Born in London, he contributed significantly to the advancement of Roman Catholic life and ecumenism in England during the 20th century, notably through co-founding the Catholic Biblical Association of Great Britain, his collaboration as an Editorial Committee member of the first one-volume Bible commentary for English-speaking Catholics and his General Editorship of its second edition, and his work as a member of the Revised Standard Version Bible Committee and as Co-Editor of the first complete Bible translation in modern English for Catholics from the Hebrew and the Greek, as well as of its ecumenical edition. His specialist subjects were the Deuterocanonical Books, on which he contributed articles to three major Biblical Commentaries (see "Publications" below), and the life and works of Alexander Geddes, a pioneer of biblical criticism, on which he wrote his doctoral thesis (see "Publications" below).