Language and Faith

Yesterday, Daniel asked me if princes go to church. This was one of those questions I'm particularly happy to answer: "Yes! In fact, a prince in England is going to get married in a couple of weeks, and he's getting married in a church." [There's your proof!]

Daniel asked me what kind of church. I said, "Anglican," and then explained that it's different from Orthodoxy.

At that point, he provided a marvelous measuring-stick to assess this new religion:

"Is it the kind that has people that don't talk the same language like us?"

That's when I suddenly realized something: Anglicanism is pretty much the only religion that is not the kind that has people that don't talk the same language like us. In fact, the name of the religion basically means the same thing as our language. I explained that Anglicans do speak our language, but they speak it somewhat differently from us [aside from Canadian Anglicans and our own Episcopalian compatriots].

And what struck me as hilarious is that, from Daniel's perspective, it would be precisely our religion - certainly not the Anglicans - that has people that don't talk the same language as us. No, the main cultural, as distinct from religious, difference between Orthodoxy and Anglicanism is that the Anglicans talk like us and our own coreligionists largely don't, at least back in the old countries.

Of course, I shouldn't presume that the English believe we speak the same language as them. My brother was a linguist, and he maintained that "American" was effectively a separate dialect from that of Olde Albion. And Henry Higgins would concur: As George Bernard Shaw says through this other, more famous linguist: "There are even places where English completely disappears. In America they haven't used it for years." But that's another matter...

(March 27, 2011)