Patrick Comerford
We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar, we returned to ordinary time in the secular time too when the clocks went back overnight, and today is the Last Sunday after Trinity (25 October 2026). Dare I say it, but we are also just two months from Christmas.
Later this morning, I am reading one of the readings and leading the intercessions at the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford.
In many parishes this morning, the Gospel reading in the lectionary is Matthew 22: 34-46. But in places, including Stony Stratford, where this Sunday is being marked as Bible Sunday, the readings are: Nehemiah 8: 1-4a [5-6] 8-12; Psalm 119: 9-16; Colossians 3: 12-17; Matthew 24: 30-35.
Before today begins, meanwhile, I am taking some quiet time early this morning to give thanks, and for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:
1, today’s Gospel reading;
2, a short reflection;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
Matthew 24: 30-35 (NRSVA):
[Jesus said:] 30 ‘Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see “the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven” with power and great glory. 31 And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
32 ‘From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. 33 So also, when you see all these things, you know that he is near, at the very gates. 34 Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. 35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.’
Today’s Reflections:
My idea of indulgence is spending hours on end in the bookshops – new and second-hand – in Dublin, in Cambridge and in Oxford, and I still miss the old Staffs Bookshop in Lichfield, once my favourite second-hand bookshop.
But, as I navigate my way through the aisles and shelves of bookshops, I find I cannot help noticing the very limited versions of Bibles on many shelves. I seldom set out to buy a new Bible – my bookshelves have been stacked with a variety of translations and versions, usually known by their Initials (NRSV, NRSVA, JB, RSV, NIV, AV … ), and with Bibles in many languages, including English, Irish, Greek, Hebrew, French, Italian, Latin and Chinese – bought in Shanghai … I once had a version in Xhosa, bought in South Africa.
For a long-time I I clung onto some of these Bibles, even when they were bruised and battered, torn and dog-eared. I still have a King James Version that I think I was given during my school days.
There was a Living Bible, paraphrased by Kenneth Taylor … this version was printed in 1972 and sold for £1. It was heavily marked and stained, having endured being packed into rucksacks and travelling with me as I hitch-hikeded around Ireland and England at the age of 20.
My copy of the New English Bible had a note of where and when it was bought over 50 years ago: ‘Lichfield, 10.9.1973’ … I still remember that day, because the coup against Allende was staged in Chile the following day. The art nouveau illustrations by Horace Knowles are still a pleasure to come across.
I bought my first version of the Common Bible, with its ecumenical presentation of western and eastern canonical books, when I was working in Wexford in 1974. It was a paperback edition that fell apart through years of use, and was replaced over time with a later edition.
My many copies of the NRSVA have been lost, misplaced, borrowed or lent over the years, and the latest copy was found in the basement of the Oxfam bookshop on St Giles in Oxford.
A range of translations and commentaries is important for anyone who is interested in Biblical scholarship. And so, I was a little surprised at the very limited range of Bibles available on the shelves of one bookshop recently: four stacks of the King James Version, and one copy of the English Standard Version … and that was it.
The translations of the Bible we favour indicate a theological bias even before we start reading it.
The beauty of the English language in the King James Version is beyond question. Its influence on literary English places it alongside the works of Chaucer and Shakespeare and the Book of Common Prayer.
But, apart from historical, dramatic, poetic or comparative reasons, there are limited reasons for using the King James Version today, and if this was given to someone today as their first Bible, I would not expect them to continue reading it for very long.
The single, sole alternative of the English Standard Version in that bookshop that particular day took me aback.
There is a saying in Italian that I learned in Ealing Abbey while studying patristic and liturgical Latin: Traduttore, traditore – ‘The translator is a traitor.’
Every translation of the Bible is an interpretation as well as a translation, and the new text always betrays the old prejudices of the translators.
There was an interesting debate in the letters columns of the The Tablet some years ago when the Roman Catholic bishops of England and Wales approved the English Standard Version for a revised Lectionary.
The Irish-born historian Eamon Duffy, Emeritus Professor of the History of Christianity at Cambridge and author of The Stripping of the Altars, finds the ESV reflects ‘a deep-rooted dimension of Anglophone culture.’
He finds the Jerusalem Bible ‘is often woefully flat-footed, most painfully-obvious in Passiontide and at Christmas, when what is read in our churches falls so far short of versions given familiarity and valence by their presence in cultural touch-points like Handel’s Messiah or the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols.’
Dr Sara Parvis of the University of Edinburgh was generously kind when she described the ESV as a ‘low-church evangelical Protestant translation.’ Neil Xavier O’Donoghue of Saint Patrick’s College, Maynooth, conceded that the ESV ‘was produced by conservative Evangelical scholars in the United States and is often described as Calvinist in philosophy.’
In fact, the ESV is deeply ‘fundamentalist,’ unnecessarily imposing the translators’ extreme ‘conservative evangelical’ views and dogmas on the text and on the reader.
The ESV’s general editor, Wayne Grudem, argued in paper published in 2016 ‘Why Voting for Donald Trump Is a Morally Good Choice.’
In recent years, Grudem and his colleagues have challenged the consensus on the Trinity, arguing that Christ is eternally subordinate to God the Father and that this provides a pattern for how men and women should relate to each other – that is, women should be subordinate to men.
This is a radical departure from what the Church has taught for more than 1,500 years, and a serious misunderstanding of a core Christian belief that needs to be rejected by anyone concerned for biblical orthodoxy.
