What Does The Prayer Really Say?
W D T P R S

What Does the Prayer Really Say?  6^th Sunday in of Ordinary Time

A Monsignor Moment:  In a letter of 23 September 2002 which I received last week, Msgr. ML of Saskatchewan writes: “I endorse every prayerful kind and encouraging written intervention to those entrusted with the arduous task of providing a true English translation of the Missale Romanum.”  Thank you, Rev. Msgr., for reminding us that, while our individual influence in the halls of power might be limited, prayer is not without effect.  Pray to the Guardian Angels of those involved in translations: gang up on them. 

Another Monsignor, JB of PA, referring to the not yet translated Martyrologium Romanum of 2001, writes: “Although I am not a skilled Latinist, or I would not be writing to you in English, I enjoy your column each week and thank you for your work.  Would you answer a question for me…? Where is Rupifortium in Gallia? … I like to read the new Martyrology and work with Lewis & Short (Fr. Z: what a wise prelate this is to use the unbeatable L&S!) …but I have not been able to identify Rupifortium. Can you help?”  My pleasure, Monsignor.  Perpend.

I think you are talking about the entry in the Martyrologium for 14 September on p. 487 about Fr. Claude de Laplace, beatified with 63 other priests and religious companions on 1 October 1995 by His Holiness John Paul II.  Rupifortium (ad litus Galliae), from Latin rupes (“rock”, French roche) and fortis (“strong” French fort) is none other than the coastal city of Rochefort, 18 miles south of La Rochelle in France on the right bank of the Charante, 6 miles east of the Bay of Biscay.  Rochefort (the city, not Alexandre Dumas’, père, homonymous eyed-patched swordsman of Cardinal Richelieu, the nemesis of D’Artagnan in Les Trois Mousquetaires published en feuilleton in 1844 played by the Christopher Lee in the 1973 movie, who has since graduated to the wicked wizard Saruman in the ongoing tripartite film saga of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, but I digress…) took its name from the castle built on the bank of the Charente River for protection against Norman invaders.  In the 11^th c. a town grew up around the castle’s fortifications.  It was later built up as a shipbuilding port by Louis XIV’s Minister of the Navy, Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619-83), whose white Vermont marble relief portrait decorates the chamber of the House of Representatives in Washington, D.C, third to the right of the Speaker’s chair.  Lafayette’s frigate Hermione was built at Rochefort in 1779 and can still be visited since 1997 after its restoration.    

These blesseds are called the “les martyrs des pontons de Rochefort… martyrs of the ‘hulks’ of Rochefort” because, condemned to deportation, they were held in old ships used as prisons (pontons): the Washington, La Décade, La Vaillante, La Bayonnaise, Les Deux-Associés, and Bonhomme Richard.  827 priests and religious such as Christian Brothers refused to swear the oath of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy of 12 July 1790, by which the Assembly attempted to reorganize the Church according to the model of the state.  By this instrument the state confiscated Church property and effectively forced clergy to commit a formal act of apostasy.  Of the 827 held in the “hulks” from 11 April 1794 to 7 February 1795, 542 died enduring horrific suffering for their faith, martyrs of the “Revolution”.  Some of the 285 survivors left written testimonies about the heroic examples of their martyred companions.  Bl. Claude de Laplace of Autun died on the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, 14 September 1794 at 69 years of age aboard the ship Les Deux-Associés in the Rochefort harbor.  He was a faithful Catholic parish priest, the curé of Moulins, and rests in triumph now on the Île Madame in the estuary of the Charante until the Lord returns.

