I see in the comments to a recent post a short conversation about children's liturgies. As it happens, we've recently restarted a Liturgy of the Word for Children (LWC) at our parish that had gone dormant during COVID. There is a special Lectionary for LWC; it strikes me as considerably easier to understand than what we use in church.
LWC is one of those programs in which adult volunteers call the children forward after the Opening Prayer at mass; after receiving a blessing of exhoration ("Children, listen carefully...") from the presider, the volunteers and kids march out to a separate room on campus, where they have their own, separate celebration of the Liturgy of the Word. Then they come back (somewhat) quietly to their parents and families during the singing of the song for Preparation of Gifts.LWC was up and running when we joined the parish as a not-yet-parents young married couple in the early 1990s. All through our children's years growing up, it ran weekly at one of our Sunday morning masses (in fact, it ran at two of the masses for a time). So I had seen the children leaving and coming back many times, but I had never previously been involved nor actually witnessed one of these sessions.
You may know that the Catholic church has a special edition of the Lectionary (the book of readings for mass) with a different biblical translation than that used in "regular mass" for adults (and others). The "regular" Lectionary uses 20th-century editions of the New American Bible (NAB) translation for the Old Testament and the New American Bible Revised Edition (NABRE) for the New Testament.
The Lectionary for children uses a completely different translation: the Contemporary English Version (CEV) translation. According to my friend Google Gemini, the CEV is an ecumenical Protestant initiative. The commission that produced the CEV also produced a Catholic edition that includes the so-called Deuterocanonical books (or, as Protestants traditionally refer to them, Apocrypha) such as Judith and Wisdom. The CEV was intentionally written to be accessible to the "common person"; its language was geared to a fifth-grade level.
I thought it might be of interest to present some side-by-side comparisons of the two editions. We did our inaugural (or reboot of the) LWC on September 12th, a couple of Sundays ago. That was the 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle A. The Gospel for that day is the famous "seventy times seven" passage: the parable of the king who forgives a servant for the latter's monumental debt; but the servant in turn declines to forgive his fellow servant for a much smaller debt.
NAB version ("regular Lectionary"):
the kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who decided to settle accounts with his servants.
When he began the accounting, a debtor was brought before him who owed him a huge amount. Since he had no way of paying it back, his master ordered him to be sold, along with his wife, his children, and all his property, in payment of the debt.
At that, the servant fell down, did him homage, and said, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay you back in full.’ Moved with compassion the master of that servant let him go and forgave him the loan.
CEV version ("children's Lectionary"):
One day a king decided to call his in his officials and them to give an account of what they owed him.
As he was doing this, one official was brought in who owed him fifty milllion silver coins. But he didn't have any money to pay what he owed. The king ordered him to be sold, along with his wife and children and all he owned, in order to pay the debt.
The official got down on his knees and began begging, 'Have pity on me, and I will pay you every cent I owe!' The king felt sorry for him and let him go free. He even told the official he did not have to pay back the money.
If you compare the two passages, you'll note that the children's version simplifies such terms as "debtor", "property", "homage" and "compassion". (We might also note that "servant" is replaced with "official". I am not sure that amounts to a child-friendly simplification. I understand that, from a translation perspective, "official" might more accurately convey the nuance that these servants were not poor tenant farmers, but rather high-ranking members of the king's court who may have been responsible for debt collection of an entire territory or province.)
The first reading for that day, from the Book of Sirach, provides an even starker contrast between the two translations:
|
NAB
Lectionary (“Regular version”) |
CEV
Lectionary (“Kids version”) |
|
Wrath and anger are hateful things, yet the sinner hugs them tight. The vengeful will suffer the LORD’s vengeance, for he remembers their sins in detail. Could anyone nourish anger against another and expect healing from the LORD? Could anyone refuse mercy to another like himself,can he seek pardon for his own sins? If one who is but flesh cherishes wrath, who will forgive his sins? Remember your last days, set enmity aside;remember death and decay, and cease from sin! Think of the
commandments, hate not your neighbor; remember the
Most High’s covenant, and overlook faults. |
If you stay angry with someone, don’t expect the Lord to heal you. Don’t ask God to forgive you, if you don’t have pity on others. God won’t forgive you, if you stay angry at someone. So stop holding grudges and start obeying God. Then forget
about the sins and the ignorance of others. |
(I've tried to set up the spacing in the table above so that verses that parallel each other are next to each other.)
