This remark resonates singularly, as the first encyclical has just been published that has no version in Latin (cf. Exit Latin as the official language of the Church), thus marking the de facto rupture of the Church with its two-thousand-year-old tradition that made Latin its official language.

And yet, in 2012, Benedict XVI had, through a motu proprio, instituted a « Pontificia Academia Latinitatis ». (to this day, it still exists, it even has a website https://www.pontificiaacademialatinitatis.org/. Is it nothing more than an empty shell?)

The motu proprio of 2012 opened with a few very personal remarks from the Holy Father (benoit-et-moi.fr/archives/2012)

1. The Latin language has always been held in the highest esteem by the Catholic Church and Roman pontiffs, who have assiduously favored its knowledge and diffusion, having made it their own language, capable of transmitting the universal message of the Gospel, as already affirmed with authority by the Apostolic Constitution Sapientia Veterum of my Predecessor, the blessed John XXIII.
In fact, since Pentecost, the Church has spoken and prayed in all the languages of men. However, the Christian Communities of the first centuries made extensive use of the Greek and Latin languages, languages of universal communication in the world in which they lived, through which the novelty of the Word of Christ encountered the heritage of Greco-Roman culture.
After the disappearance of the Western Roman Empire, the Church of Rome not only continued to make use of the Latin language, but made itself in some way its guardian and promoter, both in the fields of theology and liturgy, and in that of the formation and transmission of knowledge.

2. Nowadays also, knowledge of the Latin language and culture proves more than ever necessary for the study of the sources from which many ecclesiastical disciplines such as, for example, theology, liturgy, Patristics and canon law, as taught by the Vatican II Council (cf. Decree Optatam totius , 13), can be derived.
Furthermore, in this language are drawn up in their typical form, precisely to emphasize the universal character of the Church, the liturgical books of the Roman Rite, the most important documents of the pontifical Magisterium and the most solemn official acts of the Sovereigns Pontiffs.

3. In contemporary culture, however, one observes, in the context of a generalized weakening of humanistic studies, the danger of increasingly superficial knowledge of the Latin language, which is also reflected in the philosophical and theological studies of future priests. On the other hand, precisely in our world, where science and technology have such a large part, there is renewed interest in Latin culture and language, not only in those Continents that have their cultural roots in the Greco-Roman heritage. This attention is all the more important in that it involves not only academic and institutional circles, but also concerns young people and scholars from very different nations and traditions.

4. It therefore seems urgent to support efforts for better knowledge and more competent use of the Latin language, both within the ecclesiastical environment and in the broader world of culture. In order to emphasize and make this effort resonate, it appears more than ever appropriate to adopt didactic methods in keeping with new conditions, and the promotion of a network of relationships between educational institutions and researchers, in order to value the rich and diverse heritage of Latin civilization.
To help achieve these objectives, following in the footsteps of my revered predecessors, with this Motu Proprio, I today institute the Pontificia Accademia di Latinità, which depends on the Pontifical Council for Culture. It is directed by a president, assisted by a secretary, appointed by me, and by an Academic Council.


The Latinitas Foundation , established by Pope Paul VI, by the Letter Romani Sermonis of June 30, 1976, is extinguished.
This apostolic letter in the form of Motu Proprio, by which I approve ad experimentum for five years the statute, I order that it be published in L'Osservatore Romano.

Given in Rome, near Saint Peter's, on November 10, 2012, memorial of Saint Leo the Great, in the eighth year of my pontificate.

Benedictus PP XVI

Andrea Tornielli (it was obviously before he became the exclusive spokesman of the Argentine pope) had devoted a very interesting article anticipating the official announcement. Where one discovers the difficult task of the Curia's Latinists, seeking to best translate the technical terms of the economic Encyclical « Caritas in Veritate ». A task that today, clearly, no one is any longer in a position to do.

Here is how the Pope wants to promote Latin


Andrea Tornielli,
La Stampa, 8/31/2012


« Promoveatur lingua latina ». (let us promote the Latin language)

Pope Ratzinger wants to develop knowledge of the language of Cicero, Augustine and Erasmus of Rotterdam, in the Church, but also in civil society and school, and is about to publish a motu proprio that institutes the new « Pontificia Academia Latinitatis ».

