# Why is God addressed with 'tu' in French but the Virgin Mary with 'vous'? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 13, 2021, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-god-addressed-with-tu-in-french-but-the-virgin-mary-with-vous/948566 "2021-08-13T03:57:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Octagon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/2acd7d/32.png) [@Octagon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octagon)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2021, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-god-addressed-with-tu-in-french-but-the-virgin-mary-with-vous/948566/1 "2021-08-13T03:57:29Z")
Why is God addressed with ‘tu’ in the "Our Father’(Notre Père) in French but the Virgin Mary with ‘vous’ in the ‘Hail Mary’’( ‘Je Vous Salue Marie’)? In English both are addressed with thee and thou (the familiar ‘you’). ---
**Author:** ![Heracles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heracles/32/487_2.png) [@Heracles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Heracles)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2021, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-god-addressed-with-tu-in-french-but-the-virgin-mary-with-vous/948566/2 "2021-08-13T04:24:16Z")
From what my father told me, in the 1940s, the _Notre Père_ did use the polite form when recited in French : “Notre Père qui _êtes_ aux cieux, que _Votre_ nom soit sanctifié, …” ). However, this prayer was part of the liturgy and so was recited in Latin during mass. The Vatican II Council in the 1960s chose to abandon Latin for vernacular language. Apparently, the Latin words translated into “tu”, so the French liturgical texts were written to address God and the saints in the familiar form. The prayer thus became “Notre Père qui _es_ aux cieux, que _ton_ nom soit sanctifié…” at that point. But the _Ave_ wasn’t actually part of the liturgy, and continued to use the polite form : “Je vous salue Marie…” ([Source](https://www.la-croix.com/Tutoyer-Dieu-vouvoyer-Vierge-2021-05-07-1101154498)) ---
**Author:** ![Octagon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/2acd7d/32.png) [@Octagon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octagon)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2021, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-god-addressed-with-tu-in-french-but-the-virgin-mary-with-vous/948566/3 "2021-08-13T12:55:36Z")
Thanks Heracles. I wasn’t aware that the ‘Ave’ wasn’t part of the liturgy. ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2021, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-god-addressed-with-tu-in-french-but-the-virgin-mary-with-vous/948566/4 "2021-08-13T14:31:10Z")
I don’t know about French, but in Middle English and early modern English, “thou” vs. “you” is an art and not a science. For example, Chaucer’s poem “[An ABC](https://poets.org/poem/abc-prayer-our-lady),” which is a lengthy acrostic prayer addressed to the Virgin Mary, shifts _constantly_ between “thou” and “you” forms, often within the same sentence, depending on the particular degree of intimacy vs. reverence he wants to convey in a particular moment. So they were certainly both available choices when addressing religious figures. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2021, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-god-addressed-with-tu-in-french-but-the-virgin-mary-with-vous/948566/5 "2021-08-13T16:01:13Z")
> [@Heracles](#): > > From what my father told me, in the 1940s, the _Notre Père_ did use the polite form when recited in French : “Notre Père qui _êtes_ aux cieux, que _Votre_ nom soit sanctifié, …” ). This is the way I learned it in French class in the 1960s. Didn’t know it was changed. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2021, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-god-addressed-with-tu-in-french-but-the-virgin-mary-with-vous/948566/6 "2021-08-14T17:50:16Z")
> [@Heracles](#): > > Apparently, the Latin words translated into “tu”, The T-V distinction (that’s the linguistic term for distinguishing between an informal and a formal way of addressing someone) doesn’t exist in Latin; it’s all _tu_ in Latin (at least in its classical form - it might be that postclassical vulgar Latin developed it). I always assumed that it was a general feature of all European languages that have the T-V distinction that in Christian prayers, where God is directly addressed, the informal version is used, to indicate the intimacy that a faithful person has with the creator. FWIW, [here’s](https://www.google.de/books/edition/Liturgie_du_p%C3%A8re_de_famille_ou_la_prati/0n4VAAAAQAAJ?hl=de&gbpv=0) a Google Books link to a book published in 1800 in francophone Switzerland that has the Lord’s Prayer in the “tu” version in French. ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2021, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-god-addressed-with-tu-in-french-but-the-virgin-mary-with-vous/948566/7 "2021-10-01T21:32:08Z")
> [@Heracles](#): > > From what my father told me, in the 1940s, the _Notre Père_ did use the polite form when recited in French : “Notre Père qui _êtes_ aux cieux, que _Votre_ nom soit sanctifié, …” ). > [@ThelmaLou](#): > > This is the way I learned it in French class in the 1960s. Didn’t know it was changed. I took French in the mid 1970s, at Catholic school, and the teacher changed it about halfway through. No clue why.