By Dr. Scott Hahn

Pope Benedict XVI is urging Catholics to recover the ancient tradition of lectio divina - of prayerfully reading Scripture as an "intimate dialogue" between ourselves and the Lord.

Promoting this life-transforming method of praying the Scriptures, he has declared, "will bring to the Church - I am convinced of it - a new spiritual springtime."

The Pope's insistent call for a renewed "biblical ministry" is dear to my heart.

Serving this biblical renewal is the reason for the St. Paul Center, which you so generously support through your prayers and other contributions.

And advancing this renewal is the purpose behind my new book, Letter and Spirit: From Written Text to Living Word in the Liturgy (Doubleday, $22).

From the start, the liturgy has been the natural and supernatural habitat of the Scriptures. On the night He rose from the dead, Jesus set the pattern of our spiritual worship - opening up “all the Scriptures” for His disciples and then, while at table, making himself known to them “in the breaking of the bread” (see Luke 24:27-32).

Since that night, believers have gathered to celebrate the Lord's resurrection, to hear the Scriptures opened and to know our Lord in the breaking of the bread.

When we read the Bible in the liturgy, Christ himself is present in our midst. And in our sacred worship, the Scriptures are fulfilled - the written text of the Scriptures becomes the living Word of God.

Our Holy Father has put it beautifully: "The liturgy is the privileged place to listen to the divine Word, which renders present the Lord's salvific acts . . . . God and man meet in a saving embrace, which finds its fulfillment precisely in the liturgical celebration."

These themes have emerged as keynotes in this new pontificate - the indivisible unity of Scripture and liturgy, the "sacred power" of God's Word to bring us into communion with "the whole of salvation history."

And these are the deep mysteries I explore in Letter and Spirit. It is written for ordinary Catholics, but also for professors, priests, seminarians, and teachers.

By going deeper into the history, theology, and worship of the Church, I hope to help all Catholics see both the Bible and the Mass with new eyes.

I want all of us to see what Benedict sees, what the Church has always wanted us to see - how when the Scriptures are read in the Mass, God speaks and we respond in prayer with open and trusting hearts, how our salvation truly comes to us in the letter and the Spirit of God's Word.

By retrieving the Church's ancient art of listening to and proclaiming the Scriptures in the liturgy, I hope Letter and Spirit will contribute to the new springtime our Holy Father forsees.

November 2005