I don’t know about you, but I am a little tired of the suggestion (from churchmen who shall remain nameless, out of respect for those who are offended by gender-exclusive language) that people are too stooopid to understand the new translation which, God willing, we will be able to use before the Lord returns.
Let me put this to you this way:
Are you stooopid or something?
Okay, boys and girls, let’s have a test!
Let’s read the new and improved text of the Creed used at Mass.
Here we go! I will flag in RED the parts that might be tooo haaard. Skip them if you have to.
I believe in one God,
the Father almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all things visible and invisible.
And in one Lord Jesus Christ,
the Only Begotten Son of God,
born of the Father before all ages.
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
consubstantial* with the Father;
through him all things were made.
For us men and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
and by the Holy Spirit
was incarnate* of the Virgin Mary,
and became man.
For our sake
he was crucified under Pontius Pilate,
he suffered death and was buried,
and rose again on the third day
in accordance with the Scriptures.
He ascended into heaven and is seated
at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory
to judge the living and the dead
and his kingdom will have no end.
[…] And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord,
the giver of life, who proceeds
from the Father and the Son,
who with the Father and the Son
is adored and glorified,
who has spoken through the prophets.
[…] And one, holy, catholic
and apostolic Church.
I confess one baptism
for the forgiveness of sins
and I look forward to the resurrection
of the dead
and the life of the world to come. Amen.
*WARNING: These are in fact haaard parts, generally considered by smart people… not necessary just liberal smart people (in other words, people smarter than you), to be mysteries. While they ought to be covered thoroughly in your First Holy Communion catechesis as well as from the pulpit at different times of the year, they do remain sort of haaard, even ineffable. This fact does NOT… NOT… put the following POLL in the category of "trick question".
Okay! I am sure that was haaard, but let’s see how you did!
n
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Ha! I was the first vote.
One of the things I was struck with in the new translation was the reintroduction of the personal nature of belief. And personal accountability. It is our singular act of will that determines acceptance or refusal of God’s will. I was pleased to see ‘I’ in the Creed.
Every person who individually prays the Creed tacitly demonstrates to God the ‘we’ in a vertical sense. I’m so tired of ‘we’ in the horizontal sense. I love my fellow Catholics, but at Mass we are acknowledging and worshiping God. All of that being said, the mystical Body of Christ fulfills the rest.
Will Raymond Arroyo (sp?) in the future report on “all things visible and invisible?”
Fr. Z, I’m also sick and tired of all those stoooopid churchmen who think the faithful are too thick to understand good homilies or too ignorant to understand their faith at all! :(
As nasman2 points out, the return to “I” is an important part in affirming the decision, the “yes”, to live as a Catholic. I remember reading (I know some prelates might disapprove of this, but hey…) about this in a book by a pretty smart guy…a certain Introduction to Christianity by one J. Ratzinger.
“visible and invisible”
This is talking about the things you can see and the things you can’t see, right? It seems so Latiny.
So how many years did it take do do that? I am glad the words incarnate and consubstantial are there. Every Catholic should learn them early in life. Now that will happen on it’s own.
Errr… what’s this “begotten” all about? Is that English?
Seriously, God of God, Light of Light etc. is a loftier way of saying it. More traditional, too.
through HIm all things were made should be by Whom all things were made reflecting the Late Latin sense of per as well as the relative pronoun. Were things made through Him? What is he, the Demiurge? Creeping Neoplatonism if you ask me. Why muck it up?
I prefer incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto ex Maria Virgine be was made Flesh by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary. I’d concede factus est as became but was made keeps closer to the Latin if not the Greek. Are the translators prudes who shun the “flesh”?
suffered death is wrong. There is no death in the Latin or Greek.
for our sake is pleonastic; for suffices.
his kingdom shall have no end should be of his kingdom there shall be no end.
Dominum et vivificantem — where’s the conjunction? Minus 2 points for slovenliness.
simul adoratur — they could have looked up simul in a pocket dictionary instead of omitting it.
cum gloria means with glory not in glory.
locutus est per prophetas — why the distracting shift to the present perfect from the aorist? Minus 10 points for lack of parallelism.
remissionem is forgiveness, sure, but the ineffably more sublime remission has been ignominiously vanquished by these treacherous translators.
