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Vatican blooper
(This piece originally appeared in the Patriot Ledger on Oct. 22, 2013. Reposted by permission of Suzette Martinez Standring.)
It was a big Vatican-related blooper. What would "Lesus" do? Nobody knows, but Jesus would have spelled his own name correctly. The Italian State Mint issued 6,000 misspelled medals to commemorate Pope Francis' papal ascension. Oopsie!
On the commemorative coin, the correct Latin phrasing should have been, "Vidit ergo Jesus publicanum et quia miserando antque eligendo vidit, ait illi sequere me."
Instead it reads (and I'm giving you the English translation): "Lesus, therefore, saw the publican, and because he saw by having mercy and by choosing, He said to him, 'Follow me."
I will take Jesus' lead and have mercy to the person responsible and say, "Come follow me…to the eye doctor."
At first I thought the "L" was an ancient use of lettering unfamiliar to me. After all, the "U" in Jesus is written as a "V," which is very common in Latin engravings.
But "L" cannot substitute for "J." The Roman letter, "L," symbolizes "fifty." Fifty-esus? The very sound of it goes from the sacred to the profane, as in "That'll cost you fifty-esus." Perhaps some rapper might call himself 50-esus to rival 50-Cent.
It's handy when mistakes can be melted down, and the Vatican has recalled all of the remaining gold, silver and bronze medals this month.
Make no mistake. I am not on my high horse about the error. I cringe at my own past misspellings, often hastily written. Wrongly spelled names, "open to the pubic," really, I should know better.
Remember when Chevrolet built the Chevy Nova? They couldn't understand why it wasn't selling in South America until they realized that "no va" in Spanish means "no go."
I got a kick out of reading a list of the worst typos in history. Some errors in judgment were way more expensive than mine.
In my past, I recall an acquaintance who broke up with "Yuko," and replaced her with a new girlfriend named "Yuki." A different (slightly embittered) ex of his remarked to me, "He went from monkey to donkey with one letter."
Well, taking my savior's lead again, I say, "This, too, shall pass."
As to the blooper papal medals, the four that were purchased before the major recall will rise in value as rare collector items.
That's the flip side of the coin. Render to Caesar what is Caesar's.
- Suzette Martinez Standring
Suzette Martinez Standring is the award-winning author of The Art of Column Writing: Insider Secrets from Art Buchwald, Dave Barry, Arianna Huffington, Pete Hamill and Other Great Columnists and the former president of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. She writes a national spirituality blog and newspaper columns for GateHouse Media. "My writing goal is bring folks together, think outside the box and laugh at ourselves through the bonds of faith," she says.