Most of the proposed changes prevent heretical understandings, and I believe are quite necessary. But "Lord I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof" ... Yick. It just doesn't conceptually translate well. Coming under one's roof just doesn't have any *meaning* in English. In Latin, it meant to place oneself in the responsibility of another (A lingering remnant of this concept?: "As long as you are under MY ROOF..."). Hence, "protect" is from the Latin word, "tectum," or "roof."
Hence, in Latin, "non sum dignus, ut intres sub tectum" means more than "I am not worthy for you to enter under my roof," but also "I am unfit to serve as your protector."
"Coming under one's roof just doesn't have any *meaning* in English. In Latin, it meant to place oneself in the responsibility of another (A lingering remnant of this concept?: "As long as you are under MY ROOF..."). Hence, "protect" is from the Latin word, "tectum," or "roof." "
dangus, I think you may be over-analysing this prayer a little. As in most of the prayers of the Mass, it is a straight quote from the Scripture which was originally written in Greek in this case:
Luke 7,6
"And Jesus went with them. And when he was now not far from the house, the centurion sent his friends to him, saying: Lord, trouble not thyself; FOR I AM NOT WORTHY THAT THOU SHOULDEST ENTER UNDER MY ROOF. 7 For which cause neither did I think myself worthy to come to thee; BUT ONLY SAY THE WORD, AND MY SERVANT SHALL BE HEALED. 8 For I also am a man subject to authority, having under me soldiers: and I say to one, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my servant, Do this, and he doth it. 9 Which Jesus hearing, marvelled: and turning about to the multitude that followed him, he said: Amen I say to you, I HAVE NOT FOUND SO GREAT FAITH, NOT EVEN IN ISRAEL. 10 And they who were sent, being returned to the house, found the servant whole who had been sick."
The liturgical purpose of this prayer is to evoke the memorial of the centurion and this encounter with Jesus. Not only does the centurion acknowledge his unworthiness (repentance and humility without which we should not approach the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament), but he also manifests his faith in Christ as the one who is totally subject to the authority of the Father, and hence who is also able to command with absolute authority.
It is this total subjection of Jesus to the Father's will together with His own divinity which makes His own act of worship to the Father absolutely perfect and of infinite value. It is only with this degree of faith, trust and worship, exhibited here by the centurion, that we can be truly united to Christ's supreme act of worship as we dare to approach our Almighty Lord and God who is really, substantially, Body, Blood, Soul & Divinity, present there before us in Holy Communion.
Thus the purpose of this prayer is to raise our hearts and minds to God in repentance, humility, faith and adoration, before we have the grace and privilege of receiving that very same God under the roof of those temples of the Holy Spirit which our bodies are.
Unfortunately, this nameless bishop seems to think that the faithful are incapable of handling this concept, and would rather keep them in the state of ignorant, unweaned children, who by virtue of a dumbed-down liturgy are losing all consciousness of the significance of what is happening at Holy Mass.
Two points. First of all, the part about "come under my roof" is a Scriptural reference, which I think should definitely be kept and people should be taught about it.
Second, dropping the actual words for what you believe to be the meaning is not, strictly speaking, translation. Sometimes it has to be done for a particular phrase in a modern text (such as a newspaper article) that simply wouldn't make any sense on a more literal basis, but it is never necessary in the liturgy, where everything makes sense and has been carefully thought out to do so.
The ICEL "translators" used something called "dynamic equivalence," which means essentially that the translator gets to substitute his concept of what the text means for the actual words, and express it however he wants. Needless to say, once you cut yourself loose from the actual text, you can have a field day, especially if you have an agenda that you're working from.
It should be a straight translation and everybody should have to use it, with no modifications, additions or deletions.
Yah, well, for 400 years "under my roof" worked just fine.
The concept is not difficult to understand; I did when I was about 7 years old--"roof" meaning "scalp."
"Protection" or 'custody' gives another interesting shade of meaning. So what?