Not a botch, to be sure, but neither is it a monument of English prose or Latin scholarship. Why not just use the Anglican Use version? It appeals both to the intellectually and spiritually quick and dead. [We should have a look at that version.]
I may be stoopid, or nostalgic, or impossible to please, but “and became man” sounds so matter-of-fact. “And Was Made Man” reverberates like rolling thunder, resonates in the mind, and supplies a closing cadence before the (missing) genuflection.
At least we have the English liturgy now saying what it is supposed to say. I will not live to see it, but the next stage must be to make it say it beautifully and memorably.
Oy veh! I almost forgot. It’s Holy Ghost not Holy Spirit. I must be meshugennah.
When I was a catechist of ten-year-olds I was surprised by how interested they were when I gave a short impromptu lesson on some of the Latin they might hear at Mass. “Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi…” They really wanted to know it. And they strongly preferred the Bible to the pablum in their age-appropriate workbooks. Nor were they shy about raising their hands and asking the meaning of any word they didn’t know. But then, ten-year-olds aren’t stooopid.
Well I have to admit I did not know what consubstantial meant. But there is this thing called a dictionary which comes in handy in situations like this. So it really wasn’t all that hard to look it up and learn something new.
No, we’re not that stupid. But I’m not so sure about the people who bickered and delayed for so many years before producing it.
Honestly, my prediction is that laypeople are going to adjust to using it in less than 1/10 the time that it took for the USCCB to get their heads wrapped around the fact that they had to produce it. This has taken years! We’ll read it from the missal for a few Sunday mornings and then fly with it. Honestly, most of us do more complex things before 10AM at work every day. Do they think we are peasants feeding half-dead chickens and rooting in the dirt out here or what??? (Shades of Monty Python movies)
“Do they think we are peasants feeding half-dead chickens and rooting in the dirt out here or what??? (Shades of Monty Python movies)
Yes, they do….at least intellectually.
I’ve been wondering, is it important that we should use create instead of make in any or all cases? Once upon a time I was told that while we sometimes use it loosely create is closer to the out-of-nothing creation that we’re referring to here with “maker of Heaven and Earth”. Then I went to Mass and never heard “creator” again outside of Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Yet on the other hand it appears the Latin uses the same verb root for creator and “made man”, if I followed it correctly last time I was at a Latin Mass. Then again, I may just be overthinking myself as usual, since I’m now tempted to ramble about the fact that we say in both English and Latin (last I noticed) “was made man” and yet usually when one makes one thing into another it is no longer the former, which isn’t the case with the God made man.
By the way, I learned what invisible meant because as a five or six year old gamer I had to distinguish it from invincible. I love breaking multiple, preferably oppositional, stereotypes at once.
Two things jump out at me:
Why is it “For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate, he suffered death and was buried?” Wouldn’t “He was crucified also for us, suffered under Pontius Pilate, and was buried” be better?
I think “for the forgiveness of sins” should be “for the remission of sins.”
Still, this is better than the current version.
TrautMAN, hmmmmmmm. Wouldn’t Trautall work better?
And 30 people have said that it is too difficult to understand! Incredible! (That means unbelievable if you don’t know that word.}
What is amazing is I know a handful of people with college degrees, but who are more liberal minded of course, who think this is pushing it…
I of course, disagree totally. As I was explaining to an evangelical today at work (as some know, I work for a tele evangelist), faith should be a challenge to us, and it should give us something to look forward to. That being said, it is more rewarding when one is forced to look deeper into it, and simply not be spoon fed
Our Faith, the fullness of faith, has this beautifully. It engages ALL the senses, which in turn, engages our very being.
Even St. Thomas More could not outwit his enemy.
Know your enemy: St. Paul reminds us that we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, and spiritual wickedness in high places.
Although not all problems and obstacles that we face in life are caused by principalities and powers, there is evidence (by their fruits) that the smoke of Satan has entered the Church.
We cannot outwit the devil, but we can PRAY AND FAST to arm ourselves spiritually.
Well,I had no trouble understanding it.
Now if only the Canadian bishops would bring back the Nicene Creed instead of the Apostles’, which is all we get to say up here . . .
The problem is solved if we just sing it: “Credo in unum Deum…” [Do I hear an “Amen!”?]
