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Romans 3
Douay-Rheims Bible, Challoner revision (1749–1752), the traditional Catholic English Bible, translated from the Latin Vulgate. If you read a modern Bible, this is the same Scripture in older English; some names are spelled differently (Cesarea for Caesarea, Apocalypse for Revelation). About this translation
1 What advantage then hath the Jew: or what is the profit of circumcision?
2 Much every way. First indeed, because the words of God were committed to them.
3 For what if some of them have not believed? Shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect? God forbid!
4 But God is true and every man a liar, as it is written: That thou mayest be justified in thy words and mayest overcome when thou art judged. CCC
5 But if our injustice commend the justice of God, what shall we say? Is God unjust, who executeth wrath?
6 (I speak according to man.) God forbid! Otherwise how shall God judge this world?
7 For if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie, unto his glory, why am I also yet judged as a sinner?
8 And not rather (as we are slandered and as some affirm that we say) let us do evil that there may come good? Whose damnation is just.
9 What then? Do we excel them? No, not so. For we have charged both Jews and Greeks, that they are all under sin.
10 As it is written: There is not any man just.
11 There is none that understandeth: there is none that seeketh after God.
12 All have turned out of the way: they are become unprofitable together: there is none that doth good, there is not so much as one.
13 Their throat is an open sepulchre: with their tongues they have dealt deceitfully. The venom of asps is under their lips.
14 Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness:
15 Their feet swift to shed blood:
16 Destruction and misery in their ways:
17 And the way of peace they have not known.
18 There is no fear of God before their eyes.
19 Now we know that what things soever the law speaketh, it speaketh to them that are in the law: that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may be made subject to God.
20 Because by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified before him. For by the law is the knowledge of sin. CCC
21 But now, without the law, the justice of God is made manifest, being witnessed by the law and the prophets. CCC · Fathers
22 Even the justice of God, by faith of Jesus Christ, unto all, and upon all them that believe in him: for there is no distinction. CCC
23 For all have sinned and do need the glory of God. CCC · Fathers
24 Being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, CCC
25 Whom God hath proposed to be a propitiation, through faith in his blood, to the shewing of his justice, for the remission of former sins, CCC
26 Through the forbearance of God, for the shewing of his justice in this time: that he himself may be just and the justifier of him who is of the faith of Jesus Christ. CCC
27 Where is then thy boasting? It is excluded. By what law? Of works? No, but by the law of faith.
28 For we account a man to be justified by faith, without the works of the law.
29 Is he the God of the Jews only? Is he not also of the Gentiles? yes, of the Gentiles also.
30 For it is one God that justifieth circumcision by faith and uncircumcision through faith. Fathers
31 Do we then, destroy the law through faith? God forbid! But we establish the law.
This chapter in the Catechism and the early Church
Where the Catechism of the Catholic Church cites these verses (from its footnotes on vatican.va), and where the earliest Church Fathers quote them (Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1, public domain). Short quotes only; follow the links for the full text.
Read the Catechism
- CCC 2465 “The Old Testament attests that God is the source of all truth. His Word is truth. His Law is truth. His "faithfulness…”
Read the Catechism
- CCC 708 “This divine pedagogy appears especially in the gift of the Law. God gave the letter of the Law as a "pedagogue" to…”
Read the Catechism and Fathers
- CCC 1992 “Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy…”
- CCC 2543 “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it,…”
“For verily I say unto you, Until heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle shall not pass from the law and the prophets till all come to pass.”
Quoted in Against Heresies, Book IV, St. Irenaeus of Lyons (c. AD 180), Chapter XXXIV. Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1
Read the Catechism
- CCC 1987 “The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to…”
- CCC 1992 “Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy…”
- CCC 2543 “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it,…”
Read the Catechism and Fathers
- CCC 399 “Scripture portrays the tragic consequences of this first disobedience. Adam and Eve immediately lose the grace of original holiness. They become afraid…”
- CCC 705 “Disfigured by sin and death, man remains "in the image of God," in the image of the Son, but is deprived "of…”
- CCC 1992 “Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy…”
- CCC 2809 “The holiness of God is the inaccessible center of his eternal mystery. What is revealed of it in creation and history, Scripture…”
“For "all men come short of the glory of God,”
Quoted in Against Heresies, Book IV, St. Irenaeus of Lyons (c. AD 180), Chapter XXVII. Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1
“… nor be severe upon those of old time, but ought ourselves to fear, lest perchance, after [we have come to] the knowledge of Christ, if we do things displeasing to God, we obtain no further forgiveness of sins, but be shut out from His kingdom.”
Quoted in Against Heresies, Book IV, St. Irenaeus of Lyons (c. AD 180), Chapter XXVII. Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1
Read the Catechism
- CCC 1992 “Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy…”
Read the Catechism
- CCC 433 “The name of the Saviour God was invoked only once in the year by the high priest in atonement for the sins…”
- CCC 1460 “The penance the confessor imposes must take into account the penitent's personal situation and must seek his spiritual good. It must correspond…”
- CCC 1992 “Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy…”
Read the Catechism
- CCC 1992 “Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy…”
Read the Fathers
“… God that human nature (hominem) which had departed from God; and therefore men were taught to worship God after a new fashion, but not another god, because in truth there is but "one God, who justifieth the circumcision by faith, and the uncircumcision through faith.”
Quoted in Against Heresies, Book III, St. Irenaeus of Lyons (c. AD 180), Chapter X. Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1
“Since this is the case, we must not seek for another Father besides Him, or above Him, since there is one God who justifies the circumcision by faith, and the uncircumcision through faith.”
Quoted in Against Heresies, Book V, St. Irenaeus of Lyons (c. AD 180), Chapter XXII. Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1
A modern English Catholic translation will be added once its publisher grants permission.