In the "regular Lectionary", this particular passage from Sirach is not an easy read! I'd expect the lector assigned to proclaim it would be challenged; and I'd think it would be a diffficult listen, too, for people in the pews.
By contrast, the "kids Lectionary" version is pretty easily digestible.
It is this characteristic of easy apprehension that causes some priests (especially those past retirement age, who actually lived through the Second Vatican Council) to advocate for using the kids' Lectionary, even at so-called "adult masses". After comparing the readings for that Sunday - I get it!
We have never had a children's Liturgy of the Word here, even before Covid. What we did have was a children's offertory in which the kids brought up their envelopes or pocket change and put them in the basket. They seemed to enjoy doing that, and the priests seemed to enjoy greeting the kids. But that got discontinued during Covid and never got picked up again.
ReplyDeleteDuring school Masses on weekdays, the children would do the readings that were normally done by the lectors. They got up on a little step stool at the ambo and read from the normal Lectionary. Some of the children were as young as 3rd grade, but did a very good job of handling the readings. The main problem was volume, the younger ones spoke softly.
The homily was by a deacon (usually Kelly) and he geared it to a children's level. The children who attended the religious ed program rather than the day school had their own Mass on the evenings they attended.
Now the school is consolidated with the larger parish, and there isn't a school at St. Anthony's anymore as of this school year, which is a little sad. But most of the students did transfer over to the combined school..
I can see the value of the children's Lectionary, but also like the idea of exposing them to the actual Scripture.
A few years back there was a translation, "Good News for Modern Man". I don't think it was ever used in liturgy, but sometimes for study. I think it was more simplified.
DeleteEasy comprehension?
ReplyDeleteWhat I object to is the "If you do X, then God does Y" formula. It's like Protestant tithing and the prosperity gospel and "the abundant life" thinking that basically makes the whole relationship with God sound sound transactional and manipulative.
Oscar Wilde wrote at the end of his life that God doesn't care so much abt what we do along the way as what we finally become.
But, then, Oscar was a gay convert on his deathbed, and many Catholics utterly reject the sincerity of a "person like that," and until his son wrote his autobiography in the 1950s, many rejected that he had actually converted at all and that the priest was a fake.
Maybe If you never do X, then it is harder for God to Y is a better expression of the Catholic view.
But what do I know?
Jean, I agree with this -
Delete“ What I object to is the "If you do X, then God does Y" formula. It's like Protestant tithing and the prosperity gospel and "the abundant life" thinking that basically makes the whole relationship with God sound transactional and manipulative.”.
It’s one of my longstanding beefs with Catholicism - especially promoting the ideas such as those associated with Divine Mercy Sunday - go to mass, say certain prayers, etc and you will be protected from hell. Or indulgences - if you do certain things and say certain prayers then you will receive an “ indulgence “. Etc
Children’s Liturgy of the Word was launched in our parish in the early 80’s. I was one of the volunteers. The assistant priest was young, enthusiastic and related extremely well with the children 👶. He explained the readings at their level and did a great job. ( I think some were simplified but don’t remember) I know it lasted for many years after my sons were young, but I think that the current pastor ( he’s been there since e before Covid), discontinued it. Just as he discontinued the coffee and doughnuts after the most highly attended masses. He’s very conservative and seems to have no idea how to build a communal, but I don’t know for sure since I haven’t been to mass there for years. I do.know that the size of the congregation is less than half what it used to be. It’s a very 1950s parish when it comes to the extracurricular activities- just the olden time stuff - Sodality, rosary, benediction, Jeff Cavins bible study, etc. Nothing wrong with that but those who were involved there when I was involved went there for things like Children’s liturgy, the mom group that met to talk about the challenges of family, marriage and kids (with a baby sitter provided in a different room), Centering Prayer, extensive social justice work with a dozen different committees that addressed many needs ( literally hundreds of parishioners actively involved) great adult ed programs with teachers imported from the local seminaries, Georgetown, CU etc. , The parish was alive. Now it seems on life support.
