The Italian and English translations of the Lord’s Prayer can give believers the wrong impression that God can and does lead people into temptation, Pope Francis has said.
The Italian bishops’ television channel, TV2000, has been broadcasting a series of conversations between the Pope and a prison chaplain looking at the Lord’s Prayer line by line.
The episode broadcast last week focused on the line: “Lead us not into temptation.”
Fr Marco Pozza told the Pope that friends had asked him: “Can God really lead us into temptation?”
“This is not a good translation,” the Pope said.
The standard versions of the prayer are translated from the Latin, which was translated from the New Testament in Greek.
Pope Francis noted that the French bishops had earlier decided to change the line to the equivalent of “do not let us enter into temptation”. The common Spanish translation is already “no nos dejes caer en la tentación” or “do not let us fall into temptation”. Pope Francis told Fr Pozza: “I’m the one who falls.
But it’s not [God] who pushes me into temptation to see how I fall. No, a father does not do this. A father helps us up immediately.
“The one who leads us into temptation is Satan,” the Pope said. “That’s Satan’s job.”
The Catechism of the Catholic Church, in its discussion of the Lord’s Prayer, says: “Our sins result from our consenting to temptation; we therefore ask our Father not to ‘lead’ us into temptation …
“The Greek means both ‘do not allow us to enter into temptation’ and ‘do not let us yield to temptation’.”
Planned Parenthood facing investigation over organ sale
A US government department is investigating Planned Parenthood over the use of organs from unborn children.
Last week, Stephen Boyd, a senior official at the Department of Justice, made a formal request for documents previously obtained by the Senate.
They relate to Planned Parenthood’s involvement in the sale of hearts, brains and other organs from unborn children for research purposes. Undercover journalists filmed doctors from Planned Parenthood discussing deals.
But Planned Parenthood has denied that its employees broke any laws, and has responded to the news by saying: “The investigations by three other Congressional committees, and investigations in 13 states including a Grand Jury in Texas, have all shown that Planned Parenthood did nothing wrong.”
Boyd, the assistant attorney general for legislative affairs, said that “at this point” officials only wanted to see the documents for investigatory purposes.
He said that any “formal legal proceeding, such as a grand jury” would require a resolution from the Senate to use unredacted materials.
Prosecute fraudsters, Rome told
The Vatican has been praised by Council of Europe experts for its legislation against money-laundering and its vigilance in flagging suspected cases.
But Moneyval said the effectiveness of the Vatican efforts could not be proven until Vatican courts actually prosecuted someone for a crime. In its progress report the committee noted the Vatican had not yet brought a criminal case despite freezing several accounts.
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