Until now, on the other side of the Tiber, it was a foundation, « Latinitas », which remained under the aegis of the Secretariat of State and is now destined to disappear, that took care of keeping the ancient idiom alive: in addition to publishing a journal of the same name, and organizing the international « Certamen Vaticanum » competition for Latin poetry and prose, in past years it worked to translate modern words into Latin.

The imminent institution of the new pontifical academy which is added to the eleven existing ones – among which are the most sensitive ones, those dedicated to science and life – is confirmed in a letter that Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, sent to Don Romano Nicolini, a priest from Rimini, a great defender of the return of Latin to the high school. Ravasi recalled that the Academy initiative is « desired by the Holy Father » and is sponsored by the Vatican's culture dicastery; it will include « eminent scholars of different nationalities, with the aim of promoting the use and knowledge of the Latin language both in the ecclesiastical environment and in the civil, and therefore scholastic, environment ». A way of responding, the cardinal concludes in the letter, « to many requests that reach us from different parts of the world. »

Fifty years have passed since John XXIII, on the eve of the Council, promulgated the Apostolic Constitution « Veterum sapientia » to define Latin as the immutable language of the Church and to reaffirm its importance, asking Catholic schools and universities to restore it in case it had been abandoned or reduced. Vatican II would decide to maintain certain parts of the mass in Latin, but the post-conciliar liturgical reform was to abolish all trace of it in current use. Thus, while half a century earlier, prelates from all parts of the world had been able to understand each other mutually by speaking the language of Caesar and the faithful maintained weekly contact with it, today, in the Church, Latin is no longer in good health. And it is other circles, lay ones, that are motivated to promote it.

On the other side of the Tiber, specialists continue to work, proposing neologisms to translate papal encyclicals and official documents.

A not very easy task was translating into Latin the latest encyclical of Benedict XVI, « Caritas in veritate » (July 2009), dedicated to social urgencies and the economic and financial crisis. Some choices of the Holy See's Latinists were criticized by « La Civiltà Cattolica », the influential Jesuit magazine, which examined the questionable choice of the terms « delocalizatio », « anticonceptio » and « sterilizatio », approving on the other hand the choices of « plenior libertas » for liberalization, and « fanaticus furor » for fanaticism. Among the curiosities, the term « fontes alterius generis » to translate « alternative energy sources » and « fontes energiae qui non renovantur » for non-renewable energy resources.

The Pope's initiative to institute a new Pontifical Academy is an important signal, of renewed attention. « Latin teaches us to have esteem for beautiful things – explains Don Nicolini, who has distributed ten thousand copies of a free introductory brochure on the Latin language in school circles and is spreading the call to make it return among the subjects of the school curriculum – and also teaches us to give importance to our roots ».

Among those working to renew the Latin lexicon so as to be able to communicate in the language of Cicero, there is also Don Roberto Spataro, 47 years old, professor of ancient Christian literature and secretary of the Pontificium Institutum Altioris latinitatis, desired by Paul VI at the current Salesian Pontifical University of Rome.

« How to translate « raven »?

I was expecting this question … Well, I would say: « Domesticus delator » or « Intestinus proditor », replies the priest [we were in the midst of « Vatileaks, translator's note]. And he explains how Latin neologisms are formed: « There are two schools of thought. The first, which could be called Anglo-Saxon, considers that before creating a neologism to translate modern words, one must sift through everything that has been written in Latin over the centuries, not just in classical Latin. The other school, which for convenience we will call Latin, believes that one can be freer in creating a paraphrase that renders well the idea and meaning of the modern word, while preserving the flavor of classical Latin, of Cicero ».

Spataro belongs to the second school and invites « to leaf through the latest edition of the « Lexicon recentis latinitatis », edited by Don Cleto Pavanetto, excellent Salesian Latinist and published in 2003, with no less than 15,000 modern words translated into Latin ».

For example, photocopy is translated by « exemplar luce expressum », banknote becomes « charta nummária », basketball « follis canistrique ludus », best seller « liber máxime divénditus », blue-jeans« bracae línteae caerúleae », and goal (in football) « retis violátio ». Mini skirts become « brevíssimae bracae femíneae », VAT is translated by« fiscale prétii additamentum », parachute becomes « umbrella descensória. »


In the lexicon, however, there is a lack of references to the Internet. « Indeed, there is none – explains Don Spataro – but over the past nine years, among those who write and speak in Latin, new expressions have been forged. Thus, the Internet is « inter rete », and the email address « inscriptio cursus electronici ».