Anne, off topic but I remember you mentioning a beautiful Polish town you visited. Kind of an artist colony? I lost the reference you gave me. I’m trying to set up a trip in November.
DeleteStan, there's this: The "Knitting Madonna" (Panna Maria Pletoucí) roadside shrine in Travná, Czech Republic, sitting directly on the border with Poland, near Lutyna.
DeleteThanks, Jean
DeleteStanley, the town is called Kazimierz Dolny. It is about a 2 hour drive from Warsaw. We were there in 2015 for our youngest son’s wedding. The bride grew up in France, the daughter of a French father and Polish mother, and spent summers there growing up. Her mother grew up there, and her grandparents still lived there when they got married. Our son and his wife and their three sons live in Colorado now, but spend every summer in Kazimierz Dolny. It’s my daughter in law’s favorite place. We had a wonderful stay there, extra special because of the wedding.
Deletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazimierz_Dolny
Stanley, the charming town art/colony today doesn’t show many obvious scars from the Nazi era. Half the town then was Jewish. When the Nazis rode into town they made the Jews remove headstones, grave markers and monuments from the Jewish cemetery and build a road for the Nazi tanks. Then they took away every Jew in the town - from the eldest to the youngest. Not one ever returned. They also arrested all the able bodied Catholic males and took them to Lublin Castle. My d-i- law’s grandfather and his two brothers were among them. One brother was suspected of being in the Resistance and he was shot, with many others, during those first few days at Lublin, where the Nazis had corralled thousands from the towns in that part of Poland. My daughter in law’s grandfather was then sent to Auschwitz for a few months before being transferred to a labor camp in Germany. The family never found out what happened to the third brother. My d-i-law’s grandfather survived the camp, and was one of only two “men” (including teenagers - he was 17) who were arrested who survived the war and returned. Her grandfather was delightful, and his strong spirit and sense of humor were obvious, even though we couldn’t actually converse. He died after a very short illness about three years after the wedding. Everyone was shocked because he hadn’t seemed seriously ill and the hospital was planning to discharge him. Her grandmother had dementia. She lived for another couple of years before passing away. She seemed to be a sweet person.
DeleteThanks vary much, Anne, for the name and the personal and public histories. I’ll have to see if it can be fit into a grande tour. I’m going with M and her daughter and daughter’s boyfriend. The young couple hasn’t been there before.
DeleteStanley, you might need to rent a car. The train doesn’t go there, but to a town not too far. I don’t think they have uber there, but maybe by now. The roads were great, so no problems there. Did you rent a car on your last trip? It’s a really easy drive from Warsaw. When are you going? One thing that surprised me driving around were the many homemade shrines to Mary on the roadsides - mostly not on the highways, but on lots of other roads. Always decorated with flowers, and often with one - three women praying there.
DeleteRe- reading I see you plan to go in November. We were there at the end of May and the weather was glorious - blue, blue clear skies, flowers everywhere. We hiked to the castle ruins and the views from the hiking path were spectacular. You won’t get that weather in November but I imagine there won’t be crowds either. 😉
Delete"What I object to is the "If you do X, then God does Y" formula. It's like Protestant tithing and the prosperity gospel and "the abundant life" thinking that basically makes the whole relationship with God sound sound transactional and manipulative."
DeleteI get that. I'm uncomfortable with transactional, too.
I would say, too, that the Children's lectionary translation for that first reading, states the "if...then..." transactional logic pretty baldly. Although it seems to me it's also present in the "adult" translation of that passage.
Through the lens of Jesus, I've thought for a long time that the most problematic (for me, anyway) line of the "Our Father" prayer is, "Forgive us our traspasses as we forgive those who trespass against us." This passage from Sirach seems to be in the same spirit.
Perhaps a slightly different way of thinking about this is brought out by the parable excerpted above: forgiveness needs to be more than a one-off transaction. It needs to be a way of life, as much as living a life of prayer and service and gratitude. That may be the meaning of "seventy times seven". Living a life of forgiveness is a sign of our immersion in the way of Jesus. And the flip side is: if we live lives of grudge-holding (and no prayer, and wishing to be served, and ingratitude), that is a pretty powerful sign that we're not really immersed in his way.