But, of course, that is not likely to happen initially here in the U.S. It’s going to take a concerted effort of the people to pick up a copy of the new translation and actually read it, out loud, as written at Mass. Sure, there are going to be a lot of people griping about it, just like they did between 1965 and 1969. But, this too shall pass.
It’s also going to have to be a concerted effort on the part of the priests to say the Mass exactly as it’s written with no deviations. This will actually be more difficult to accomplish than the people saying their parts correctly.
The way some people have been banging on about the new translation, you’d think they were changing huge chunks of it, but most of the Creed above is exactly the same as it is now. Still…has anyone stopped to consider if Trautman et al. have raised any valid points amidst the verbal detritus? A sentence with 88 words does seem extreme, although I’ll admit that I haven’t seen it. I suppose this is the thing that unsettles me most (I’m only 26 so have grown up with the current translation): ‘ineffable’ etc… I’m perfectly happy with, and we already say ‘incarnate’ in the UK, but if the sentence structure makes it difficult to read, or proclaim for the priests’ parts, won’t that counter-act the transcendent nature of the language? Please tell me that I’m worrying about nothing!
Astronomer,
Perhaps they’d ought to ask themselves what they think of laypeople next time they go to their doctor, talk to their lawyer, turn on the TV, pay for a blood test, buy a manufactured product, use a washing machine, drive a car, use a microphone, turn on a light switch…….Where do they think these things come from??? GRRRR.
I would think that “visible and invisible” is easier for small children to understand than “seen and unseen.” “Invisible” is, after all, part of the vocabulary of any kid who watches superhero cartoons or reads Harry Potter books or any number of other fairy tales, while “unseen” is actually more difficult.
This is not to say that slightly more difficult vocabulary isn’t all right, of course, just that in that particular case, I think that anyone who says it is more difficult for either adults or children is dead wrong and ought to try having a conversation with a child sometime.
“And 30 people have said that it is too difficult to understand! Incredible! (That means unbelievable if you don’t know that word.}”
OK, pelerin, that’s funny. I’m not sure whether those 30 people are falsely modest, protesting the translations, don’t know how to use radio buttons, or are admitting something that’s ..uh really scary….and I probably don’t ever want to know. =)
I admit, I think “seen and unseen” rolls off the tongue a little better. I know there’s a distinction. “Unseen” is not the same as “invisible” (my car is “unseen” to me, because there’s a wall between me and my car, it doesn’t mean my car is mystical). But I can live with it. I drive an hour each way once a month to say it in Latin, I can say it in English at my NO parish.
And I agree with Ionnes, Raymond Arroyo will have to change the name of his blog. :>
Excuse me while I…(urp!)…give me a break…this is just too much…either we believe in the Creed and the rest of it or we do not. Make a choice. Catholic or not. That’s my story and I’m sticking with it!
But then again, it’s really haaaard to accept these changes…oh, dear, oh, my, I might have to REALLY believe then…gosh!
I find it surprising that the Canadian bishops allow or mandate(?) the Apostles’ Creed. That seems out there and borderline heretical. The Nicene Creed mandates the assent to the doctrine of the Incarnation, Central to the Christian Faith. As to remission vs other words I will leave to the latinists to translate. Looking at any of the older translations whether Anglican or Catholic would be helpful. In addition to the sodomite sympathizers and women priestess, does anyone know if the Anglican Church was subjected to the same addlebrained schemes as the English speaking RC Church during the seventies or is this something confined to our Church. I am just trying to imagine with what did they replace “We beseech Thee O Lord “during the great Litany?
JPG
When I first started going to Mass before I converted, I never cared for the simplified language of the Nicene Creed. Having been raised int he Orthodox Church, I was used to a particular translation in which the word was “incarnate” used and “consubstantial” was “of one substance.”
Also, I really find it off putting when first person singular is translated as first person plural. In every language that I know of (Latin, English, Bulgarian, Russian, Church Slavonic), I is always usand never we.
Sorry if I’m ranting just wanted to point out a few things.
I was actually told as a child that we are not allowed to say Holy Ghost anymore because it will scare me. (I was about 10). Can you imagine such garbage. Sorry Father that these persons have so annoyed you, it is unfair to say the least. They are not the majority, the translation will be used. Bottom line, so take some peace, the Lord has won…God Bless.
Uhhhh, Father Z, what’s a Creed? Signed, Bishop Trautman.
