(CNN) – The Roman Catholic Mass is undergoing a major overhaul. In an effort to unify how the global church prays, the English translation of the church’s worship service is being modified in order to more accurately reflect the Latin from which the Roman Missal is translated.
The Catholic Church is known by some as a bastion of permanence that has not often yielded to the forces of change in the modern era. In many ways the changes harken back to the Mass spoken in Latin, as it was in the United States prior to the 1960s.
“There is an Italian proverb,” said the Rev. Msgr. Kevin W. Irwin, a professor of liturgical studies at the Catholic University of America, “that ‘every translator is a traitor.’ “
“Every translation is less than the original,” he said.
The liturgical changes are “all within the responses and the language of the Mass. In the grand scheme of things, they’re fairly minor,” said Mary DeTurris Poust, whose book The Essential Guide to Catholic Prayer and the Mass, on the subject came out in March.
“It will be a great chance to think about what the prayers mean again,” said Theresa Leyva, a choir member at St. John Neumann Parish in Gaithersburg, Md., as she browsed the new translation of the missal at a book store.
“I’m sure the first few weeks, it’ll be a little rough, but we’ll slip into it,” said Sara Hulse, a student at Catholic University from Milford, N.J., on her way to Mass.
Experts acknowledge mixed reactions to the changes in the mass amongst members of a Catholic Church unaccustomed to change.
The alterations in language are drastic enough that for longtime Catholics “it will be a big change to have to use a sheet of paper or a worship aid to say prayers,” said DeTurris Poust.
Some of the changes include, instead of responding, “And also with you,” to the priest when he says, “The Lord be with you,” Catholics will now respond with, “And with your Spirit.”
During the penitential act, where Catholics once said, “I confess to almighty God and to you my brothers and sisters, that I have sinned through my own fault,” they will now say, “that I have greatly sinned.”
In the Nicene Creed, where once Catholics said that God is the “Maker…of all that is seen and unseen,” they will now say God makes “all things visible and invisible.”
And in that same prayer, where Jesus was once “Begotten, not made, one in being with the Father,” He is now, “begotten, not made, con-substantial with the Father.”