To tie it in with Oscar Wilde: living lives of forgiveness, gratitude, etc., shape who we've become by the end of our lives. (I'm not sure this is exactly the point Wilde was making - I expect his point is more about the validity of deathbed conversions, and perhaps the "reference parable" should be that of the Prodigal Son, whose conversion happens much later in life than his older brother's. I guess you see many Catholics as harboring "older brother" views. You may be right!)
"I think that the current pastor ( he’s been there since e before Covid), discontinued it. Just as he discontinued the coffee and doughnuts after the most highly attended masses. He’s very conservative and seems to have no idea how to build a communal, but I don’t know for sure since I haven’t been to mass there for years. I do.know that the size of the congregation is less than half what it used to be. It’s a very 1950s parish when it comes to the extracurricular activities- just the olden time stuff - Sodality, rosary, benediction, Jeff Cavins bible study, etc. Nothing wrong with that but those who were involved there when I was involved went there for things like Children’s liturgy, the mom group that met to talk about the challenges of family, marriage and kids (with a baby sitter provided in a different room), Centering Prayer, extensive social justice work with a dozen different committees that addressed many needs ( literally hundreds of parishioners actively involved) great adult ed programs with teachers imported from the local seminaries, Georgetown, CU etc. , The parish was alive. Now it seems on life support."
DeleteI'm sorry to hear this happened to your parish. Personally, my preferences run along the same line as yours; and I can say that the parish we're trying to build and sustain at St. Edna's is much more along the lines of your preferences.
That said, the parish next door is considered more conservative. I don't think they do Liturgy of the Word for Children (although I'd be happy to learn I'm wrong about that). That parish attracts people who prefer the more traditional approach, including parents who are trying to raise their children in that mode. I don't think we're a "liberal parish", but we are what I would consider a less ideological, more mainstream parish. And we see part of that as working to attract younger families with children.
COVID's impact on parishes has been pretty interesting. We lost a lot of parishioners, but in the six or so years since then, we've gradually "bounced back" - our mass attendance is now somewhat higher than it was in the years immediately preceding COVID. My take is: various parishioners who were not strongly attached to our parish, but who attended mass there in a sort of habit or inertia, found the disruption of COVID to be liberating. They rethought many aspects of their lives during that period, and part of it was, where to go to church (or whether to go to church at all).
When I say we've bounced back since then, I don't mean that everyeone who left has come back. I mean that some who left came back; and quite a few others who weren't part of our community prior to COVID, have found their way to us in the post-COVID world.
If you look at the long-term trends of our parish, it's one of a long, gradual shrinking. In the early 1990s, we drew 3,000+ parishioners to our Sunday masses, and it was common for attendees to be standing in the back and up the side aisles. Now it's less than 2,000 each weekend. I mention this because it may help explain why some of the things you appreciated about your parish as a young parent, have been discontinued. It may be partly because of pastor preferences (a leader can do a lot of good things, or cause a lot of damage), but may also be because there aren't as many people available to volunteer. It's become harder to sustain parish programs and activities.
