Have you seen this? Pope begins Bible-reading marathonWhat a neat way to use the pope's star status!
I could not help wondering what would happen if BibleSoc and the Scripture Union's Christians in sport group (and a few others) got together and got NZ celebrities to read a gospel. It might not get on free to air TV here, but it could be cheap (by TV standards) to make, at least if the celebs volunteered their time. It could also go on DVD and YouTube so get wide distribution. Even with some imagination, become a serial story, stopping at exciting places and distributed by mobile phone as well as the other routes.
What a way to get Kiwis in touch with the Bible! And the cumulative impact of a whole bunch of celebs could really help make faith cool. Each of them would only have to give an hour or so of their time...
Labels: audio.bible, bible, culture, video
¶ 9:37 AM
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I'm quite interested in the logistics. How will it be published/archived?
An important distinction for me between this and PodBible is they are targeting bigshots rather than everyman. I can see that as being a very effective strategy in Africa where if the bishops and superintendents of churches signed up to do reading it would legitimize the translation.
By 
David Ker, at
October 7, 2008 12:57 PM
I don't know about the "real" PopeBible, I suspect that it will only be available commercially on TV and DVD.
What I'd envisage is using the celebs and making it as widely available as possible, just think of kids SEEING that a whole bunch of celebs think the Bible is worth spending time to read... that's my vision. Plus I don't live in a "Christian country" like Italy, in NZ we'd have difficulty getting TV time, so we'd need to go under the radar and aim for mass distribution.
By Tim, at
October 7, 2008 1:06 PM
PS, I can see how in Africa a "Bishops' Bible" could be a really good way to "sell" a new translation - <WickedThought> it would also be flattering to the bishops asked to read, which should help persuade them ;) </WickedThought>
By Tim, at
October 7, 2008 1:10 PM
To clarify something in the article: Only the first and last hour of the marathon are on the normal TV channel of the state broadcaster. The rest is on one of the broadcaster's satellite channels, so not very accessible to Italians (although it can be watched live on Internet as well). This created quite a few complaints from Italians - I have had more comments on this fact than on any other on my blog. I don't believe there are only plans to distribute the video after the event. By the way, most of the readers are not celebrities, but "normal" people that signed up to read a chapter.
