Okay reporting back. Did a full re-install of BG3. That solved nothing.
However, saw in another thread that the issue was the auto-sync with PSN related to character data. (Not the game data.) After playing with the upload and download on character data with the cloud, the BG3 specifically would not sync. After turning off the sync feature, I could play the game.
Alternatively, if the internet network connection was turned off then it worked but you could not play any multiplayer game save files.
So my conclusion is PSN and something specific to how BG3 syncs character data.