Yes, but not enough of them, say some Catholic biblical experts. Too many Catholics apparently have not gotten the word that the Bible is not the sole domain of the clergy:
"While it may be a best-seller, the Bible still is not regularly read, nor has it become an integral part of many Catholics’ lives, said a panel of biblical experts.
"’Unfortunately, it must be said, there is still little Bible in the lives of the faithful,’ said Italian Bishop Vincenzo Paglia, president of the Catholic Bible Federation.
"Recent research conducted in Italy, Spain and France found that many Catholics consider the sacred Scriptures as something ‘reserved for the clergy’ rather than as an accessible resource for them to draw upon for truth and inspiration in their own lives, he said.
"Bishop Paglia, together with a number of biblical experts, spoke at a Vatican press conference Sept. 8 to present an upcoming international congress commemorating the 40th anniversary of Dei Verbum, the Second Vatican Council document on Scripture and divine revelation."
On the bright side, Bishop Paglia notes that "It is by listening to the word of God, in fact, that the believer discovers himself to be a disciple and even an apostle, that is, an evangelizer" (emphasis added). Rather than distributing Bibles to Catholics, a la the Gideon Society (a plan that the bishop notes is problematic), a better approach might be to get Catholics back to Mass where they can hear the word of God every Sunday — or better yet, every day.
Do Catholics Read the Bible?
By engage I mean being open to receiving something new from a passage of Scripture, even if it has been heard (or read) many times before. It takes, istm, an openness to the action of God inside of us, thus overcoming the rationalism that makes us re…
Rather than distributing Bibles to Catholics, a la the Gideon Society (a plan that the bishop notes is problematic), a better approach might be to get Catholics back to Mass where they can hear the word of God every Sunday — or better yet, every day.
If it’s done the way the Gideons do it (i.e. Bibles printed with introductory notes that imply Bible reading is a do-it-yourself program and placed impersonally without any community contact information), yes, distributing Bibles can be a problem.
But Bibles can be distributed in a way that encourages Church participation, and this need not be considered problematic at all.
Also, I’d submit that Bible-reading isn’t that much higher for Mass-attending Catholics. So one way to change the current situation isn’t so much getting them in the pews, though that’s an obvious first step, but in better homiletics.
Scriptural exegesis by someone like Fr. John Corapi makes listeners want to tear into the Gospel narratives (reverently of course); homilies reflective of the Gospel of Nice make the Bible seem like a boring hash of optional sentiments.
Bible Studies are another way of encouraging Catholics to read Scripture.
Not to offend anybody, but hanging around Protestants is another way to get Catholics to read the bible.
Worked for me at least. Of course, there’s a lot of danger of running into and beleiving anti-Catholic teachings (even teachings that aren’t obviously anti-Catholic.)
Granted, we could probably use more reading of the bible, but at least Catholics that attend Mass regularly do read the bible (or have it read to them). That whole “Liturgy of the Word” thing.
This would seem to be an obvious answer. Unfortunately, I think it puts the cart before the horse. While there are such people, I haven’t met any person that became a passionate bible reader before they became passionate about the faith. Even amongst Protestants the focus isn’t so much on the Bible itself as much as it is on forming small communities within the Church whose members encourage one another. (Think Rick Warren) Yes, in the evangelical community, Bible reading is more prevalent, but there are few if any cultural evangelicals.
there are few if any cultural evangelicals.
Very good point.
And while it’s true that there are good and bad dimensions to that fact (good: everyone believes and practices to some extent; bad: it tends to be based on a voluntaristic rather than communitarian vision), I don’t think anyone could argue that most Catholics don’t need a kick in the pants when it comes to personal conversion.
I do feel guilty about my lack of bible reading. I can’t fit much in any more, between full time work and full time grad school, the occational bath and unburrying my kitchen from dirty dishes, and waving hi to my husband so he knows I’m still alive.
I’m another graduate student with the same dillema. I used to read the Bible a lot more than I do now.
That being said, I think the Liturgy of the Word has really openened my eyes to scripture in terms of how the NT complements the old. The Saturday night of my confirmation was a revelation for me and my brother in terms of all the OT prefigurations of Baptism.
Yeah. We have mass, and we do “get some bible” there… and really, going to mass is more important. For protestants, all they really HAVE is the bible, so they really DO need it more. There’s so much that i’d LIKE to do, and just don’t have time to. And I’m really tired of people telling me… you have time to do whatever you MAKE time to do. I have like 50 things I “make” time to do. There’s no more time for anything else.. And sleep has already been cut from the “to do” list so that I can write papers about stupid things and occationally see my family.
