Do you remember the British comedy group “Beyond the Fringe”? We love the LP record in our house.
I was thinking about a Peter Cook “Beyond the Fringe” sketch today because I have been reading tweets in Latin and my husband and I always joke about the English miner in Cook’s “Sitting on the Bench” routine who was wistful about not becoming a judge.
“I could have been a judge, but I never had the Latin, never had the Latin for the judgin’.”
The Latin tweets I’ve been following are from Pope Francis, who is said to have gathered a large following who just like Latin. I am not a Catholic, but a lot of what the new Pope has said impresses me, especially his cautions against materialism and his concern for those who suffer. I also like exercising the rusty hinges in my brain where fuzzy memories of Latin are stored. And if I don’t quite get the whole tweet, Google Translate is available — and turns out to be much better at Latin than, say, Swedish or Arabic.
I retweeted this missive:
Papa Franciscus @Pontifex_ln 22 Jun
Si sensum vitae in Iesu invenimus, eos negligere non possumus qui patiuntur quique sunt tristes.
Google Translate: If we find the meaning of life in Jesus, we can not ignore those who suffer and those who are sad.
Photo: AFP/Getty Images
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