Can’t. Handle. The. Latin…eeeeeeeezzzz.
If you don’t like all those full-stops, try semicolons! I see there’s one in there already, but it reads more like an m-dash, to me. The semicolon was Chesterton’s favourite bit of punctuation, may I add!
Here’s what it looks like:
I believe in one God,
the Father almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all things visible and invisible;
And in one Lord Jesus Christ,
the Only Begotten Son of God,
born of the Father before all ages;
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
consubstantial with the Father —
through him all things were made;
For us men and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
and by the Holy Spirit
was incarnate of the Virgin Mary,
and became man;
For our sake
he was crucified under Pontius Pilate,
he suffered death and was buried,
and rose again on the third day
in accordance with the Scriptures;
He ascended into heaven and is seated
at the right hand of the Father;
He will come again in glory
to judge the living and the dead
and his kingdom will have no end;
And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord,
the giver of life, who proceeds
from the Father and the Son,
who with the Father and the Son
is adored and glorified,
who has spoken through the prophets;
And one, holy, catholic
and apostolic Church.
I confess one baptism
for the forgiveness of sins
and I look forward to the resurrection
of the dead
and the life of the world to come. Amen.
“UMMMM” was just too tempting to pass up. I do like shiny things though. Oh look at the butterfly…………
“Consubstantial” Of the same substance, nature, or essence. Much better than “one Being”
Speaking as a convert from the Anglican Communion, young Anglicans from about 4 on up don’t have any problems with the Creed in the elegant (and accurate) BCP translation. At about the logic stage (10-12) kids with decent English teachers start to diagram (on their own initiative) the multitudinous clauses of the Canon, the Creed, the Gloria–and they think those long and complex prayers ‘neat’ (or ‘wicked’, which I will never understand meaning ‘exceptionally good’) and perfectly understandable. The lengthy Confession and the Prayer of Humble Access aren’t problems grammar-wise; it’s the “There is no health in us” and “We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy Table” which strike children and set them to thinking about sinful nature and so on. (I know adults who say those lines are ‘much too harsh’. and of course they do not appear in the newer Rite II–see below.)
JPG, the Episcopalians in ECUSA were, indeed, “subject to…” The main difference was that the 1976 BCP had two Rites, Rite I which was the familiar Shakespearian language with a few deletions here and there, and Rite II which looks very, very much like the NO. (There is also a rite called “Communion under Special Circumstances” meant to be used for very large group liturgies, retreats, youth gatherings as appropriate et cetera but not as the regular liturgy–it’s essentially DIY. Rite II has alternate versions of the Prayers of the People and of the Prayer of Consecration, but one is not supposed to make them up unless it’s “special circumstances”; traddies jokingly call this Rite III.) The previous BCP was forbidden without the bishop’s express permission, but since Rite I was almost exactly the older rite, most traditionalist parishes used/use it exclusively, or also use the previous BCP at a non-principal liturgy (the early morning no-music service is common).
That situation was analogous to what it would have been in the Church to have had the EF and the OF both printed in all liturgical books and equally allowed post-Vatican II…imagine what that would have been like! (Or even the NO in Latin and in the vernacular would be closer.) The use of the previous rite is analogous to the indult for the EF, but the permission was there from the beginning.
However, having Rite I available obviously did not keep the Episcopal Church in the US from making the same mistakes as many Catholic parishes vis-a-vis lex orendi, lex credendi and pitiful catechesis following the change in the liturgy.
Oh, and the Great Litany in the 1976 BCP has “We beseech thee to hear us, good Lord” as well as “Good Lord, deliver us,” “Have mercy upon us,” and so on. Personally, I suspect this was a sop to traditionalists–the ‘reformers’ probably thought that no modern parish would bother with a litany (vain repetition, right?) so why not let those traddies have their thees, thous, and beseeches in a prayer more enlightened worshippers won’t use anyway?
My biggest trouble with the argument that the average person is too dumb is that even if they are, week after week of hearing this would eventually become comprehensible out of context.
If some “persons” don’t like “consubstantial,” let’s give them the choice between that and “homoousia” and see what he/she/it chooses.
I guess I am an Ummmm…
My daily contact with the Ordinary Form is that which I see on EWTN. Do not misunderstand, if a retired Priest friend was to ask me to assist at his OF Mass, I would be there without hesitation.
