Seneca, Anno Domini and the mongrel that is the enlish language.

I skimmed over the Wikipedia article about Seneca the Roman Philosopher, dramatist and Statesmen. He was born in the very late years of the last century BC and he tutored and later advised that most tyrannical and extravagant Cesar Nero.
He was later executed for the apparently plotting Nero's death (and who wouldn't plot the death of such a dangerous mad man?).

While I was reading I noticed some funny acronyms that usually take the place of BC and AD they where BCE and CE. Now I know BC stands for Before Christ as in before his birth. Poor student of the world that I am however I believed that AD was also English and I therefore assumed it meant After Death, it doesn't. If it did mean after death what would happen to the years Christ was alive? AD actually stands for the Latin Anno Domini or the Year of (Our) Lord, Anno meaning Year(seen in words like annual) and Domini meaning Lord(seen in words like Dominion).
The two total unknown acronyms of BCE and CE are rather clever devices and are both English. They both use exactly the same numbering system as BC and AD however they stand for the far more secular "Before Current/Christian Era" and "Current/Christian Era". I have to say I quite like them.