By the way, D’Artagnan really lived.  His mémoires were accomplished by Courtilez de Sandras in 1707, though his life was vastly embellished by Dumas.  The Gascon Musketeer, who in the novel distinguished himself near Rochefort in the 1628 siege of the Protestant Huguenots at La Rochelle, eventually became a marshal of France and was killed by a cannonball on the field of battle in the very moment he took hold of the newly delivered bâton that symbolized his rank.  There is a plaque in his honor at the head of the rue du Bac in Paris, the same street where you will find the motherhouse of the Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul and St. Louise de Marillac in which on November 27, 1830 the Blessed Virgin revealed the Miraculous Medal to St. Catherine Labouré.  In the epilogue of the novel we learn that Rochefort fights three duels with the new Lieutenant D’Artagnan and is wounded by him three times (Christopher Lee dies in the movie, in a sacrilegious duel in a convent church) at which point they resolve their differences and become lasting friends… as Catholic gentlemen ought.  Rochefort reappears twenty years later and dies as an old man with a still deadly blade in the first 1845 sequel Vingt ans après.   Speaking of movies, there was a 1967 musical film called Les Demoiselles de Rochefort with a young Catherine Deneuve and Gene Kelly made after the success of Deneuve’s 1964 musical about another French shipping port (hmm) Parapluies de Cherbourg (both with music by Michel Legrand, who wrote the music also for the abovementioned 1973 version of The Three Musketeers), and Gene Kelly’s 1951 hit An American in Paris, much better than his terrible 1948 version of The Three Musketeers.  As Benjamin Franklin once wrote in his Poor Richard’s Almancak of 1733, “Beware of meat twice boil’d, and an old Foe reconcil’d.”  Reminiscent of present French and American relations, n’est-ce pas?   But now I have really digressed….

Courteous Reader, as Dr. Franklin would say, I must perforce add a note about the Bonhomme Richard.  Originally called the Duc du Duras, she was an elderly, high pooped, French East Indiaman of 900 tons.  In 1779 she was bought by Louis XIV and given to the 33 year old Captain John Paul Jones of the new American Continental Navy for their struggle against the English.  Jones renamed her Bonhomme Richard in honor of his friend Dr. Benjamin Franklin, who had who used the nom de plume “Poor Richard”.  This was a sign of French-American unity: Franklin had been for years the representative of the United States in France where he was generally beloved.  Exactly 223 years to the day that Msgr. MB wrote me his letter, on 23 September 1779 at midday, the Bonhomme Richard in a squadron under Captain Jones encountered a British merchantman convoy in English waters near Flamborough Head coming from the Baltic protected by a two decked frigate 50 gun frigate HMS Serapis under Captain Richard Pearson.  Bonhomme Richard maneuvered all day to get between the convoy and the land and eventually succeeded.  She engaged Serapis in fierce fighting at 1900 under a full moon.  Early in the battle Bonhomme Richard’s battery exploded, hopelessly disabling the ship.  But Jones continued by lashing his sinking, burning ship, laden with dead and wounded to Serapis when it came alongside, all the time trying to control hundreds of previously captured British prisoners brought up out of the hold to save from downing, from rushing the deck.  During the battle, Bonhomme Richard mast ’sshattered above the top-sail and a large section crashed down to the deck along with her flag.    Captain Pearson, seeing the flag fall, called out to Captain Jones, “Have you struck your Colors, Sir?”  Resoundingly, John Paul Jones exclaimed, "Struck Sir? I have not yet begun to fight!"  Emboldened, the dying Bonhomme Richard delivered decisive blows from all sides and aloft: Jones had sent 40 marines into the rigging with grenades and muskets. Her crew decimated, Serapis struck her own Colors at 2300h. Sadly, the badly holed Bonhomme Richard went to her watery rest at 1100h on 24 September 1779.  Jones commandeered Serapis and repaired to The Texel in Holland for repairs. 

