I noticed in the lovely Introit hymn Kathy Pluth provided for the new memorial of Pope St. John Paul, one line would be completely indecipherable…
And made His gifts in him increase
… and the whole rather confusing, were it not for her utilization of the venerable custom of capitalizing personal pronouns referring to the Godhead, members of the Trinity, the Church as Bride of Christ, etc.
Quick poll, do you use this method to render a bit of extra reverence to the Lord?
If so, in conversational writing, (bloggage, memos to your pastor,) and/or more formal matters, (essays for publication, poetry, hymns.)
I had a third grade child once tell me how happy he was that I had gone through all copies of a psalm we were singing from The Dread Gather and “corrected” the psalm verses, because “it makes God important.”
I’m curious, does anyone know when and why this stopped being the general custom of the Church, at least in English?
The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy on the Vatican website observes the tradition. Paul VI, or the Vatican on his behalf, does in Humanae Vitae, but not in at least one motu proprio, St John Paul not at all, I think, (please correct me if that’s wrong.)
I was going to check a few hymnals, and then I remembered that GIA tried to excise all male pronouns anyway….