Editorial: Words Are Dangerous Things

*published inthe Pacific Church News, Aug/Sept 1998*

We love words, don't we? Liturgical Christians, especially, have a great love of words born of our long-time exposure to the beauty of our liturgies. The cadences, the poetry, the biblical allusions, all of this has primed us to be language afficionados. Anglicans are "people of the book" in more ways than one. We even worship one whom scripture has named "The Word." No wonder they are so close to our hearts.

It is precisely because they are so precious to us that they can be dangerous things, however. It was Jesus' words (as well as his deeds) that got him into such hot water so many years ago in Palestine. We have great difficulty today whenever we consider changing any of the words of our sacred rites, sometimes even to the point of schism. Whenever we are dealing with something so close to people's hearts, we must exercise great caution.

We are not strangers to that caution at the PCN. Each issue is proofread numerous times in order to insure an acceptable degree of accuracy and sensitivity.

For all of our efforts, unfortunately we still let a few things slip through the cracks now and then that our readers perceive as inaccurate or insensitive. Not long ago we got a letter from a reader who took us to task for our use of the word "inner-city." This particular reader informed us that this term is now a common euphemism for "the ghetto," and thus was not appropriate to the article in which it was used. We were surprised and educated by this information, and grateful to the reader who took the time to point it out.

The whole church is going through a great time of change culturally and linguistically. Liturgical elements that are beginning to sound commonplace (such as addressing God in gender-neutral terms, or using a diversity of images for God) would have been beyond the pale twenty years ago. Language grows, and so do we.

Christians are not alone in this process, either. Even major news media still haven't gotten the message that "family" routinely means something more than a man and a woman and 2.5 children. Perhaps we are blessed in the Bay Area to be so aware that families come in all shapes, sizes, colors, and orientations.

We invite you, our readers, to be our partners in this continuing journey - this love affair - with the English language. We at the PCN deeply appreciate such feedback. While Dennis Delman and I both try to read widely, we are not always aware of subtle shifts in meaning in every context. We depend on our readers to alert us to places where our knowledge is incomplete or behind the times. We welcome your comments and critiques, and make every effort to be sensitive when new contexts or shifts of meaning are pointed out to us.

Blessed be the Word!