Currently, I am blessed to assist at Masses offered by Priests of the FSSP in Littleton, Colorado.
As I travel ~ 40 miles one way, it is uncommon for me to assist at these Masses that are not those of Sunday or other days of obligation. I DO know that I am fortunate. Whenever possible, on Saturdays, I make the trek, for Mass and Confession.
Sursum Corda
Fr. Zuhlsdorf: We should have a look at that version. (i.e. the Anglican Use version.)
It is, of course, in more antiquated language than the proposed translation. But it is sublime English. The Knotts Missal – there are other versions of the liturgy — but here is the Credo from that missal (pardon the anacolouthon):
I believe in one God. The Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth,
and of all things visible and invisible.
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God.
Begotten of his Father before all worlds,
God of God, light of light, very God of very God.
Begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father: by whom all things were made.
Who for us men, and for our salvation came down from heaven.
(Here genuflect.) And was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary: And was made man.
And was crucified also for us: under Pontius Pilate he suffered, and was buried.
And the third day he rose again according to the Scriptures. And ascended into heaven:
and sitteth on the right hand of the Father.
And he shall come again with glory to judge both the quick and the dead:
Whose kingdom shall have no end.
And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord, and giver of life:
who proceedeth from the Father and the Son. Who with the Father and the Son
together is worshipped and glorified: who spake by the Prophets.
And I believe one holy, catholick and apostolick Church. I acknowledge one baptism
for the remission of sins. And I look for the resurrection of the dead.
And the life of the world to come. Amen.
Much to be praised is the wise adage of Churchill: Old words are best. Old words when short are best of all.
This is not an argument in favor of the condescension of Trautmann, who received his higher education on the dime of the faithful. It is an argument for lofty liturgical language, which befits its supernal purpose: viz., the worship of the very God.
Sitteth, procedeth, spake, quick, according to, very God, Holy Ghost: let the novus ordinarians learn English. Latinity will follow.
Roland de Chanson quoted: “Begotten not made, being of one substance with the Father: by whom all things were made.”
Honestly, I like the “of one substance with the Father” as it is a literal explanation of “consubstantialem Patri.”
I borrowed from the Ruthenians and the traditional prayer for this improvement which restores the proper Latin verb tenses.
I believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
creator of heaven and earth,
of all the visible and invisible;
And in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only begotten Son of God,
and born of the Father before all ages,
God of God, Light of Light, true God of true God,
begotten, not made, of one substance with the Father;
through whom all things were made;
who for us men and for our salvation has come down from heaven,
has been made incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary
and has been made man;
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
has suffered and has been buried;
has resurrected Himself on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures;
has ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father;
is going to come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and of whose kingdom there will be no end;
and in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son also,
who with the Father and the Son is jointly adored and glorified:
who has spoken through the prophets;
and in one holy catholic and apostolic Church;
and confess one baptism for the remission of sins.
I expect the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen
My parents fought these changes 40 years ago and no priest would listen! The changes came so fast it made my mom and dad’s heads spin. But sadly, most people followed along blindly.
One of the first things they told the people: “Do not bring your missals to Mass.”
Now wasn’t that cleaver?
Thank all of you for your comments. I am on my knees at my computer with head bowed, thanking God for the Fraternity of Saint Peter. My family and I have truly received the Pearl of great price!
I’m not too stooopid to understand the creed. But I was too stooopid to understand the poll, and voted yes, thinking the poll was asking “did you understand the poll”. DOH!
Who for us men, and for our salvation came down from heaven.
(Here genuflect.) And was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary: And was made man.
“HERE GENUFLECT!!!” It was so wonderful to genuflect together years ago. In fact, it was magnificent.
I wish they would bring *that* back.
Dear Fr. Zuhlsdorf,
While I agree that singing the Credo in Latin were the best solution (and, as your podcast of the other day showed plainly and once again, in keeping not only with the very minimum wishes of the Council Fathers, but also with the expectations of the Pope who promulgated the NOM).
That said, I have always wondered whether I might not actually prefer “one in being” on philosophical grounds, as closer, in English, to the Greek homoousios. The Latin constubstantialis is, as you know, a perfectly acceptable translation of the Greek, but does, “consubstantial” really English the Latin adequately? I wonder whether “substance” really is (in this case) an adequate translation of ousia.
