text in Portuguese - http://mariangelapedro.blogspot.com.br/2012/12/o-papa-no-twitter-pontifex-e-um-passo.html
A few hours ago, the Vatican announced the handle of the Pope Benedict XVI - and aparently his successors' - on the Twitter, which he is to start using on Dec 12. The handle does not show 'pope'... Learn, at last, where the formal title of the pope really comes from.
We draw on Yahoo news, where it is said that the date for the first papal tweets is chosen in allusion to the feast of the Madonna of Guadalupe. What most people know is that such date is 'the end of the world' in a certain ancient calendar not endorsed by the Catholic Church, which, in any way, is obviously false.
More than a saint
It seems easy to realize the Roman Catholic Church actually picked that date exactly because of the unrest the triple 12 on the calendar is causing, to the point NASA has set about to deliver an online conference to try and keep people to normality.
The Catholic Church believes - in fact, firmly states - she owns the 'copyright' of the real end of the world and no other versions are authorized. Pope's going worldwide on the net just that day (since the world will not have ended) will imply - above anything else - that the Church is the institution people should listen to, rather than any other 'false prophets' around... including excellent investigative blogs like this one. Of course, we do not make any claims about the end of the world. We bother the Church for other 'worse' things we teach. Go on reading and find out what we mean.
Could we live without heavy authorities?
Well, there is no question the Roman Catholic pope is a high - the highest authority in the world to much more people than scientists would make sense of. Among the ones that totally accept his authority, a great many are not Catholics. Why is that? Oh, he is the...
Enough with that rat, let us study the handle the Vatican has chosen: @pontifex.
Also according to our source (Yahoo), the senior media advisor to the Vatican, Greg Burke, declared that, "The handle is a good one. It means 'pope' and it also means 'bridge builder."
Bridge builder! What a romantic, spiritual, world-saving word. A bit of history will make you think?
Just a few good questions
Little Red Riding Hood is able to ask.even before such a wolf. Let us try and pose here a few questions for which many are not ready, even though many wolves have been all around for so long:
1) 'Since when does 'pontifex' mean 'pope'?
2) Is there a non-romantic meaning to 'pontifex'? What is its historical origins?
3) Would you question the authority of the pope if you learned that it is precisely such enormous authority what has kept the real origins of the word 'pontifex' under secrecy (among many other Church secrecies)?
4) Would you rather be carried away by your 'faith' and scream about against those who do not believe in god and/or doctrines about the end of the world?
Pontifex in real perspective
Several centuries BC - before Christ - who was the most powerful Roman authority?
Boring world! It was... the Maximus Pontifex. The very same title of the formal head of the Roman Catholic Church today, popularly the pope. Sheer coincidence?
'Pope' merely means father in Italian. Its meaning acquired much more status as a result of its association with the pontifex.
If we consider that pontifex (Latin), besides being the original as well as the present formal title, is more universal than the English word 'pope', the Vatican did very well when choosing the handle. Even more so, pontifex embeds a much more authorative, powerful connotation. And the Roman Catholic Church remains as concerned with its imperial power as ever. That the Vatican has smothered the celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the 'revolutionary' Vatican Council II, when noisy and obiquitous mentions were the expected, is clear evidence the authority of the Roman Church above all other 'princes' of the world is not only history or a 'possible' inclination - is still given.
The Roman Empire fell. History says. The pontifex from the Roman Republic crossed the line to the Roman Empire. Went on masskiling and forging alliances. And gets to Twitter on the 21th century - twenty-one in the calendar the very Church created and established.
The most incredible 'bridge' the Catholic Church has ever built is just that, a power bridge through which hords of desperate people - for one reason or other - are always led to ignorance and thus are prone to bend down and... believe and obey. Wiser is the man who once claimed, 'They do not know what they are doing.'
Time to have questions answered
I have done research on the Ancient Roman power and religion for many years while a PhD candidate in history at one of the worst institutions in the world for ingenious minds - USP University of São Paulo. I was prevented from filing in my thesis. Anita Novinsky, my professor, denied recommending the book I wrote - she can deny even its existence and the fact she gave me a mark based on it - a top A. Is there an editor in Brazil ready to publish it? I am sure there isn't.
Power or freedom?
You also cry the common answer. Confess. 'Give me power - an elusive sense of power - and I will follow you.' No matter where.
Such cry will be echoed on Twitter - at @pontifex - as of next week.
I would rather see the end of the world as we have got used to seeing in the movies.
History for a chance
Yes, for a chance.
Go to ask.com instead of google.
Search for college of pontiff roman republic
As I just did, you will get as one result the following:
The Pontifex Maximus was the high priest of the Ancient Roman College of Pontiff...
Source: http://www.funtrivia.com/en/subtopics/The-Constitutions...
This, 'of course', belongs in a time people 'know' the Catholic Church did not exist...
Confused, are you going to stick to that wide, heavily beaten bridge?
A last question for now
What happens to such 'little' college? Vanished?
Well, in history that is taught and gets to bookstores, yes, the college of pontiffs just vanishes to reappear centuries further on, thanks to a 'bridge' historians in line with the Catholic Church/The Vatican make up. Oops! Build.
After a certain 'safe' number of centuries of oblivion, awkwardly - only if you are a brilliant mind - the Pontifex kind of falls on Constantine's lap, who 'converts'. It's a lie.
Constantine then flees Rome and goes to the East 'to guard the frontiers'. Oh! Yes, he does flee Rome and founds Constantinople. But he had a much stronger reason.
So the pontifex comes from much earlier in time, centuries before Christ?
Yes. In order to remain politically alive, you might prefer to go on repeating that the Catholic Church is roughly 2,000 years old and the Roman pope is the only and legitimate successor to Christ.
Not convinced
Of course you are not convinced. Never will. Not even if Jesus himself told you the history. You would think Jesus went crazy while sitting at the right hand of God.
Well, it is correct to say Jesus was recreated to sit - until the end of the world - at the right hand of 'God on earth', i.e., the pope of the Roman Catholic Church (there are other popes).
Ask the pope himself
Our source (Yahoo news) also informs that 'The first papal tweets will be answers to questions sent to #askpontifex'. Go ahead - and ask the pope the truth about the 'Arian controversy'. Do not wait for a honest reply. But, no doubt, you will have caused the Vatican to point fingers at the pope and fire their 'media advisor' for their going too far in the mission of... saving the world.
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