The brouhaha over the pope's speech turns out partly to be the result of clumsy translation. The original English text for the speech, posted on the Vatican's Web site (click here for a copy the BBC obtained from the Vatican and posted online Sept. 15) characterized Manuel II's comments about the prophet Mohammed—the comments that have now given worldwide offense, because the pope put little apparent distance between Manuel II's views and his own—as being of "startling brusqueness" (or, if you prefer a translation from the original German made available by The Catholic World News, "somewhat brusque"). A few days after the protests began, the Vatican added the boldfaced insert, "a brusqueness which leaves us astounded" to its English online text. I concluded (and initially wrote here) that this language had not been uttered in the original speech, but was being added after the fact to appease (halfheartedly, I thought) those who took offense. That was incorrect. A videotape shows that the pope did say (in German) "a brusqueness which leaves us astounded," but for some reason the Vatican's initial English-language translation (and that used by The Catholic World News) left the phrase out. I regret the error. I still think, however, that the pope's distancing language was insufficient, because "astounded" is a value-neutral term. Why not "offended"?