Bishop Remi J. De Roo

As a Vatican II Council Father having participated in all four sessions from 1962-65, I continue to proclaim its message whenever and wherever possible.

The book “BIBLICAL CHARACTERS AND THE ENNEAGRAM: Images of Transformation,” co-authored with Diane Tolomeo and Pearl Gervais (published by Newport Bay Publishing, Victoria, Canada 2002) is one attempt to put into practice some of the renewed orientations proposed by the Second Vatican Council. This passage is taken from the preface:

“... the Second Vatican Council (1962-65), in the document entitled Dei Verbum (On Divine Revelation), stated that, since in the sacred scripture God speaks through humans in human fashion, those who interpret and comment on the scriptures must pay close attention to, among other things, the particular literary forms, or genres, which occur in the Bible. This entails examining forms of narration which prevailed at the time of the writing and respecting the conventions which people of the time used in dealing with one another (Dei Verbum 3:12). By using the Enneagram as a tool to help us read and deepen our understanding of the biblical narratives, we are attempting to do that very thing. For example, bringing insights gained from reading and analyzing literary texts to a study of John's Gospel helps us recognize and interpret patterns and images in the gospel in a deeply metaphorical as well as a literal sense. Our knowledge of how motifs and repetitions work in literary genres opens up the gospel in ways which a strictly literal reading cannot do.”