This is asked with the utmost respect but if you speak in an unintelligible tongue, doesn’t st Paul say that it should be interpreted? He says if you speak in a tongue that is not understood you are only edifying yourself.
This is what is confusing to me. The most prominent case where speaking in tongues was written down was pentecost. And people understood what was being spoken. Modern day tongues that I have witnessed Noone interpreted and I couldn’t understand what people were saying.
You are right. Good St. Paul can be confusing to our modern ears. What we need to do is to go back in time to the point where he was totally upset with his beloved Corinthians. Personally, I would not like to have been the recipient of chapters 12-14 in his first letter to the Church of Corinth.
Nonetheless, let us first deal with the observation that the most prominent case where speaking in Tongues was written down was Pentecost. The best description starts with Acts 2: 5 which says that devout Jews from every nation under heaven were staying in Jerusalem. This situation is verified in Acts 2: 9-11 where we read about Parthians, Medes, Egypt and the districts of Libya near Cyrene , both Jews and converts to Judaism, etc., etc. As Acts 2: 6-8 says, there was a large crowd. Please note the amazement in the question referring to the Apostles. “Are not all these people who are speaking Galileans? Then how does each of us hear them in his own native language?”
The first thing to be noticed is that there are two groups of humans, one preaching to the crowd which is the second group who is listening. When St. Paul talks about the gift of Tongues, he also is referring to two groups. The first group are humans, but the second group is actually God, Himself. Immediately, we can separate the event at Pentecost from the two traditional Holy Spirit gifts which employ the use of Tongues. The first common gift is Praying in Tongues to God. And the second classical gift is Speaking in tongues in order to relate God’s message to the assembly. This second gift is the one which needs interpretation in the vernacular.
When we separate the event at Pentecost from what is taught in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal about Tongues being used as prayer and being used to give God’s message, we find that what took place is a miracle of hearing. Each person in the outside crowd received a miracle so that he or she could understand the joy-filled preaching of St. Peter and others. In my humble opinion, that miracle of hearing could have been repeated in the early Catholic Church.
Back to St. Paul. “If I speak in human and angelic tongues, but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal.” Yikes! This is a dramatic way to begin 1 Corinthians, chapter 13. It does make the point that no matter what gifts we have, love has to be the foundation for all that we do. The book ends, chapter 12 and 14 present the nine particular gifts, known as St. Paul’s classical list which are used to build up the Church. One gift uses Tongues which is why someone with the gift of Interpretation is necessary. Then St. Paul compares this gift of Speaking in Tongues to the common gift of Praying in Tongues. Some people will suggest that St. Paul was putting down the common gift of Praying in Tongues because this gift does not require interpretation. Note that God is the interpreter.
It is a tad difficult to follow St. Paul’s reasoning about the two totally separate Holy Spirit gifts which use the basic gift of Tongues. But I am sure that those Corinthians understood the complete context.
When we put Tongues in the context of the Mystical Body of Christ, 1 Corinthians, chapter 12. We realize that all of us can pray to God, but not all of us are given the ministry to serve the Church community by communicating God’s love, justice, and mercy in a “language” which needs the companion gift of Interpretation.
Various geographic locations may or may not contain people with the gift of Speaking in Tongues. that is, speaking God’s message to the community which, as St. Paul insists, needs a person with the gift of Interpretation. What you described is most likely a group praying and praising God. No one is expected to translate. God is the interpreter.
I will be happy to answer additional questions from the position of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal.
This book on line has solid information about the Catholic Charismatic Renewal.
brendancase.com/uploads/Key_to_the_Charismatic_Renewal.pdf