www.byzcath.org Forums Mysteries: The Life of Worship Vespers, Matins & the Divine Liturgy The Revised Divine Liturgy WHY THE SILENCE?

John,

You miss the whole point.... The Church either follows the culture or leads the culture. You have just made a case for surrendering the culture.

You also keep skipping the point that the Council of Hierarchs dropped a word form the Creed....

Do I know what is in the heart of secular feminists? Heavens, no. I only know what they say they want to do. Do some reading [adoremus.org].

Was English a non-Christian language before the King James Bible? It certainly was less Christian, and people had less words from the Holy Scriptures on their lips and in their minds. Do a search on "influence of king james bible on English" and you'll come up with a lot of stuff to read. One article started with: "To put words in his mouth. To see the writing on the wall. The salt of the earth. All are familiar phrases. They also have something else in common: They can be found in the Bible, specifically the King James version. There are many more sayings that have become part of everyday English whose origins can be traced to the King James Bible, and the adages are just one example of the extraordinary influence the King James has had on the English language." The KJV influenced not only the way people speak but the way they think and understand. Whole concepts that are Christian became normative for society, concepts that some are attempting to erase.

What benefit does it serve to embrace and adopt the changes forced upon us by the secular feminists? Why not lead the way by educating? You obvious reject the Vatican directive Liturgiam Authenticam. Can you give us a sound theology of why you reject it? So far you've only offered "the word is going that way and we must go with the world".

It's been discussed here at great length, but you might read What's Wrong with Gender-Neutral Bible Translations [cbmw.org] and how the forced changes negatively impact the Church, and its ability to transmit correct doctrine.

John

Can you give an example of this from their text book?

And yet you approve of it. Hmmm.

So Stuart, in your opinion, are those parents who send their children to public schools failing as parents, especially in the area of education?

John--why does it have to be either/or? The church has both led and followed society and culture over time, and it's still here. I think that the church needs to be keenly aware of the society and culture in which it lives and operates, in order to be able to speak to that particular culture. And yes, that can mean conforming in some ways to a particular culture.

I don't see any evil plot in replacing words like man or mankind where they are meant to be inclusive of all people with humanity, etc. I know there are groups that have agendas to over throw patriarchal imagery and even maleness in general, but there are groups in the church with agendas as well, some who wish it to be 1962 or 1563 again. In my opinion, neither are good. And I don't agree that it's only secular feminists foisting this on anyone. It's the way the language is moving. So I'll ask again, how is it anti-Christian to use "humankind, humanity, mortal(s), person, people," in place of "mankind, men, or man" where it means all humanity and not just males?


Yes--the bishops, with Rome's approval, dropped a word in the Creed in the RDL, but I don't think that it changed the meaning of that Creed. I wish that they had used a different word for "men" rather than dropping the word altogether. But I think that the meaning is still clear.
I don't think that people are stupid enough to think that if they say "for us and for our salvation" that it means only "us" that are in the church building now, or for Catholics only, etc. If that's they case, then one can present the argument that they can think that saying "for us men and for our salvation" only means males or just the males that are at the service now, etc. We could go on ad nauseum.

One of the good things that the Reformation did was to put Scripture into the language that the people could hear and understand and use. I will agree with you there, but I don't think that it Christianized the language, it just gave the Scriptures back to the people. It took much longer for that to happen for Catholics.

LA wants good literal translations--if that can ever be done, it a tall order. Yet the words that it is guiding those who translate are many and varied, and it's very up to those translators to decide which to use. That is where the church has to regard the culture. I think that we're going to have to agree to disagree.

You think everything taught in public schools is bad Stuart?

What class and what topic Bob?

I'm not Stuart, but I think the answer is "it depends". In some place public schools teach values abhorrent to Christians. If, for example, your public school teaches acceptance of homosexuality (and some public schools use texts like "Heather has Two Mommies" and "King and King" in the elementary grades) and you allow it then, yes, you are failing as a parent. That would be one egregious example. Of course, it could be simply that one's local public school can't manage to teach students basic math and reading (Washington, DC schools continue to graduate kids who cannot manage basic reading and writing despite one of the highest spending per student in the country). If you are a parent in such a school and have the resources to send your children elsewhere but don't, then you are a failing parent. Unfortunately many parents in such areas are too poor to pay for private education. Doing all you can possibly do is not failure. [I always remember the one lady from SE Washington, DC interviewed in support of school choice. She said she was a Baptist who sent her kids to Catholic schools not because she wanted them to become Catholic because she wanted them to learn to read and write.]

