DENT & SCRATCH The Words of the Missal

"All I want is that this book may help people to pray still better, and to love the Missal still better, so that what is old and familiar shall reveal new beauty and lovableness."If you read St. John or St. Paul, you are almost sure to love their works, or at least some parts of them. But if you take real trouble to find out what exactly their words mean—Faith, for example; Justice; Fulness; Spirit; Light—their value begins to glow forth from within, and the page becomes transfigured and quite different from what it was before you took the pains to pause, compare, ponder, and to catch all manner of elusive shades and depths of meaning in such words. When you re-read those writers you will not any more have to spend time over such details, nor find yourself pulled up or committed to any complicated work, but the flow and the glory of the inspired pages will be a new thing for you.Something similar can be done with the Roman Missal. The Latin words in the Missal at times float and waver,