This epic battle was the American Navy’s first-ever defeat of an English ship in English waters.   It was a great inspiration for America. Jones’ victory established him for many as "The Father of the American Navy."  This hallowed ship of French, American and even Catholic history has had other namesakes through the years.   According to La Déportation Révolutionnaire du Clergé Français by A.C. Sabatie (Paris, 1916), companion martyrs of Bl. Claude de Laplace died on a ship called Bonhomme Richard.  Since the original, the once Duc du Duras sank in 1779, the ship at Rochefort must have been a namesake in the French Navy named after John Paul Jones’ ship.  Another USS Bonhomme Richard was carrier CV/CVA-31 launched 29 April 1944 which saw action during WWII in the Pacific earning a battle star, the Korean War and five battle stars, and finally the Vietnam War.  This second Bonhomme Richard was decommissioned in 1971 and her name struck from the Navy List in 1981.   The third and present namesake of the Bonhomme Richard is LHD-6, an Amphibious Assault Ship, whose purpose is to embark, deploy and land elements of a Marine landing force in amphibious assault operations by helicopter, landing craft, amphibious vehicle or any combination thereof.  It is a Wasp class vessel, the largest amphibious ships in the world, looking much like an aircraft carrier.  The Bonhomme Richard is 844 feet long and 106 feet at the beam (the first was 152 by 40 and a depth of 19).  She displaces 40,500 tons and cruises at 20+ knots (23.5+ mph).  Unlike the first of her name (which had 28-12 pounder cannons, 6-18 pdr. and 8-9 pdr.), the new Bonhomme Richard carries 42 CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters, 5 AV-8B Harrier attack planes and 6 ASW helicopters, together with a company of 104 officers, 1,004 enlisted, and a – God Bless them – always faithful US Marine Corps detachment of 1,894. 

As she heads to the North Arabian Sea in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, Bonhomme Richard also carries the young Marine Corps Captain for whom I ask your prayers about a month ago.

POST COMMUNIONEM
LATIN (2002 Missale Romanum):
Caelestibus, Domine, pasti deliciis,
quaesumus, ut semper éadem,
per quae veraciter vivimus, appetamus.

 This prayer was the Postcommunio of the Sixth Sunday left over after Epiphany in the 1962MR.  These “left over” Sundays, because of a quirk of different reforms of the calendar through the years, were actually celebrated at the end of the liturgical year, before Advent.

 ICEL (1973 translation of the 1970MR):
Lord,
you give us food from heaven.
May we always hunger
for the bread of life.

 Let us see if this is what the prayer really says.    The participle pasti is from the verb pasco which means, “to pasture, drive to pasture, to feed, attend to the feeding of; nourish; cherish, cultivate” and also “feast, gratify”.  This is the verb found in the Latin Vulgate when, standing along the shore of the See of Galilee after His resurrection, Jesus says to Peter in John 21:15-17, “Feed my lambs… Pasce agnos meos… pasce oves meas… pasce oves meas…”

 LITERAL TRANSLATION:
O Lord, having been fed with heavenly delicacies,
we entreat you, that we may always strive earnestly for these same things,
by which we are truly alive.

What Does the Prayer Really Say? Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time 

ORIGINALLY PRINTED IN The Wanderer in 2001

In the older, traditional, calendar of the Roman Church this Sunday is called Septuagesima, that is, the "Seventieth" day before Easter. Lent’s official name is Quadragesima, "Fortieth". Septuagesima is/was one of the pre-Lenten Sundays, a time of preparing for the abstinence of Lent, which once was far more strict. With Septuagesima we would take up more serious attitude: the Alleluia was sung for the last time at First Vespers and excluded until Holy Saturday. Purple is worn rather than green. The station Mass for is at St. Lawrence in Rome. More about stations when we get to Lent.

The prayers and readings for the Masses of these pre-Lenten Sundays were compiled by St. Gregory the Great who was Pope in a time of great turmoil and suffering. Pre-Lent was/is particularly a time for preaching about missions and missionary work, the evangelization of peoples. In those places where the Mass is celebrated with the so-called Novus Ordo of Paul VI, we now remain in green. There is no more pre-Lent. In a sense, however, the collect from the Novus Ordo Sixth Sunday might echo of the Church’s tradition in regard in regard to the comportment required from one who desires to win more disciples and workers for the Lord.  

COLLECT:
LATIN (1970 Missale Romanum):
Deus, qui te in rectis et sinceris manere pectoribus asseris, 
da nobis tua gratia tales exsistere, 
in quibus habitare digneris.  

