Liturgical rejects: Vatican dismisses translations and translators.

Over previous years Catholic Insight has brought numerous articles on the pros and cons of biblical translations from Latin to English and their use in the Liturgy. On March 31, 2002, the Vatican Congregation for Divine Worship sent a letter to the presidents of bishops' conferences saying that it would not accept the English translations presented to it hitherto. That includes the Canadian English translation of the Roman Missal sent in several years ago.

On April 25, Rome announced that it had created its own supervisory board for translations into English (Vox clara), which will make the final decision on what is, and what is not, acceptable (see C.I., July/August, p.28). Father John Zuhlsdorf writes a regular column on the proper translation of Latin liturgical texts into English in the American weekly The Wanderer. The following abbreviated article was published there in its May 16, 2002 edition.

Editor

The Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments (CDW) has withheld its formal approval (recognitio) of the newest English translation of the second edition (edition typica altera) of the Latin Roman Missal. The letter conveying news of the rejection was dated March 16, 2002, and was over the signature of the Prefect of the Congregation, Cardinal Jorge Medina Estevez. Appended to the letter were several pages of "observations" making abundantly clear why the CDW refused the translation prepared by the International Commission on English in the Liturgy (ICEL).

The CDW apparently sent the letter to the presidents of conferences of bishops "in whose territory the Liturgy of the Roman Rite is habitually celebrated in English." A dicastery ("office, department") of the Holy See will often send a communication intended for all the bishops of a region first to the president of the conference. The president, in turn, is to distribute it to the other bishops.

One American bishop with whom I spoke about the CDW letter told me that he had not received it through any regular channel and only knew about it because a third party sent it to him by e-mail. There is more than one kind of cover-up, I suppose. (Editor: In Canada, no mention has been made of it anywhere).

Vigorous language

It is well worth the time to explore what the Congregation communicated to the bishops. In a departure from the usually careful and diplomatic curial style, this rejection letter contained some of the strongest language I have ever read in a letter coming from the Holy See. It reminded me instantly of the letter by which some years ago the CDW rejected the translation of the newer Latin edition of the Ordination rites for bishops, priests, and deacons, and then effectively beat the tar out of the bishops for even submitting it in the first place. To that notable letter the Congregation had attached many pages of corrections; even those it stated were in no way to be considered exhaustive.

In the new rejection letter we find a similar statement. Regarding the appended "observations," which are called "the principal reasons" for the rejection, the Cardinal Prefect writes, "Though these are extensive, they are not intended to be exhaustive, even in a generic sense." That is to say, the Congregation did not bother even to list all the different categories of problems, much less all the problems themselves. The translation was so bad, it seems, that the Congregation opines that the only way to point out everything wrong would require "an integral annotated or reworked text." In other words, the Congregation would need to redo the whole translation with comments and then put it side by side with ICEL's submission.

It would be helpful to have a chronology of events so that we can put this latest development in context. Then, when we go through the CDW's new letter with its appended observations, everything will make more sense.

Looking back

You will recall that the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) mandated a reform of the Roman Liturgy focusing on only a few major points. The Council Fathers clearly required that Latin remain the normal language of liturgical worship. They said that the pastors of souls have the obligation to make sure that their flocks can respond in all the parts of Mass pertaining to them, both singing and speaking, in both Latin and in their native tongues. It made a provision that in some parts of the Mass, on some useful occasions, the vernacular could be used for pastoral necessity.

Never did it envision or approve a wholesale abandoning of the Latin language. But the body called the "Consilium," which the Council Fathers and Paul VI established to carry out the reform, went way beyond its mandate and did far more than merely implement the very few changes that the Council Fathers wanted.

Local languages and ICEL

The Holy See also made it the duty and task of the bishops' conferences to prepare vernacular translations. A committee of "experts" was therefore assembled from all parts of the English-speaking world. It was given the task by the participating conferences of bishops to prepare a translation of the Latin liturgical texts. Thus ICEL (International Commission of English in the Liturgy) was born, October 17, 1963, as an unincorporated association of bishops. In 1967, ICEL was incorporated in Canada. The founding bishops represented the conferences of Australia, Canada, England and Wales, India, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland, South Africa, and the United States. In 1967, the Philippines joined as a full member. Fifteen other conferences have since joined as "associate members": the Antilles, Bangladesh, Cepac (Fiji Islands, Raratonga, Samoa and Tokelan, Tonga), Gambia, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Kenya, Malaysia, Singapore, Malawi, Nigeria, Papua New Guinea and the Solomons, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Ug anda, Zambia, Zimbabwe. The member conferences appoint a bishop representative to ICEL's episcopal board.

