The Language of the Heart

by Letters Editor · August 8, 2023

Stephen Clarke, Manila, Philippines – A few years ago my dad surprised me with a story I had not heard. Apparently, I was baptised in Latin, so strictly speaking my name is not Stephen Anthony but Stephanus Antonius. It has a nice gladiatorial ring to it.

I wonder what all the fuss is about having Mass in Latin; it seems to verge on obsession in some quarters, particularly when it is idolised to the point of its proponents separating themselves from the Church.

Language is important. And I think scripture hints at what is appropriate. On Pentecost we see the Apostles preaching (I imagine in Aramaic) and “everybody understood them in their own language” (Acts 2:6). That’s how the Holy Spirit did it; the Holy Spirit did not make them all suddenly understand Aramaic but translated it for them into their own language — the language of the heart.

A few years ago, in a fairly remote province in the Philippines, I talked with a chap from the Isneg tribe who told me about a missionary who had spent years translating the New Testament into the Isneg language. The people there speak English and Filipino, of course, and many were already Christians, but when this chap read scripture in his own language, he wept — it moved him so deeply to hear it in the language of his heart.

What is needed is to get back to basics, not so much with tradition but fully “orthodox” to the instructions left behind by Jesus: To preach the Gospel, heal the sick, raise the dead, cast out demons.

Published in the May 2023 issue of The Southern Cross magazine