Globalmania is a free digital course that helps children learn the locations of continents, countries, capitals, major cities, mountains, rivers, and bodies of water for world and U.S. geography. It allots a month each to the study of Asia, Africa, Europe, the United States, North America, South America, and Australasia/Antarctica. The course requires only a half hour to an hour per week for four weeks for each of these seven sections. While students can take a full seven months to complete the course, it can easily be done in less time. The course is dependent upon the student having a computer and an internet connection because a major portion of the learning happens through interactive games and activities that are found at various online sites.
Each month, students will follow the same lesson plan as they study each geographic area. The first week's lesson begins with a geography game that quizzes students on their prior knowledge of countries, capitals, and major cities. You choose the geographical area that is to be studied that month. Students are allowed three tries before the computer provides the correct answer. Students with no prior familiarity might find this frustrating, so a parent might play the first round with a student to prevent discouragement. Students will be scored, and they can replay as many times as they wish to improve their score.
The second week, students should play two or three more online games from the list provided in Globalmania. Games vary in design, so descriptions in Globalmania will help you decide which are most appropriate for each child.
For the third week, students begin their own map work and continue to play whichever games are most helpful or most enjoyable. Globalmania includes eight sets of maps, with sets covering each region and one set covering the entire world. Each set has three pages. The first page is a completed map with countries identified. The second is an outline map for students to complete and color if they wish. The third page is a map grid for students to draw the continent and countries themselves. You should use the first map as an answer key or as a guide for younger students if necessary. You will need to consult other maps for the locations and names of cities, rivers, and other geographic features since few features other than the country names are included on the labeled map. If a student is struggling with map completion, Globalmania suggests that they stop and play one or more of the games to refresh their memory before continuing.
In the fourth week, students are ready to play geography games against other children online. Two sites for this are suggested. They can also complete some map work, adding the countries of the geographic area they've just finished studying to the world map.
It is not clear when students are to tackle creating their own maps on the grid page, but that would be a project I would recommend for any student who feels able to do so in the fourth week.
When there are five weeks in a month, you can use the fifth week for review of all areas studied up to that point. Additional websites with other games are suggested for students to play once they have completed the course.
Globalmania takes advantage of the wealth of free learning games already available online, making them the primary learning tool for students. The Globalmania maps serve as an accountability tool. The maps are also likely to prove useful for review in future years since you can easily reprint copies whenever you want to use them.
Most students are likely to enjoy this approach, although they will have to experiment to find the games that best suit their level of knowledge and skill. Parents need to be involved enough that they are able to evaluate student map work for accuracy. Parents should probably also preview games and make recommendations to their children.
Any child who can read well enough to use the online games should be able to use Globalmania, and it's challenging enough for high school students too! The variety of online sites suggested also helps you tailor the course to each child's level.
While Globalmania is narrowly focused on map identification in contrast to a comprehensive geography course that includes cultural studies, it is a surprisingly helpful resource for something available at no cost.
List Price: Free! Click here to go to download page.


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CONCLUDING UNSCIENTIFIC POSTSCRIPTS
The fifteenth ordinary general assembly of the Synod of Bishops, convened by Pope Francis to reflect on "Youth, the Faith, and Vocational Discernment," is now history—unless you subscribe to an extreme notion of "synodality," advanced by some bishops last week, which hints at an ongoing synodal process that will presumably include, in due course, the Parousia, the Last Judgment, and the Wedding Feast of the Lamb.
Some good things happened in Rome this past month. Catholics from all over the world got to know each other's stories and experiences, which helps shake all of us out of our comfort zones. Catholicism today is genuinely "catholic" in the sense of "universal" or "global," and to live that, not just think or read about it, is a bracing and revivifying experience of solidarity. It can also be sobering, as when you're told by an impressive African bishop that one of his seminarians was recently murdered and that he's had to close several parishes because of the threat of massacres when large groups gather in his strife-torn country, Cameroon. Synods are also opportunities for catching up with friends in the great Catholic family. There was even some serious reflection on what makes for effective evangelization of young adults: in the Synod's language-based discussion groups, in some eloquent interventions in the synodal general congregations, and in the Synod's "Off Broadway" venues, including restaurants, coffee bars, and in more than one wonderful Roman gelateria. (I think it a safe bet that no one loses weight at a Synod, despite a lot of walking around.)
