Sophia Commentary

Barbara Reid, a Dominican theologian teaching in Chicago, was just a terrific speaker. We had four sessions with her during our summer community days. She spoke, primarily, from her book on the women in Luke's gospel.

"As we know well, the scriptures were written:
by men,
for men,
about men, and
from men's points of view and concerns,"
she reiterated.

"Even the commentaries about the Bible have been written by men--until recently. In our time women are finally educated, can study theology, have studied the original Hebrew and Greek, and, therefore, can know for themselves, firsthand, the difference between the gender of pronouns, the difference between words such as "leader" and "deacon." Biblical commentaries are now also written by people other than white, western males."

Barbara has just been named general editor of a series that will be published by Liturgical Press over the next few years. It is tentatively called, Sophia Commentary, and will be a commentary on every book of the bible, from a woman's perspective--something that has never been attempted.

Best of luck to her and all the writers of this groundbreaking series.



On Saturday we reached the "leisure" part of the four days and one of the activities was a trip to the Erie Zoo! Much fun was had by all. Here is one of our new friends!










Photo by Margaret Ann Pilewski, OSB