judaism and, in my experience, more open to it. Most of the attacks on the Talmud and Qabbalah out there seem to come from right wing Catholics.

The only reason why Fundamentalists do not attack rabbinic interpretation as aggressively as they attack Catholic interpretation is because they assume that frum Jews interpret the Bible just as they do.

Frum Jews are among the most literalistic people on earth (in the sense I have defined "literalism" above, not the caricatures that Catholics draw). I recommend you read Rabbi Rotenberg's books on Jewish history.

If they were familiar with the theology of Keter Malkhut and of the prevailing Lurianic approach they would recoil in horror.

Acknowledge that reality and comment on that.

Some do. So do many Catholics (and what is their excuse?). At any rate, my experience so far is that the most extravagantly mystical frum Jews are more "literal" than the more anti-mystical and rationalistic. Certainly the Lubavitcher Rebbe (zt"l; zy"`a) was fully conversant with all the mystical traditions, yet he was a Gadol who insisted absolutely on the literalness not only of the post-Creation stories in the Torah but of the creation narrative itself. How does one explain that?

My "thank you" is always in reference to the post to which I am replying. Please do not read any more into it than that.

You seem to making the point that "giving glory" to His Church, of which Christ is the head, is taking glory away from Him. The Church is His body. Giving glory to His Church is giving glory to Him. You don't believe that?

I believe it is dangerous ground to presume that glory given to a church or the church or the Catholic Church or the Pope or Mary etc is the same thing as giving glory to God.

For thou shalt worship no other god: for the LORD, whose name [is] Jealous, [is] a jealous God: - Exodus 34:14

For instance, Aaron thought it would be fine to feast unto the Lord in front of the golden calf (emphasis mine.) He was wrong.

And all the people brake off the golden earrings which [were] in their ears, and brought [them] unto Aaron. And he received [them] at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, after he had made it a molten calf: and they said, These [be] thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.

And when Aaron saw [it], he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation, and said, To morrow [is] a feast to the LORD. - Exodus 32:3-5

We cannot know the heart of another. Indeed, we don't even know our own hearts. But God knows and there is no hiding from Him.

The heart [is] deceitful above all [things], and desperately wicked: who can know it? - Jer 17:9

And so we must be careful with any thing or any one in our lives so that we do not make Aaron's mistake. For any thing or any one that we love equal to or more than God - if even for a moment - is an idol to us.

That would include our children, spouse, ideas, church, possessions, people and so on. It also includes self.

But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.

Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any [man] will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. - Matt 16:23-25

We mere mortals cannot look at two people doing the same thing and know which one is the idolater. But God knows.

One person may be praying the Rosary and worshiping our Lord Jesus Christ; another may be praying the Rosary and worshiping Mary or himself.

One person walking in the Sistine Chapel may be in awe of God inspired by just being there, and another may be an idolator enthralled by the architecture, art and luxurious appointments.

The following, for instance, has two different readings:

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help [cometh] from the LORD, which made heaven and earth. - Psalms 121:1-2 KJV

The one reading is that we should lift our eyes unto the hills and remember that our help comes from the Lord. By comparison to the issue you have raised - that praising the Catholic Church is praising God - it is worshiping God through a physical manifestation, the hill.

The other reading, which I spiritually discern, is that God made the heaven and earth so don't think your help comes from the hills (anything in the creation.)

I lift up my eyes to the hills-- where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. - Psalms 121:1-2 NIV

In sum, regardless of how one reads Psalms 121, we must examine ourselves and invite God to help us keep our priorities straight in order to obey the One and Only Great Commandment, to love Him surpassingly above all else (Matt 22):

Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if [there be any] wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. - Psalms 139:23-24

But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of [that] bread, and drink of [that] cup. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body. For this cause many [are] weak and sickly among you, and many sleep. For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world. - I Cor 11:28-32

To God be the glory, not man, never man.

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