Jim, you may be right. I don't really know why my former parish has lost so many in the last 8 or so years. It's been years since I was a young parent, but I was involved for many years after because there was a lot going on. Then a new pastor arrived (a convert - almost always a bad sign-more Catholic than the Pope, like our VP) and he upended everything. Not to his taste. I left then and went to a different parish for the next few years. After the convert pastor died - very dramatically - on the altar at the end of the Holy Thursday mass - they brought a new pastor in who seemed nice. But I wasn't a regular there anymore. One Christmas when my kids were here from Calif we went to the midnight mass there and it was clear that the priest (pastor) was drunk. Not long after they announced that he would be gone for a while for medical treatment. I kept up with both parish bulletins so that I knew if there was something offered that interested me. The alcoholic pastor didn't destroy the ministries that survived the convert pastor. After the alcoholic pastor left ( they later announced he was permanently retiring. He wasn't yet very close to retirement age) the current pastor arrived, maybe 8 years ago. Between Covid and this pastor the congregation has shrunk dramatically. The convert pastor was a bit trumpy (before trump) and wanted a legacy. He redecorated the church (a 1960s contemporary) inappropriately, bringing in some absurd looking chairs that belonged in an English country house or maybe a small cathedral, blocked a gorgeous window with a view of God's magnificence outside (nature) with some ugly stained glass, and a huge, elaborate gold sanctuary light (his taste was as tasteless as Trump's). But he really, really wanted a school. An earlier pastor had polled the congregation about whether or not they would be willing to help support a school if one was built. A strong NO. The convert pastor later decided not to survey the parish again but to just go ahead and get permission to build a school. Which he did, and that did bring in some new families apparently. But the losses of members continued. Plus his school created so much debt that it took one of his successors years to restore soundness to the parish finances.
DeleteThis is a wealthy parish. They could easily afford to have coffee and doughnuts after 2 or 3 masses if they wanted to build a community outside the school community. There is a Spanish mass every Sunday at 1 pm - crowded. And very alive. I've gone a couple of times and it reminded me of the Dominican Republic masses I attended. The people weren't there because it was a "Sunday obligation" but because they wanted to be there to worship together as a community. I think most euro-dominated parishes have lost that (probably had the community sense in the early days of tribal parishes - Irish, Italian, Polish etc) and go to mass because they 'should". The Spanish mass congregation does their own after mass social of some kind, with punch and cookies etc. In my day, the social justice ministries generally met at night because so many worked during the day. There were CP groups both day and night, and except for a bible study group. all the adult ed was at night. I could go because my husband stayed home with our sons. Most families worked something out so that the involved parent could go to meetings or other evening activities. Only the Moms group met during the day - with a babysitter. My second parish has also abandoned Vatican II ,not going to Latin, but all their activities are traditional, plus a very conservative OCIO course, and they are big on the conservative heroes like Barron. I stopped going there after the last VII pastor retired and the new priests were the younger JPII/BXVI cohort.
Thanks again, Anne. I only drove on my first trip to Germany. Since then, it’s public transportation because, well, I’ve come to hate driving. My reactions are still good but I suspect my parallel processing or gestalt capability to take in a whole gamut of simultaneous stimuli and make an instant decision isn’t what it used to be. I checked. You can get to KD by bus from nearby cities. I’ll check on Über.
DeleteMost of the wedding guests took a bus. But the bride had organized them ( arriving from several different countries) into groups to meet up at the airport and catch the bus together.. Unfortunately, limiting yourself to public transportation really limits how much you can see and appreciate because of the excess time needed for buses and the inability to just explore, follow the leads and advice of the locals about places that aren’t in the guidebooks. In our many trips to Europe, to the UK, to Japan, to Australia, etc we found that the most meaningful experiences were those that were unplanned, not on the itinerary, that we were able to see after being given insider advice because of the flexibility of the car. Perhaps one of the young people could rent the car. Especially since some car companies in Europe won’t rent to people over a certain age, like 75.
DeleteStanley, we always rented cars, except in Japan. Always in Europe and England. When we were in big cities like London or Paris we parked the car and used public transportation, or walked, or used Ubers. The traffic in those cities is horrendous and without the local knowledge it was hard to navigate and make quick decisions. But we spent most of our travels outside the big famous cities and the car was invaluable for exploring the countries beyond the big cities.
Delete==To tie it in with Oscar Wilde: living lives of forgiveness, gratitude, etc., shape who we've become by the end of our lives. (I'm not sure this is exactly the point Wilde was making - I expect his point is more about the validity of deathbed conversions, and perhaps the "reference parable" should be that of the Prodigal Son, whose conversion happens much later in life than his older brother's. I guess you see many Catholics as harboring "older brother" views. You may be right!)==
DeleteThe Prodigal Son parable, in my view, is about the older brother's strict adherence to sectarian rules vs the younger's contrition for sin that got the him in a bad way, but without any clear indication that he's actually now on the straight and narrow.