“One in being” also strikes me as more mysterious than “of one substance” or con-substantial, which are words one almost understands, so long as one doesn’t think too much about them; to me, at least, they sound like the kind of thing one could get one’s head around, so long as one doesn’t try too hard.
Chiedo scusa a S.E. l’Ordinario di Erie, s’il mio pensar gli urta!
Best,
C.
What I don’t get is that my four year old can understand and explain the Our Father and ane my three year old knows the Hail Mary, but adults can’t get words like consubstantial?
As I teach them their prayers, I explain what they mean. And now, my oldest is teaching his younger brother.
At four, his understanding is slightly more simplistic than ours. Sin is when we do things God didn’t want us to do. One of the worst sins is to call somebody stupid. A saint is a good friend of God. But, he does understand what he is saying. And he asks to hear “the story of Jesus” after mass (that is, walk through the stations amd have me explain them) and “say hello to God in the tabernacle”. He is worried that Jesus gets lonely in the tabernacle, because His mommy isn’t allowed in there with Him.
I support all the changes except the “We” to “I.” I have read and I understand the reasons behind it and I am not (unlike Bishop Trautman) willing to scuttle what is generally a very important undertaking for the sake of this point, but I am a bit surprised at the change. After all, the Holy Father expounds at some length in his book Jesus of Nazareth on the importance of the “Our” in the Lord’s Prayer. He describes it as a mark of community and of the necessity to join the Church and therefore the Body of Christ before one can pray to the Father as He did.
I understand that the Creed is different, but I believe the “We” is an important reaffirmation of the Pope’s point. We are a community of believers, which is one of the most important things setting us apart from other Christian groups. Our faith is not ours alone (though we do personally adhere to it), it is the faith of the Church, timeless, unchanging, eternal. It is the faith of the Apostles, the Church Fathers, and the whole Body of Christ from the beginning of the world until its end.
Of course, he is the Holy Father. He wrote the book and he has surely signed off on this translation of the Creed, so I accept his decision. I’m just not sure I understand it.
I was very happy to learn that the bishops have approved the new translations, although it is a little discouraging to think that it may be 2012 before the new missals show up in pews.
I came from a continuing Anglican province that used the 1928 Book of Common Prayer, and I believe, in disagreement with +Trautman, that there is value to sacral language in the liturgy. I actually prefer the Elizabethan English of the BCP, but the new missal translations seem to me to be a significant improvement over the current translations and seem completely comprehensible, even if all of my formal education was in Alabama schools.
By the way, I’m sure a modern English teacher would give Archbishop Cranmer an ‘F’ for his translation of the Nicene Creed. As published in the BCP, there are only 2 sentences (counting by periods/full stops) in the entire creed. The first contains 151 words; the second has 77 words.
What I do have trouble comprehending is the mindset of those who complain that the new translations are just too difficult to grasp. One comment on an article at NCR Online included this: “I consider myself an educated person, but I don’t use or fully comprehend what ineffable,’ ‘consubstantial,’ ‘incarnate,’ ‘inviolate,’ ‘oblation,’ ‘ignominy,’ ‘precursor,’ ‘suffused’ and ‘unvanquished’ mean.”
These may not be words that we use in everyday conversation, but how hard is it, particularly for “an educated person” to look them up, or even to ask a priest? If our faith is important, and it should be most important, why is it too much trouble to learn the terminology?
When do we start?
Does singing the Gloria in Latin make you stoopid as well? We have some people who keep telling us that we won’t understand all those pesky Latin Mass parts we keep using. Well Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, I thought it all right to do such things, especially since Congress folk can’t read a bill before voting on it.
Oh these liberals, so controlling and judgemental. They need some hot soup and the funny pages to calm them down.
Father, that was very Zarchastic!
I wish they would change that word “maker” to creator. I can make a cake, but I can’t create one.
If you stand behind a tree, you are “not seen.” But you are not invisible. There is a difference.
Re: We to I
The Church never changed the Credo into the Credimus. You can look at the official default version of the Ordinary Form (which is in Latin) for days, and that word “Credo”, “I believe”, is still going to be there.
Absent the permissions of the bishops and the popes, we could only say that translating the word “Credo” as “We believe” is factually incorrect and a lie. Given their permissions, I am bound to say that it has always been… infelicitous.
