This Bible was translated into the language that Sinti Romany speak and published by
Romanes Arbeit Marburg because a little girl refused to lie.
A German deaconess* named Sister Luise started to meet regularly with Sinti children who lived near her. This came to an abrupt end when one of these children was asked to lie for a relative. The little girl refused. She had learned from Sister Luise that lying does not please God.
The relative was not happy. He looked for a way to stop Sister Luise's influence, and he found one. Among the Sinti, contact with blood makes one ritually unclean. Unclean people are banned from Sinti society. Hospital workers, including doctors and nurses, are per definition unclean. Sister Luise did not work in a hospital. But she had substituted at the reception desk for a fellow deaconess who did. This was enough to have her declared unclean. She could no longer visit the children or have direct social contact with them.
Sister Luise prayed and thought. She decided to start sending cards with Bible verses in them to the people she couldn't visit. She discovered that someone had started translating bits of Scripture into Sinti. She started pasting those bits into her colorful cards.
One thing led to another. Sister Luise became a founding member of Romanes Arbeit Marburg (Romany Work Marburg or RAM for short). First RAM published finished books of the Bible--Mark, John, Genesis. Then they published the entire New Testament. And last summer, they published the whole Bible.
Sister Luise is no longer with us. But the Bible she helped bring into being will be blessing to many Sinti children now and in generations to come.
*This sort of deaconess is kind of like a Protestant nun, traditionally serving in health care, social work, and/or mission.