God is, of course, interested in what the younger brother will become as a result of his contrition and father's love. I think God is also invested in what the older brother will become, now having to accept his younger brother and his baggage into the family circle.
This is a stressed-out family at a crossroads, and we don't get to find out what these people become over time.
I started The Pilgrim at Tinker Creek long ago but I’m not sure I finished it. She is a bit opaque. The book won a Pulitzer and she was only 28. I might try again now that I am old.
DeleteInteresting. I have never considered the Prodigal Son to be a teaching about conversion (new take on it for me), but a teaching about God’s unconditional love, mercy and forgiveness. The father got the feast ready when the son was still a long way off and greeted him with love before the younger son had even been able to say “Sorry” .
I think the parable is more to get people thinking than in offering hard and fast "lessons." We may all be inclined to filter it thru our own experience. My parents were alcoholics who had many prodigal son moments of contrition. An extended riff along these lines is "Rachel Getting Married," one of the best extended views of the prodigal I have ever seen.
DeleteThe passages from CEV Lectionary (“Kids version”) are perfectly dreadful. Whether or not Lenin actually said the following, it's a great quote, "Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted." I feel (at best) gravely ambivalent about my 12 years of Catholic education. Imagine saying to kids similar things about their mothers or fathers to what the CEV tells them about God.
ReplyDeleteDon’t expect your mother to heal you . . . Don’t ask your father to forgive you . . . Your parents won’t forgive you . . . .
It certainly seems to be a hard teaching that our being forgiven is contingent on our forgiving others.
DeleteSorry to hear that writer Annie Dillard has just died at the age of 81. I mostly remember her collection of essays “Teaching a Stone to Talk”.
ReplyDeleteI might be old enough to take her on now. She has too much of Virginia Woolf's opacity for me, but, upside, less inclined to fill her pocket with stones and walk into a deep river.
DeleteShe was immersed in and attentive to the natural world which, I suppose, can be really opaque. But then something leaks through. I especially liked her essay “Weasel!”. At the end, she relates the story of a raptor found with the skull of a weasel, a one time prey, permanently bite-locked into the body of the raptor, I guess it’s time to reread.
DeleteI have this above. I wanted to,delete it and put it here butt can’t seem to figure out how to delete my comments anymore. I used to know how. Help!
DeleteI started The Pilgrim at Tinker Creek long ago but I’m not sure I finished it. She is a bit opaque. The book won a Pulitzer and she was only 28. I might try again now that I am old.
Interesting take on The Prodigal Son. . I have never considered the Prodigal Son to be a teaching about conversion (new take on it for me), but a teaching about God’s unconditional love, mercy and forgiveness. The father got the feast ready when the son was still a long way off and greeted him with love before the younger son had even been able to say “Sorry” . There was no sign of conversion before the father embraced him.
I have never been drawn to "nature writing" per se, though I enjoyed Berndt Heinrich's Ravens in Winter, in which he spent winter in Maine dragging dead cows out to the woods and building a blind to study how crows and ravens developed quite different approaches to staying alive. Crows are highly attuned to how they can exploit the behavior of other species. They can't peck open road kill, so a lookout or two is posted to alert others when a car comes by and squashes it. Or they follow wolf packs, sometimes even buzzing over deer herds to tell the wolves where to go. Ravens a built bigger and stronger, and prefer to stay aloof. However, the semi tame ravens in the Tower of London show more crow traits like getting in trash and stealing your food. One of them has a thing for Pringles, and can recognize the canisters.
DeleteSo might give Dillard a try when I am up to more than light entertainments.
Thanks Jim, for this fine presentation on the Children’s Lectionary; I did not know there was a simplified text. I am not happy about that. It seems to a part of the whole tendency of parishes to substitute simple prosaic teaching for exposure to complex ritual composed of poetry, song and dance.
ReplyDeleteThe aim of Vatican II was to make our participation in ritual easier, but not to eliminate its poetry, song and dance.
As a child I was very bored by Low Masses and Catechism classes. Exposure to Gregorian chant during summer school and becoming an altar boy led me to discover the song and dance of the liturgy. Serving at a Pre-Vatican II Mass was a highly choreographed event. Discovery of the Hours was a discovery both of the poetry of the liturgy and its choreography across the day.
