When non-Catholics start quoting Bible verses to "prove" that Catholic teachings aren’t biblical, reach for this powerful Bible-based explanation and defense of the Catholic Faith! Where Is That in the Bible? shows you how to deflate standard objections to Catholicism — and how to use Scripture to bring people into (or back into) the Church. Veteran apologist and best-selling author Patrick Madrid gives you simple ways to:

• Show the true meaning of verses anti-Catholics twist to attack the Church

• Give Biblical answers to the most common questions that non-Catholics ask Catholics about the Church

• Explain exactly what the Bible teaches about the pope, priestly celibacy, the divinity of Christ, homosexuality, abortion, salvation, purgatory, the use of statues and icons, confession to a priest, baptism, and other issues often objected to by non-Catholics

• Interpret the Bible correctly, according to authentic Christian Tradition — and steer clear of common mistakes many people make when reading Scripture

• Share the riches of the Catholic Faith more effectively, especially with those who consider Catholicism to be "unbiblical."

Not only does each chapter handle the most common objections about the faith (the papacy, sola scriptura, the saints, Mary, and the sacraments), but each also provides a plethora of Biblical verses to support the Catholic teachings in each case.

The nice thing about this book, aside from its size (which makes it easy to carry with you), is that it provides Scripture for issues beyond the typical objections raised. Interested readers will discover Biblical citations on issues such as abortion, tithing, non-Catholic beliefs, drinking and other issues - giving it some merit even outside of Catholic circles.

While there are several books like this in existence, few have gathered so much good information all into one place.

49 of 52 found the following review helpful:


The Yellow Pages for the Catholic  Nov 14, 2001
This book is not a theological compendium of all Catholic Beliefs.

If you want that, go buy a Catechism.

This book is not an apologetics manual for how to irrefutably defend the faith.

If you want that, I suggest Scott Hahn's tape series *Answering Common Objections*, or some other such material.

If we're clear on what this book is NOT, let's look at what it is.

It IS a reference book. It IS the kind of thing you want to keep handy at all times, or better yet, memorize it. It IS the sort of supplement that is nice to have when you KNOW the words of the bible, but you don't remember the chapter and verse. It IS the kind of thing that's nice when you KNOW the logic behind a teaching, but you need a list of bible verses that support it. It IS a kind of cross-reference guide that will help you become familiar with all the places in the bible that support Catholic teaching, so that you don't have to rely on one lonely proof-text.

This really is more like a Yellow Pages, with a handy tab-style reference on the sides of the pages, for fast, easy reference. It's a great investment, at a great price. Do yourself the favor of buying and memorizing this book.

36 of 39 found the following review helpful:


A wonderful book!  Jun 13, 2001
Where has this book been all my life? I am so happy to have found it! It's given me hundreds of Bible verses (in context) that my husband and I can use in our discussions with our non-Catholic family and friends. So many of them are used to putting Catholics on the defensive with the magic question: "Where is that in the Bible? Hmmmm?" This book has the answers! I bought a copy at a parish conference the author spoke at, and since then I have bought several other copies to give out to friends. This book isn't an exhaustive or comprehensive explanation of all the Bible verses for all Catholic doctrines, and it doesn't pretend to be. Instead, I personally have found it to be a handy, clear, and extremely "user-friendly" quick reference book. And that's exactly what I and many, many Catholics have needed for so long. Now we have it with this wonderful new book.

29 of 31 found the following review helpful:


Every Catholic Should Own this book  Jan 28, 2005 By Glutton for books
The art of defending beliefs soley by scriptural reference is not one historically well developed in the Catholic church. Many times growing up, I would ask my mother or a faith formation teacher why Catholics believe something, and the response would be becuse the Church has always said that.

The fact is that the Church would not say something that was not supported by scripture, but when thrust into the Bible Belt as a teen, and constantly forced to defend my beliefs which were attacked as "unbiblical," I was not properly prepared for any such dialogue. Only saying "I know it's somewhere in the Bible" does not convince many minds, particularly when the people arguing with you appear to knwo that Bible more thoroughly and insist they never heard of anything to justify your belief.

I wish I had this book then. It is a great handbook for explaining the biblical roots of Catholic beliefs that generally come under attack or that seem difficult to explain by scritural references. Topics included (but are not limited to) the papcy, calling priests "father," communion of saints, Mary, relics, statues, purgatory, slavation, sola sciptura, and the sacraments. All faith formation prgrams should give a copy to all candidates for confirmation (if not a bit sooner) and RCIA. Also, every parent should have a copy so tht when the questions come up, they can quickly find the answers, if they do not remmebr the sources off hand. It also is helpful to people thining about leaving or returning to the Catholic Church, as well as those thinking about entering.

Patrick Madrid describes this book as the fruit of his study of scrpiture. That it comprises notes he made in the margins of his Bible to defend and explain Catholic beliefs. The format is similar to an encyclopedia and has indexes on the side of the pages about the topics, so that it is easy to find support for topics that are the source of your (or others') questions. Each topics has a brief explanation on the doctrine of belief, and usually includes the references to where the belief is articulated in the Cathechism, directing the reader to where the teaching is explained in greater deatil. Then a list of biblical references follows, so the reader can see how the cathechism pulled these teachings out of scripture.

The book also includes scriptural references to provide defense against attacks by Morman, Jehovak Witnesses, and details about the Inquistion.

The book focuses on scriptural references that are shared with the Protestant Bible. Meaning, that the Catholic Bible has more references than the book indicates to support its beliefs, because it includes a more comprehensive collection of Old Testament books, but Madrid wisely does not use these references because they would not have much validity with Prostestants who don't consider those books "biblical."

It is difficult for me to decide whether this is a four star rating or five stars. I wish the book was longer and had more explanations, but at the same time I value its compact size, whcih can easily be carried in a purse or pocket. At times I felt that some of the references used to validate a doctrine were tenuous at best, but upon those occasions, there were many other references on the subject that supported the Church's persepctive more clearly. I also wished at times that Madrid more fully explained the relationship between the scripture verses cited and the doctirne, but doing so would have produced a different sort of book, one long and more difficult to find the references in a pinch. As this book's accessible format is one of its strongest assets, it seems wrong to penalize it by giving it less a star; particularly when the argument involves wanting more of a good thing.

28 of 30 found the following review helpful:


A helpful book for explaining the whys of the Catholic faith  May 03, 2002
This little book has been a lot of help to me. As a convert to Catholicism, I needed a way to explain the Catholic faith to my parents (I want them to convert, too) and I found it in this book. It provides scriptural support for questions like "Why do Catholics have a priesthood if the Bible says that we are all priests?" and "Do Catholics worship the saints?" I think it is very well done and provides lots of Bible references, in addition to the initial explanation of each topic. This is all done, by the way, in a manner that does NOT suggest that Protestants are stupid and deluded for not believing as Catholics do, which I appreciated. It is simple and matter-of-fact, very readable and easy to use.

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