Tammy,
I think you make a good point. It’s important both to receive the Word aurally and in a sacramental way. When the two receptions follow in rapid succesion it’s the best of possible worlds.
I don’t know though, occasionally I enjoy writing my papers. Then again, I’m an English major. :-p
I find the Psalms useful as prayers.
If you’d like to read more of the Bible, try praying the Liturgy of the Hours. I usually read the Office of Readings and Morning Prayer when I wake up, Evening Prayer when I come home from work/school, and Night Prayer when I go to bed. I recommend just starting with one of the Hours until it becomes a part of your day. It’s really easy to be too ambitious and then end up not doing any. I really like the Office of Readings – you get a biblical passage that’s longer than the average Mass reading, as well as a patristic reading. One can never get enough Augustine!
I can’t resist. the disparate topics of Biblical literacy and English majoring have converged in one combox.
Being one who grades English papers for a living, I know of a few instances where Catholic students have used the phrase “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” in a paper, footnoting it as being said by “Jesus” in the “Bible.”
It is important to read the Bible not just to know what is IN it, but what is NOT in it and only an aphorism popularly attributed to Mahatma Gandhi.
Also, if you do decide to read the Bible more (which is good) and all you have around is the New American Bible, do yourself a favor and RIP OUT the introductory material and footnotes.
You’ll thank me later.
I still can’t get the phrase “most modern scholars…” out of my head.
Tim,
I balance my modern New American Bible out with my Victorian Douay-Rheims version (great for patristic readings too, btw). I find this to be a much better option then ripping out the pages (which would be against my code as an English major anyway).
Seriously though, I know you’re using hyperbole, but it’s really not that bad. Right? (new Catholic here :-p )
MZ Forest, it didn’t used to be that way. The mega-church/small group movement is fairly new, last 10-20 years. Before that, Evangelicals really did read the Bible many of them every single day. What goes by the name evangelical today isn’t really the same -thing- any more.
And it was communitarian. The Evangelical Free Church in my home town is still this way. If there is a question or disagreement, the response is to get out their Bibles and read the text together, and examine what is actually written. It isn’t so much ‘me and my Bible’, as ‘all of us, in humility before the Word of God’.
Tammy, do you have any drive time? With all you are doing, this might not be feasible, but -listening- to the Bible read on CD or tape while driving will still get it into you.
Tammy, I do agree, I haven’t found that I have been given the capability of creating time into the cosmos.
Ryan, you sure sound Missouri Synod! 🙂
You can always learn to read it in the original Greek. Not an easy task, I haven’t -really- accomplished it, but it would be worth doing.
Well Greek is last on my list of languages after French Latin and Anglo-Saxon, so it looks like I’ll be reading the Bible in those languages before that.
And what do you mean I sound Missouri Synod? I’m puzzled myself (sorry, couldn’t resist).
Ryan, you sounded like a good, orthodox, conservative Lutheran. That was not an insult, but an observation of substantial unity.
I was referring to you mention of the Word aurally, but also the “visible word” of baptism and the Eucharist.
Two thoughts.
First, this study was done in Europe, so I suspect that the numbers would be less than a comparable one done in the US.
Second, being an active evangelical until my conversion about 9 or 10 years ago, I see things a bit differently. I have never been able to really appreciate the Bible, but I do appreciate the much greater spiritual treasures that the Catholic Church has. Saints and their writings, theologians-some more readable than others, conversion stories, etc. A lot of this is either missing or much shallower in the evangelical world.
The Liturgy of the Hours is indeed a great place to start, and I highly recommend starting with am prayers or night prayers, even the same one repeatedly rather than switching day to day. I have done that at times when I’m really tired. Being a Bear of Very Small Brain I like commentary (as provided by the authors in the Catholic Answers catalog rather than the footnotes of the New American) or thematic presentation (like the Lit of Hours – i.e. psalms of praise in the morning, etc) Just slogging through from start to finish I find tedious and unrewarding. I’m doing it anyway, because JIMMY TOLD US TO a while back 😉 I keep the bible in the bathroom and read a few paragraphs at a time.
whatever translation they use for the Lit of hours is much nicer.