I am not surprised that religious education and homilies which reduce Catholicism to some prose beliefs and/or practices has led to their rejection or irrelevance for many Catholics. I have found most of that to be irrelevant to my life.
The Wisdom passage is poetry; it compares our condemnation of others with our failure to condemn ourselves. If we then apply our thinking about others and ourselves to God, we might conclude that God will condemn us. But our wisdom is not God’s wisdom.
"It seems to a part of the whole tendency of parishes to substitute simple prosaic teaching for exposure to complex ritual composed of poetry, song and dance. The aim of Vatican II was to make our participation in ritual easier, but not to eliminate its poetry, song and dance."
DeleteIt's quite possible that some poetic complexity of expression is sacrificed in order to make the meaning of the proverbs more accessible to children. I haven't been immersed enough yet in the CEV to have an opinion as to whether this is an isolated example or a more general issue.
Honestly, I think the way the verses are expressed in the NAB ("regular Lectionary") version is more opaque than poetic. If anyone is interested, the RSV version of this passage strikes me as considerably clearer than the NAB version, without being noticeably less poetic:
https://biblia.com/bible/rsvce/sirach-27-30--28-7
David and Jack make really good points about the quality of Biblical exegesis in the children's translation.
ReplyDeleteOur Church Ladies drew a line in the sand on "Sunday School," and that's been a parish problem, imo. Saw one mom in the lobby at her wit's end telling her 4-year-old in a strangled whisper: "You will get on your goddam knees and say your goddam prayers!"
M'okay. There's another lapsed Catholic for the pyre.
Here is my all-purpose fount of knowledge and occasional hallucinations, Google Gemini, on the ability of children to listen attentively in church:
ReplyDelete_____
In a church setting, children ages 3 to 10 will overwhelmingly tend to "space out" during un-tailored Bible proclamations, though the exact way they drift varies heavily across this broad developmental window.
Because developmental experts calculate a child's attention span at roughly 2 to 3 minutes per year of age, a 30-minute block of adult-focused liturgy naturally exceeds their biological capacity.
The Age-by-Age Breakdown
Ages 3–5 (The Sensory Drifters): Children at this age lack the vocabulary to comprehend complex theological language. They cannot track abstract phrasing, so they quickly switch to absorbing the immediate physical environment. They will look at stained glass, play with hymnals, trace patterns on the pews, or watch the movements of the priest and altar servers. They are not listening to the words, but they are soaking in the "atmosphere".
Ages 6–8 (The Keyword Spotters): These children possess better auditory stamina but still struggle with archaic or dense scriptural prose. They will try to listen initially, but when the vocabulary becomes too dense, they "space out" into daydreams. However, their attention will occasionally snap back if they hear a familiar anchor word or story element (like "Noah," "boat," "lion," or "Jesus") before drifting away again.
Ages 9–10 (The Mental Wanderers): Near the top of this bracket, children have the cognitive ability to listen for longer stretches (up to 20–30 minutes under ideal conditions). However, without active engagement or a personal hook, they will use their advanced cognitive processing power to deliberately internalize their daydreams—replaying video games, thinking about sports, or planning their day—while maintaining the outward appearance of sitting quietly.
Processing vs. Spacing Out
While they are technically "spaced out" from the specific text being read, their brains are not completely shut down. They are experiencing "auditory figure-ground" overload. When speech lacks a recognizable meaning, the human brain reclassifies the speaker's voice as background noise (similar to static or a fan running) and redirects its focus inward to a mental task it can handle, such as imagination.
Dirty little secret, we didn't take our kids to church much before the age of 4 or 5. We were lucky to be living near family at that time who would sit with them. I don't think the late start hurt them, they're practicing Catholics. That's kind of the way my parents did it, too.
