Customer Reviews

Catholic Bible Stories for Children

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The most popular Old and New Testament stories have been included and are written in a lively and accessible style for young readers. All of the stories contain a bible citation in the event families would like to read the story in another bible version. A highlight of this book is the artwork, with bright and wonderful illustrations by Kevin Davidson. The sturdy, high quality hardcover of this book ensures that the book will stand up to lots of great times spent reading these bible stories.

This book is ideal for a young reader-- one who is reading short chapter books. The stories are short but not so short that their meaning is lost. There are plenty of pictures and the pages are colorful. The book is well written. My son enjoys reading his book and he is not that fond of reading. We gave this as a First Communion gift.

I bought this book for my 7 yr old daughter & she loves it! It is easy enough for her to read & the pictures are great! I would recommend this book for all kids & even teens that maybe do not like to read such long books.

I'm giving this book to my daughter for her 1st Communion. The stories are easy to read. The stories also go in order to the bible. The illustrations makes the stories easy to understand.

This is the best Catholic Bible for children! It avoids all traces of historical-critical "Genesis didn't really happen" thinking, and includes Bible stories on Mary and Maccabees, including praying for the dead. The pictures are wonderful. Bible quotes are taken from the Revised Standard Version, much better in my opinion than the New American Bible used in other Catholic children's Bibles.

My son is four, and he loves it. We read a story every night.

I would also like to respond to the reviewer who accuses the authors of an Arian heresy. As I understand it, the Word/Second Person of the Blessed Trinity was not "Jesus" until He took flesh. So in that sense, Old Testament history WAS before Jesus the God-man. It happened BEFORE the Word became flesh.

I recently purchased this book for my CCD class. I used it last week for the first time. The children were very attentive while I was reading the story. They really enjoyed hearing about the birth of Jesus and about the visit from the angel Gabriel who came to Mary to tell her the "good news" that God had chosen her to be the mother of his only son who would bring salvation to all mankind. The bible stories are very well written and easy to understand. The pictures are bright and colorful which adds to the enjoyment of the stories. This book is a great tool for catechists and for parents who are teaching young children about their faith.

I purchased this book to read to my children Bible stories. This provides a shorter version and tailored for children. My daughter loves to hear the stories and see the pictures. I am glad I purchased this Bible Stories book.

I was considering purchasing "Catholic Bible Stories for Children" by Ann Ball and Julianne M. Will for a nephew when I took advantage of the helpful "Click to Look Inside" feature that Amazon offers on the picture of the book at the top of the page. Try it yourself.

So far so good. The early pages carry the "Nihil Obstat" and "Imprimitur" stamps that mark most good Catholic Bibles and I am ready to be impressed with this book and be favorable to the pages that would follow.

Well not far past these approvals, I see an entire page (page 17) devoted to just the text "In The Time Before Jesus" with nothing but an image from outer space for the background. This phrase also appears in the table of contents though that would less likely be read to or noticed by children. It continues on the next page to say that God created, etc.

Combined this gives the effect of explicitly excluding Jesus from 1) being God and 2) being active in creation.

Jesus is God. Therefore there was never a "time before Jesus" since time itself is a part of creation and Jesus pre-existed all creation since He is Himself God. All creation that follows on the next few pages of this book was made through Jesus, not "before Jesus".

In fact John's Gospel begins with "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made."

This is our Catholic belief and the reason to buy a Catholic Bible. We want our Catholic Children to have a solid foundation to build upon later.

Wouldn't it be nice to see this acknowledged here in "Catholic Bible Stories for Children" or at the very least not excluded?

If we consider the book of Genesis to be part of the Jewish Old Testament, which does not explicitly name Jesus, Genesis still has God speaking during creation indicating the Word was present and active during creation while God spoke. It even says "the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters." So we have the entire Trinity even as early as Genesis present during creation.

The heretical belief that Jesus was not God, was created, and that there was a time before Jesus existed is nothing other than the Arian heresy which was condemned by the Catholic Church in the early Council of Nicaea.

You may say, "Well this is intended for children, it obviously could not get into those theological details".
"In The Time Before Jesus" is too confusing a phrase and begs explaining to children that this only refers to the time we measure (as in B.C.) before Jesus' incarnation only and that He still existed as God prior to time. If you explain this every time you read this to your child (which seems more theologically complicated to young ears), then maybe the child will not be confused later in life thinking that at some point in time due to this early Bible's wording that God existed but Jesus did not exist during creation.

The authors of "Catholic Bible Stories for Children" could have avoided this entire problem by just saying "In The Beginning of Time" or just "In The Beginning" on page 17. The book could then continue as it does with God creating as this slight alteration in the current text would not exclude Jesus from existing prior to creation and does not exclude Jesus from being an active force in creating all things which a child would hopefully later learn more about as they get older. No further clarification at this age would be required with this proposed updated wording.

The wording as it currently stands in this Children's Bible does require clarification because if it is understood the wrong way by the child, this appears to be the Arian heresy and is the wrong way to begin a Child's Bible reading.