Epiphany: Catholic Edition

I pray

   that they may all

   be one. (John 17:21)

Dear Rachel,

I never heard of the “Catholic Edition” of the Revised Standard Version of the Bible. How did you come across it? I discovered you are right. It is true—first published in 1966, fourteen years after the RSV was published. So, it’s been around for near 60 years and I knew nothing of it until you brought it up. Thanks for educating me once again.

I ended up Amazonian it with one click. Mom caught me: “Another Bible?” I tried to explain how it’s all your fault. Anyway, it turned out to be very interesting to me on several levels:

Level One:  Ecumenism… It reminded me of my idealistic seminary days when a group of us students and professors from Golden Gate Theological Seminary meet together with a group of  students and processors from the University of San Francisco (a Catholic Jesuit university on the “Hill Top” between the Golden Gate Bridge and Golden Gate Park). It’s a vague memory. I recall them coming to our hill and us going to their hill—maybe a total of four times. As I recall, the lines of division tended to be more conservative vs liberal, than protestant vs catholic. Father John and I ended up being buddies on the more conservative/evangelical end of things. I wish, like a lot of such encounters, we would have stayed in touch. I suppose he’s gone on to Glory—maybe then for sure.

Level Two:  The Revised Standard Version… It remains my life long personal Bible. It follows the tradition of the King James with its attentiveness to the public reading of scripture (the pastor’s first and primary duty, 1Tm 4:13). It is a translation for the worshipping community.

Level Three: A Common Bible… Since the King James Version no longer holds sway, churches can no longer settle on a common translation. It’s a dream; but wouldn’t it be great if all churches could settle on a common worship translation? We could call it our Sunday Morning Worship Bible. Then, for the remainder of the week, we could enjoy all sorts of other, helpful, even fun, translations.

Three is a good number. I’ll quit. Thank you for surprising me. It is always fun to learn stuff.

Love, DAD