RETURNING PROPERTY TO COPYRIGHT RHETORIC FOR BIBLE

Photo Screenshot: Ihayag ang Katotohanan (Catholic Faith Defender) / Facebook; January 17, 2026, 3:05 PM

Introduction

You may aware as a protestants, that some catholics demanded that return all bibles to the Catholic Church, like a post by Ihayag ang Katotohanan(Catholic) which states in English as: "PASTOR, PLEASE SURRENDER THE BIBLE YOU ARE USING, BECAUSE YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO IT📢Return to the Catholic Church." However, is this a policy from the Roman Catholic Church?

Argument Claim

Demands for Protestant pastors to "surrender" their Bibles are not official Catholic Church policy but are a specific type of aggressive online apologetics or "polemics" found in social media circles. This rhetoric is based on a theological argument regarding the origins of the Bible rather than a legal or physical claim. 

Polemical Catholics who use this phrase typically argue that because the Catholic Church determined the New Testament canon in the 4th century, the Bible is "Catholic property". They assert that without the Catholic Church, there would be no Bible for Protestants to use. They claim it is "contradictory" for Protestants to accept the Bible while rejecting the authority of the Church that certified it. These posts often use slogans like "Return to the Catholic Church" to suggest that true biblical faith is only possible within Catholicism. 

Actual Official Policy vs. Polemical Stance

While individual apologists may use confrontational language, the official Catholic Church stance is different. The Church does not demand that non-Catholics surrender physical Bibles. Modern Church teaching, especially since Vatican II, encourages shared study of Scripture with other Christians, though it mandates that translations used by Catholics must be approved by the USCCB or other authorities. In the past (such as in the 1908 Catechism of St. Pius X), Catholics were sometimes told to "reject with disgust" or even burn Protestant Bibles because they were seen as "forbidden" or "corrupt" due to missing books or specific translations. This tactic is widely described as "owning the Prots"—a form of "rage bait" or in-group signaling intended to affirm Catholic authority rather than engage in friendly outreach. It highlights the historical rift over the "Deuterocanonical" books (the seven books Protestants removed during the Reformation) and the Catholic belief that the Church is the "servant of written revelation" rather than its master. 

Public Domain to Copyright

Some polemical Catholics use the "copyright infringement" stance to argue that because the Catholic Church compiled the biblical canon, any group using the Bible while rejecting Catholic authority is essentially using "stolen property". Polemicists often claim the Bible is a "Catholic book" because the Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, authoritatively determined which books were inspired at 4th-century councils like Rome (382 AD), Hippo (393 AD), and Carthage (397 AD). Some extreme polemical stances frame Protestant use of the Bible as a form of intellectual property theft or copyright infringement, arguing that Protestants "took" the Bible from the Church but rejected the authority that gave it to them. This line of reasoning often cites the early Church Father Tertullian, who famously challenged heretics by asking, "Who are you?... This is my property... I am the heir of the Apostles". 

Legally, as our previous article, " BIBLE TRANSLATION: A ROLE OF UNIVERSAL TO VERNACULAR LANGUAGE", states that original languages are public domain, but modern translations are copyright properties by various scholars or translators. Protestants typically reject the "ownership" claim, arguing that the Church merely recognized the authority of already inspired books rather than "creating" the Bible’s authority. Official Catholic teaching, as seen in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, maintains that God is the author of Sacred Scripture, though the Church is its divinely appointed custodian and infallible interpreter.

Reference

EWTN News. (2026). Catholic News Agency. https://www.ewtnnews.com/?redirectedfrom=cna

‌Questions about the Bible | USCCB. (n.d.). Www.usccb.org. https://www.usccb.org/faq

‌Rose, D. (2014, March 1). Protestantism’s Old Testament Problem. Catholic Answers. https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/protestantisms-old-testament-problem

‌Meade, J. (2021, November 7). Why Are Protestant and Catholic Bibles Different? by John Meade. Text & Canon Institute. https://textandcanon.org/why-the-catholic-bible-has-more-books-than-the-protestant-bible/

‌Bible Permissions | USCCB. (n.d.). Www.usccb.org. https://www.usccb.org/offices/new-american-bible/permissions

‌Newsome, D. M. (2011, September 27). Where We Got the Bible | Catholic Campus Ministry. Catholic Campus Ministry. https://wcucatholic.org/where-we-got-the-bible/

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