when did Roman catholic church allow ordinary church goers to read the Bible?

Answer 1

The bible is for reading of everybody who want to read it. Nobody is prohibited from reading it.
jtm

Answer 2

The Catholic Church has never banned people from reading the Bible. This is an anti-Catholic myth.

Up until the printing press was invented, Bibles were copied by hand, were very rare, and were very valuable. There weren't even enough Bibles around for one to be in every church.

Also there were not many people who could read their own language much less the Latin in which almost all Bibles were written by hand.

This does not mean that Christians did not know the Bible. The average Christian of the tenth century may have known more about the Bible than the average Christian of today.

Catholics, in fact, are encouraged to read the Bible.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church says: The Church forcefully and specifically exhorts all the Christian faithful to learn ‘the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ,' by frequent reading of the divine Scriptures. ‘Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ.'

Although some Catholics do not read the Bible on a regular basis, we all listen to the Word being proclaimed and explained in every Mass.

In every Sunday Mass there are at least four Bible readings
+ First Reading - usually from the Old Testament
+ A Psalm is prayed by all
+ Second Reading - usually from a New Testament Epistle
+ Gospel Reading
+ then the priest bring them all together and helps us apply them to our lives in the homily

With love in Christ.

Answer 3

>>when did Roman catholic church allow ordinary church goers to read the Bible?<<

From the very beginning. Despite the claims of Protestants, I've never encountered evidence that the Church ever disallowed Bible reading by the faithful.

Answer 4

They were allowed to start reading it around 1960. Many claim that the printing press is what kept them from having the Bible but it's invention in 1459 still saw the Catholic priests forbidding lay people to have a Bible. That is why we really need to help them understand. Even now a lot of what they do or read in mass isn't from the Bible.
http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/encyc/encyc02/htm/iv.v.lxi.htm
Many protestants were killed by the early RCC and Bibles burned.
Many were also martyred for early translations into English. Study RCC history.

Answer 5

The church always allowed them to read the bible they were just against translation to local language out of fear of mistranslation or self interpretation which catholics believe the Word of God should not be interpreted in the matters of faith without a bishop (That's what happened to Luther and look at his religion now can't stop the denominations from making new ones each year). Anyways the catholic church did bring official bibles into modern language way before king James, though. The fact is those who read the bible and were educated enough to read the bible knew Latin, so if you didn't know Latin you'd be illiterate.

Answer 6

It was never prohibited.

Remember- it was the Catholic Church that first ASSEMBLED the books of scripture into the Bible!

What WAS prohibited was the reading of UNAPPROVED translations.

And if anyone brings up 'chaining bibles to the church,' that was because Bibles were hand written and very valuable- even early on in the printing process. Very few people could afford them- if they even knew how to read.

Answer 7

Some time after the Gutenberg Bible was printed? I don't know, but the Bible stories are told in stained glass windows of early cathedrals because most people were illiterate anyway.

Answer 8

The Catholic faithful were never prevented from reading the Bible. If a Catholic wanted to study the Bible it had to be under the supervision of a trained teacher. After Vatican II, this restriction was lifted.

Peace and blessings!

Answer 9

I would probably say around 1980 when Pope John Paul II was instilling new traditions for the Catholic Church.

Answer 10

because they want to spread the gospel