GIVE US THIS DAY OUR SUPERSUBSTANTIAL BREAD

Prompted by a friend with whom I once briefly shared a jail cell, a few years ago I bought a paperback Douay-Rheims Bible. Sometimes I take it to monthly meetings with Protestant friends to choose Scripture for the local rag. They listen politely but we’ve never used the Douay version for publication in the paper: ‘Good News’ is the bible which would seem to resonate best with Central Hawke’s Bay readers.

However, I’m aware of the Douay’s faithfulness to the Vulgate translation by St Jerome and was pleasantly surprised recently to read it was confirmed by the Magisterium of the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent as “authentic” and that “no one should dare or presume under any pretext to reject it”.

But I was more than surprised – I was staggered – to stumble across the Douay version of the Our Father, according to St Matthew. In chapter 6, 11 Jesus instructs us to pray Give us this day our supersubstantial bread.

I immediately thought, that means the Eucharist, and in the notes at the bottom of the page I read, In St Luke the same word is rendered daily bread. It is understood of the bread of life, which we receive in the Blessed Sacrament.

Now, the notes in the Douay are, like the text, sanctioned by the Magisterium as authentic.

What would have been the result if for the nearly 1600 years that the Douay was the only Bible used by the Church, those millions - or billions - of Catholics had all asked in that prayer which is the most commonly prayed, give us this day our supersubstantial bread? What effect would that have had on the numbers of churches built, Masses celebrated and priests ordained? What if we were still praying it now? Just asking …

From now on, in praying the Rosary St Matthew’s version of the Our Father will be mine. And the Douay bible, with its authenticity guaranteed, its subtleties, nuances and depth of meaning will be mine also, in daily use as a companion to the modern texts which are oh, so different from the Douay - and from one another.

And why were we sharing a jail cell, my friend and I? We’d been arrested for praying outside the abortion clinic at Wellington Hospital. That friend, who spent months in Arohata as a result of her heroic witness, still imports the Douay-Rheims Bible and sells it on request.