These affairs always take time to digest, so what follows is a mosaic of impressions that I hope will give readers of these LETTERS a little more sense of what happened during Synod-2018 and what it might portend for the Church's immediate future.
The Smuggler Synod?
In 449, Emperor Theodosius II summoned an ecumenical council, which was to be led at Ephesus by Patriarch Dioscorus I of Alexandria. The Church was bitterly divided over complex theological questions of the relationship between the human and the divine in Christ: "Monophysites" held that Christ had only a divine nature for which his humanity was a kind of disguise, while the anti-monophysites affirmed two natures, divine and human, in the one divine person of Christ—the formula eventually adopted by the Council of Chalcedon in 451 after an intervention by Pope Leo the Great. Theodosius's council was a failure, as many bishops declined to attend; and ever since, what was intended to be "Ephesus II" has been known in much of the Christian world as the "Robber Council," or "Robber Synod."
It is an open question whether this month's exercise will come to be known as the "Smuggler Synod." For there was a lot of smuggling going on before and during Synod-2018.
The smuggling began in the Synod's preparatory phase. A "pre-Synod" meeting of young people in March 2018 was thoroughly rigged, according to the accounts of some brave souls who were there because the Synod managers either misidentified them or wanted them as cover. Working sessions were conducted long into the night, the goal being to get inserted into the meeting's final document a number of progressive Catholic approaches to human sexuality. One discussion group leader banned an opening prayer before the group's meetings—what had been proposed was a joint recitation of the Lord's Prayer, the Hail Mary, and the Doxology—saying that this might make the non-Catholics present uncomfortable. The Synod managers and the new Dicastery for Laity, Family, and Life trumpeted this meeting as a great advance in "listening"; it was an exercise in manipulation and spin.
Then there was the Synod's Instrumentum Laboris, or working document. Into it was smuggled the phrase "LGBT youth," which had not appeared in the pre-Synod meeting's reports, claims by Synod general secretary Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri notwithstanding. Other language more redolent of the New York Times op-ed page than the Catechism of the Catholic Church got smuggled into the Instrumentum Laboris, which also included a lot of mind-numbing, down-market sociology, organized in what one Synod father described as a "manic-depressive" schema that lauded young adults on one hand and then lamented the sour state of everything (including young adults) on the other.
The auditors appointed for the Synod—lay people, in the main, and many of them young adults—were carefully chosen (or smuggled in) to reflect the priorities of the Synod managers. Smuggled out, so to speak, were representatives of successful, global young adult initiatives like FOCUS and the World Youth Alliance. Thomas Andronie, one of the Official Young Adults and head of the lavishly funded official youth organization of the German Church, gave a blistering speech in a synodal general congregation in which he essentially proposed reconstructing Catholicism as Lutheranism. Unofficial young adults, orthodox and vibrantly evangelical, had an impact "Off Broadway," but their virtual exclusion from the Synod's official proceedings was an example of the smugglers erecting a Trumpian wall around the Synod's official work, presumably for fear of ideological contamination.
The smugglers really got their act into high gear in the Synod's last week. As Cardinal Oswald Gracias, the archbishop of Mumbai, and Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the archbishop of Westminster, both noted with some vigor, there had been very little discussion of "synodality" in the Instrumentum Laboris, in the general congregations, or in the Synod's discussion groups; and there was no serious push for including a lengthy discussion of this seemingly arcane topic in the Synod's draft final report. But presto! There it was, and it elicited a spirited debate between the proponents of "synodality" (who never seemed to be able to define precisely what that meant, besides a lot more meetings for everyone—or chosen everyones—to attend), and those who objected on several grounds: that the concept was theologically nebulous, susceptible of manipulation, and in tension with the teaching of Vatican II on the role of bishops in the Church; that a discussion of "synodality," whatever it meant, had nothing to do with Synod-2018's topic, "Youth, the Faith, and Vocational Discernment"; and that, as "synodality" hadn't been a major issue in the general congregations and discussion groups, it shouldn't figure prominently in the final report. Was another agenda being smuggled into the Synod at the last minute?