According to ICEL's financial reports in 1995, ICEL revenues were $767,976 of which $601,477 came from royalties for the copyrighted translations they prepared; $155,427 came from an assessment of participating conferences of bishops. It seems that each time something published with ICEL translations is purchased, ICEL gets a taste. No wonder they put out so many editions.

Pope John Paul II 

Our present Pope has been teaching about evangelization and inculturation for years. Few have heeded him. In 1988, for the 25th anniversary of Sacrosanctum Concilium, he wrote an apostolic letter concerning liturgy called Vicesiinus-quintus annus referring to translation; it said:

"20. For the work of translation, as well as for the wider implications of liturgical renewal for whole countries, each episcopal conference was required to establish a national commission and ensure the collaboration of experts in the various sectors of liturgical science and pastoral practice. The time has come to evaluate this commission, its past activity, both the positive and negative aspects, and the guidelines and the help which it has received from the episcopal conference regarding its composition and activity" (emphasis added).

In 1993 he also wrote:

"One of your responsibilities in this regard is to make available exact and appropriate translations of the official liturgical books so that, following the required review and confirmation by the Holy See, they may be an instrument and guarantee of a genuine sharing in the mystery of Christ and the Church: lex orandi, lex credendi. The arduous task of translation must guard the full doctrinal integrity and, according to the genius of each language, the beauty of the original texts. (Ad limina address to the bishops of California, Nevada, and Hawaii, L'Osservatore Romano, Dec. 15/93).

Note that these were American bishops and that the Pope seemed to think that people weren't getting what they needed.

A list of corrections

On September 20, 1997, Cardinal Estevez, Prefect of the CDW, wrote a blistering letter to Cleveland's Bishop Anthony Pilla, then president of the NCCB. That letter rejected the poor translation of the critically important Rites of Ordination of bishops, priests, and deacons that had been offered to Rome for approval. The new Latin ritual had come out in 1990. It took ICEL six years to translate it. It was approved by the NCCB's Administrative Committee in March 1996 and submitted to the Holy See. The letter sent by the CDW said that the translation was in many places inaccurate and unlovely, and constituted a theological departure from the Roman tradition. It came with the now famous list of corrections "not to be considered exhaustive."

On October 26, 1999, the same Prefect wrote to His Excellency Maurice Taylor, Bishop of Galloway (Scotland) and then chairman of ICEL, thrashing ICEL in the finest Roman fashion over inaccurate translation issues. Central to that letter was, again, the 1990 Latin of the editio typica altera of the Rites of Ordination. The Cardinal said that ICEL "in its present form is not in a position to render to the bishops, to the Holy See, and the English-speaking faithful an adequate level of service."

Poor Bishop Taylor received another letter dated January 14, 2000, from Archbishop Francesco Pio Tamburrino, Secretary of the CDW. ICEL was directed to cease publication and distribution of its controversial translation of the Psalms because the text was "doctrinally flawed."

ICEL fights back

In March and April of 2000, there was an exchange of letters regarding translations in the Jesuit-run publication America between Donald W. Trautman, Bishop of Erie and former chairman of the NCCB's Committee on Liturgy, and Cardinal Medina Estevez. Reacting to the CDW's requirement that ICEL cease composing original prayers for insertion into the Missal, that a nihil obstat be obtained for the work of the advisory committee and secretariat staff, and that translations "accurately and fully convey the content of the original texts," Bishop Trautman essentially argued that the Holy See was really trying to demean the episcopal conferences. He argued that translations should reflect the changing nature of the way language is used in common usage, and that the bishops of the local region know better than the Holy See what prayers are needed and thus should be able to create new prayers on their own.

