Alumnus Author Asks Why the Word Became Words

An associate professor of theology at Wyoming Catholic College, Dr. Jeremy Holmes (’99) has an abiding love for Scripture which dates back to his childhood, when his deeply faithful Protestant family was on a journey toward the Catholic Church. “When he wasn’t practicing piano or rehearsing magic tricks,” reads Dr. Holmes’ biography on the WCC website, “he pored over the Bible, scribbling endless notes in his paperback RSV.”

That love for the Word of God carried on through his studies at the College and beyond, when Dr. Holmes earned advanced degrees in theology and Biblical studies at the International Theological Institute and Marquette University. And it now shines forth in his first published book, Cur Deus Verba: Why the Word Became Words.

A systematic theology of Scripture, Cur Deus Verba seeks to answer the question, “What did God seek to accomplish by making the Bible?” From this question flow others, such as, why did God create anything at all? Why did the Word become Flesh? Why does the Church need an inspired text?

“Cur Deus Verba is a work of theology in the narrow sense: a reflection that takes God as its subject and everything else in relation to God,” explains the book’s publisher, Ignatius Press. “It treats every aspect of Scripture, including the human elements, to be understood in relation to God.”

Among those who have offered praise for the book are none other than Dr. Andrew Seeley, who was the author’s tutor for Junior Mathematics at the College. “Dr. Holmes offers the Church a renewed approach to reading Scripture drawn from Her own rich traditions and contemporary insights into community, tradition, psychology, history, and much more,” says Dr. Seeley. “His clarity of presentation, congenial style, apt examples, fruitful quotations, and attention to the needs of his readers make it a work that should be profitable for all the orders of the Church, from the learned layman to the Scripture scholar.”