And then there was the draft final report's claim, in nomine synodalitatis (as it were) that the Final Final Report was to be read in continuity with the Instrumentum Laboris, which in previous Synods had been deemed (and by Cardinal Baldisseri, no less) as the "seed" that "dies" so that the final report might be born. This struck more than one Synod father as an attempt to smuggle into a now-expanded Synod work product (i.e., the Final Final Report + the Instrumentum Laboris + who knows what else) the "LGBT" language that had been severely criticized in the Synod's general congregations and discussion groups, as well as other notions dear to the Synod managers. And why was a document (the Instrumentum Laboris) that had been staff-prepared being granted some sort of permanent and authoritative status in a Synod of Bishops? Vigorous opposition led to this absurd notion of a working document incorporated as an interpretive device into an ongoing synodal process being modified in the Really Final Draft Final Report (RFDFR), which only spoke of the "diversity and complementarity" of the Instrumentum Laboris and the Final Report.
Local-Option Catholicism?
As discussion of the "synodality" paragraphs in the RFDFR intensified in the Synod's last forty-eight hours, Anglophone and African bishops began to sense that the rude beast slouching through the Synod's final week, wearing a sandwich-board identifying it as "Synodality," might signify an effort by the Synod managers, presumably with the acquiescence of the pope, to remake the Catholicism of the future into a local-option federation of national or regional Churches with differing (and perhaps even conflicting) theologies and pastoral practices.
To bend toward the charitable for a moment, it's just conceivable that at least some proponents of "synodality" may be trying to give a new expression to the diversity of charismatic gifts in the Church described by St. Paul in the first reading at Mass on the Synod's last working day:
And he gave some as Apostles, others as prophets, others as evangelists, others as pastors and teachers, to equip the holy ones for the work of ministry, for building up the Body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of faith and knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood to the extent of the full stature of Christ… (Ephesians 4:11–13).
In other words, some proponents of "synodality" may be imagining that this often-vague concept is a response to the complexity of a Church in which 1) all the baptized are recipients of the Holy Spirit's gifts and thus "protagonists" of the Church's life; 2) there is episcopal governance by Christ's will; and 3) there is a pope with supreme authority, also by Christ's will. No serious student of either theology or history will deny that there have been different and legitimate attempts to "order" this complexity over two millennia, some of them more successful than others in advancing the Church's essential mission of evangelization. So discussion of how to keep all those moving parts moving in the same direction is welcome—as long as it is open and honest.
But those are precisely the qualities missing from the rushed discussion of "synodality" at Synod-2018. The topic was smuggled into the Draft Final Report after virtually no discussion in the Synod itself; the voting on the relevant sections of the Really Final Draft Final Report on Saturday was marred by the Synod general secretary's refusal to have the third part of the RFDFR translated before the vote; and the impression was thus created that this entire business was being bulldozed through by the Synod managers in a thoroughly, er, unsynodal manner.
Moreover, the references to multiple tiers of "synodality" in the RFDFR and thus the approved Final Report seemed to some bishops—again, Anglophones and Africans—to open the door to local-option Catholicism. Thus the Extraordinary Synod on Amazonia next year could "synodally" decide that ordaining mature married men (viri probati) to the priesthood is pastorally important and request the pope's approval of that practice, which the pope would then give in recognition of the principle of "synodality." Or the German bishops' conference (perhaps joined by the Austrian and Belgian bishops' conferences) could "synodally" decide to have some form of liturgical blessing for so-called "same-sex marriages," which practice would also receive a nihil obstat from the Bishop of Rome, recognizing those local Churches' "synodal" authority.
And before long, the Catholic Church would have been deconstructed into a simulacrum of the Anglican Communion, a lot of which is dying from, among other things, a surfeit of "synodality."
Against charges sure to emerge from the portside of the Barque of Peter, it must be underscored that these are not the concerns of Ultra-Traditionalists at war with Vatican II. Rather, they are the entirely legitimate concerns of some of the Church's most dynamic bishops, all of whom are proponents of the New Evangelization. What they see in this local-option Catholicism is a prescription for utter incoherence leading to evangelical failure.
The Magic Kingdom Against Itself
Denizens of the Holy See and friendly observers sometimes refer to the reality inside the Leonine Wall as the "Magic Kingdom," a gentle dig at the Vatican's sometimes puzzling ways. During Synod-2018, however, the Holy See sometimes seemed to be working against itself, one hand not knowing what the other was doing.
