The English-language publisher of a new Vatican-sponsored youth
catechism says that a passage suggesting the use of contraception by
Christian couples is not in the book's original German text, which was
incorrectly translated into Italian.
“The Italian translation was really a mistaken understanding of the
German,” Ignatius Press Founding Editor Fr. Joseph Fessio told CNA on
April 12.
“We did notice in the German original there was some
ambiguity, but we wanted to translate it in the way we knew was most
consistent with the Church's teachings.”
According to Fr. Fessio and Ignatius Press President Mark Brumley,
the Italian version incorrectly translates the German word
“Empfängnisregelung.”
Although the term literally means “birth
regulation,” in a general sense that can signify natural family
planning, it is also sometimes used to refer to “birth control” through
contraceptive means.
However, the Italian version of the YouCat does not translate the
term according to what Fr. Fessio says is its literal meaning. Instead,
it renders the German word as as “metodi anticoncezionali,” meaning
“contraceptive methods.”
“The problem did not originate with the German text,” Brumley said in
a statement on Ignatius' website, “at least not if the Italian
translation is based on the same German text as that on which Ignatius
Press based its translation.”
“The German text of question 420 asks whether a Christian married
couple may regulate the number of children they have,” Brumley
explained. “It does not ask whether the couple may use methods of
contraception.”
Ignatius Press' English-language YouCat poses the question, “May a
Christian married couple regulate the number of children they have?” It
gives the answer: “Yes, a Christian married couple may and should be
responsible in using the gift and privilege of transmitting life.”
However, the Italian edition gives the same positive answer in
response to the question, “Puo una coppia christiana fare ricorso ai
metodi anticoncezionali?” (“May a Christian couple have recourse to
contraceptive methods?”).
The creation of the 300-page YouCat was overseen by Cardinal
Archbishop Christoph Schonborn of Vienna, who edited the 1992 Catechism
of the Catholic Church.
The German text of the YouCat received the
approval of the Austrian bishops in March 2010.