Cardinal Medina Estevez responded in the same publication (mirabile visu), saying that recent decisions of the CDW did not actually constitute any change of policy, that episcopal conferences had a defined role in the process of liturgical texts and so did the Holy See, that the CDW's problem was with ICEL and not with the conferences, that creation of new texts was not part of ICEL's role, that ICEL and the bishops would have wasted a great deal less time and money had they simply followed the norms for translation rather than attempt to act on their own as "an independent agent for liturgical renewal" (independent it seems from the Holy See and the Roman tradition).

So, clearly the Holy See was insisting that they wanted good translations and that they were fully prepared to deep-six any substandard work. You would have thought that the bishops would have learned their lesson from the debacle over the Rites of Ordination in 1997. Still, they submitted their translation of the 1975 edition of the Missale Romanum in 1998.

Then came the CDW's bombshell document Liturgiam authenticam (LA) establishing new norms for the translation of liturgical texts and laying down the guidelines by which translations would be approved in the future. LA has a theological foundation that serves as an important key to understanding the norms: a proper understanding of the Church and inculturation and an accurate meaning of "active participation." These norms went into force on April 25, 2001. (Editor: see C.I., July/August 2001, pp. 10-11; Nov 2001, pp. 33-34; Dec 2001, pp. 18-20).

Recent events

A tight grouping of recent events forms the immediate context of the March 16, 2002 letter of the CDW. Consider this. This new letter conveys the rejection by the Congregation of ICEL's translation of the second edition of the Latin Missale Romanum published in 1975. ICEL worked on it for 11 years and submitted its translation to Rome for review and approval in the spring of 1998. The Holy See has had it for four years. In the interim the third edition of the Latin Missal was in preparation. The Pope approved that text in April 2002.

The third edition's General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM--containing the essential rubrics and directions for how Mass is to be celebrated) was released in Latin in 2000, two years before the promulgation of the Missal itself. So the Holy See provided an opportunity to get to know the new GIRM and even prepare a good translation so that, when the new Missal came out and went into force the GIRM could be used and understood more readily. To date, there is no official translation of the new GIRM and one has to wonder why not. This is not rocket science. It's Latin.

Permit an explanatory digression: the episcopal conference in the United States, in its liturgical document Built of Living Stones, mistranslated a key passage from paragraph 299 of the new GIRM concerning the location and disposition of altars. The conference released that document on November 16, 2000.

However, nearly two months before, on September 25, 2000, the CDW had made an official response to a question posed about that very paragraph. The Congregation even explained in its official publication Notitae the proper way to understand the Latin grammar. Built of Living Stones contains precisely the error that the CDW corrected earlier. Do not even suggest that those who prepared a liturgical document for the conference of the United States of America (and not, say, Malawi) did not know that the CDW had made that response already.

New committee

Let's return to the recent backdrop for the CDW's letter. As of April 25, 2002, the Holy See has created a new committee called Vox clara (VC--from the hymn for Lauds during Advent) designed "to assist and advise (the CDW) in ensuring that the texts of the Latin liturgy are translated into English accurately and according to the norms of LA."

The Pope said in his April 20 address to the new panel and the CDW that VC must help the development of a new translation of the third edition of the Missale Romanum "as quickly as possible." In an issued statement Vox clara spoke to the "absolute need for translations. . .which are precise, theologically faithful, and effectively proclaimable."

The Congregation's complaints

With this context in mind, let us turn to the March 16, 2002, letter itself.

First, the Congregation explains that it has been patient for a long time despite the inability of ICEL to collaborate with it.

The CDW had asked ICEL to change their personnel (i.e., find new translators) and make changes to their structure, statutes, and administration so that it might possibly be salvaged and still serve a useful purpose. Now we read, "Unfortunately, however, such measures have not yet resulted. .in a fresh group of experts and administrators appropriately positioned to collaborate with the Holy See."

The CDW doesn't want to impute ill will to ICEL, but offers that perhaps it is more a matter of "an evidently insurmountable divergence as regards fundamental principles of liturgical translation." In other words, ICEL made some cosmetic changes: the same folks with the same ideology are still on tap. Hence Rome saw that ICEL and the bishops were simply going to continue along the same lines, disregard LA, and produce another errant translation of the new third edition of the Missal.

