A Sound of Sheer Silence

It's kind of amazing to find someone whom you disagree about everything , but Fr. Dwight Longenecker is coming rather close to that point for me.   His recent post on Crux is less offensive than other things he has written , but I wanted to write about it because it hits a very specific pet peeve of mine.  Here, Longenecker defends the "new" translation of the Catholic Mass that was imposed on the English speaking world five years ago. I should say two things before I get to the meat of my objection.  First, Longenecker doesn't really defend the idea that the new translation is good because it is more like the Latin original, except for a throw away line about "accuracy and doctrinal faithfulness."  That's another rant, and I would encourage you to check out Questions from a Ewe's blog where she breaks down the supposed "accuracy" of the new translation .  The second point is that Longenecker suggests that this recent translation is what...

I was very fortunate in high school to have, in my junior and senior years, two wonderful English teachers.  They introduced me to Shakespeare, and Donne, and Faulkner, and Tennyson.  And T.S. Eliot.  Especially T.S. Eliot. Something about Eliot got its hooks into me, and never let go.  It was so complex, like a vast puzzle, but there was something simple and real and profound underneath all of the allusions and references.  I wrote my senior English paper on Eliot's "Four Quartets."  I have no idea what I said in that paper, but it was probably something stupid--who knows anything as a 17 year old?  Nevertheless, I tried. For Ash Wednesday today, I reread Eliot's "Ash Wednesday."  I was struck by this section at the end of Part I: And pray to God to have mercy upon us And pray that I may forget These matters that with myself I too much discuss Too much explain Because I do not hope to turn again Let these words answer For what is don...