Read the Links I gave. Read Liturgiam Authenticam. Thre is plenty of documentation to demonstrate that many of the changes you embrace are not naturally occurring but driven by secular feminist politics. Your decision not to accept evidence does not make the evidence less true.

BTW, in Standard English terms like "man" and "mankind" apply to all men from Adam and Eve to the last child conceived before the Second Coming.

And consider the slippery slope. Many of terms are not meant to be inclusive but to remove differences between men and women. Again, read the links.

And again, the RDL doesn't replace "man" with anything in the Creed. It simply drops the word entirely.

Two kids through both private and public schools. Sister who is an active teacher in NYC public schools, father a retired principal in NYC public schools. My observation? Pretty much, yes. And remember, my kids went to what is advertised as "the Best Public High School in America".

Many have no choice (which, I guess, is the point). The system is rigged so that those of modest means have to send their children to public schools, regardless of whether the instruction is good, bad or indifferent. It may just be a coincidence that a very high proportion of public school teachers in places like New York City, Washington, DC and Los Angeles, CA send their kids to private schools. It may just be a coincidence that the children of the President of the United States and the grandchildren of the Vice President of the United States, and almost all the children and grandchildren of the 535 Congressmen and Senators all go to private schools--to say nothing of the children of the upper and upper-middle class. But the middle and lower classes need not apply--to public schools you go. A growing number of brave souls are home schooling, and the results they generate seem much superior to public schools as well.

In the ideal world, there would be free and open competition in primary and secondary education, as there is in higher education. Money would be attached to students, not to specific school systems, and parents could use that to send their kids to the school that best suits their needs. Until that time, the public education monopoly, upheld by the iron triangle of teachers unions, the politicians beholden to the unions, and the ed schools, will ensure that even institutionalized mediocrity remains beyond their capabilities. For, as Albert Shanker famously noted, "When students pay union dues, then I'll represent the interests of students".

By the way, I'm a product of the New York City Public Schools myself. The rot was already setting in when I departed, circa 1972.

Again John--I know that the RDL doesn't replace "men" (not "man" BTW) with anything, but simply omits it. Did you read what I wrote? I'll paste it here in case you didn't.

"Yes--the bishops, with Rome's approval, dropped a word in the Creed in the RDL, but I don't think that it changed the meaning of that Creed. I wish that they had used a different word for "men" rather than dropping the word altogether. But I think that the meaning is still clear.
I don't think that people are stupid enough to think that if they say "for us and for our salvation" that it means only "us" that are in the church building now, or for Catholics only, etc. If that's they case, then one can present the argument that they can think that saying "for us men and for our salvation" only means males or just the males that are at the service now, etc. We could go on ad nauseum."

All these conspiracy theories, it's beginning to sound like the DaVinci Code in here. Yes, there are liberal women who wish to promote their agenda of male=bad and patriarchy=oppression. Frankly John, most of them don't give a fig about the church. Some may even be in the church or on the fringes. It doesn't matter much to me if they are. They have a place in the church just as much as you or Bishop Andrew or any other Catholic does. BTW, I've read Ms. Hitchcock's 1995 article in your link before. I wouldn't consider the Adoremus Bulletin, the pinnacle of linguistic scholarship however, and they too have their own agenda. The CBMW, is this an Evangelical organization? I've never heard of them before. Their core beliefs are interesting. CBMW Core Beliefs [cbmw.org]

I'll ask again, what is the Standard English that you refer to? What are it's rules? And who gets to decide what it is and where it is used?

And finally, I'll ask you John, for the third time: how is it anti-Christian to use "humankind, humanity, mortal(s), person, people," in place of "mankind, men, or man" where it means all humanity and not just males?

I await your responses.

