Papal Masses in Britain will use some new English texts

(August 20, 2010) People attending Pope Benedict XVI's Masses in Scotland and England in September will get a chance to hear and sing a few of the newly translated Mass texts, according to the pope's chief liturgist. Msgr. Guido Marini, papal master of liturgical ceremonies, said on August 19^th that the prayers sung in English at the papal Masses in Great Britain will use the translations from the new Order of the Mass approved by the Vatican in 2008. "The songs from the Order of the Mass for example the Gloria will be from the new translation, which was approved a while ago," he said. The words for the rest of the Mass prayers will be from the text currently in use, he said, because when the papal Masses were being planned, the Vatican had not yet granted final approval to the bishops of Scotland, England and Wales for the complete English translation of the Roman Missal. Although the new translation of the Order of the Mass, which contains the main prayers used at Mass, was approved by the Vatican two years ago, bishops' conferences in English-speaking countries decided to wait to introduce the prayers until the entire Roman Missal was translated and approved. The new translation of the Mass was designed to follow more closely the text in the original Latin.