One example of this was the Draft Final Report's use of the language of "sexual orientation," which strikes many Americans as a merely descriptive phrase, but which has a very different valence or connotation in international organizations where the Holy See is determined to play a role. For years, Vatican representatives have worked hard to keep "sexual orientation" out of international treaties, covenants, reports, etc., because they know that this usage opens the door to international legal approval of (and insistence on) so-called "same-sex marriage," transgenderism, and so forth. Yet here was that very same language in a draft Synod final report, and no complaint seems to have been heard from the Secretariat of State. Had there been a change in Vatican policy, such that the Holy See now had no objection to the use of the language of "sexual orientation"? If so, why? And if not, why didn't Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Secretary of State, explain why this language had long been considered a red flag by the Vatican?
Criticism of this usage from other quarters led to its being modified in the Really Final Draft Final Report. But the sense that there is a disturbing degree of chaos behind the Leonine Walls these days was reinforced.
Another instance of a lack of coordination (not to mention oversight by the Secretariat of State) involved the RFDFR's rejection of "all forms of….discrimination" against people who experience same-sex attraction. The sentiment is unexceptionable but the language, as one Anglophone bishop consistently pointed out, was dangerous and the text should deplore "all forms of….unjust discrimination." Why? Because, the bishops explained, bishops have to make all sorts of "discriminations" or judgment calls in their ministry, e.g., in choosing teachers for Catholic schools. Suppose a teacher in a Catholic school files a civil suit claiming "discrimination" because he or she has been relieved of their position after entering into a same-sex "marriage"; would that person not be able to cite the Synod's final report in his or her favor, unless the report distinguished between legitimate, prudential choices and "unjust discrimination"?
These may seem minor points, but they are quite real in everyday pastoral life, and the fact that that's not recognized says that Those In Charge are not as on-the-ball as they should be.
Previous Engagements
A great deal was made of the fact that two bishops from the People's Republic of China, Guo Jincai and Yang Xiaoting, would be attending a Synod of Bishops for the first time. Both bishops had once been excommunicated (one as recently as mid-September), because they had been illicitly ordained. They were warmly welcomed by Pope Francis in his homily at the Synod's opening Mass, and proponents of the Vatican's recent deal with the Chinese government on the appointment of bishops lauded the two Chinese bishops' presence as a first fruit of that arrangement and a step toward the deeper unity of the Church.
Then, after ten days or so, the Chinese bishops left, pleading previous engagements at home. One could only wonder what those engagements might be.
It then turned out that the two bishops had been proposed by the Chinese communist party (which now has supervisory responsibility for religious bodies in China) and then accepted by the Vatican. That sequence, plus their premature departure, seemed to signal that the "first fruit" of the new Vatican/China deal might be a bit rotten, as many had feared. One also wonders what impression all this made on young adults in China who are pondering the Catholic Church and its message. If the message conveyed by this subplot is that the Church is another puppet of the Chinese communist party and the Chinese government, it is difficult to see how evangelization in China will be advanced among the young people who were supposed to be the Synod's primary concern.
Meanwhile, within ten days of the bishops' return to China, the Chinese authorities destroyed the Marian Shrine of Our Lady of Sorrows in Dongergou (Shanxi province) and Our Lady of Bliss, also called Our Lady of the Mountain, in Anlong (Guizhou province). No word has yet been received from Bishop Marcello Sanchez Sorondo, Chancellor of the Pontifical Academies, on whether these demolitions have caused him to reconsider his description of China as a country that brilliantly embodies Catholic social doctrine.
Cleaning the Slate or The Missing Pope
At a dinner during the Synod's final week, the Polish bishops at Synod-2018—Stanisław Gądecki, archbishop of Poznań, and Grzegorz Ryś, archbishop of Łódż—wondered aloud why there was no reference in the draft final report to the teaching or experience of John Paul II, the most successful papal youth minister in modern history and the author of the Theology of the Body, Catholicism's most developed (and persuasive) answer to the claims of the sexual revolution. Similar questions were posed to me by Cardinal Kamimierz Nycz and his auxiliaries when I met with them in Warsaw during a brief visit there during the Synod. Thanks to an amendment proposed by the two Poles, the Theology of the Body did get a mention in the Really Final Draft Final Report (as did the Catechism of the Catholic Church). Still, the questions the archbishops raised were not misplaced, and one possible answer to them sheds further light on the Church's immediate future.
