Salvete Omnes,

I hope that everyone has had a great Halloween with party, candy, and great costumes! However what I would like to talk about today is the fact that the Latin language has become a little less bright in the world this last month.

Pope Francis in August 2014. Courtesy of WikiCommons and Stemoc.

“In a break with the past, Pope Francis has decided that Latin will not be the official language of a worldwide gathering of bishops at the Vatican.” reports the Reuters (a news site).

In synods, Latin was the official language of documents for meetings and even some participants chose to speak in Latin. However with Pope Francis’ announcement; Italian would become the synod’s official language.

For those who are unsure what a synod is; let me explain. A synod is ” a council of a church, usually convened to decide an issue of doctrine, administration or application.”

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In all honesty, I feel quite upset and perturbed at this new because I was such strong advocate for the Catholic church’s use of Latin.  Upon my beginning this position with Transparent Language Company, I wrote one of my first post on the usefulness of Latin in the world (here). The Catholic Church is like one of the last advocates for Latin.

It is no lie that the use of Latin in the Church has greatly diminished since the turn of favor for local languages. However, Latin still remains the official language of the universal Church. And it is the language of reference for translating major documents into the modern language.

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Next week, I am hoping to start a new type of post next week that focuses on grammar and my first stab at video blogging.  Please let me know if there is anything you, my audience, would prefer me to focus on. However, I would like to start at the beginning of grammar for Latin.