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The New Translation of the Mass
As you may have heard on the grapevine, a new translation of Mass into English is on its way to us. The new versions of the common texts which we use every Sunday will come unto use across the UK at the start of September. The full missal with the priest's prayers for each day will be ready for the start of Advent 2011. But permission has been given for sung versions of the new texts to be used from this Easter onwards if this helps parishes to learn them.
Why is there a new translation? The Missal we currently use dates from the 1970s and represented a rapid translation into English as soon as the Church authorities allowed this to happen. Translators used a rule called "dynamic equivalence" which means "use the most natural expression in English which captures the gist of the Latin original."
In 2001, the Vatican issued a document called Liturgiam Authenticam which gave new rules for translations. From now on, all translations of the Liturgy had to follow the Latin originals as precisely as possible. Partly this was because very ancient prayers of the Latin liturgy had been carefully crafted over time to express precise meanings about what we believe as Catholic Christians. Another reason was that much of our liturgy quotes phrases from the Bible, and the connection might be missed if those texts were paraphrased.
We are also reminded that certain parts of the Liturgy are meant to be sung - even on ordinary weekdays. So when we learn the new versions of Holy Holy and the Gloria, we will learn them as sung settings from the beginning, and use them this way even on weekdays. This may require a little more effort on our part, but God is worth it!
‘And with your spirit'
One of the first things we will notice with the new translation is that, when the priest says ‘The Lord be with you', we now say ‘And with your spirit'. This is much closer to the original Latin. When the Mass was first translated into English we were one of only two languages that did not translate it as ‘your spirit'. It is a very biblical response: Paul concludes four of his letters with a very similar expression. For example, at the end of his Second Letter to Timothy, Paul ends by saying, ‘The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you'. If you think about it, for nearly 2000 years Christians have been greeting each other, ‘The Lord be with you', ‘and with your spirit.' So the new translation will bring unity to this response in all the languages of the world - and with all previous Christian generations.
At the end of the readings and the Gospel at Mass, we are used to hearing ‘This is the Word of the Lord'; ‘This is the Gospel of the Lord'. In the new translation, the words ‘This is' are now left out and we will hear ‘The Word of the Lord' and ‘The Gospel of the Lord'. One of the reasons is that the Latin does not include ‘This is'. But there is more to it than that. If the priest or deacon lifts the book and says ‘This is', it can suggest that he is talking about the book itself. In fact, he is talking about the Word of God - which is alive and active. The words at the end of the readings are announcing a great event. They are telling us that God has spoken; that Christ is present. We respond ‘Thanks be to God', or ‘Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ' which is our acknowledgement that what we have heard is, indeed, the Word of God. For more about the Word of the Lord, see ‘Verbum Domini' by Benedict XVI, available to download as a pdf file on http://tinyurl.com/B16-Verbum
Gloria, Creed
We are already using the new text of the Gloria, and in September, we will also notice some changes in the Creed. In fact, there is not a great deal of change in the new words that we will pray so we will have to be careful that we don't slip into the old texts! The first lines of the Gloria itself echo the angels' message to the shepherds, announcing the birth of Christ (Luke 2:14). Because of these changes, new music is being written so that we will be able to sing the new translation, too. When it comes to the Creed we will notice the first change immediately - ‘I believe', not, ‘We believe'. We have become used to praying the Creed all together as a parish. The trouble is, when we say ‘we believe' it could suggest that between us all we believe everything being said. It is not clear that we all believe everything that is being said. To say ‘I believe' makes it quite clear that each one of us believes everything we are saying.
The Mystery of Faith
For Catholics, a ‘mystery' is not a puzzle that cannot be solved. It is a truth that is so deep that we know we'll never be able to get to the bottom of it; a truth we'll never completely be able understand. One example of this is our belief in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. We believe that Christ is truly present but we can't wholly explain it. The priest shows us the host and then the chalice. Then he genuflects and says ‘The mystery of faith'. We continue with one of three responses. These are all different from the ones we have been used to and they come directly from the New Testament. So when the priest says ‘The mystery of faith' he is inviting us to welcome this Real Presence of Christ. We then make our response, which we address to God.
Lord I am not worthy
As the priest invites us to receive Holy Communion, he will say ‘Behold', rather than ‘This is', ‘the Lamb of God'. ‘Behold' means ‘to look at' and is our invitation to adore Christ who we are about to receive in Holy Communion. We are used to saying ‘Lord I am not worthy to receive you' ... This will change to: ‘Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed'. This is almost exactly what the Roman Centurion said when he came and begged Jesus to heal his servant. When Jesus says he will come to the Centurion's house, the man knows that Jesus doesn't need to do that, that just his word will be enough. The Centurion says: ‘Lord I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word and my servant will be healed'. Our new reply changes only one word of the Centurion's speech - "my servant..." becomes: "my soul will be healed".
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