The concept of the Eternal Subordination of the Son (ESS) has been created by Grudem and the Neo-Calvinists. Grudem, Bruce Ware of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Owen Strachen, and other Neo-Calvinists believe that Christ submitted to God for all eternity, a concept that reflects the teachings of Arius of Alexandria. Arianism is the belief that the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit are not equal, instead Jesus was created by God and is eternally subordinate to the Father.
Grudem and his supporters have been challenged by some leading evangelicals, including Carl Trueman and Liam Goligher, who have asked whether he is creating a new deity. They have contrasted statements from Grudem and Ware with quotations from the historic creeds.
One critic concluded: ‘It comes down to this; if they are right we have been worshipping an idol since the beginning of the church; and if they are wrong they are constructing a new deity – a deity in whom there are degrees of power, differences of will, and diversity of thought. Because, mark this, to have an eternally subordinate Son intrinsic to the Godhead creates the potential of three minds, wills and powers. What they have done is to take the passages referring to the economic Trinity and collapse them into the ontological Trinity.’
Grudem also drafted the ‘Guidelines’ of the Council of Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (1997) that reject gender-inclusive approaches. This is due to their patriarchy-based objective of excluding women from leadership in the Church. But it may explain why the ESV, again and again, uses masculine pronouns and male gender-specific words that are absent from the Greek original, where other translations do not.
For example, although the ESV in its preface claims that ‘people rather than men is regularly used where the original languages refer to both men and women,’ this is not so. A good example would be when the generic Greek ἄνθρωποι (anthropoi), ‘human beings,’ is used to refer to a mixed group containing both women and men. To translate the term ‘men’ in such a case is in fact to misrepresent the meaning of the word since women were also present and were not mere ciphers or appendages of the men present.
But there are at least 100 instances in the ESV New Testament where ‘men’ translates the Greek ἄνθρωποι.
In some places the word ‘men’ is even added unnecessarily. For example, πρῶτοι τοῦ λαοῦ (protoi tou lao), ‘leaders of the people’ (NRSV and RNJB) or, more literally, ‘the first in rank among the people,’ in Luke 19: 47, becomes ‘principal men of the people’ in the ESV.
Earlier, the ESV translate Luke 18: 27, ‘What is impossible with man is possible with God.’ The NRSV renders this as, ‘What is impossible for mortals is possible for God.’ The original Greek says, Τὰ ἀδύνατα παρὰ ἀνθρώποις δυνατὰ παρὰ τῷ θεῷ ἐστιν.
The ESV translates I Corinthians 1: 25 as ‘For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.’ The NRSV says, ‘For God’s foolishness is wider than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.’ The RNJB says, ‘God’s folly is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.’ The original Greek says, ὅτι τὸ μωρὸν τοῦ θεοῦ σοφώτερον τῶν ἀνθρώπων ἐστίν, καὶ τὸ ἀσθενὲς τοῦ θεοῦ ἰσχυρότερον τῶν ἀνθρώπων.
When I am asked to recommend ‘versions’ of the Bible, I say without hesitation, ‘read the original.’ There is nothing to compare with wrestling with the original texts in Hebrew and Greek. But if I must recommend a translation to students and readers then it is the RSV and NRSV, for their scholarship and despite all their weaknesses.
Have I ever recommended the ESV?
Never.
Why?
Traduttore, traditore.
Today’s Prayers (Sunday 25 October 2026, Bible Sunday):
The theme this week (25 to 31 October) in Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Update from Myanmar’ (pp 50-51). This theme was introduced today with a programme update from the Revd Davidson Solanki, Senior Regional Manager for Asia and the Middle East, USPG:
On 28 March 2025, a 7.7-magnitude earthquake hit central Myanmar, destroying homes, churches, and important infrastructure. Many communities were already struggling because of ongoing conflict and displacement since the 2021 military coup. The Church in Myanmar (CPM), together with USPG, responded quickly with emergency relief, putting faith into action by supporting those most in need.
Since then, CPM has been strengthening its longer-term development work. Church staff and leaders have met in workshops and discussions to reflect on what they have learned in the field, look at the impact of their programmes, and agree on shared priorities. This has helped ensure that work across dioceses is better coordinated and shaped by local communities.
This teamwork between leaders and practitioners is helping CPM move from short-term crisis response to more planned and sustainable programmes. Bishops have affirmed that development is a key part of the Church’s mission and have committed to supporting staff, improving systems, and reducing reliance on outside funding.
The aim is simple but important: to help communities be better prepared not only for emergencies like earthquakes, but also for ongoing social and economic challenges. Faith, experience, and leadership are coming together to build stronger, more resilient communities.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Sunday 25 October 2026, Bible Sunday) invites us to pray:
Bible Sunday in the Anglican Church is a day to celebrate Scripture as God’s living Word, shaping our faith, worship, and daily life.
Consider: how would you summarise the Gospel in 60 seconds? Perhaps you could take inspiration from the lectionary reading for today, Matthew 22: 34-46, where Jesus teaches the greatest commandments: to love God and love our neighbour.
The Collect of the Day:
Blessed Lord,
who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning:
help us so to hear them,
to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest them
that, through patience, and the comfort of your holy word,
we may embrace and for ever hold fast
the hope of everlasting life,
which you have given us in our Saviour Jesus Christ,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post Communion Prayer:
God of all grace,
your Son Jesus Christ fed the hungry
with the bread of his life
and the word of his kingdom:
renew your people with your heavenly grace,
and in all our weakness
sustain us by your true and living bread;
who is alive and reigns, now and for ever.
Additional Collect:
Merciful God,
teach us to be faithful in change and uncertainty,
that trusting in your word
and obeying your will
we may enter the unfailing joy of Jesus Christ our Lord.
Yesterday’s Reflections
Continued Tomorrow:
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
