Today I would like to tell a story to the dear reader of a programmatic song called "Ubi Caritas"
(Where there is charity).
Once upon a time something dramatic happened to this song: 'Cause after weeks of work on the lyrics, one night, the night before the writer of the lyrics wanted to carry the finished lyrics to the printing shop, he actually died.
Sadly, a wind blew through the open window that night, too, and the lyrics got blown to the slightly dirty floor.
Luckily enough, the writer had told his friend about the finished lyrics before and so the paper was found and finally published.
And you could say, in those days, it became kind of a hit.
However, because the original paper was blown to the dirty floor, a letter was covered by some dirt making it look as if the letter was being crossed out.
The letter that got "crossed out" was an "s" actually.
Because of this, the true meaning of the song got actually lost: The lyrics as they were published were:
"Ubi caritas et amor, ubi caritas, deus ibi est."
Thats Latin and it actually means:
"Where there is charity and love,
where there is charity, there is god."
Not bad but actually not as devine as the original meaning:
"Ubi caritas est amor, ubi caritas, deus ibi est."
The translation of this is:
"Where there is charity, there is love,
where there is charity, there is god."
And this means that...
where there is charity, there is god
and...
love is god (and god is love).
Do you realize the difference? Pretty powerful the difference, huh?
Well, normally fairy tales have a happy end. This one obviously doesn't. But I do hope that one day, the lost "s" is rediscovered.
But until that day, let's keep ourselves aware that
god is love because god shows charity.