The first thing to be noticed about this attempted airbrushing is that it is quite out of character in high-level Church documents. Vatican II made copious references to the magisterium of previous popes, especially Pius XII. In their magisterium, John Paul II and Benedict XVI made similar, extensive references to the work of their predecessors. This was not simply a question of good manners; it had a serious theological purpose, which was to demonstrate that, even as the Church's thinking and teaching develops, that developed thought is in continuity with what has gone before, even as the Church's experience and reflection leads it to draw new meanings from the treasure chest of the Deposit of Faith.
This now seems to have stopped. Amoris Laetitia, the apostolic exhortation completing the work of the Synods of 2014 and 2015, only quoted John Paul's apostolic exhortation on marriage and the family, Familiaris Consortio, in a bowdlerized form. John Paul's encyclical on the renewal of Catholic moral theology, Veritatis Splendor, has virtually disappeared in the present pontificate. Now comes Synod-2018, which struck concerned Synod fathers as a deliberate attempt to marginalize the pope who reinvented Catholic young adult ministry in his extensive pilgrimages and in the phenomenon of World Youth Day (which other Synod fathers actually proposed eliminating).
No one is entirely sure what is going on here. But it is not beyond the bounds of propriety to suggest that, in today's Rome, there is a devaluing of continuity coupled with a misunderstanding of the development of doctrine and a fascination with papal autocracy. More-than-hints of that were already evident at Synod-2014 and Synod-2015, and one prominent proponent of Pope Francis's style of governance has even suggested that his "discernment" is independent of Scripture and tradition—a species of ultramontanism that would make Henry Edward Manning and Alfredo Ottaviani blush. The problem has now come into clearer focus, and it was deeply disturbing to more than a few of the bishops at Synod-2018.
On Just Not Getting It
The Synod's final report has a very weak statement on the sexual abuse crisis and its deadening effects on the evangelization of young adults, despite strenuous efforts from Anglophone bishops to get the Synod to make a strong statement of apology and contrition and a pledge of serious reform. The pushback against this came from, among others, Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, the Synod's general secretary, but it also reflected the obtuseness of Vatican officials and Latin American bishops who continue to insist against all the evidence that much of this crisis is a media-generated attack on the Church.
The weak statement makes itself even weaker by identifying only one causal factor—clericalism—in the sexual abuse of the young by priests and bishops. To be sure, "clericalism" in the sense of a warped idea of sacerdotal or episcopal power, and "clericalism" in the sense of a caste protecting its own, are both involved in this crisis. But over the past few months, the diagnosis of "clericalism" as the root malady here has too often been a means of dodging the hard, empirical fact that the overwhelming majority of this abuse in the U.S. (and, it seems elsewhere) has involved sexually dysfunctional clergy preying on young men. That form of denial is unworthy of a Synod and will likely make it more difficult to address clericalism, the burning issue of chastity in Holy Orders (and indeed in all states of life in the Church), and the crisis of confidence in Church leadership to which too many in Rome seem determinedly oblivious.
The New Evangelization vs. The Museum
Several contributors to these LETTERS have remarked on the fault line in the Church between bishops confident in the power of the gospel and committed to its unambiguous proclamation, and bishops who seem to have been worn down by the Zeitgeist of the postmodern West and are seeking some sort of truce or accommodation with the reigning cultural powers. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the former are from the living parts of the Church, while the latter, in the main, come from those sectors of the world Church where Catholic practice has been dying for decades. One hopes that the experience of spending a month with the former will energize the latter. But when one hears a bishop saying that secularization is a good thing because it gets us out of the mindset that Catholicism can be genetically transmitted, one's hopes start to flag. I've spent the better part of the last decade arguing that Catholicism-by-osmosis is over and that friendship with Jesus Christ has to be proposed and offered; but that doesn't mean I think the kind of aggressive secularization one sees in, say, parts of western Europe or Québec is on the side of the angels. Those pressures are only "helpful" if they're met by bold, confident evangelization that also pushes back against attempts to drive believers to the margin of society.
A month in Rome also sheds light on another facet of this fault line between the emboldened and the beaten-down, and that is laziness—what I came to think of as the Museum Complex during my work in the Eternal City on Roman Pilgrimage: The Station Churches. I was reminded of it during the Synod's first week when I was near Piazza del Popolo for lunch with two friends. I was a bit early, so I strolled up the Corso to that magnificent square. There are five churches in the immediate vicinity (meaning within two square blocks or so), and every one of them (including those with some splendid Caravaggios) was locked tight at 1 p.m. and would remain so for the next three or four hours. A friend to whom I commented on this replied that Santa Maria del Popolo is "almost never open."