Note that the =eris endings look similar but are really quite different. Digneris is from a deponent verb and is a present indicative, passive in form but active in meaning. Asseris is more complicated. There are two verbs that can give us this form: as-sero, sêvi, situm, 3, "to sow, plant, or set near something" or else as-sero, serui, sertum, 3, "to join some person or thing to one’s self"; hence, "to declare one (a slave) to be free by laying hands upon him, to set free, to liberate" or even "to free from, to protect, defend, defend against" and also "to appropriate something to one’s self, to claim, declare it one’s own possession" and moreover "to maintain, affirm, assert, declare." As-sero is also written ad-sero. Asseris could possibly be the second person singular of the passive present indicative, or of the future, or of the perfect subjunctive, or of the future perfect. It is also possibly a syncopated (shortened) form of the perfect indicative form of as-sero, sêvi, situm: asseveris or from as-sero, serui, sertum: asserueris. All this is, I am sure, riveting. But sometimes it is important to know precisely what verb you are dealing with.

For example, during Lent the Church sings at Vespers the great hymn Audi, benigne Cónditor. Since the reform of Vatican II some hymns of the Liturgy of the Hours have been tinkered with in respect to both words and melody. In the case of this hymn, the melody was adjusted in such a way that the second syllable of Cónditor receives an emphasis that it did not have before Vatican II. So what? The way you pronounce that word, where you place the syllabic emphasis changes the meaning. There are two completely different verbs in Latin that can give us the word spelled Conditor: cóndo, cóndere ("to fashion, produce, establish") results in cónditor while condio, condire ("to pickle, preserve, to spice") produces Condítor. The way incautious people sing the Vespers hymn now lifts our hearts and minds to the merciful Pickler, rather than the merciful Creator. The same goes for the Advent Vespers hymn. Since the reform, instead of singing Creator alme siderum (Loving Creator of the stars) we sing Conditor Alme siderum and again the melody was changed. This means pretty much the same thing but the inattentive singer gives us an image of some cosmic cook sealing the stars into Ball jars or sprinkling fresh herbs through the heavens. The absent-minded will also translate the prayer incorrectly, won’t they?  

LITERAL TRANSLATION: 
O God, who declared that you remain in upright and pure hearts, 
grant us to manifest ourselves to be, by your grace, the sort of people 
in whom you have deigned to abide.  

Rectus, from rego, means "straight, upright" which also applies in the moral sense of "morally right, correct, lawful, just, virtuous, noble, good." Sincerus means "clean, pure, sound, not spoiled, uninjured, whole, entire, real, natural, genuine, sincere." It also has a moral connotation. Pectus signifies a range of things from "the breast bone, chest" "stomach" and therefore by extension concepts like "courage" and other "feelings, dispositions". It also refers to the "spirit, soul, mind, understanding." In the ancient world, the heart was thought in some ways to be the seat also of the mind and understanding and not just of feelings and emotions. So, it is reasonable to translate this as "upright and pure hearts". Exsisto according to the mighty Lewis & Short Dictionary is "to step out, emerge" and also "spring forth, proceed, arise, become." It also means "to be visible or manifest in any manner, to exist, to be."

In this prayer the distinction between be and show forth is tissue thin. We have from this word the sense of being on the outside what we are inside, or rather in the case of the outwardly pious and practicing Christian, being sincerely and truly on the inside what we are showing on the outside. His grace is the key.   At our baptism the Holy Spirit enters our lives in the manner of one coming to dwell in a temple. With the indwelling of the Holy Spirit comes "habitual" or sanctifying grace and all His gifts and fruits, by which we live both inwardly and outwardly in conformity with His presence. We manifest His presence outwardly when He is present within. There is nothing we do to merit this gift of His presence and yet, mysteriously, we still have a role to play in His deigning to dwell in our souls. We can make choices about our lives. We can make use of the gifts and graces God gives, allow Him to make our hands strong enough to hold on to all He deigns to bequeath, and then cooperate in His bringing all good things to completion.

In John 15 Jesus speaks of the hostile world and its reaction to His disciples. How must we act towards those who belong still to that hostile world rather than to Christ? In vv. 26-27 we hear the Lord say, "But when the Counselor comes, I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me." And in John 14:23, Jesus says, "If a man loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him." Vatican II’s document concerning missions and missionary work, rightly stated that each of us is called to be a witness to Christ for the sake of others (cf. Ad gentes, 5). We must win by our actions and attitudes disciples for Christ out of a hostile world.   We desire the indwelling of the One in Three Person God, without whom we are lost.

