Si homo Dei sum ...

Chapter 1 of the 2 Kings concerns Ochozias the king of Samaria and the prophet Elias, who predicted his death.  Verse 10 concerns a captain of 50 and his men, whom the king sent to Elias.

"Respondensque Helias dixit quinquagenario: "Si homo Dei sum, descendat ignis e caelo et devoret te et quinquaginta tuos." Descendit itaque ignis e caelo et devoravit eum et quinquaginta qui erant cum eo."

And Elias answering, said to the captain of fifty: If I be a man of God, let fire come down from heaven and consume thee, and thy fifty. And there came down fire from heaven and consumed him, and the fifty that were with him.

The third conjugation verb descendere appears first in the present subjunctive form descendat, when Elias predicts the death of the captain and his men and then in the perfect indicative form descendit, recording that the fire came down.

Similarly, the first conjugation verb devorare appears first in the present subjunctive form devoret, and then in the perfect indicative active form devoravit.

Incidentally, it would appear that for the verb descendere, the 3rd person singular present indicative active and the 3rd person singular perfect indicative active are identical in form, both being descendit.

descendo, descendere, descendi, descensus  to be reduced; to come down

devoro, devorare, devoravi, devoratus  to devour, consume

Apud Iesum est verum gaudium

On Christmas Day His Holiness Pope Francis tweeted: "Apud Iesum est verum gaudium", which means something like: "With Jesus is the true joy."

Apud is a preposition which takes the accusative hence Iesum from Iesus.  When I looked it up I realised it would be easier to give some examples of its usage rather than a specific translation:

apud me  at my house

apud patres  in the time of our fathers

apud Ciceronem  in the works of Cicero

Semper Fidelis

"Semper fidelis" is a well known and common motto meaning: "Always faithful."  Americans may know it better in the abbreviated form "semper fi", as used by the US Marine Corps.

There are various variations on "semper fidelis" including the excellent "semper et ubique fidelis", which means: "Always and everywhere faithful."

Ubique is the root of the English word ubiquitous and similarly fidelis of the word fidelity.  Whilst semper is not the parent of any English word, it does survive in Spanish as siempre with the same meaning.

Nil nisi optimum & Nil satis nisi optimum

"Nil satis, nisi optimum" is the motto of Everton Football Club among others.  It means: "Nothing is enough, unless it is the best."  There is also the shorter motto: "Nil nisi optimum", which means simply: "Nothing but the best."