DeleteI have never been smitten with liturgy, unlike several of you here. . Growing up with the Latin mass was pretty boring - the priest’s back was to us and he mumbled in Latin. The few hymns we sang were insipid Marian hymns like “Mary we crown thee with blaaaaahsoms today.” I had a bilingual missal as did most Catholics in high school. Nothing before that. Before I received it for confirmation at the end of 8th grade I really had no idea what was said in mass. I could read the missal way faster than the priest could mumble it so I was spaced out pretty much until adulthood. Even the gospel and epistles was proclaimed in Latin. Nobody understood if we’re honest about it. I understood some because of 4 years of Latin. I won two awards for Latin when I graduated from high school. But very few people understood any of it. I have no idea if this children’s mass version is any good at all. I suspect that it’s better for the kids than the adult version with archaic language, even if the adult language is more “poetic” to some. I don’t remember what we did in our children’s liturgy of the word but I think we read a truncated version of the adult version. But the young priest turned that into something really interesting for the kids in his “ homily “ - he was talented. Too bad he left the priesthood around age 40 because he wanted to get married and have kids and couldn’t do that as a RC priest. I suspect the arrival of a married priest with kids ( former EC priest) added to his discontent and pushed him over the edge. He was legally laicized. He was a natural with children, related to them amazingly well.
ReplyDeleteThe first time I heard the mass in English was in Paris. at the English language Catholic parish ( St Joseph’s) . The other students from my college who were in Paris attending classes at l’Institut Catholique were recruited by a priest who had written a modern mass. We sang it at St Joseph’s. He called it the American mass. He was African American and his mass was a full departure from the masses I had gone to before then. We thought it was amazing. He was also studying at the Catho. His mass got our attention, that’s for sure. Back in the US for senior year the mass was in English. But still really boring.
Wiki excerpt - “He began to gain notoriety for his music during the Civil Rights Movement, beginning with his "An American Mass Program", which combined Gregorian Chant with the melodic patterns and rhythms of Negro Spirituals.[3] (He was influenced in this tradition by Sister Mary Elaine Gentemann, who had composed such a Mass in 1945.)”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Rivers
https://stjosephcincinnati.org/our-team/. Obituary
https://saintjosephs.fr/. st. Joseph’s in Paris.
That is very interesting about Clarence Rivers! I had not heard of him before. Here is some of his work:
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfzeRMNBtn0&list=RDbfzeRMNBtn0&start_radio=1
At some point when our sons were growing up the schools started to talk about learning styles - auditory, visual and Kinesthetic. I am a visual learner and retain very little of what I hear in speeches, classroom lectures, readings and homilies at church. I took excellent notes in class and I always did assigned reading. I would forget what a teacher or professor said about 5 seconds after leaving the room. Although I tried to force myself to listen to homilies, I failed. I was somewhere else long before they finished. When some liturgists decided to dispense with printed “worship aides” for mass in favor of “proclaiming” the gospel, epistle and OT readings I was lost in space for pretty much the entire mass. My eldest son is the opposite. . He is an auditory learner with an unusually good memory. He seldom read his assignments in either high school or college yet got good grades. In college he seldom missed a lecture - and he also seldom read his textbooks and assigned articles. A friend’s daughter was a kinesthetic learner - she did best with active, hands-on learning. I suspect these different learning styles impact what kids get out of mass - especially from the readings and homilies. I’m not sure any translation of scripture would get through to some of them. Spoken scripture doesn’t get through to me either. If I don’t read it, I don’t retain it.
ReplyDeleteLiturgy freaks, in my experience, are a pain in the neck, from the Vatican boys who make fussy little word changes (cup/chalice, consubstantial) to the people who write new hymns nobody can sing or that sound like campfire songs (Talbot's Here I Am, Lord), to Church Ladies imposing special dress requirements on people for sacramental firsts so the pictures turn out nice to the Altar Society's obsession with vestments and altar cloths. I can only imagine that God and the saints have some good laughs over this.
ReplyDeleteThe order of the Liturgy and what all goes on seems fine, but I'd like to see more emphasis paid to its ministerial purposes than these artsy aspects.
The Church could also celebrate the lives of the saints more with a mention like: "Welcome to St Swithin's Catholic Church. Today is the feast day of Hildegard of Bingen who said, 'The mystery of God hugs you in its all-encompassing arms.' The hymn this morning is 466, Please stand."
But I would never suggest it cuz then I'd be a liturgy freak, too.