Word.ws English Dictionary

mea culpa

/ˌmeɪ.əˈkʊl.pə/

mea culpa interjection: my fault, due to my error; I am to blame.

Interjection

mea culpa

  1. My fault, due to my error; I am to blame.
    Synonyms:
    my bad, peccavi

Noun

mea culpa (plural mea culpas or mea culpae or meis culpis)

  1. An instance of mea culpa; an apology.
    • For Example, when St. Anthony ſaid his Confiteor, which he did often enough, all the Spectators fell down on their Knees, and gave themſelves ſuch rude Mea Culpa’s as was enough to beat the breath out of their Bodies.1692, The Ingenious and Diverting Letters of the Lady ⸺ Travels into Spain: […], 2nd edition, London: […] Samuel Crouch […], page 62
    • Basketball had been replaced by breathless commentators cross-talking and speculating, politicians on split screens eagerly interrupting each other to find scapegoats, and most mute (male) state officials, including Hawaii Gov. David Ige, opening their mouths to sputter (paraphrasing here) — golly...2018 January 13, Tad Bartimus, “When There’s Nuke Headed Your Way, ‘Do What You Gotta Do’”, in Civil Beat
    Synonyms:
    peccavi

Verb

mea culpa (third-person singular simple present mea culpa's, present participle mea culpa'ing, simple past and past participle mea culpa'ed)

  1. (ambitransitive) To apologize for something, especially excessively.
    • When it was over and he grew tired of not being invited to the good parties on the Vineyard, he mea culpa’ed his way back into the good graces of the liberals who’d abandoned old LBJ years earlier.2013 November, Stephen Hunter, The Third Bullet: A Bob Lee Swagger Novel (Bob Lee Swagger; 8), New York, NY: Pocket Books, →ISBN, pages 423–424

mea culpa meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Malayalam

mea culpa in Hindi

my fault, due to my error
मेरी ग़लती merī ġaltī, मेरी ग़लती है merī ġaltī hai

mea culpa in Tamil

என் தவறு, என் பிழை

mea culpa in Urdu

mea culpa, my fault
اپنی غلطی سے apnī ġalatī se

mea culpa in Malayalam

my fault, due to my error
എന്റെ പിഴ enṟe piḻa
More languagesFewer languages
mea culpa in Punjabi
ਮੇਰੀ ਗ਼ਲਤੀ merī ġaltī, ਮੇਰੀ ਗ਼ਲਤੀ ਹੈ merī ġaltī hai

Examples of mea culpa in a sentence

  • David Ige, opening their mouths to sputter (paraphrasing here) — golly gee, we don’t know what happened, but we plan to find out — mea culpas.2018 January 13, Tad Bartimus, “When There’s Nuke Headed Your Way, ‘Do What You Gotta Do’”, in Civil Beat:
  • The president refused to offer any sort of mea culpa on Tuesday, even as the Taliban celebrated their “independence” from America with gunfire in the streets of Kabul.2021 September 1, Michael D. Shear, Jim Tankersley, “Biden Defends Afghan Pullout and Declares an End to Nation-Building”, in The New York...
  • At her trial, lawyers convinced Manning to issue a mea culpa: […]2022 October 27, Simon Parkin, “README.txt by Chelsea Manning review – secrets and spies”, in The Guardian, →ISSN, archived from the...

Synonyms of mea culpa

Forms of mea culpa

Noun
pluralmea culpas
pluralmea culpae
pluralmeis culpis
Verb
third-person singular presentmea culpa's
present participlemea culpa'ing
past participlemea culpa'ed
pastmea culpa'ed

Origin of mea culpa

From the Latin phrase meā culpā (“through my fault”), ablative case of mea culpa (“my fault, guilt”), taken from the Confiteor, a traditional penitential prayer in Western Christianity.

Questions about mea culpa

What does mea culpa mean?
Mea culpa means my fault, due to my error; I am to blame.
What is mea culpa in Hindi?
Mea culpa in Hindi is मेरी ग़लती (merī ġaltī), मेरी ग़लती है (merī ġaltī hai). See Mea culpa meaning in Hindi.
How do you use mea culpa in a sentence?
David Ige, opening their mouths to sputter (paraphrasing here) — golly gee, we don’t know what happened, but we plan to find out — mea culpas.
What part of speech is mea culpa?
Mea culpa can be an interjection, a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce mea culpa?
Mea culpa is pronounced /ˌmeɪ.əˈkʊl.pə/.

Words near mea culpa in the dictionary

  1. ME/CFS
  2. ME2
  3. ME3
  4. ME4
  5. MEA
  6. mea culpa
  7. mea culpae
  8. mea culpas
  9. Meaburn
  10. Meaburns
  11. meach

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: mea culpa (page history and authors); mea culpa (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); اپنی غلطی سے (Urdu) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-mea culpa.wav.

Cite this entry: “mea culpa.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/mea_culpa. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.