And that is an example of "dynamic equivalence" translation. "For us and for our salvation" is not the same as "For us men and for our salvation". The translator has departed from the original text in order to impose his understanding of the text upon us. Liturgical translation requires a word-for-word approach. Omitting something substantive, as is done in the RDL, not only alters the meaning, but is done for a reason, that reason being, in this case, to avoid the offensive word "men".

As I said, it's a third rate translation by a bunch of third rate academic wannabees.

As for the rest of your response, it's pretty clear you don't travel much in academic circles, or none of this would seem at all unusual to you.

Well, no. There are plenty of people in the Catholic Church who are uneducated and believe that Christ became man only for Catholics. Incorrect texts transmit incomplete and / incorrect doctrine. Making the language less precise and potentially exclusive by dropping "man" (which was ruled "theologically grave") makes the task more difficult.

Well, the Vatican does not consider the issue to be one of the DeVinci Code. Hence directives like Liturgiam Authenticam. I suppose you consider Pope John Paul II a conspiracist?

CBMA is an Evangelical Christian organization. Wayne Grudem's review of the NRSV has been praised by many Catholics. Further, the NRSV is the only Bible to have an approval withdrawn for liturgical use once issued (after the Vatican reviewed it, with reasons that include many of those given in Mr. Gudem's article). True, we as Catholics will not agree with everything in their Core Beliefs (they are Protestant). But a good deal of what you see there can be found in Pope John Paul's Mulieris Dignitatem [vatican.va] (On the Dignity and Vocation of Women) (although JPII takes it much farther and is loads better).

Standard English is the normative form of English for writing and speaking. It includes grammar, vocabulary and spelling and (to a lesser extent) pronunciation. I learned about it in elementary and high school. There are lots of resources, including writing guides like Fowler's "Modern English Usage" (they are also called "style guides", "writing guides" and "style manuals").

You are, of course, free to reject Ms. Hitchcock's work. But good men like Cardinal Arinzo (retired head of the Congregation of Divine Worship) has spoken highly of her work. He certainly didn't consider her to be a conspiracist. And there are plenty of others who have spoken to the same problems from within the Church (which is why ICEL was gutted and reformed by JPII). Besides, you don't need to be a conspiracist to see that there are those out to change the language to support their politics. Watch most news casts long enough and you fill find we are labeled as "anti-choice" and "anti-abortion" rather then "pro-life" while those who support the murder of the innocents are labeled as "pro-choice". You simply cannot claim that the whole thing is innocent and naturally developing. The evidence shows it is not. He who controls the language controls much. Using "pro-choice" sends a message that abortion is not a moral issue but really about choice. [Look no further then some of the discussions here where I've been chided for being wrong for referring to the 'forces of death' and 'pro-death' in discussing abortion and euthanasia - when in fact all I have done was to use language I garnered from the Holy Father! What does that say?] When society buys into that and frames the debate about choice rather then life and death it is difficult to win back the argument (and they do teach stuff like this in our public schools).

Standard English has "mankind, men and man" all referring to every man born from Adam and Eve forward. I oppose the forced change to drop these terms because those doing it do so in an attempt make the English language gender neutral because their 'theology' is one where men and women are not just equal (as the Church teaches) but identical (sameness). And the evidence shows the change is forced. [And it further shows that the same thing is not happening in languages with similar equivalents of terms like "men" where there is no political push to do so.] So I oppose the changes because they are not natural developing, and the facts show it.

BTW, listen to Ambassador Hillary Clinton next time she speaks. During last year's campaign whenever she read a speech (or prepared remarks) they were written in that politically correct style. But when she spoke "off the cuff" she reverted to Standard English (man, mankind, etc. - inclusive terms for all men from Adam and Eve forward). The agenda all so forced and unnatural. I'm sorry you are unable to see it.

And others (including Rome) will tell you about the various shades of meaning that can be transmitted with the phrase "who for us men and our salvation He became man" that simply does not get transmitted when you either leave out the term "man" or change it to "human", "humankind" or "humanity".

Yes, we will agree to disagree.

.......theologically grave.

theologically = adverb
grave = adjective

What does "theologically grav"e mean?? Isn't there supposed to be a noun there somewhere. Pronounced by an expert in the English language?? I don't think so, and neither would any English teacher.

I own a grave but there is nothing theological about it.