Saturday, October 15, 2005

Karma Light?

One used to go to the BBC and such papers as The Herald Tribune for information. But according to this hilarious item by Canadian columnist Michael Higgins, you might best avoid it. Maybe it's my age or upbringing, but even moderately educated non- Catholics used to know that "Carmelites" were nuns, and that LATIN was the "foreign language" of certain Church rituals.

"British journalist Libby Purves got it quite right when she observed recently and humourously in her column in The Tablet:

"'On 4 April an old convent school friend speechlessly thrust a copy of the International Herald Tribune into my hand and pointed to the paragraph about the catafalque:

"The 84-year-old [Pope] Jean Paul [sic] was laid out in Clementine Hall, dressed in white and red vestments... tucked under his left arm was the silver staff, called the crow's ear, that he had carried in public.

"So the crozier has become the crow's ear. But it doesn't stop here. Purves continues:

"'The BBC subtitle service was quite rich in moments of epic religious illiteracy, providing a troop of Karma Light nuns [Carmelite]. It also gave up entirely on the 'Oremus' by subtitling it 'Chanting in a foreign language.' "

Hat tip to Kathy Shaidle at Relapsed Catholic.

2 comments:

Voracious Reader said...

This has nothing to do with your post, but I didn't know where to put it.

The commentary on Gates of Vienna leads me to believe that its contributors live in the same county as Bill and I do--namely, Albemarle County. Are they the friends you mentioned you had living in "here"?

Small world.

Apologies for putting this comment in such a strange place.

Steve Bodio said...

Why don't you email me?-- Odious or Peculiar can give you the email (I am also missing Larissa's, though I think she got back to Matt on a comment on HER Blog. Blogs!) Did you see her... no, I'm not going to start using this as an open channel!

Shortly-- I don't know Dymphna or the Baron except through our blogs, though they do live in that (approximate) area. I know three or four more people around there though, all interesting..

I think Libby has (your) Bill's card too, if it's that round one, but I don't know where.

Weird way to communicate! No apologies called for.