Vatican City

Here's an interesting bit of information from my friend Cort's website on Wednesday June 7, 2006:

"Vatican City became an independent, sovereign state when the Lateran Treaty was signed in Rome on this date in 1929. Italy had annexed the Papal States in 1871, restricting papal business to a few buildings and paying a yearly compensation. But the Church never accepted the annexation or the payments and the popes considered themselves prisoners in the Vatican. The Lateran Treaty ended this status and also established Roman Catholicism as the only official religion of Italy."