Should 'she' and 'her' be capitalized when referring to the Church?

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No. Pronouns are capitalized when referring to God, however.
 
The use of reverential capitalization is not as popular as it once was. For instance, the Catechism of the Catholic Church does not use reverential capitalization of the pronouns referring to the Church, or to God for that matter.
 
Similarly, our missals in church don’t capitalize God’s pronouns.
 
I was previously told by members of this site that Catholics generally don’t capitalize the pronouns. Some said they do out of respect. The reviewers on my writer’s site keep pointing out my use of lowercase as incorrect. Granted, most are not Catholics, and maybe it’s a Protestant thing. Dunno. I could go either way at this point. The target audience is primarily Catholics, then Christians, then heathens.
 
normdplume said:
The reviewers on my writer’s site keep pointing out my use of lowercase as incorrect.
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That’s just their personal preference.
You’re also free to refer to the Church as “it”, if you want to.
 
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I looked up on my nook in the Jesus of Nazareth series I’m reading by Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI to see if he capitalized “she” for the Church and he didn’t. He of course capitalized “Church.”

For God pronouns “He” and “Him” I like capitals because it is easier I think for the reader to know whether you’re referring to God or a non-divine person especially in a fictional story, assuming that is what you are writing.

I am trying to resolve in editing / revising my own writing whether to capitalize “you” when a person in a story is praying to God since it seems more personal.
 
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No. And capitalizing pronouns for God has its roots in Protestantism, and should generally be avoided in Catholic writing.
 
Capitalizing the pronouns for the Church is the same as capitalizing the pronouns for God, because the Church is the Body of Christ.

Capitalization of the Divine Name and of pronouns is a fully acceptable pious practice; it is not a Protestant thing so much as it is a Christian thing. It fell out of favor in English, because it fell out of favor in other European languages.
 
@womanatwell Pope Benedict’s Jesus of Nazareth series was translated from German. (I just checked on Amazon.) And the original German would tell us nothing because all nouns are capitalized in German.

The editor must have been following style guide. These guides can vary from publication to publication.
 
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Yes, I would have been more precise to say the publisher of the English translation of these books used the small “s” in “she” for the Church. Original German may capitalize all nouns, but we are talking about pronouns. What I could find is that German often capitalizes the pronoun “you.”
 
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This “Reverential Capitalization” article in Wikipedia gives some facts and history:

Reverential capitalization - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Near the end it states:
Today there is no widely accepted rule in English on whether or not to use reverential capitalization. Different house styles have different rules given by their style manuals. Reverential capitalization is not to be used, for example, according to the style guidelines set by the Chicago Manual of Style[5] or the Associated Press Stylebook. It is prescribed, for example, by the US Government Printing Office Style Manual (2008).[6]
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Though some might consider it confusing, I could even imagine differences in styles between non-fiction news reporting and fictional stories.

In our age of ecumenical efforts, I don’t think capitalizing reverential pronouns is the worst thing Catholics could do.
 
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Most importantly, check the style guide of the publishers to which you’re submitting it. It should be formatted according to those guidelines.
 
You made an excellent point about pronouns. I apologize for my mistake. My German speaking friend informed me that both nouns and pronouns are capitalized in German. Thanks for the tip. 😃
 
This is true, although many people are self-publishing now. And don’t forget about writing on the Internet! 🙂
 
True. I can only speak from my own experience in publishing—if you send me a manuscript with a lot of reverential capitalization, it’s going to end up unread and rejected because those caps are extremely distracting.
 
PaulfromIowa said:
No. Pronouns are capitalized when referring to God, however.
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Often, but not always, even in scriptural rendering considered quite orthodox: Genesis 1:5 ( Ignatius Press RSV2CE) - “God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.” Ge 1:5).
 
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