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VATICAN CITY, APR 19, 2005 (VIS) - Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was elected as Supreme Pontiff, the 264th successor of Peter, and has chosen the name Benedict XVI.

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only two days and four votes! so fades away the nenwspapers endless 'insider news' that the Cardinals would be divided on 'so many issues' and this would be a long hard election.

Myself - I do not even trust mass media for the wheather - anymore. I will go to the window and look for myself.

Joseph Ratzinger took the name Benedict XVI - now who can tell us about the last Benedict? and we shall have a hint there.

-ray

Pope Benedict XV was in office during much of World War I. He founded the Pontifical Oriental Instute, if memory serves me correctly.

Incognitus

Incognitus,

You remember that far back? You are much older than I could have guessed!

Admin, who enjoys teasing :p

Well, the media is trying to claim Benedict XV was a liberal (like there is any such thing as a liberal Pope! Ha!) and that he chose the name to soften his image of being a hardliner. But, like you said, you can't trust the media.

"Benedict" means blessing. The benediction is given at the end of Mass. My opinion is that he chose this name because he wants to continue JPII's legacy, tie up the loose ends, be the benediction.

Also, the comment was made on EWTN Radio that "Benedict" literally means "well spoken". I think maybe he wants to focus on his task as the mouthpiece of the Holy Spirit, speaking the truth of Catholic doctrine.

Tammy

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I found this World Book article about Pope Benedict XV on line. The author is listed at the bottom of the page. Sounds like another man of peace in troubled times to me. \o/

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Benedict XV (1854-1922) was elected pope of the Roman Catholic Church in 1914. His reign was dominated by World War I (1914-1918) and by a conflict with the Kingdom of Italy. This conflict, called the Roman question, concerned the status of Rome after Italian troops occupied the city in 1870, thus ending papal temporal (nonreligious) power there.

During the war, Benedict tried to maintain a strict neutrality between the opposing Allies and Central Powers. In the Treaty of London in 1915, the Allies secretly agreed with Italy to exclude the pope from peace negotiations to prevent him from introducing the Roman question. In 1917, Benedict submitted a seven-point peace plan, but both warring sides rejected it.

After the war, Benedict called for international reconciliation and gave general approval to the establishment of the League of Nations. He encouraged the United States Catholic bishops to found the National Catholic Welfare Council in 1919 to represent Catholic interests in the United States. The council later was renamed the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and eventually became part of the present-day United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

In 1917, Benedict issued the Code of Canon Law. The code was the first complete collection of laws governing the entire church. Much of the code had been completed during the reign of the previous pope, Pius X.

Benedict was born on Nov. 24, 1854, in Pegli, near Genoa, Italy. His given and family name was Giacomo Della Chiesa. He was ordained a priest in 1878 and was trained for papal diplomatic service. Benedict was active in church diplomacy from 1882 until his appointment as archbishop of Bologna in 1907. He was named a cardinal in 1914, three months before his election as pope. He died on Jan. 22, 1922.




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Contributor:
� Gerald P. Fogarty, S.T.M., Professor of Religious Studies and History, University of Virginia.

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Blessings,

Porter

The following was posted by Tammy:
> ... "Benedict" means blessing.

While I know little Lain, I do know that that name in Latin is "Benedictus"; I've been told that it is the same name in Latin as is "Macarios" in Greek, in which case it means "Blessed" or "The Blessed One".

> Also, the comment was made on EWTN Radio that
> "Benedict" literally means "well spoken".

True. The single Latin word "benedictus" translates two different Greek works, "macarios" and "evlogimenos" (and two sets of derived words); the latter literally means "well spoken" or "well speaking". (Church Slavonic also has two words, "blazhen" is "blogosloven", the latter also meaning, "well spoken".) I've oft wondered how much nuance is lost when translating the New Testament and other works written in Greek into Latin.

Photius

When in the Divine Liturgy we pray for the Pope, how will Benedict be stated in the Ukrainian language?

Inasmuch as it likely mirrors Church Slavonic somewhat I offer the Church Slavonic, I am not familiar enough with modern and liturgical Ukrainian to say more, but:

Venedikt is the nominative, the prepositional should be Venedikt'i (as in "for...") and the genetive Venedikta (for instance at the Great Entrance and "among the first...")

Church Slavoniv and Ukrainian are more inflected than English.

T

Thank you very much Tony, "Venedict" - I like it!

I am very happy to hear of the election of Card. Ratzinger to the Papacy. (Listen, you can hear all those liberal priests and nuns choking.)Ha, ha.

The following was posted by Tony:
> the prepositional should be Venedikt'i (as in
> "for...") and the genetive Venedikta (for
> instance at the Great Entrance and "among the
> first...")

The prepositional ends in the letter "yat" which is a soft vowel, pronounced by the Ukrainians like the "ea" in "bean" (someone please provide something more accurate if you can!) and by most, probably all, other Slavs as the "e" in "bed".

What's used at the Great Entrance is the accusative case, not the genative. This has two forms in first declension nouns, "Venedikta" (coinciding with the genative) and "Venedikt" (ending in the hard sign [prouncounced as a schwa vowel by some southern Slavs; otherwise, silent], coinciding with the nominative; for animate nouns, the former is usual in contempoary (post-Nikon) Church Slavonic (and always the case in Russian and, I believe, Ukrianian).

Also, for "many years", the dative will be needed: this is either "Venediktu" (more usual) or "Venedick'evi" (older, and more southern form, but still used not infrequently).

Photius

Dr. Fogarty writes that "In 1917, Benedict submitted a seven-point peace plan, but both warring sides rejected it." NEGO!

Emperor Charles of Austria-Hungary accepted Pope Benedict XV's peace plan and made serious attempts to bring about negotiations. It was London and Paris that refused.

This is one of the major reasons that Pope John Paul II beatified Charles last fall, with the specific title "Friend of Peace". Blessed Charles, pray for us.

Incognitus

P.S. to John - of course I can remember - did you think my grey hairs came out of a bottle? !

Photius,

The system for transliteration used among Carptho-Russians (based on the old Czech/Slovak spelling system) renders the yat' -'i. This is a simple -i sound. So virgin is d'iva in the nominative, and ages of ages is v'iki v'ikov. Since this board is primarily, not exclusively, of Carpatho-Russian usage I usually defer to that for these matters. If you prefer devo and veki vekov, that is fine too, most Carpatho-Russians are not familiar with those sounds though.

I have been taught that the genitive (roditelnyi) is used for the formula "da pomianet n." The genitive matches the longer (animate) form of the accusative.

T

Incognitus, thanks for that correction.
The article does show that Pope Benedict XV was a peacemaker in a time of turmoil. So perhaps that should encourage us to believe the new Pope wishes to be a peacemaker as his name sake and as Pope John Paul II was.

In Christ,

Mary Jo

Photius,

I am happy you brought this up. I kept looking into this and you are right.

Either I remembered incorrectly or it was explained somewhat incorrectly, likely the former, I am tired. Perhaps it is because we usually here hierarchs commemorated (who are animate masculine nouns, therefore taking the longer ending in the accusative matching the genitive).

T