Why are there not Bibles in the pews of Catholic churches?

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EnglishTeacher said:
You would have to know in advance the references for the readings of the day and have them tabbed in your Bible if you wanted to be able to turn to them in time during the Liturgy of the Word
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USCCB website and Laudate and Universalis apps pull them right up on your device. I also see many people, especially older people, reading Magnificat, and the truly hardcore Catholics often seen at TLM have their own Missals with ribbon markers.

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with just listening, though, as long as one listens and doesn’t daydream or poke their phone.
 
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Kei said:
Most people couldn’t read until hundreds of years ago, so hearing the Bible is how they learned from it.
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Well, those of you who were Roman Catholic a hundred years ago didn’t hear the Scriptural readings during the Mass. They were in Latin.
 
MonteRCMS said:
By my own questioning of fellow Catholics many of whom were well educated, they are not aware that the vast majority of the Mass … 80%? … is biblical in origin.

They actually think the priest makes it all up.
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…Sweet Jesus. 😦
 
ComplineSanFran said:
Well, those of you who were Roman Catholic a hundred years ago didn’t hear the Scriptural readings during the Mass. They were in Latin.
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Bibles in the vernacular have been around since before King James.

And in any case no, the priests wasn’t reading the Gospel in Latin. [Edit: not solely in Latin.] The priests read the Scriptural passages in the local language so people could understand.

There were still prayers in Latin, even during my early life: but there were also written translations in the prayer books so people knew what they were hearing.
 
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You Imply Latin wasn’t a universal language that pretty much all academic works were written in.
Also, Church-approved common language Bible translations have existed for hundreds of years.
 
Obviously my parish is an exception…but they do have Bibles along with the missals in the pews. They’re not quite as plentiful as the missals, maybe one Bible per every 2 or 3 missals. I’ve used them at weekly Mass when I can’t quite understand the priest’s accent.
 
I always bring my Bible, I like to see why certain verses are omitted. More are omitted from the Psalms than any other. Why? Read them for yourself.

Like the past weekends 1st reading from Proverbs. Go read what was omitted.
 
Quote:
"And thus is the crux of the problem."

What problem? Whose problem?
 
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Slovak. My sponsor and mentor when entering the Church said this particular conservative parish was the only non-EF-only parish of it’s kind around our area.
 
We have a new Filipino…
The mind drifts away during his homilies…
 
The days of “only the priests are allowed to have a Bible” are gone. Many Catholics have Bibles in their homes and use them. I am a cradle Catholic. And I have several Catholic Bibles (different editions). I read and use all of them. (I also have my maternal grandparents KJV Bibles and read them for comparison and the handwritten notes in the margins.)

We are encouraged to read the Bible each day for a minimum of 30 minutes. There are different editions to choose from.
 
Zaccheus said:
And in any case no, the priests wasn’t reading the Gospel in Latin. The priests read the Scriptural passages in the local language so people could understand.
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Yes, the Epistle and Gospel were read in Latin. Always. The concessions were that before the homily, the priest (or Bishop) gave a short summary or quick read to augment his text. See the writings of a number of liturgical scholars; here is Joseph Jungmann, SJ in The Mass of the Roman Rite: ITS ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT (Missarum Sollemnia)

‘This has its parallel in our own Roman Mass, when, after the reading of the Latin Gospel, there follows a reading (of Epistle and Gospel) in the vernacular, but with this difference, that the reading in the vernacular is viewed by the general law of the Church only as an introduction to (or a substitution for) the sermon and is left devoid of any liturgical framing… it is here in the matter of the lessons that we can see most plainly the great rift that exists-a rift growing wider with the centuries-between the holy text in its traditional sacred language and the natural objective of being understood by the audience.’
 
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I was invited and went to a Baptist service once when I was in high school. This was the famous Dr. Charles Stanley of First Baptist Church of Atlanta . There were three or four quotes Dr. Stanley made from the Bible I believe, and each time, everyone grabbed the Bible from the pew, and turned to the right page. By the time I found it of course, he had moved on.

I was not quite sure why it was there. People had notebooks to take notes, that, I understood. Unless people read the Bible before services, I think the Bibles in Protestant churches are underused.
 
Umm, the OLAM Shrine has copies of the RSV-CE scattered throughout the pews. Anywhere you sit, there’s one within reach.

D
 
Catholic Churches will usually have a library where you can check out a bible.

Other than that, the mass is not structured such that the priest will ask the congregation to open to a particular passage. Catholics are asked to stay engaged during mass, while bible study or devotion would take place out of Mass.
 
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2towers said:
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lilypadrees:
We are encouraged to read the Bible each day for a minimum of 30 minutes. There are different editions to choose from.
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And there is a lot more of it to read from.
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Yes, and there are no books removed from it.
 
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