AYMOND LEO CARDINAL BURKE, Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, is one of the world’s most respected Catholic bishops. Please click on the upper right corner to watch a 2012 interview wherein he speaks about the new translation of the Roman Missal.
THE INTERVIEW IS STUPENDOUS. Everyone ought to watch it. It’s only three minutes long.
His Eminence makes several noteworthy statements, which I won’t type out here (since you can simply watch the video). However, I will comment briefly on just one remark he made. Comparing the previous translation to the new, more accurate translation, Cardinal Burke said:
[We no longer have] this almost juvenile kind of language where . . . you know . . . we say, “God is good. Let us be good. Amen.” The whole richness of the faith is more fully expressed in these prayers . . .
OK, so Cardinal Burke is overstating the case? Right?
Absolutely not! Take, for example, last Sunday’s Prayer over the Offerings (11th Sunday in Ordinary Time):
Official Latin Version
Deus, qui humáni géneris utrámque substántiam
præséntium múnerum
et aliménto végetas et rénovas sacraménto,
tríbue, quaésumus, ut eórum
et corpóribus nostris subsídium non desit et méntibus.
Per Christum Dóminum nostrum.
Previous Translation
Lord God, in this bread and wine you give us food for body and spirit.
May the eucharist renew our strength and bring us health of mind and body.
We ask this in the name of Jesus the Lord.
New Translation
O God, who in the offerings presented here
provide for the twofold needs of human nature,
nourishing us with food
and renewing us with your Sacrament,
grant, we pray,
that the sustenance they provide may not fail us in body or in spirit.
Through Christ our Lord.
What more is there to be said?
P.S.
The Campion Missal uses the beautiful translations praised by Cardinal Burke.
