Someone closely involved in the translation process writes the following to me. (The author is not from ICEL. I\u2019m not\u00a0telling what country or national conference he\u2019s from.)<\/p>\n
My private view is that this text won’t last long. I think it will need to be revisited sooner rather than later. By that stage I will have completed my term and it will be someone else\u2019s problem!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
This got me thinking. Not about my view of the final text \u2013 I already think it\u2019s not too good. It\u2019s too stilted and unnatural, i.e., not very beautiful. The revisers didn\u2019t consult musicians, so it\u2019s unsingable in some places. In too many places it\u2019s oddly inaccurate of the Latin meaning. There are some improvements, to be sure, in the final revision, but even more problems.<\/p>\n
The author – who, by the way, was once a strong supporter of the whole retranslation project –\u00a0got me thinking, rather, about how long this text will last. Five years? Ten? Twenty? Or will there be a consensus already within two or three years that it\u2019s time to set up the revision committee? Or sooner, because people rise up in protest as in South Africa<\/a>? Or as in the German-speaking countries<\/a>, where the newly-translated funeral rites book had to be withdrawn within just a few months of its introduction?<\/p>\n
If only we could know how long the new Missal will last, we might know the best thing to do right now. If the new Missal is doomed to be withdrawn within, say, a year, the best service to perform for the Church right now would be to work mightily to prevent its introduction. It would be a great kindness to our Bishops to spare them of such a pastoral disaster. If, on the other hand, the Missal is destined to last several years, but opinion turns fairly quickly to how to revise it, it would be a service to the Church to start that conversation already now. The richer the discussion, the better. The more probing and perceptive the critique of the new text, the better. The more accurate the diagnosis of what went wrong, the better.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m presuming that the new Missal will be implemented in the U.S. on the First Sunday of Advent, 2011. I will be working mightily, in my\u00a0monastic community and in the many diocese and parishes to which I\u2019ve been invited, for the best possible implementation. I will do my best to help priests sing the new texts well. I will do my best to help people see everything good in the new translation and to pray it from the heart. I\u2019m here to serve the Church.<\/p>\n
But there are many ways to serve the Church. It\u2019s easy to accuse the Missal\u2019s critics of disobedience. Those who critique the new text, and even those who work to prevent its implementation, are also serving the Church. Theirs might be the highest service of all.<\/p>\n
If only we knew how long the the new Missal will last. If only we knew the mind of the Lord. (Cf. 1 Corinthians 2:16, Romans 11:34, Isaiah 40:13)<\/em><\/p>\n
awr<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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