Look up mea culpa in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Mea culpa is a Latin phrase that translates into English as "my mistake" or "my fault". To emphasize the message, the adjective "maxima" may be inserted, resulting in "mea maxima culpa," which would translate as "my most [grievous] fault."

Origin [link]

The origin of the expression is from a prayer of confession of sinfulness used in the Mass of the Roman Catholic Church known as Confiteor (Latin for "I confess"), of which the first evidence dates from shortly before 1100. The phrase "mea culpa" appears in the prayer from the 16th century.^[1] The Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite text of the prayer is (with the new approved 2010 ICEL English translation, recently put into use) :

The text in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite (pre-1970) is (with unofficial English translation):

Those saying the prayer beat their breast at the italicized words. The pre-1970 Roman Missal specified that that should be done three times. Anglican Missals have the same prayer, such as the Church of England.^[3]

Popular meaning [link]

In the popular vernacular, the expression "mea culpa" is an admission of having made a mistake by one's own fault (one that could have been avoided if the person had been more diligent). It may be used even in trivial situations: if a sports player, for instance, admits that his team lost a game because he missed an opportunity to score, this may be called a "mea culpa", meaning that he admitted his mistake, which he could have avoided (at least in theory), and that resulted in a subsequent evil. In some countries, phonetic versions of the phrase are used with the same meaning. For instance, in Slovene, the phrase "Moja Kolpa" is often used, sounding almost the same, but literally meaning closer to "My problem".

See also [link]

• My bad
• List of Latin phrases
• Self-criticism

References [link]

1. ^ Fortescue, A. (1908). Confiteor. In The Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Retrieved March 4, 2009 from: New Advent
2. ^ From the 2010 ICEL Translation
3. ^ "Authorized Forms of Confession and Absolution", The Church of England, Retrieved February 9th, 2012 from churchofengland.org