The 3-year Lectionary cycle was indeed a great idea emerging from the post vatican 2 liturgical reform.
In my view, even the 1 year Lectionary was a great idea.
Many non-Catholic churches have in fact adopted the Catholic lectionary for their own use.
Why? For one thing, any pastor or priest, left on his own to select the readings for Sunday, would be inclined to select his favorite passages and use them over and over. He might never get to some OT books.
The Lectionary avoids that by providing an integrated series of bible readings from both the old and new testaments. Not only that, the readings are integrated so that the OT reading might have a prophecy which is fulfilled in the NT reading. The readings will, in any case, be integrally related to each other.
I wonder if Catholics realize just how much of the bible they are really acquainted with, just from the 3 year cycle of Mass readings.