I will also say that it got me a very low grade in Latin class, all because I was sure that the Church must know how to conjugate Latin verbs. I was devastated. I don’t think it’s too much to say that Reason left her throne. I couldn’t believe that the Church would come straight out and lie to me, for years. I finally figured out that the power to bind and loose covered even mistranslation… but it never should have been done, and the scale on which it happened in the old translation is the sort of thing that still makes me boil over, if I think about it very long.
There was also a lot of hedging going on with the Creed; some people held plenty of mental reservations in that “we”. “We believe in the resurrection of the dead, but I don’t.” This was of course grammatically foolish — you can’t exclude yourself from “We” without shifting to “They”. But in a church translating first person singular as first person plural, you can expect such disrespect for logic and grammar to happen.
So it’s GREAT that “Credo” will once more be properly translated as “I believe”!
People will face the Lord as individuals within a community, instead of trying to turn us into a communal blob or usurping the roles of the Nicaean council fathers. Catholic schoolchildren will not face humiliation in Latin class or the temptation to lose faith in the Church’s teaching. Things will become plain and straightforward and easy to understand, not strained interpretations requiring footnotes and lame explanations.
Perhaps this transliteration would be preferable to Sir Trautman, “I believe in God… and all the rest of that other stuff.”
By being able to say ‘I believe’ once again instead of ‘We believe’ ‘people will face the Lord as individuals within a community, instead of trying to turn us into a communal blob’ says Suburbanbanshee.
Well put! this is perhaps the change that I am most looking forward to.
I constantly wonder why the wrong translation was chosen for ‘Credo’ in English whereas the French retained the correct translation of ‘Je crois’. I find it more powerful and meaningful when in France to be able to recite the Creed because of this. The ‘We believe’ is so impersonal.
What always amazes me about the position as expressed by Bishop T, and that sneering blogger whom Fr Z fisked in a previous thread, and those of their ilk, is how they absolutely fail to see the illogicality of their position: we be’s all too stoooopid to unnerstan’ dem big wurdz like “consubstantial” but sumahows we suddindly snapz us out of this stoopidity a few minutes later when we usez dem reeeeely big wurdz like “who art; hallowed be thy…; thy kingdom… forgive us our trespasses…” not to mention concepts like “lead us not into temptation” that only big grown-up peepul should know about. Thank God they never managed to get their grubby paws on the Our Father. It’s the last semblance of dignity left in the post-70 translation shambles.
I prefer to see the word “consubstantial” used in the Creed as opposed to “one in being.” In my mind at least “consubstantial” has a much clearer and in many ways a much different meaning that “one in being.” It explains in precise language a theological and philosophical concept that “one in being” can’t quite capture.
I wanted to make a little comment also about the Anglican version of the creed. I grew up in the United Methodist Church and we memorized the Apostles Creed using some rather old sounding formulations. Out of habit I still recite that version of creed whenever I pray the rosary and I’ve gotten a few looks at my church if somebody hears “from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.” When I was growing up in my child like mind I reasoned that anything living no matter what had to be quicker than anything that was dead, so even without fully knowing what “quick” meant I could at least figure it out well enough.
I like the ‘new’ translation of the Creed-and I understand all the ‘haaard’ words!
Jen B- your kids sound sooo cute!
Not to labour the point too much, as I don’t know what the situation was in the US immediately post-1969, but in Ireland and the UK they kept the 1965/6 translations of the Gloria, Creed and Sanctus for a few years after the NO came in – up to early ’75 if memory serves. Then they brought in the current versions identical to what is now the standard universal English translation: “We believe… one in being etc”. Anyway, prior to that the older versions had:
“I believe…”
“visible and invisible…”
“only-begotten Son of God…”
“born of the Father before time began…”
“one in substance with the Father…”
“I look forward to the resurrection of the dead”
In other words, the new translation is practically identical to what we in Ireland and the UK had up to 1975. Back to the future in other words. I would like to assure Bishop T that, from 1970 to 1975, we could perfectly well handle this “haaaarrrrd” phraseology without evident
psychological distress, and we didn’t feel an urgent hankering to embrace our fellow-worshippers by use of the 1st person plural. At least, we didn’t until we were told that we had to, with no choice in the matter. It’s called “empowering the laity” I believe (sorry, we believe)
The new translations of the Gloria and Sanctus are practically identical to our “old” versions as well, except for the “thee”s and thou”s. The whole thing is like waking up from a bizarre 35-year coma: “Wow, was I really dead [stoooopid] for all that time??”
