In this book, Gerald O'Collins, SJ, takes a systematic look at the 2010 English translation of the Roman Missal and the ways it fails to achieve what the Second Vatican Council mandated: the full participation of priest and people.

Critiquing the unsatisfactory principles prescribed by the Vatican instruction Liturgiam Authenticam (2001), this book, which includes a chapter by John Wilkins:

• tells the story of the maneuverings that sidelined the 1998 translation approved by eleven conferences of English-speaking bishops,
• criticizes the 2010 translation, and
• illustrates the clear superiority of the 1998 translation, the "Missal that never was"