Puzzled,
Thanks! I will keep this in mind for the future. And just so you know, I didn’t take it for an insult, I was just looking for clarification.
Unity is good. ^_^
“I’m another graduate student with the same dillema. I used to read the Bible a lot more than I do now.”
As a current PhD candidate, here’s my advice: buy Our Sunday Visitor’s new Catholic Daily Bible. It’s the RSVCE and it includes daily quotes from the saints, though unfortunately has no notes. The readings really do take only about 15-20 minutes; less some days. [End advertisement.] If this is too big a bite to take one, just committ yourself to reading one chapter a day. Just make sure you aren’t trying to do too much, because that’s an easy way to burn out and quit entirely. You could even start by reading just one psalm a day.
Whatever Bible program you get, here’s the key point. You set aside 10-20 minutes in which you aren’t allowed to do other things, or you rank your activities such that you aren’t allowed to (watch TV, read Wheel of Time novels, read blogs- inserts activies of your choice) before you read your Bible. In other words, you make the Bible reading an essential part of your daily routine. If you’re an evening person, make it the last thing you do in the evening, every evening. If you’re a morning person, make it one of your morning rituals. Or if you’re like me and you eat lunch alone, read the Bible while you eat lunch. If the amount you’re reading is practical (read: short enough), and you’re reasonably good at developing habits, it shouldn’t be too hard to make the daily readings a regular habit.
We got Bible stories early on, had to buy a Bible for CCD later, and of course we always had the Mass. But the kind of in-depth Bible study that constantly relates the Bible and the sacraments, the Bible and Catholic theology — well, maybe they had that at some of the book discussions. But I didn’t get that. And as I’ve said before, providing good Catholic Bible study for college kids and post-high school people is a must, because that’s when you really get pressured by evangelicals looking for converts — and that’s when a lot of people first start looking for religion of their own free will, as opposed to a mandatory parental thing like piano class. (It wasn’t for me, but I can see how it is for many young people.)
Anyone who has time for blogging has time for personal Scripture reading.
“The sacred synod also earnestly and especially urges all the Christian faithful… to learn by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures the ‘excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ’ (Phil. 3:8). ‘For ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.’ Therefore, they should gladly put themselves in touch with the sacred text itself, whether it be through the liturgy, rich in the divine word, or through devotional reading, or through instructions suitable for the purpose and other aids which, in our time, with approval and active support of the shepherds of the Church, are commendably spread everywhere. And let them remember that prayer should accompany the reading of Sacred Scripture, so that God and man may talk together; for ‘we speak to Him when we pray; we hear Him when we read the divine saying.'” Dei Verbum (Dogmatic Constitution) 25
I think it was St. John Chrysostom who said the laity have more need of regular scripture reading than either priests or religious, but I’d have to check the reference.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops also has the daily readings online every day, which is great. If you can’t attend daily Mass you can at least mediatate on the same scriptures.
the USCCB Wewbsite:
http://www.usccb.org
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops also has the daily readings online every day, which is great.
I love that too!
Here’s a direct link for the reading-of-the-day.
And here’s the calendar for the whole month.
If you use a different reading program, you can choose your chapter of the NAB here.
Fans of the Revised Standard Version should also know that the whole thing (yes, the deuterocanonical books are listed after the NT) is available at the University of Virginia’s etext library.
I see some really good ideas here. I’m fairly impressed with what Scott Hahn has been up to, except where he gets particularly speculative. I wonder if that outfit has studies to go with contiguous passages of Scripture. It is a bood with various genres -written in ordinary human language-.
I’m fairly impressed with what Scott Hahn has been up to, except where he gets particularly speculative.
Ditto. My biggest problem with Hahn’s work is that he doesn’t always tell people which parts are really speculative, so I’ve known a lot of people to confuse his unusual personal speculation with Church teaching. He needs to tone that down (rather like Christopher West has been toning down his own more speculative ideas). Otherwise, Hahn’s stuff is usually great!
My favorite Bible reading program (not a commentary or study guide) is The Great Adventure. I’m starting my nephew young on this.
When teaching other people to be more observant Bible readers, I like Oletta Wald’s Joy of Discovery. She’s a Lutheran herself, but the book is a tool rather than a commentary, so anyone can get something beneficial out of it. Most importantly, I think it helps people learn to ask better questions.
Other books, like Mark Shea’s Making Senses Out of Scripture, can help with other senses of scripture.