The PBC likewise ruled that it should be held as certain that St. Luke was
the author of the Acts of the Apostles (1913) and St. Paul of the Pastoral
Epistles (1913).
Admittedly, these five pronouncements were handed down many decades
ago, nevertheless, none of them has been overridden by subsequent Church
statements. Rather, the Second Vatican Council went out of its way to
clearly reaffirm the historicity of the Gospels:
“The Church has always and everywhere maintained, and continues
to maintain, the apostolic origin of the four Gospels. The apostles
preached, as Christ had charged them to do, and then, under the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they and others of the apostolic age
handed on to us in writing the same message they had preached, the
foundation of our Faith: the fourfold Gospel, according to Matthew,
Mark, Luke and John … Holy Mother Church has firmly and with
absolute constancy held that the four Gospels … whose historical
character the Church unhesitatingly asserts, faithfully hand on what
Jesus Christ really did and taught for their eternal salvation.”
16
Of all the Gospels, the one whose authenticity is most challenged is the
fourth. Before the end of the eighteenth century no one denied that St. John
the Apostle was the author. However, skeptical critics emerged at that time,
dismissing the fourth Gospel as a work of fiction compiled by unknown
Christians in the mid-second century who were disappointed by Christ’s
failure to return as promised. These same critics further argued that the
historic Jesus had nothing to do with the “miracle-working divine Son of
God,” but rather was simply a profound teacher and revolutionary who
challenged the corrupt institutions of His day.
16
Dei Verbum, # 19.
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