Pontifex

The Pope has taken to Twitter, using the handle @pontifex (see this BBC article for an explanation of other papal communication methods). Some press reports say that the name pontifex was chosen because it means both pope and bridge-builder. In classical Latin, however, pontifex meant Roman high priest, and the OED says that the idea that the fex part of the word is from facere, to do or make "may represent merely a folk etymology". The Dictionary says that the bridge-maker or bridge-builder meaning is "chiefly used punningly or allusively with reference to the supposed etymology".