I had the same experience in the Piazza Santi Apostoli last week. Walking toward the world's best rigatoni carbonara at the Ristorante Abruzzi, I had hoped to be able to pray for a few moments at the Basilica of the Twelve Holy Apostles. It was locked tight at 1 p.m. (having been closed by then for an hour) and wouldn't re-open until 4 p.m. During those four hours, like up the Corso a Piazza del Popolo, hundreds if not thousands of tourist and shoppers would pass attractive and historic churches—none of which would open its doors in welcome to them, suggesting the possibility of prayer. It's the Museum Complex at its worst: the Church as custodian of an architectural and artistic patrimony, rather than the Church as evangelizer.
Given the Italian passion for pranzo and the post-luncheon riposo, I could imagine these churches being closed for an hour or two. But four hours? What does that say about the Roman Church's idea of itself? Has the Vicariate of Rome gotten the memo about the New Evangelization? What is happening to Pope Francis's idea of a "Church permanently in mission" in his own diocese?
The Most Disliked Man in Rome?
It really is time for Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, the 78-year old General Secretary of the Synod of Bishops, to hang up his spurs.
After an initial show of bonhomie on the Synod's first working day, Cardinal Baldisseri reverted to the petulant, bullying style that has marked his interactions with members of both the Synod general council and each Synod's working commissions since his appointment five years ago. His intransigent refusal to have documents translated into languages other than Italian is both an obstacle to real discussion and a means of manipulation and control. He consistently refused to let members of Synod-2018's drafting commission have draft materials in electronic form, complaining about "leaks" from English-speakers. He stormed out of a meeting of this synod's communication commission after a heated discussion of translations, saying on his way out the door that "Next time it will all be in Latin!" As noted above, he would not provide translations of the key third part of the Really Final Draft Final Report (which included the most extensive discussion of "synodality"), and no one thought this simply a matter of time-pressure. Further, and as also noted previously, he resisted a strong statement on clerical sexual abuse and episcopal malfeasance in the RFDFR, seemingly clueless about the gravity of the crisis throughout the world Church.
None of this contributes to comity or collegiality; and whatever "synodality" means, it isn't advanced by such boorish behavior. The cardinal's aggressive stubbornness is also an insult to bishops who are every bit as much successors of the apostles as Baldisseri, but whom he nonetheless treats as if they were refractory kindergarteners, especially when they insist that they know their situations better than Baldisseri does (as on the abuse crisis). If Pope Francis is serious about making the Synod of Bishops work better, he will thank Lorenzo Baldisseri for his services and bring in a new general secretary—right away.
After the Exhaustion
The Synod process seems designed to wear everyone down, thus making it easier for the Synod's mandarins to get their way. So it's not surprising that there's a sense of deflation at the end of Synod-2018. There are also more than a few worries about how the Church is going to weather the rough seas into which it is being steered. Still, there was some very good work done here this past month. New networks of conversation and collaboration were built. Nothing completely egregious got into the Final Report, thanks to some hard and effective work. New Catholic leaders emerged on the world stage.
And there were, as always, many experiences of fellowship, and the grace that flows from the Holy Spirit through solidarity in a great cause. In that sense I've been glad to have been here. And like others, I suspect, I'm grateful that Synod-2018 has given me a clearer understanding that business-as-usual is not an adequate model for the next months and years of Catholic life.
- George Weigel
TESTIMONY FOR THE CHURCH
(During the second full week of Synod-2018, the University of Notre Dame's Center for Ethics and Culture, directed by Professor Carter Snead, hosted a series of evening receptions at which Synod fathers could meet young adults, hear their concerns personally, and discuss the Synod's themes in an informal atmosphere. The following reflection was offered at one of those events by John Paul Ferguson, a Notre Dame undergraduate. Jack Ferguson's summons to a truth-based evangelization of young people who, like the rest of us, are called to sanctity, struck your editor as a fitting way to end these LETTERS. XR II)
Good evening, everyone.
Over the past two evenings, we've heard our friends Keenan and Katherine reflect how they have experienced and come to treasure the transcendental virtues of "beauty" and "goodness" in their life of faith. Tonight, I hope to contribute this final reflection on "truth," especially the truth of our Lord—what we believe the beautiful and good lead us towards.
