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AlbertDerGrosse
Guest
And I hate to tell you this, but throughout the centuries, these bits of “pious scripture” were recited throughout Christendom for hundreds of years, whether through liturgy or through pious prayer.Because they were in the appendix of the Clementine Vulgate and in the Vulgate even prior to that. So they differ from other apocrypha in that the Church has openly promoted Catholics reading them throughout the centuries.
and…Also Protestants make no distinction from these and the deuterocanonical books which they call the apocrypha . So it is interesting we always talk about Protestants removing these books from their Bibles but what about the fact that the Apocrypha also includes these which both of us don’t view as canon?
Your question actually hits exactly the point I’m making. These three are in Catholic Bibles. Or at least they used to be in an appendix. Newer ones refrain from it. Yes the apocrypha consists of many books but these three seem to have a place of elevated status if that makes any sense, since they were in the Vulgate and also are used in liturgy.
Other apocryphal texts don’t have that going on for them. The fact that they were preserved in the Vulgate seems like the Church then must have held them in esteem even if they weren’t considered Canon.