Translated From The Latin

The bishops are at it again. In response to the ballooning sex abuse scandal, they found a solution in asking us to bow when we receive the Eucharist. Parishioners being what they are, there's precious little bobbing and weaving at the front of the altar. Now, you'd think Their Eminences would have noticed that their bowing business sank like a large stone, but no, they've gone off on another tack to make the Mass more relevant.

You see, there was a time when everything was in Latin, a time I scarcely remember and so don't actually miss. Although I am fond of the occasional Gregorian chant in a dead language, but it's the harmony and not the words that do it. Our leaders are old men who know their Latin, however, and they are concerned that the faithful aren't getting the full benefit of the Mass because the translations were too folksy - too much geared towards common speech. With fewer and fewer Catholics attending Mass, it's time to steer the unwieldly ship of faith back to the origins.

No, not all the way back to Aramaic. Just far enough to get on the other side of Vatican II and all those radical changes that the dinosaurs are itching to reverse. Make the English version of the Mass more true to a literal translation, and people will flock to Church come Sunday.

Most of the changes are minor, a slight tweak of a phrase and it's pretty much the same as ever. But, Your Eminences, when someone comes to the house, I think in terms of receiving guests. Maybe if I was Middle Eastern, I might be prone to having people enter under my roof. Here in the Western World, we don't talk like that, entering under roofs. "Howya, Roddy, glad to have you enter under my roof, lad and we'll share a jar." Oh yes, that makes the prayers ever so much more relevant.

If all the changes go through, at least the priest will have a subject for his weekly sermon for the next month. What in the name of Jesus is 'consubstantial'? In the Nicene Creed, I get what we are saying when we avow that we are 'one in being' with the Father. Now we're supposed to get a big word like consubstantial out of our mouths at half seven on a Sunday morning? And understand what we're saying we believe in?

"No time to talk about today's Gospel, parishioners. I've got a very interesting PowerPoint presentation on the words that have been stuck in so that our prayers don't sound the least bit Protestant at all, at all."

You can't get the people to sing the hymns, and now they won't be responding to the prayers either. Might as well listen to the whole thing on the radio and skip the trip to the church altogether.