PC row
in US
BY VIVIANE HEWITT LN ROME
WHILE THE NEW Catechism tops the bestseller lists throughout Europe, the Vatican admitted this week that the English language version was still being delayed because of American feminists'protests at alleged sexist terminology.
The major stumbling block remains the Creed and the campaign, waged mainly in the United States, in favour of inclusive language.
Instead of the phrase in the Creed "and he became man", feminists who include many male clergy as well as nuns would prefer "and he became truly human".
A translation was presented to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith earlier this year but drew protests from the more traditionalist lobby in America. It claimed that the translation was not close enough to the original text.
They were backed by the authoritative Jesuit theologian, Fr Avery Dulles, who criticised the English version for trying to fill in the doctrinal gaps in the translation by introducing a series of notes on traditional tenets in smaller print at the back of the book.
A new translation is nearly ready, said the Osservatore Romano this week in its summing up of sales of the Catechism so far, a year after its presentation.
The English version, first scheduled for publication last March, then for Christmas, ii now expected in the spring.
Meanwhile, three million copies of the Catechism have been sold in nine languages, the Vatican reported.
Additional versions in a wide variety of languages are currently being drafted. They include Tagalog, the language of the Philippines, Swahili, Vietnamese, Korean, Croat, Bulgarian Russian, and Albanian.Italy and France are about to publish an edition in braille.In Italy, the Vatican publishing house