Currents News Staff
Over time, changes have been made within the Catholic Church to the Mass and various prayers, but a Vatican official has clarified that is not currently happening to the ‘Our Father’ in English.
Rumors that the ‘Our Father’ is changing are true, but only for Italians.
The English version will stay exactly the same, for now. Archbishop Arthur Roche, the Secretary for the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, asserts it was not Pope Francis who pushed for this change, but the Italian Episcopal conference.
“No, the pope isn’t changing the ‘Our Father’?” he asked. “How could he change what is in Scripture?”
“You see,” he explained, “the most fundamental text for liturgical translations is the
Bible. Because the prayers of the Mass are mainly taken from the Scriptures. So the texts of the Mass have to correspond to the Bible.”
Archbishop Roche acknowledged that each Episcopal conference around the world has a responsibility to make all liturgical texts coincide with the Bible translation in their native tongue.
This change is taking place now because the Italian Episcopal conference is remaking their
Roman Missal.
The entire process has taken them over 10 years to complete.
Archbishop Roche said the phrase “and lead us not into temptation” is the one to be replaced.
“Because it says in the Italian text, ‘not to abandon us into temptation,’ That is why the
Italian bishops have chosen to use that phrase,” he explained.
The expected publication date for the Italian Roman Missal is Advent 2019. Once published,
this is when the change for the ‘Our Father’ will officially take place in all Italian Masses.
Archbishop Roche insisted that each translation and prayer should adhere to the vernacular of the country.
In the past, New Zealand even had a different ‘Our Father’ than that in the United States.
But now, he said all English speakers have the same prayer, and that is not going to change anytime soon.