Comments for The New Pontifical Academy for Latin at http://www.thecatholicthing.org , comment 1 to 8 out of 8 comments http://www.thecatholicthing.org Thu, 23 May 2013 21:01:59 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.3 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2012/the-new-pontifical-academy-for-latin.html#comment-14396 Great article! I absolutely love the Polish people because of my fathers connection with the polish army when they came to Coatbridge, Scotland during WW II. He was able to teach some of them English using the medium of Latin and French because he knew no Polish. That said I recently attended a mass in Polish in Edinburgh but it was a waste of time because I couldn't figure out where we were in the proceedings because I know no Polish. Now had mass been in Latin it would have been a different ball game. I note too that seminarians are required to be well versed in Latin in terms of canon law but it seems that that part of their education may be being neglected. I also noticed that in Finland the news is broadcast in Latin. Hopefully things will improve with the pope's initiative. It is a great feeling of the universality of the church when you are aware that mass is being said in the same words right round the globe instead of the current 'tower of babel' we get at present. AMDG - james hughes Thu, 15 Nov 2012 20:18:37 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2012/the-new-pontifical-academy-for-latin.html#comment-14392 @Patrick There are five open seats in the Académie française right now. Maybe Dr. Rowland is in possession of knowledge concerning a secret, recent election at the Académie ... Or maybe it's an error ... (we all make mistakes sometimes) ... - Ib Thu, 15 Nov 2012 17:04:26 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2012/the-new-pontifical-academy-for-latin.html#comment-14391 Jsmitty, To imagine that you are in charge of forming young minds, it takes my breath away. Might I suggest, assumptions and all, that your presentation here of Grammar is a microcosm of the very errors of thinking you present on these threads? You suggest a more rigorous grammar, and oh you would be so right if not for your shallow presentation of what grammar is. The moderns have used a microscope to dissect the lowest levels of the true nature of grammar and what you mention is merely the entrails of what the Grammarians called “prosody”. To be rigorous and demanding of such a shallow definition is pedantic at best. So what is grammar if not past participles on dangling modifiers? Well, prosody is the lowest level followed by etymology, analogy- metaphor, literary devices and culminating in exegesis. I don’t have time to go into specifics, but you have illustrated neatly in part what is wrong with modern academics. They mistake something shallow for something deep if they analyze it to death. But really, it is the attempt to answer questions about roots by manipulating fruits. - Achilles Thu, 15 Nov 2012 15:29:53 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2012/the-new-pontifical-academy-for-latin.html#comment-14383 I studied Latin, Greek and Hebrew late in life as a seminarian since it had been long discontinued in my impoverished Detroit High school. You could learn all the latest ways to imbibe, snort or inject in that place, but never a connection to culture beyond that of addiction or covetousness. It was what François Lyotard would later describe as one type of "the Inhuman." When such places as these high schools are what the society accepts as institutions of education, what hope can most of the poor have to gain access to the riches of Western civilization. The Pope's initiative is wonderful, don't get me wrong, but it is a tiny drop in the Sahara desert, when what is needed is a torrential rain. Too long have we been like those you do not rule, on whom your name is not invoked. Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, with the mountains quaking before you Isaiah 63:19 - Crumb Thu, 15 Nov 2012 09:40:19 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2012/the-new-pontifical-academy-for-latin.html#comment-14380 Excellent article and good news, although I do have to make one quibble: I'm pretty sure Pope Benedict is not a member of the Académie française. Perhaps you had in mind a different French academic society. The Académie is an authority on the French language and so it is unlikely that a native German speaker would be made a member. Current Catholic members are Jean-Luc Marion and René Girard. - Patrick Thu, 15 Nov 2012 06:58:24 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2012/the-new-pontifical-academy-for-latin.html#comment-14379 Very nicely presented, Tracey Rowland, especially the brief yet daunting resumé on Pope Benedict. If I had not studied Latin at St. Don Bosco, I would have had a much harder time with higher sciences and mathematics. When my fellow students were stumped, I relied on Latin roots to comprehend complex ideas never presented with colloquial conversation. Thank you. - Ernest Thu, 15 Nov 2012 05:43:44 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2012/the-new-pontifical-academy-for-latin.html#comment-14377 Thanks for letting us know about this. This is a long overdue correction to the collapse in classical learning throughout the West. As someone who has taught at different academic levels, I am convinced that the decline in writing skills parallels the decline in teaching grammar rigorously. Schools figured why bother learning the rules syntax in English since a big reason for the traditional approach was that the students would have to be prepared for Latin and Greek grammar--and now if Latin and Greek have gone away we can just focus on "creative expression." Never mind whether students know about subordinate clauses or direct and indirect objects or the like---they can tell us how they feel about things. And I think that it is a scandal that we have members of the clergy today who don't know a single word of Latin or Greek and thus cannot read the Bible in its original toungue or any of the writings of the Fathers or Doctors which have not been translated (which is most of them!) God bless this endeavor! - jsmitty Thu, 15 Nov 2012 05:00:48 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2012/the-new-pontifical-academy-for-latin.html#comment-14375 Perhaps the resourses of EWTN might be used in this very worthy endeavor ?? - Jack Thu, 15 Nov 2012 02:58:28 +0100