Bible Printed on Card Stirs Little Enthusiasm

Right after Easter, a Northern California firm specializing in what it calls “micropublication”--miniaturizing printed pages onto single, small cards--began marketing one containing the entire Bible.

Reduced to the size of a business card, the 1,562 pages of the Bible were touted by ThemeCards Inc. of Mountain View as “a personal reminder of faith” that can be easily carried about.

Letters to religious organizations suggested that the Bible card would be an excellent tool in raising funds. With a little religious rhetoric of its own, the company enthused: “Our mission is to have 2 million Christians carrying the Bible card by Christmas.”

However, a spokesman for ThemeCards, contacted by telephone, said recently that although close to 200,000 have been printed, sales have been light: between 20,000 and 30,000.

“It’s probably as good as expected, but not as good as we hoped,” said Robert J. Callen.

Not only that, the latest issue of the Wittenburg Door, a nationally circulated evangelical magazine specializing in satire, thought little of the Bible card and gave it its “Loser of the Month” award.

“So, if you can’t read it, what can you do with it?” asked the magazine, which is published in El Cajon. “You can carry it around with you and think about it. . . . Well, Holy Microthinking, isn’t that special?”

Optimism has not diminished at ThemeCards, however. “Interest is growing,” Callen claimed.

The print on the Bible card (Old and New Testaments) needs to be magnified about 100 times in order to be read, but Callen says that a portable microscope capable of that magnification is now on the market. The company has also printed just the New Testament on a card, which requires only 30 or 40 times magnification, he said.

But Callen acknowledged that the Bible cards are not so much for reading as they are “conversation pieces.”

To critics of the card’s functional uselessness, Callen said he has countered with questions about why some Christians wear crosses. “A lot of people look at it as jewelry, not as a sign that they are Christian,” he said.

Among ministries that have bought the tiny Bibles in connection with their fund-raising appeals is Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network in Virginia Beach, Va., Callen said.

The company is not limiting itself to Christianity. The central teachings of Gautama Buddha have been put on another card and the voluminous Koran, holy book of Islam, has also been put on a card.

Regarding the Koran, Callen said, “We have no definite orders, but we are working with agents in the Middle East and hope to market it there.”