It is so Important to Use the Correct Words
Being a language teacher, I am very interested in words and how they are used. I read a sad story on The Guardian website about thousands of Catholic baptisms which were invalidated because the priest used the wrong word when performing the baptism ceremony.
Father Andres Arango resigned from the St. Gregory parish church in Phoenix this month after diocese leaders discovered he had for years mistakenly used the phrase "We baptize you" instead of "I baptize you". I'm not Catholic, so I didn't know this, but maybe the people in his church didn't either. The article states that baptism is an irrevocable requirement for salvation in Catholic theology. An invalid baptism invalidates any subsequent sacraments, especially confirmation, marriage, and holy orders. His error means that countless baptisms will have to be performed again and some in his parish will find that their marriages are not recognized. The priest regrets his error and asks forgiveness, while the Bishop of Phoenix asks churchgoers to pray for the priest and all those impacted by the unfortunate situation. The Vatican affirms that using the word "We" in place of the word "I" invalidates the ceremony.
Father Arango was born in Brazil, became a priest in 1995, and moved to the US in 2001, so I am assuming English is not his first language. Some of my vocabulary lessons include what I call "confused words", such as affect-effect, assure-ensure-insure, complement-compliment, loose-lose, etc. Although I hope that my students will learn and use the correct word, if they don't, the mistake is minor compared to Father Arango's mistake.
7 comments:
OMG, I could not believe this when I read it. I acknowledge that I am a former Catholic who left the Church when the news broke everywhere of priests molesting boys. I had always felt uneasy with a relationship our parrish priest tried to build with my grandson...then a 2nd grader at our church school. Years later he was named as one of the guilty ones.
Now the "Church" proclaims sacraments null and void over just ONE word. How could you expect anything else from the archaic church leadership. Luckily we are LEGALLY married, lol. You would think that since the Church loses participants in droves it would make an allowance. Enough of my rant.
My grandson is married to a woman of Cuban heritage who misspeaks several words. I find it charming and always understand her intent and never ever correct her.
xx, Carol
Another pair of words I have seen confused in recent times is then-than. I would not have thought a native English speaker would get those two mixed up, but it seems that people do.
As for the priest's "wrong" word invalidating even subsequent sacraments, that is just bizarre to me.
I wonder what God thinks when he reads this article. Hasn't man made too many complicated rules about how to live with God, in the name of religion?
Who does 'I' and 'we' refer to? I = the priest? we = the priest and God? or the priest and the church?
I read that using 'we' instead of 'I' proves you are a good boss and includes himself/herself with the staff, e.g. we should do our best
I also read that people who use 'we' instead of 'I' often are lying to remove some of the guilt, e.g. we didn't steal it!
Then there is the 'royal we', e.g. 'We are not amused' said by Queen Victoria.
The origin of this royal pronoun' is said to trace back to 1169 when the English king Henry II used it to mean 'God and I'.
So we are back to the article in the Guardian again. If I have understood it correctly, the exact wording is:
I baptise you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Therefore 'I' would refer to the priest and not the priest and God.
We humans make things so complicated. Why not just be, live and get on with life?
Many students might misunderstand languages are just a tool for communication. But they learn deeper and gradually realize that it has cultural backgrounds. Languages and the culture in which they have been used are indivisible.
That's really sad -- and to me a minor error in language when there could be so many more really serious things to worry about in the church. Language fascinates me and how they differ -- the various pronouns, etc. I'm always confused in French on how cat is female, even if it's male, so you use the female pronoun -- and even for furniture and rivers!
I had not read this - very sad for those involved. I do love words too and pronunciation of similar words in different languages can be confusing too. xx
That is so weird the Church will make such a big deal out of the use of one word! I hope none of the kids he baptized became a priest himself, or there will be a whole new level of confusion.
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