The CDW refers in its letter to reasons offered by ICEL and the bishops as to why more personnel changes had not been made; apparently ICEL told the CDW there were "contractual arrangements" that could not be broken.

It seems to me that ICEL had adequate revenue to find a few more translators and simply pay out the existing contracts. After all, what is more important, protecting their contracts and budget or obedience to the Holy See in preparation of good and useful translations (which is their raison d'etre, after all)?

Stalling

The CDW has an interesting comment on "stalling." Recall that the CDW received the proposed translation in 1998 but didn't issue its rejection letter until now. They write to the bishops that some have called this a "stalling strategy aimed at thwarting the eventual publication of a new English-language translation." I prefer to think that the CDW was trying all this time to avoid spanking anyone and was giving the parties concerned every opportunity to do their duty. Thus the CDW flatly denies a stalling tactic on their part and ripostes that further delay would have had even more negative consequences. They say in effect that while they have pretty much lost hope that ICEL can be worked with, they still imagine that some good points of the translation can be salvaged. And then they say that they have no objection were the content of their letter to be made public together with the contents of the "Observations."

That sounds to me a bit like "You can run, your excellencies, but you cannot hide." This is an ironic point, in view of the fact that the U.S. Conference seems not yet to have even distributed this letter to its members in an official way.

In my opinion, the fact that the Holy See bothered to blast the obsolete translation at all was primarily to communicate to ICEL and the bishops that things must change and they had better change now. Rome wants results now, not stalling or delays or simply a shell game of personnel. On the other hand, we can also see this mess as a symptom of a larger struggle over the role and power of episcopal conferences. The bishops want to keep as much power and control in their regions as possible. They resent Roman centralized influence and curial meddling in what they perceive to be their own turf. And they don't want a Roman Missal either. But Rome does want a Roman Missal.

Observations

The Observations offered by the CDW are extensive and blunt. The very first concerned the name of the book. ICEL called it a "Sacramentary" again, rather than Roman Missal. The CDW proceeds to explain the difference.

In the initial section (I), we learn not only that the bishops called their book the Sacramentary but "the ordering of the texts has departed almost entirely from that of the Missale Romanum, where such ordering has significant theological and catechetical implications."

They also changed the structure of the initial rites of the Mass for Sunday, Feasts, and Solemnities, excluding the Act of Contrition whenever the Gloria is used.

ICEL introduced extraneous biographical notes into the Proper of Saints, such as the claim that St. Jerome was "irascible and intolerant," calling St. Nicholas "Santa Claus," and saying that St. Pius V's excommunication of Elizabeth I of England "hardened the split between Catholics and Protestants."

While insisting that the 1994 Instruction Varietates (on inculturation in the liturgy) be adhered to closely, the CDW points out that they had already communicated to all the episcopal conferences back in 1988 that they were not to compose new texts for insertion into the Missal. Their comment then was that "the desire for constant variety, typical of many consumerist societies, not come to be regarded in itself as constituting a cultural value capable of serving as a vehicle for authentic inculturation." And while praising the character of Roman collects, the CDW contrasts their sobriety and transcendence with the "superficial" and "mass-produced" character of ICEL's original compositions.

About the collects and their structure, the Congregation observes that "relative clauses often disappear" and that "this loss is detrimental not only to the unity of the structure, but to the manner of conveying the proper sense of the posture before God of the Christian people." This structure of the Latin collect with its relative clause (Deus, qui...) makes an acknowledgment of who God is and who we are, while the independent clause style used nearly exclusively by ICEL explains "about God to God". "The quality of supplication," says the Observations, "is also adversely affected so that many of the texts now appear to say to God rather abruptly: "You did a; now do b."

One of the bones of contention for a long time has been inclusive language. (Editor: Catholic Insight has covered this in past issues and it will be omitted here except for one point: the CDW doesn't like the Church referred to as "it" instead of the proper "she.")

CDW takes ICEL to task for changing terminology as well. A "collect" is a "collect" and not just an "Opening Prayer." "Prayer over the gifts" is not adequate for a super oblata, suggesting that "Prayer over the offerings" would be more accurate. "Opening Song" does not translate "Cantus ad introitum." And, speaking of the "p" word, the CDW notes that in 1997 (a year before this translation was sent in) the Holy See had made it clear that the word "priest" rather than "presbyter" is to be used. They mean different things. And while ICEL avoids the word "priest," it also consistently avoids the word "saint," so on October 6 we would be celebrating "Bruno, presbyter, hermit, religious founder."