I have to admit, the options for voting were so funny that I almost voted either “Yes?” or “Ummmmmm . . .” Be that as it may, I’m just too enthusiastic about the new translation.
No,
I am not that stupid and I find it very difficult to accept the Bp. Trautman and the 45 are that stupid either.
I cannot escape the feeling that there is someting other than “pastoral concerns” behind the objections to a more accurate translation.
It seems obvious to me that Bishop Trautman really does believe that Vatican II was a complete break from the past and really did “correct” the erroneous teachings of the Church. His concern, then, is not that ordinary layfolk will not be able to understand the new traslation; rather his concern seems to be that we will begin to actually believe something different than what he thinks we should believe.
MikeJ9919, re “I believe” vs. “We believe” states, … I’m just not sure I understand it….
Think of it this way: when one enters the military (or any other sworn government service), one takes an oath of enlistment/commission/office. Each person must individually swear the oath, taking personal responsibility for the tenets; therefore one says, “I (state your name)” and not “we” — even though gathered together in a group. I see the Credo in the same light: I am professing my own personal belief, not that of the entire gathered group. If I am part of a group — and believe in most, but not everything that group stands for — I can still say “we [as a group] believe” and be honest. If I say “I believe” and truly do not believe what I am swearing, then I am lying.
–ghp
ChadS gave me a laugh when he said, …When I was growing up in my child like mind I reasoned that anything living no matter what had to be quicker than anything that was dead, so even without fully knowing what “quick” meant I could at least figure it out well enough….
Yeah…. I understand! “Cut to the quick” likewise confused me until I discovered (silly me … an unknown word and I had to resort to a dictionary rather than intuitively understand it) it is from Old English (Anglo-Saxon) cwicu, meaning “alive”.
ghp,
If you have ever cut your fingernail too deeply – ‘into the quick’ – you know in a very personal and painful way what that word means!
Chad,
I still say the ’28 form when I’m praying my Rosary. Probably not a good idea as if I’m not paying strict attention the old words tend to fall out of the memory bank during Mass . . .
I prefer “being of one substance” to “consubtantial”, simply because it is more English than Latinate. I notice that the KJV is likewise more English in that sense than the Douay-Rheims version . . . But I want to make clear that I am not complaining and am very grateful for the revisions!!!
I grew up on the ’28 BCP, and understood it well enough even as a very small child (I was singing in the St. Cecilia Choir, so was attending the entire service from the age of 6 or so, even though most kids were shuttled out to Sunday School before the Communion service began. In those days it was only once a month, straight Morning Prayer being the general rule.)
In fact, I remember a Sunday School class in which our teacher very kindly explained the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, and the General Confession . . . complete with diagrams. Lots of questions from all of us, which were patiently answered. Kids WANT to learn, unless it has been beaten, bored, or bullied out of them.
American Mother, I didn’t know the version we learned came from the 1928 BCP. One day when looking at Wikipedia the Anglican version of the Apostles Creed was the only one that looked familiar to me. Perhaps my church was onto something back then (back then being only the late 70s and early 80s).
Michael J said: “It seems obvious to me that Bishop Trautman really does believe that Vatican II was a complete break from the past and really did “correct” the erroneous teachings of the Church. His concern, then, is not that ordinary layfolk will not be able to understand the new traslation; rather his concern seems to be that we will begin to actually believe something different than what he thinks we should believe.”
I agree 100%. He’s not just quibbling about words, although he makes it sound like he is. Indeed, in his objections on Tuesday, he made a point of claiming there was dogmatic content in his objections to the translations of the antiphons by the Congregation in Rome.
Therefore he appears to be asserting that there is a difference of dogma between himself and the Congregation, which is very interesting. Perhaps this needs more investigation.
This is already the translation I say every Sunday in the Eastern Rite. Go Byzantines! The only thing that’s different, is ours says “I” believe in the holy ghost…and “I believe and confess” one baptism for the forgiveness of since “and await” the resurrection of the dead and life everlasting Amen.