Mind your language
MY friend and fellow lady columnist, Jennifer Paterson, once pointed out to me that most cookery writers spend their time copying out each other's recipes.
So here are some ideas from Eamon Duffy's essay in a new book about litur- gy called Beyond the Prosaic, published by T&T Clark. (My husband watching me upside down reading it on the kitchen table mistook it for yet another book on Prozac.) In it Dr Duffy com- pares a few translations of Collects in the old Roman Missal made by Cran- mer, with those made by the cloth- eared translators of the 1973 English version of the Catholic Missal and by the revisers of that Missal, whose work is to be unveiled at the millennium.
Here is Cranmer's version for what we now call the 11th Sunday in Ordi- nary Time: 0 God, the strength of all them that put their trust in thee, mercifully accept our prayers; and because through the weak- ness of our mortal nature we can do no good thing without thee, grant us the help of thy grace, that in keeping of thy commandments we may please thee, both in will and deed; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
This Dr Duffy regards as a pretty good rendering of the Latin original:
Deus in te sperantium fortitude, invoca- tionibus nostris adesto propitius, et, quia sine te nihil potest mortalis infirmitas, gratiae tua praesta semper auxilium, ut, in exsequendis mandatis tuis, et volun- tate tibi et actione placeamus.
The 1973 version almost beggars belief:
Almighty God, our hope and our strength, without you we falter. Help us to follow Christ and to live according to your will.
Moreover, the translation contains a Pelagian presupposition — that all we need from God is a bit of a helping hand. The draft of the millennial sacra- mentary is more promising.
0 God, the strength of all who hope in you, accept our earnest prayer. And since without you we are weak and cer- tain to fall, grant us always the help of your grace, that in following your com- mands we may please you in desire and deed.
This seems a welcome glint of light on the horizon; but I understand that alternative prayers will be available that may displace these Collects entirely. Pass the Prozac, dearest.
Dot Wordsworth
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