Editor’s Note: If you want to verify any doubt you might have that the Cardinals violated the Papal Law on Conclaves by misreading the Latin text, you can now do so with a Vatican postage stamp, the publication of which obviously was done with the approval of Cardinal Prevost and all his advisors.
This is because the Stamp bears the Ablative form of Leo, instead of the Nominative. It also gets the punctuation wrong. It should read:
Leo P.P. XIV
“Leone” is not only the Latin ablative of the name, “Leo”, but it is also the Italian form of the name, since the time of the Lombard invasions of Italy. “Leone” is also the form used when the Mass is said in Latin, since the phrase in which the name of the Roman Pontiff is supposed to be named is in the Ablative. “P.P.” is the Latin abbreviation for “Pastor Pastorum”, “Shepherd of Shepherds”. So the name is in Italian, but the abbreviation in Latin, or the name is in the wrong case: there is no other alternative.
Ignorance of Latin reigns supreme in the Vatican, evidently.
On the side of the stamp is written: “Anno I S. P. MMXXV” in Latin, “Anno primo Sui Pontifcatus 2025” or “In the first year of His Pontificate.” This is also in error, since “suus, -a, -um” is only to be used in sentences referring to a prior subject. The correct form for “of His” in this context is, “Eius”, and should be abbreviated “E.” not “S.”.
Why they chose Latin there, but put “Città del Vaticano” below is not readily apparent. Perhaps because most of the Vatican Stamps on postage leaving the Vatican go through the Italian Post Office, they chose Italian for the name of the Sovereign State. And maybe you could argue that the name of the Pope is in Italian, not Latin, for the same reason. But the rest is in Latin and Roman Numerals. Which is inconsistent. — The comma is used in the valuation, because in Europe the comma is used where in the United States the period is used as a decimal point.
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The Book on the Trinity, every faithful Catholic priest would love as his next present
This is Br. Bugnolo's English Translation, of Saint Bonaventure's encylopedic book of theology on the Trinity: With this book, your priest will always have something intelligent and awesomely inspiring to preach to you about
God the Father, God the Son & God the Holy Spirit!
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Makes my pig Latin seem scholarly! 😋