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Latin rebirth in schools
Latin is about to undergo a renaissance in schools under plans being drawn up by the Vatican.
Vatican officials say Pope Benedict XVI is preparing to establish a new pontifical academy for the study and promotion of Latin
The Holy See has aligned itself unwittingly with the likes of London mayor Boris Johnson, an enthusiastic proponent of the classics, in calling for Latin to be given greater contemporary relevance and for more teaching in schools and universities.
Vatican officials want to see the language of Cicero and Caesar spread beyond the walls of the tiny city state, the only place in the world where ATM cash machines give instructions in Latin.
They say Pope Benedict XVI is preparing to establish a new pontifical academy for the study and promotion of Latin, to be known as the "Pontificia Academia Latinitatis".
Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, the president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, said the academy will be staffed by "eminent academics of various nationalities, whose aim it will be to promote the use and knowledge of the Latin language in both ecclesiastical and civil contexts, including schools."
Latin remains the official language of the Roman Catholic Church and the idea is that if more people understand it, it will be easier to explain and disseminate the Church's teachings.
In 2003 the Vatican published a lexicon of 15,000 Latin terms for modern-day words.
A photocopied document is rendered as "exemplar luce expressum", while a parachute is an "umbrella descensória".
In the unlikely event that a Catholic priest needs to use the word "hot pants" in Latin, he would have to say "brevíssimae bracae femíneae".
If he was writing about a mountain bike he would use the words "bírota montāna" while if he needed to ask someone to send an email, he would request an "inscriptio cursus electronici".
When Vatican officials translated an encyclical written by the Pope about the environment, they rendered alternative energy sources as "fontes alterius generis".
Latin's prominence as the language of the Catholic Church has been watered down since the reforms of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s.
Before that, priests of different nationalities had an advanced understanding of a language which the rest of the world regarded as dead or dying.
"When I was a young seminarian I was once on the border of Italy and Austria, where we met a group of priests. We spoke not in German or in Italian but in Latin," Father Ciro Benedettini, a Vatican spokesman, told .
"There is certainly a desire for more people to learn and understand Latin. From the Church's point of view, the more people who speak Latin, the better."
US 'to return to gold standard within two years', says Euro Pacific Capital chief Peter Schiff
A major US investor has predicted the world's leading economy will return to the gold standard within two years, giving further weight to Republican moves to set up a commission to look at the issue.
The gold standard has returned to mainstream US politics for the first time in 30 years with a 'gold commission' becoming part of official Republican party policy
Peter Schiff, chief executive of Euro Pacific Capital, has argued that the US is heading for a currency crisis, and an immediate move to peg the dollar to gold is needed as the economy is caught in a "phony recovery".
"Eventually we will be back on a gold standard, not because politicians want it, but because the public demands it and the situation requires it," he told King World News.
"We are headed for a currency crisis, and the only way we’re going to stop it is by putting real value back into the paper dollar. So we have to tie it to gold.
"The sooner we do it the better because the sooner we start to repair the problems the easier it is. The longer we wait, the bigger the problems get. But I think it’s happening soon [a return to the gold standard], in a year or two."
The economy is so bad, Mr Schiff argues, that despite Ben Bernanke's speech today in which he is expected to dampen hopes of further monetary policy stimulus, the Federal Reserve chairman will soon be forced into another round of quantitative easing.
“QE3 is coming. You know we’ve got a phony recovery, so it’s going to fail. So we are going to get more QE. It’s not that we need it, but if we don’t have QE3, then we are back in recession," said Mr Schiff, who ran as a candidate in the Republican primary for the US Senate seat in Connecticut in 2010.
"We have a lot of problems, and if we cure them it’s going to mean a short-term recession as we repair the damage. Until the Fed lets us have a real recession, as painful as that may be, we are never going to have a recovery."
Added to North America's economic woes, a "fiscal cliff" is looming. A number of tax increases and spending cuts are due at the end of the year that are expected to weigh heavily on growth and possibly drive the economy back into a recession.
Mr Schiff believes this will push the US into currency and debt crises, paving the way for a return to the gold standard.
"They want to keep growing the government, growing the deficits. That eventually means we will have a currency crisis, and a sovereign debt crisis, which will lay the foundation for a return to the gold standard."
The gold standard has returned to mainstream US politics for the first time in 30 years with a “gold commission” becoming part of official Republican party policy. This commission will look at whether a return to the gold standard is feasible.
Marsha Blackburn, a Republican congresswoman from Tennessee and co-chair of the committee, recently told the Financial Times: “These were adopted because they are things that Republicans agree on. The House recently passed a bill on this, and this is something that we think needs to be done.”
The proposal evokes memories of the Gold Commission created by Ronald Reagan in 1981, 10 years after Richard Nixon broke the link between gold and the dollar during the 1971 oil crisis. That commission supported the status quo.
Some argue a return to the gold standard would foster economic stability and prosperity, primarily by creating price stability, fixed exchange rates and placing limits government deficit spending as well as trade imbalances.
However, opponents believe it would limit the flexibility of governments and central banks in managing economies, restricting the ability to adjust money supply, government budgets and exchange rates.
Gold rose 0.3pc to $1,660.95 an ounce on Friday.
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New Home for Anders Breivik (12 pics)
It seems like Norway is the best place in the world for mass murders. Let's see where Anders Breivik will spend the next 21 years of his life for the murder of 77 innocent men and women. Welcome to the Ila Detention and Security Prison in Oslo, Norway. Anders Breivik's prison cell, or should I call it apartment, has three rooms - bedroom, working room and gym. You can see the bedroom in the first photo.
Anders Breivik will get 8 euro (10 USD) a day to buy fresh fruits, candies, etc. at the jail store.
There is a free dentist service.
After Breivik will move into the cell the bedroom will look like this.
And the working room will look like this one.