That phrase in today’s prayer, "the sort of people in whom you have deigned to abide" will force us to reflect on our treatment of and conduct towards our neighbor, whom Christ commands us to love in accord with our love of God and self. Paul writes in 2 Cor 13:11-13: "Finally, brethren, farewell. Mend your ways, heed my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the saints greet you. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all." Since the Vatican II reforms, the last part of that has been included in the Mass as an optional salutation.

St. Thomas Aquinas, in his Commentary on Corinthians observes that this dense greeting of Paul refers to all the necessary supernatural graces: "The grace of Christ, by which we are justified and saved; the love of God the Father, by which we are united to Him; and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, who distributes the divine gifts to us."   This period of Ordinary Time is among other things a long reflection given to us by Holy Mother Church on the day to day details of Christian life. We have in this prayer a truly helpful petition.  

ICEL: 
God our Father, 
you have promised to remain for ever 
with those who do what is just and right. 
Help us to live in your presence.   

These ICEL prayers of Ordinary Time seem, by and large, less in harmony with the Latin originals than those of the stronger seasons of Advent/Christmas and Lent/Easter. They seem less "sacral." Notice that there is no reference to "grace" in the ICEL version, while in the Latin it is at the heart of the collect. The absence of "grace" seems to lessen in many ways "do what is just and right." We can do all sorts of wonderful things and not be in the state of grace. But if, as Paul says in 1 Cor 13, we lack charity, the sacrificial love of God that makes our works pleasing to Him, what we do is as nothing. There is no interior reference in the ICEL version. Furthermore, no matter what amazing things a person might do God is not "for ever with" one who interiorly separate from Him, in whom there is no "habitual grace". That kind of grace is more than "help." During the weeks to follow we must watch this trend and see if ICEL remains consistent.

What Does the Prayer Really Say?  5^th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Once upon a time, papal documents were composed in Latin.   The Pope would either write them himself or provide points which his Latin secretaries would then draft and polish.   For example, when Leo XIII (+1903) wrote his milestone Rerum novarum (1891) the composition was entirely in Latin.  The notebooks from its composition reveal great care to create a clear and elegant text.  Nearly everything, with notable exceptions like Pius XI’s Mit brennender Sorge (1937), was composed in Latin until the time of Paul VI and the Second Vatican Council when tremendous pressure was placed on the Holy See to produce translations in various languages.  It was necessary to correct the slapdash versions issued by journalists and others who were at times engaging in misinformation.  The speed at which the texts were expected forced a shift from composition in Latin to the vernacular.  It is easier to write in one’s native tongue, obviously, and so documents got longer – and not always clearer.  Under the pressure to get the texts out, the quality of texts and translations diminished.  The exponentially increasing speed of the media creates problems.  In this light, Pope Benedict in this year’s Message for World Day for Social Communication said, “Daily we are reminded that immediacy of communication does not necessarily translate into the building of cooperation and communion in society” (emphasis mine). 

Accurate translations are difficult to produce.  They are extremely hard to produce with both accuracy and speed.  Translation was a factor in the delayed release of the Pope Benedict’s first encyclical Deus caritas est (DCE).  While it was downplayed in the 25 January press conference for the release of the encyclical, Pope Benedict himself had stated during a general audience with a wistful “finally” that, in part, translation difficulties delayed its publication.  Holy Father wrote in German, working probably with the collaboration of others at Castel Gandolfo, the summer residence, from September onward.  While the first part is vintage Ratzinger, some think the second part was based on an unfinished work of the late Pope John Paul II.  The Latin translators in the Secretariat of State would have preferred to work directly from the German original (which sure makes sense) but they were instead constrained use an Italian translation.  However, the Italian text was in some ways not up to par and so a redrafting was necessary.  In addition, there were those in the halls of power who made observations about content.  Thus, the encyclical itself went through a revision and there were delays. 

