the Third Week of Advent
Click here to learn more!
Bible Dictionaries
Preaching
1910 New Catholic Dictionary
or
In the strict and only true sense of the term, implies public discoursing on a religious subject by one having authority to do so. Preaching, therefore, can be applied only to the public religious discourses given by bishops or priests of the Catholic Church. Preaching began with Our Lord Himself, who preached very frequently, and entrusted the continuation of the work to the Apostles. Sacred Scripture speaks very frequently, and very forcibly, about the necessity and great importance of preaching the word of God. When Our Lord invested the Apostles with the "power of teaching," He placed one of the three essential elements for the institution of the Catholic Church. Christ by giving to the Apostles (and to their successors), the threefold power of ruling, teaching, and sanctifying, instituted His (the Catholic) Church. He gave this power to the Apostles in the following words:
Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world. Matthew 28
For if I preach not the gospel, it is no glory to me, for a necessity lieth upon me; for woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel. 1 Corinthians 9
For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on Him, in whom they have not believed? Or how shall they believe Him, of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear, without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they be sent, as it is written: How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace, of them that bring glad tidings of good things! (Romans 10)
So essential to the preservation of Christianity is the ministry of preaching, that if the voice of the Evangelist were hushed in a district or city for fifty years, the light of the gospel would well-nigh be extinguished in that region.
Wherefore since by God's good pleasure, things are preserved. through the same causes by which they were brought into being, it is evident that the preaching of the wisdom taught us by the Christian religion is the means divinely employed to continue the work of eternal salvation, and that it must with just reason be looked upon as a matter of the greatest and most momentous concern.
These files are public domain.
Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com. Used by Permission.
Entry for 'Preaching'. 1910 New Catholic Dictionary. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/ncd/p/preaching.html. 1910.
