Sacral Language and the Forthcoming Missal

I'm pleased to see that seminars concerning the forthcoming Missal appear to be increasingly upfront about the reality: the current (lame duck, as Fr. Z says) translation is deeply defective whereas the forthcoming translation is corrected. There's no reason to be shy about saying so, even given the implicit admission of error. This workshop sponsored by the St. Louis Archdiocese essentially says this. As Christopher Carstens of the Office of Sacred Worship in the Diocese of La Crosse, Wis., puts it "we have a new missal and a new set of translation principles that have grown and matured over 50 years that weren't there the year after the Second Vatican Council or five years or 10 years after the Council."

Another point made in this workshop is extremely important: the need for a special language for worship. "Think of the 'Star-Spangled Banner,'" Carstens said, reciting, "'Oh, say can you see, by the dawn's early light, what so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?' We don't speak like that." It is a more formal, elevated style of language. So, too, is the language of the Liturgy.

We might add another point that follows: so too is the music of liturgy.

Chant Cafe

Tell that to Fr. Alan Jurkus.


Click the link to read more about the St. Louis conference.