They're replacing "thee, thy, thou" with you and your

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BTW in many European languages the Thou form is coming on strong. Since the use of “You” for the singular is formal and distant, it slowly is being replaced by the “Thou” form in singular use to show friendship, familiarity and equality.

There is a famous story about Francois Mitterand, former President of France. He worked closely with a man for 30+ years, yet they both always used the formal “vous” form. Finally the man asked the President that since they’d worked together for so long, could he use the familiar “tu” form when speaking to Mitterand. Mitterand responded, “Si vous voulez.” - using the vous form for his part. So English prayers are not the only places where such things annoy!
 
RosalieM said:
Why? I know it shouldn’t bother me, but it does. I’ve said “Blessed art thou” and “Blessed is the fruit of thy womb” since forever. I cringe when I hear them subsitute “blessed are you” and “blessed is the fruit of your womb”. They even changed it in the hymn “o come Emmanuel”…to “rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel shall come to YOU, O Israel…” Why?:confused:
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When the Douay-Rheims translation came out thee, thou, thy etc was the way people spoke in those days. There is nothing sacred about these English words.
 
RosalieM said:
Why? I know it shouldn’t bother me, but it does. I’ve said “Blessed art thou” and “Blessed is the fruit of thy womb” since forever. I cringe when I hear them subsitute “blessed are you” and “blessed is the fruit of your womb”. They even changed it in the hymn “o come Emmanuel”…to “rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel shall come to YOU, O Israel…” Why?:confused:
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I must say that I have heard some individuals use the modern you and your but only a few. Are you saying your Parish has received a directive from someone officially changing the words? We haven’t had anything like that. We have an old hymnal that did change the " o come Emmanuel " from thee to you, we are finally getting rid of them. Also the old hymn, Amazing Grace, apparently needed an update, people just can’t figure out what a " wretch " is, so they changed it, I love it the way it was.It is amazing to me, that people are so full of themselves that they feel they can change tradition in the Church.
 
johnnykins said:
The second person singular declension has disappeared from modern English and has been replaced by the second person plural. Just the natural development of the language.
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English, the analytical language, now qualifies the second person plural with terms like “you guys” or “youse” or “you Catholics,” etc. Otherwise the “you” has to be taken in its context: whether it’s a reply to one person or several, for example, on a message board. But it can also be provocative so it’s wise to specify the intended receiver(s).
 
It all started when TPTB started saying Holy Spirit instead of Holy Ghost.
 
fall_fox said:
Also the old hymn, Amazing Grace, apparently needed an update, people just can’t figure out what a " wretch " is, so they changed it, I love it the way it was.It is amazing to me, that people are so full of themselves that they feel they can change tradition in the Church.
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Isn’t the tradition you speak of here more of the traditions of the Anglican and other denominational Churches? English in the liturgy is a relatively new thing in the Catholic Church. Even the English prayers (Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory Be) appear to be borrowed from the CoE (Henry VIII mandated their current form, I believe) so can we really say these are Church traditions?
 
I agree, what else needs correcting? Let’s stay with what works.
 
Spirithound said:
Consider this: “thou/thy/thee/thine” is the singular-informal.
“you/your/yours” is the plural or singular-formal.
By using the y’s, we’re upping the reverence.
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You are confusing the contemporary use of the language with the religious use of the language. Thou/thy/thee/thine are use in religious language to denote the difference between addressing Our Lord and our neighbor.
 
thistle said:
When the Douay-Rheims translation came out thee, thou, thy etc was the way people spoke in those days. There is nothing sacred about these English words.
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They are considered appropriate language in prayer precisely through usage and tradition.
 
Bob_Aliano said:
You are confusing the contemporary use of the language with the religious use of the language. Thou/thy/thee/thine are use in religious language to denote the difference between addressing Our Lord and our neighbor.
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But in Latin, there is no difference between the language used to address Our Lord and the language used to address our neighbor. Just in modern vernaculars. Well, I suppose that is a pretty good reason to avoid Latin and update everything to vernacular, so that we can properly express this key theological difference.
 
centurionguard said:
I don’t have much problem with such Old English grammar terms.

My beloved belated father used to always say when I’d ask him what any word meant; Look it up in the dictionary son😃

He was right. Today I use an Old English Dictionary if I get stuck. French, English, Latin etc love dictionaries, thesauruses, concordance bibles etc. The older the better.