In the American legal system, we swear in court to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. It's that middle tenet of the oath—the whole truth—that I think is noteworthy for the Church to consider. When truth is proclaimed partially or incompletely, it can be as misleading as a lie. I believe this kind of truth is what my friends, my peers, my classmates, and my fellow young men and women throughout the world are wanting to hear proclaimed wholeheartedly, courageously, and lovingly from the Church.
When I think of young people, my friends, and the Church, I'm struck by many of those who leave the Church, because they reject a false idea of what the Church actually is. They have not heard that "whole truth" of what Jesus Christ proclaimed, and what he asks of us, how he asks us to respond to His love; the whole truth that: The stories of our lives are always illuminated by light of supernatural grace, that are called to enter to struggle of radical holiness. We must be reminded that we are not called to success, to contentment, to mere toleration—we're called to sainthood.
Any of my friends could tell you that Jesus taught love. But too many have no idea what this love consists of, what God's Plan really is. Even many of those who attended Catholic primary and secondary schools had weak formation from parents, teachers, and parishes.
One of my best friends back on campus went through his whole confirmation process and high school religious education only ever hearing that "Jesus loves everyone"—which surely is the beginning and end of the Christian mystery—but leaves everything in the middle—the heroic struggle—completely unexplored.
My roommate had a similar story in his Catholic high school. His understanding of the faith had little depth, and therefore little strength. When he came to Notre Dame, he began to finally receive instruction in his faith; he began reading the Bible for the first time, and C. S. Lewis.
These two friends of mine began encountering the tradition of the Church; both were greatly inspired by reading Augustine; they began participating in the sacramental life of the Church, attending Mass and confession regularly for the first time. They're the ones who drag me to adoration.
What a great joy it has been to accompany them in their conversion.
They've now been given the whole picture, the whole truth, instead of a watered-down offer of comfort. It was something they were desiring so badly, but they didn't know it because they weren't receiving it. Of course, this transformation doesn't mean they are now perfect (far from it!), but now they have entered the struggle—the journey back. They are trying.
As their friend and fellow young person, we're in our fight together. There's new life I witness in these friends when we share about our encounters with the Lord, about our encounters with the fullness of the truth and its inspiration from the beautiful and good.
At a moment in which a lot is said about "change and listening in the Church," I don't think we young people are going to change Jesus Christ's Church. Rather, we need Jesus Christ's Church to be changing us, converting us, transforming us into saints. At the Mass, we recite the Credo, the "I believe," not the Cupio, the "I want."
And lastly, though of course there should always be an "urgency" with respect to our salvation—as Peter perhaps overzealously jumped out of the boat to swim towards our Lord on the shore just to be near him—I think it is especially important for all of us, especially young persons, to be reminded that our Lord can play the long game.
On behalf of our young generation, I ask all of you that the Church's urgency never becomes a compromised urgency. Just last Sunday, we heard the Gospel telling us Jesus looked at the rich young man with love, but let him walk away sad when he refused to respond to the call. The Gospel tells us that droves of his former disciples walked away grumbling after the Bread of Life sermon. Never did he run after them, offering to negotiate, or lessen the terms. Jesus doesn't make settlements, he prosecutes for the win every time.
In the middle of Notre Dame's campus, there is a statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus that reads Venite ad me Omnes— "Come to me, all of you." What he's inviting us to is the liberation that arises from the truth of knowing, loving, and serving His person. Synod fathers, please lead us not with any accommodation of the beautiful, good, and true—but with the real example of the joy and freedom of a friendship with him who is the beautiful, good, and true.
Please pray for us, that as the youth, we might not defer our life in the Church until we are grown, but that we might respond courageously to the time and place that the Lord has created us for.
A WORD OF THANKS….
LETTERS FROM THE SYNOD-2018 has been made available throughout the English-speaking world through the cooperation of our collaborators: Ramona Tausz, Julia Yost, and R. R. Reno at First Things in New York; Nick Hallett and Luke Coppen at The Catholic Herald in London; and Peter Rosengren at The Catholic Weekly in Sydney. One could not ask for better or more supportive colleagues.
Many of the Anglophone bishops at Synod-2018 contributed to this work by their conversation, discussion, occasional correction, and friendship. I am most grateful to all of them, as I am to many English-speaking scribes and broadcasters who came to Rome for Synod-2018 and participated in a variety of cooperative ventures. Long live the Junior Ganymede Club!
