I was disappointed by this statement from the Irish Episcopal Conference this morning. The bishops seem to be moving towards the decision to adopt the Revised New Jerusalem Bible (RNJB) for the production of a new lectionary for the Irish Church. Now, I'm not a biblical scholar, and I'm not really qualified to have an expert opinion on whether one translation is better than another. However, I am a priest with over a decade's experience in parish ministry, in addition to some time doing postgraduate studies in theology, and on this question of a new lectionary, I'm primarily drawing on my experience of the pastoral and adminstrative work of an ordinary priest in a parish.
The key issue here is not the abstract question of what translation of the scriptures is the best, but rather the practical question of how the Irish hierarchy can best use their resources to deliver a suitable and usable lectionary that will meet the needs of parishes and parish clergy. With that in mind, it makes very little sense to go down the road of soliciting other English-speaking episcopal conferences who might want to join forces with the Irish in producing a lectionary based on the RNJB when our nearest neighbours (Scotland and England & Wales) are already well-advanced on producing their own lectionary based upon the English Standard Version: Catholic Edition (ESVCE). They're doing this piggybacking on the work of the Indian Episcopal Conference which has already received Vatican approval for their ESVCE. Why aren't we collaborating with our nearest neighbours in their lectionary project? Surely it would make sense to invest our financial and human resources into the development of a common lectionary with them rather than re-inventing the wheel with a speculative lectionary project using a translation of the bible that has no guarantee of receiving Vatican approval?
From my own pastoral experience, it is of great benefit to me that the Irish Church uses the same liturgical translation as the English, Welsh and Scots. It means that resources produced for parish use in Britain can also be used in Ireland, and vice-versa. In my own work with, for example, bereaved families in planning funeral Masses, I have found some of the most useful resources have been produced in England, but can be easily adapted for Irish use precisely because the lectionary we use for funeral Masses in both countries is identitical. This doesn't simply make life easier for me, it has implications for Irish publishers who produce common materials for use in this country and in Great Britain, and for those religious congregations who administer their work in Ireland and Britain as a single unit.
I made a submission making this point as part of the consultation process, and I think that my main point is worth expressing in very simple terms - we need to have a good lectionary in Ireland, and unless the ESVCE is genuinely unsuitable, there seems to be no good reason to waste the limited monetary and human resources availible to the Irish Church at a time when she is facing huge challenges on a speculative lectionary project, when every practical reason points to collaboration with our neighbours as the obvious way forward.
