French-speaking Catholics are about to face the same aggravation that overtook their English-speaking co-religionists at the end of 2011. That is when the new English translation of the rite of Mass was imposed in place of the translation that had been in use for 40 years. That translation was by no means perfect, but its language patterns were closer to those used in ordinary speech. The new English version tried too hard to represent the exact meaning of the Latin text of which it was a translation, and the same criticism is being made of the new French version. The clumsy term “consubstantial”, reintroduced into the Creed in both cases, is not really a translation at all but an archaic Latinism rooted in Greek philosophy.

The new English text has now settled down. Its imperfections are still apparent though familiarity has made it easier to swallow them. Yet the English-speaking Catholic world’s unhappy experience, which French speakers are about to replicate, has taught the authorities in Rome nothing.