Brandon Vogt has a post up on some free resources from Logos for Catholics which include the documents of Vatican II and Pope Benedict’s exhortation Verbum Domini until December 31. Brandon’s site has the details and the coupon code necessary to get these resources for free. Brandon also gives information on how to use the tool.
As a user of Logos for the last ten years I have been very happy with both the increased performance and power of the Logos library system and how they have become even more Catholic friendly with a number of Catholic resources. For example one of the most recommended scriptural commentaries is “A Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture” by Dom Bernard Orchard which had been out of print for awhile. Not only is it in print now, but it is also available on Logos. The power of Logos lets you read the scriptures side by side with whatever commentaries or other writings like what the Church Fathers had said about a passage.
They also have mobile apps (currently iPhone/iPad only, though the Android version is in development) and I had actually just used the Logos app on my iPad to read through the Gospel of Luke on Christmas. I had not realized until I read Brandon’s post that the free Verbum app for Catholic Bible study has included resources where all you have to do is to create a free Logos account to take advantage of them. So you can use the current free resources mentioned above along with those included built-in resources without owning Logos or the Catholic implementation of Verbum. Verbum uses the new Logos Bible Software 5.
What is nice also is that if you go ahead and buy Verbum than all of those Catholic resources are available on the mobile apps along with of course the desktop version. Another thing nice about the Logos ecosystem is that you can start with the basic package and then either upgrade to another package with increased resources or buy individual books. Upgrading to another package is pro-rated based on what you already own. While it is true many of some of the older resources are available online for free – the advantage of Logos/Verbum is that all the resources are indexed so that they are tied to verses in scripture and quickly referenced.
I currently own Logos 4 with the Catholic Scholars package, but did not yet have Verbum. I found though that I could get the Basic Verbum package for $34.95 pro-rated based on what I already owned. Even better using the coupon code “JIMMY” from Jimmy Akin’s site I got a %15 discount and paid $29.41 instead. The %15 discount is good for any of the Verbum packages.
Another nice thing about the Logos library system is the way that it syncs on both the desktop and mobile versions. To set it up you just need to have Verbum installed and tied to your Logos account and then it will download all of the resources you own. So setting up on a new computer is a snap. When I just installed Verbum it used all the information and documents I already had installed with Logos 4 and was up an running very fast.
2 comments
Thanks for the information on Logos and Verbum. It sounds like a very, very powerful and useful study tool. I am not currently interested in it, only because I am looking for ways to decrease my time spent in front of a computer screen, rather than increase.
However, it caught my eye that you mentioned that “A Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture” by Dom Bernard Orchard is no longer out of print. I searched for this book on Amazon.com just now, and I can only find the old out-of-print version. If there is a new in-print version, do you know where I can find it?
Yeah the Dom Orchard is what made me switch from Olive Tree Bible Reader to Logos. Beautiful image there of Verbum desktop version.