Neal at Literal-Minded highlights something that's always driven me crazy about the Apostle's Creed. Like, I notice it almost every time I'm at Mass and it distracts me.
I noticed this part in the middle:
"Jesus Christ … who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered, died, and was buried."
It’s another multiple-level coordination! The full verb phrases are "was conceived by the Holy Spirit," "suffered," "died," and "was buried." Buried among them is the participial verb phrase "born of the Virgin Mary," with the "was" that would complete it understood from the first VP. To be perfectly parallel, the passage would have to be one of the following:
Jesus Christ … who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, was born of the Virgin Mary, suffered, died, and was buried.
Jesus Christ … who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, suffered, died, and was buried.
There are a few other linguistic observations I’ve collected at church, but never put into posts of their own, so I might as well put them here….
Neal goes on to point out several other things he's noticed.
Of course, we are going to get a new English translation of the Mass sometime in the next few years. I wonder if they'll fix this glaring problem with multiple-level coordination. I should totally write a letter to the Pope about it.
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