Clergy express worry as Bible sales drop

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People no longer want to buy Bibles because they have phones. They have turned to online and digital Bibles, which is a danger to the Church.

The Bible Society of Uganda has expressed worry over the declining use of physical Bibles as Ugandans embrace the digital versions of the holy book.

The Bible Society says only one out of every 10 people going to church nowadays carries a physical Bible.

Bishop Barnabas Tibaijuka of Ruwenzori West Diocese said many Ugandans are no longer interested in the physical Bibles.

“People no longer want to buy Bibles because they have phones. They have turned to online and digital Bibles, which is a danger to the Church. For example, there is a debate in England where they want Bible readers to justify whether God is He or She,” Bishop Tibaijuka said during the Bible Society of Uganda’s review meeting in Fort Portal City yesterday.

“If we embrace these online Bibles 100 percent, we are going to lose track. I want to appeal to all Bible readers that even if you have a downloadable Bible on your phone, at least have a Bible written and sold by the Uganda Bible Society,” he added.

Bishop Tibaijuka also revealed that the Bible Society has managed to translate most of content of the holy book into different local languages. He urged more people to buy the Bibles at family level.

“The written Bible can be read by everyone, while the phone Bible can only be read by the user. We have people who have compromised the Gospel and have tampered with the Bible,” he said.

In an interview with this publication, Mr Peter Lumbuye Serumaga, the general secretary of the Bible Society of Uganda, said most of the Bibles are sitting in their warehouse because the churches no longer buy them.

“Nationally, there is a general decline in the reading of the scripture. When you look at the Luganda and English versions, those have also been sitting in the warehouse for a long time. We’re calling upon the people to buy the Bibles,” Mr Lumbuye said.

“In a year, we normally sell between 300,000 to 400,000 copies, including all those in other languages. Our target is to increase the sales from 500,000 to 1,000,000 annually because 85 percent of our population are Christians,” he added. In 2023, the society distributed 282,168 copies of the Bible.