Here is another thorny problem with translations.  The final, official version of any document of the Holy See must be in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis, the authoritative instrument of promulgation.  When a document is initially released in its various language versions, Latin in the newspaper L’Osservatore Romano and usually also English, German, Italian, French, Spanish and Portuguese, it is then subject to reaction and feedback from the world.  When the official version, the second Latin version appears in the Acta the Latin is usually different from the first version.  However, nobody ever retranslates the previously released vernacular versions!   So, usually when people are quoting a text, they are quoting something issued long before the real text is issued in the Acta after changes were made.  The Latin version of Deus caritas est (DCE) is available on the Vatican’s website and L’Osservatore published it on its front page even though on the night before, on the L’Osservatore website, the preview of the front page showed it in Italian.  Someone must have made some phones calls!  As far as I know, the Latin won’t be published in booklet form, that is, until the Acta.

What about the English translation of DCE?  One odd phrase got my attention.  In DCE 3: “… doesn’t the Church, with all her commandments and prohibitions, turn to bitterness the most precious thing in life? Doesn’t she blow the whistle just when the joy which is the Creator’s gift offers us a happiness which is itself a certain foretaste of the Divine?”  Ehem… “Blow the whistle?”  At first we might think this is sports imagery.  The Italian says “innalza forse cartelli di divieto… raise perhaps forbidden signs…” which to the incautious might sound like a reference to a soccer referee holding up a penalty card.   But the referee’s card is a “cartellino”, not a “cartello” of a certain color, not a “cartello di divieto”.  Is it traffic imagery?  In German, which is what Benedict wrote in, we read, “Stellt sie nicht gerade da Verbotstafeln auf… Doesn’t she put up forbidden signs precisely there…”.  A “Verbotstafel” could be a traffic sign, a non-smoking sign or other indication.   It’s generic.  In Latin we have the same thing, “Nonne fortasse nuntios prohibitionis attollit Ecclesia ibi omnino…”  You might have expected here a neuter plural nuntia prohibitionis, since a nuntius is usually the bearer of the news.  However, nuntius can also mean, “command, order, injunction”.  So, “blow the whistle”?   I wonder where those ICEL translators wound up after all.

SUPER OBLATA (2002MR)
Domine Deus noster
qui has potius creaturas
ad fragilitatis nostrae subsidium condidisti,
tribue, quaesumus,
ut etiam aeternitatis nobis fiant sacramentum.

 
This prayer was in the 1962MR during Passiontide and in the Veronese Sacramentary in the month of September in amongst prayers suggesting fasting (admonitio ieiunii).  One wonders if the people who put together the 1970MR sensed the need to salvage something of the ancient tradition of preparatory Sundays before Lent (e.g. Septuagesima).  There is a touch of military imagery in this prayer through words like subsidium and sacramentum (originally meaning an oath taken by soldiers).

 We need to look at vocabulary in order to understand what the prayer really says.  Our worthy Lewis & Short Dictionary shows potius is from the rarely declined potis, “able, capable; possible.”  We often see the comparative form potior, which is “preferred, better, preferable” and in the superlative potissimus (declinable) and thus the comparative adverbial form potius signifying “rather, preferably, more.”  Potissime and potissimum are superlatives for “chiefly, principally, especially, in preference to all others, above all, most of all.”  Potius is imbedded in has…creaturas which helps us to determine that it means “above all” or perhaps “above or in preference to all others.”  The verb subsideo gives us the substantive subsidium originally meaning, “the troops stationed in reserve in the third line of battle (behind the principes), the line of reserve, reserve-ranks, triarii.”  By extension it also means “support, assistance, aid, help, protection.”  Condo, cóndere, condidi, cónditum gives us “to bring, lay or put together” in the sense of “establish, build, construct, compose, describe” and, strangely, “hide”.

 LITERAL TRANSLATION:
O Lord our God,
who made these creatures above all others
unto a support of our frailty,
grant, we beseech Thee,
that they may become for us the sacrament also of eternity.

 ICEL (1973 translation of the 1970MR):
 Lord our God,
may the bread and wine
you give us for our nourishment on earth
become the sacrament of our eternal life.

