I have encountered many Catholics in my life. Most are family but I also have many friends that are Catholic. I know them and their lives intimately. From my life experience I can tell you unequivocally that most Catholics DO NOT read or study the bible.
I appreciate what you are saying with regard to worship however I maintain that it is 20% biblical and 80% ritual.
Just the other night my brother-in-law was telling me about how they knew when to stand or sit during Christmas mass based on the ringing of the bell, etc...
It’s simply not biblical.
Unfortunately, it sounds like your brother-in-law should actually go to Mass sometime. The only time there is ringing of the bell during Mass is when everyone is supposed to be kneeling.
There is always just enough wrong in these little " I know a Catholic..." anecdotes to know when they're bogus.
Most of the Mass in fact is taken word-for-word from the Bible. If you sit down with a Missal and just go through you will find that not including the three Bible readings and Psalm that are in every Sunday Mass, all the major parts of the liturgy quote extensively from the Bible, as do the people's responses. I could go through the whole service line by line, but here's one example: the response of the people to "behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world" (which is itself a quote, John 1:29) is "Lord, I am not worthy to receive you [under my roof will be added in 2011] but only say the word and I shall be healed." Matthew 8:8.
The Church has encouraged Bible reading for years and years (about the time folks started being generally literate). In fact, the old Bible that belonged to my aunt-in-law has a proclamation in the front from Pope Leo XIII of a thirty-day indulgence for all who read and meditate devoutly on Sacred Scripture for half an hour. That proclamation was made in 1898.
I always have my iPhone in the pocket of my choir robe (with the sound turned off) with the entire Bible in English and Latin. But the readings for the day are in the pew in front of you. And there's Bible study every Wednesday night, every Wednesday morning before the work day begins, and two Bible classes on Sunday morning between Masses - one for the teenagers and one for adults. There's also a Men's Bible Study but I'm not sure when it meets.
And the bell ringing doesn't tell anybody when to stand or sit. What it tells you is when the priest elevates the Body and Blood of Christ. That is the summit and zenith of the Mass, Christ becoming present on the altar. At that point, everybody is already kneeling and has been since the Sanctus.
I am beginning to suspect that your brother-in-law is pulling your leg. I have occasionally myself seen how much a radical anti-Catholic can swallow, but I don't do it any more because they are so credulous that there's really no point.
The best thing for you to do is go talk to a priest and get the straight skinny. Relying on hearsay and what you think is happening when you don't know the program is probably not the best way to form an opinion.
And it's simply not true either!
This is truly a remarkable and excellent example of how any old ignorant falsehood is marshalled against us and glommed onto to those who are not so much looking for the truth as they are looking for a reason to "refudiate" the Catholic Church.
FYI: At the prayer of consecration in my parish ONLY on special days when we're putting on the dog, a kind of handbell thing is rung at the epiclesis and several times during the "Words of Institution" which we think are when God graciously fulfills his promise with respect to the transubstantiation of the element in question.
In the Latin Rite churches, the prayer of consecration has a prescribed form. At the beginning everyone able to stand is standing. There's a dialogue between the celebrant and the congregation. That leads into the Sanctus, which is said or sung while all stand.
THEN everyone kneels except the celebrant. He praises God and asks the Holy Spirit to bless the 'gifts'. That's the "epiclesis." One ringing.
Then there is the narrative of the Institution almost word-for-word as Paul gives it. The bells are rung at various points in that part.
The prayer continues. Then we all stand for the Lord's prayer.
Note that we were all on our knees before any bell-ringing happened and remained on our knees after the bell ringing stopped, and no one but sick people was sitting at all.
I recommend taking what your cousin says as less than 100% reliable.
***It’s simply not biblical.***
With respect, I have to tell you that if they’d had copyright laws during the time of Christ, the Catholic church would OWN the bible. After all, it was HIS apostles who wrote the New Testament.
Our ENTIRE Mass and education is BIBLE BASED!!!!
What religious sect are you....and don’t tell me CHRISTIAN! If you do, that means you don’t even go to a Church!