I’m not an Inclusive Language enthusiast nor do I care to be Politically correct.
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I like etymology myself.
thou
2nd nominative singular personal pronoun, O.E. þu, from P.Gmc. *thu (cf. O.Fris. thu, M.Du., M.L.G. du, O.H.G., Ger. du, O.N. þu, Goth. þu), from PIE *tu-, second person singular pronoun (cf. L. tu, Ir. tu, Welsh ti, Gk. su, Lith. tu, O.C.S. ty, Skt. twa-m). Superseded in M.E. by plural form you (from a different root), but retained in certain dialects (e.g. Philadelphia Quakers). The plural at first was used in addressing superior individuals, later also (to err on the side of propriety) strangers, and ultimately all equals. By c.1450 the use of thou to address inferiors gave it a tinge of insult unless addressed by parents to children, or intimates to one another. Hence the verb meaning “to use ‘thou’ to a person” (mid-15c.).
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THEE and THOU
The pronoun of the second person in English grammar used to break down like this:
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Nominative singular: THOU
Nominative plural: YE
Objective singular: THEE
Objective plural: YOU
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In the Middle Ages, people began to use plural forms in all cases, at first as a sign of respect to superiors, then as a courtesy to equals. By the 1600s, the singular forms had come to represent familiarity and lack of status, and fell from use except in the case of a few dialects, notably in the industrial north of England. People in Lancashire north of the Rossendale Forest and Yorkshire used to be well known for their use of the singular second person pronouns tha (nom.) and thee (acc.). For religious reasons, the Quakers also retained the familiar forms, though generally in such a way that thee was used in all cases, along with the third person of the verb (thee has where grammar would dictate thou hast), and they brought it to America, where it was current in entire neighborhoods of Philadelphia till the 1890s and in some farms in the hinterland for perhaps another generation after that.
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So what began as a clear distinction based on number turned into a distinction based on formality and social status.
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Languages like Japanese and (especially) Indonesian have a variety of words for “you” depending on the social status of the speaker and addressee(s). “It’s a nightmare trying to determine which form to use so that you won’t offend anyone,” an online friend once told me.
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more at etymonline.com/columns/do-be-thee.htm
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I’m hanging on to what I grew up with and will continue to pray with “thee and thou”.🙂 I think some people in my parish felt they could introduce that and include it with the mass changes and it wouldn’t be noticed so much. Speaking of mass changes, wasn’t “the Lord be with you” originally “the Lord be with thee”? and with “thy” spirit?😉 (oh heck, why not just go back to Latin?)😃
 
RosalieM said:
Speaking of mass changes, wasn’t “the Lord be with you” originally “the Lord be with thee”? and with “thy” spirit?😉 (oh heck, why not just go back to Latin?)😃
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Agreed about the Latin but you’re probably thinking of the Hail Mary where the angel said, Dominus tecum, (“the Lord IS with thee.”) In the mass the priest addresses the congregation Dominus vobiscum. (“The Lord IS with you (plural))”
 
roadsend said:
It all started when TPTB started saying Holy Spirit instead of Holy Ghost.
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Actually, I have heard that in English, there has been a fairly regular change from “Holy Spirit” to “Holy Ghost” and back again, so we address Him with the word that has the least spooky connotations at the time.
 
Bob_Aliano said:
You are confusing the contemporary use of the language with the religious use of the language. Thou/thy/thee/thine are use in religious language to denote the difference between addressing Our Lord and our neighbor.
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The “contemporary” use of “thou” is the religious use. In secular occasions, it’s only still used in northern England and Scotland.

I would further like to see your lexical analysis of the Scriptural use of “thou” vs. “you”.

Also, you haven’t really contradicted my post.
 
ProVobis said:
English, the analytical language, now qualifies the second person plural with terms like “you guys” or “youse” or “you Catholics,” etc. Otherwise the “you” has to be taken in its context: whether it’s a reply to one person or several, for example, on a message board. But it can also be provocative so it’s wise to specify the intended receiver(s).
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In the South, we prefer “Y’all” for the second person plural. 😃
 
RosalieM said:
I’m hanging on to what I grew up with and will continue to pray with “thee and thou”.🙂 I think some people in my parish felt they could introduce that and include it with the mass changes and it wouldn’t be noticed so much. Speaking of mass changes, wasn’t “the Lord be with you” originally “the Lord be with thee”? and with “thy” spirit?😉 (oh heck, why not just go back to Latin?)😃
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How was this change announced? The Hail Mary is not a liturgical prayer, so I don’t understand what you mean when you say “some people in my parish”. How is the DRE or RCIA director teaching the prayer? Are you just overhearing folks saying the roasry this way before Mass? What is the context? Actually, I don’t know if either version is church approved (or any translation except the original latin), so you can’t say someone is saying it wrong with “you and your” anyway.
 
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