 ICEL decided to break down hae creaturae… “these creatures” into bread and wine.   I can understand why they did that, but I think it usurps both our intellect and imagination.  Furthermore, there is rich material for preaching and teaching in the word and concept “creature”, which is used in the Latin liturgical tradition for something about to be sanctified.  For example, in the pre-Conciliar Rituale Romanum, the source for various sacramental rites and blessings, there is the rite for blessing holy water.  As in the rite for baptism, water was to be infused with salt.  Both the salt and water had to be exorcised first.  So, the priest would solemnly speak directly to the salt as if it were a living thing, making signs of the Cross, “Thou creature of salt, I purge thee of all evil by the living + God, by the true + God, by the holy + God…  Be thou a purified salt for the health of believers, giving soundness of body and soul to all who use thee.  In whatever place thou art sprinkled, may phantoms and wickedness, and Satan’s cunning be banished.  And let every unclean spirit be repulsed by Him Who shall come to judge the living and the dead, and the world by fire.”   To exorcize the water the priest prayed, “Thou creature of water, I purge thee of evil….  Mayest thou be empowered to drive forth (the envious foe) and exile him together with his fallen angels….”  In the newer, post-Conciliar Missale Romanum, in an Appendix containing the rite for blessing water sprinkled during the penitential rite of Holy Mass, the priest still calls water creatura, but he no longer exorcizes it or speaks to it directly. 

 This image of the thing to be blessed as a living creature was once common. For example, on the feast of St. John the Evangelist there was a special blessing for wine: “…Bless, + O Lord, this creature draught that it might be a helpful medicine to all who drink it.”   On Epiphany the priest could bless gold, incense and myrrh, first exorcizing them and calling them all “creatures.”   The creature oil was always exorcized and blessed.  Just as a living person had to be exorcised before being baptized, so too anything intended for God and His special sanctification.  The more important and precious a thing was, the greater the need for it to be pure at its offering.  God then sanctifies and takes it apart from ordinary things unto His own.  Consequently, the bread and wine being prepared at the offertory of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass are of great importance.   They will be taken by God to be transformed into Jesus Christ Himself.   One can understand why in the reforms of the liturgy greater emphasis was placed on the offertory procession, restoring ancient practice of bring things from our daily life to the altar for their sanctification.

 Water, salt, oil, bread and wine… these are simple things from daily life.  They are simple but of profound, even critical, importance.  We cannot live without them.  In the holy rites of the Catholic Church we would speak directly to the things to be consecrated as if they were living things, so intimately were they bound together with how God supports our very lives.   Our Blessed Lord during His earthly life instituted the seven sacraments we enjoy today.  Knowing that we are human creatures and not angelic creatures, he gave us outward signs with these sacraments so that we could understand when the invisible and interior reality was being conferred.  He thus took simple, but vastly important created things from our ordinary lives and raised them to a new sacramental reality.  Even the need to tell our troubles to a friend, so common but so important for our well-being, he raised to a sacrament.  The longing of a man and woman to be together, instituted as a holy union from the beginning of our race, was elevated making of the very bodies of the spouse something new and holy.  The struggle at the end of life or when we are in mortal peril was taken by Christ and given back to us as a sacrament and the daily and common yet life-supporting substance oil was his vehicle for giving us grace.

 A word like creatura, given a decent and beautiful translation and some sensible and timely liturgical catechesis, can create a sense of wonder about what is happening during the Eucharistic Prayer.  It reminds us that we too are creatures, made in the image and likeness of God.  Today’s

Super oblata through the word creatura indicates that we are being drawn in to a hallowed nexus of the creaturely with the Creator.  The solemn language of the moment drapes, as it were, the altar and its appointments, the priest/mediator, and particularly (potius) the creatures of the bread and wine to be consecrated, with a mysterious cloak, reminiscent of the cloud that would descend upon the mountain and the tent when YAWEH God would speak face to face with Moses.

 In our liturgical prayers we need to have a sacral style, removed from daily language.  They must be beautiful, evocative, striking and solemn.  Is that what the translators and the bishops are going to provide for us?