By shunning the very concepts in the rich Latin vocabulary such as quaesumus, exoramus, imploramus, praesta (all praying and begging words used to express our attitude before our Creator), ICEL's choices wind up being "monotonous and impoverished with respect to the Latin" and make ICEL's prayers "abrupt and presumptuous, so that the oration seems to be a command rather than a prayer." Their language "often lapses into sentimentality and emotionality in place of the noble simplicity of Latin." ICEL also shifts focus away from the transcendent to the interior dispositions of those who pray.

For patena, calix (paten, chalice) etc., the translators avoid the use of specifically sacral terminology, and use words commonly employed in the vernacular for kitchenware. How many times, dear readers, have we been subjected to the banal "this is the cup of my Blood" and the "minister of the cup"?

Liturgical roles

Liturgical roles are given their own section in the critiques. Remember that in August 1997 (before this translation was submitted) eight dicasteries of the Holy See signed onto a document called On Certain questions regarding the collaboration of the non-ordained faithful in the Sacred ministry of the priest, trying to correct the acid corrosion of the distinction of roles in the Church, especially in the liturgy (and thus belief and practice). Now the CDW notes that the bishops and ICEL had made changes that violated the distinction of liturgical roles. One of the most glaring was in the Chrism Mass of Holy Thursday, one of the most important moments underscoring the meaning and unity of the body of priests with the bishop. ICEL and the bishops inserted into the rubrics that laypersons exercising various ministries could take their place with the bishop during Mass. And if that were not bad enough, we find in the "Observations":

"In the Order of Mass, where the Latin rubric reads, 'Tunc sacerdos incipit Precem eucharisticum,' the translators have altered it to read instead, 'The priest leads the assembly in the eucharistic prayer.' Such an alteration--for it cannot be termed a translation--obscures the true nature of the Eucharistic Prayer as a priestly prayer, in which the people participate by listening silently and reverently and by making the acclamations prescribed by the rite."

I scratched the surface of the "Observations" here which CDW itself says, "are not intended to be exhaustive, even in a generic sense."

Summation

My summation of the situation is this. Again and again the Holy See has issued norms and instructions. Again and again they have been ignored. Rome says X and the bishops and ICEL do f and q. Rome says, "please do x" and they continue to do f and q with b thrown in for good measure. As the Holy Father said in his opening address to Vox clara, "since the lex orandi conforms to the lex credendi, fidelity to the rites and texts of the Liturgy is of paramount importance for the Church and the Christian life."

Change the rites and you change, over time, what people believe. Reciprocally, when you see new rites being made out of whole cloth it is legitimate to wonder if the people who made them believe what the Church has always taught. Again and again the translations that we have been given or that have been proposed have stripped the rites of their explicit sacral content and have sought to distinguish those who pray from the Roman Church at least; and also, as some of the language suggests, even from those who prayed through the Church's rites in the past. It appears that those preparing the translation of the second edition of 1975 were consciously attempting to shape and form a new Church, one that was not Roman and one that lived in the here and now without reference to the past.

While in Rome at the time of the last Synod of Bishops that met to discuss the nature and role of the episcopate, I heard much lamenting from some that mean-old-Rome was too centralized and the Curia was trying to diminish the importance of the bishops. On the other hand, some members of the Curia, including one Cardinal I conversed with about that complaint, opined that they didn't want to get involved at all and, were the bishops to do their jobs, the Curia would not have to step in as it does. In such a standoff and breakdown of communication and comprehension of the complementary nature of the two groups, I think it is a very good thing indeed that the CDW's letter now be public knowledge.

What we are seeing here is part of a larger war being fought over the very unity and identity of the Church. There are many battlefields in this struggle. Some are the fields of doctrine, some of discipline. Some are issues of morals and some of faith. Some are about the nature of local churches and about the way bishops interrelate, and some concern the function and place of the Petrine ministry and Curia.

They all, however, come together in the liturgy. It looks as if the tide of battle has, for the time being, turned in favour of the faithful.