All those involved in this effort owe a great debt of gratitude to our benefactors, Rob and Berni Neal, and to our hosts at the Casa John Ambrose in Rome. Thank you.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Our real estate agent can do a visit for a hotel for sale Ho Chi Minh City to establish a company in Vietnam.
Hotel for sale in district 1 in Ho Chi Minh City. The hotel has a bar, restaurant, kitchen with a professional equipment and 17 bedrooms with a new decoration. Business fund (with all permits) : 95 000 USD. Monthly rental : 7500 USD.


Abstract: This paper investigates several incentive mechanisms for collaborative product quality improvement in a buyer-driven supply chain, and the impacts of those mechanisms on supply chain performance. The buyer, the Stackelberg leader, determines the sales price of a product while the supplier is responsible for production and product quality determination. We develop analytical models incorporating two reward schemes to better understand how the buyer can facilitate the supplier's quality improvement efforts. We offer managerial insights and practical guidelines for implementing quality management in the supply chain, derived from both an analytical comparison and numerical experiments.


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Students Study Global Population Displacement in Berlin
Faculty; Social Work; Public Health; Students
This month, 15 Brown School students studied Germany's response to an increase in refugee populations. Through this unique global course in Berlin,—Refugee Empowerment, Physical Activity and Urban Development— led by Professor of Practice Heather Cameron, students learned about the challenges facing public health, social work and social policy in regards to global population displacement. Germany has become the primary destination in Europe for asylum-seekers, receiving over a million applications in the last three years largely from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.
To deepen their understanding of refugee and migrant populations, students had the opportunity to collaborate with local organizations in the social service and government sectors through on-site visits and panel discussions. They learned about providing adequate healthcare and housing for refugees, creating cohesive and inclusive communities, and implementing innovative social strategies for overall integration of this population.
After a visit to the German Aids Foundation in which students learned about community participation and program evaluation, Brown School MSW student Roxy Lawrence reflected on her experience: "It has been really amazing and I've learned so much from this visit. I think this will be something I take with me back to the U.S. and use in my work. "
"This class gave me a breadth of information, which touched upon all contributors to health behavior and health outcomes for the refugee population. We had access into multiple agencies and programs within German society—fromhospitals, to grassroots programs, to the parliament," said Brown School MSW/MPH student Julia Hughes, who will remain in Berlin for a global practicum placement.
Cameron, the Michael B. Kaufman Professor of Practice in Social Entrepreneurship, has lived and worked in Berlin: She started a social and community enterprise called Boxgirls to empower young girls in its inner city neighborhoods through boxing. She hopes that after this Brown School Berlin experience, her students will "see what a different policy framework can make possible and push for bolder ideas for program and policy development back at home."
Pamela L. Begay Appointed Director of the Buder Center
Training Helps Scholars Put Their Research Into Practice, Achieve Equity


FoldaMount82 Aggressor wall mounted retractable basketball goals are a big money saver of traditional up folding units because there is no need to buy a motorized winch with this model.
Approx. Shipping Weight: 533 lbs.


Cavalli, L.S. Better Aquaculture for a Better World. (2016) J Marine Biol Aquacult 2(1): 1-2.
The permanent and rapid evolution of aquaculture is called the blue revolution. The blue revolution requires best environmental and social practices regarding sustainable business, work safety and gender equality. Aquaculture is an important source of local food and livelihood for people worldwide. Consequently, it is necessary to improve animal health conditions, social inclusion, sustainability and eco-friendly activity in aquaculture industry.
The rapid development of aquaculture has led to the intensification of farming by increasing the stocking densities. Therefore, any changes in water quality or poor management may cause the emergence of disease and increased animal mortality. Good management practices and new methodologies for rapid diagnosis are effective measures for establishing animal health in aquaculture.
Undoubtedly, a new and innovative aquaculture needs to adopt sustainable and eco-friendly practices. Responsible aquaculture requires minimizing negative environmental impact and conserving soil and water. The environmentally friendly is associated touse of probiotics which can improve water quality and animal health. Additionally, organic production in aquaculture has recently gained importance in major organic food markets. Organic aquaculture is an approach that addresses environmental impact, safety issues in aquaculture products, eco-certification, feed composition, sustainable alternatives, general nutritional principles and product quality.
Furthermore, the social impacts of the aquaculture sector have been neglected. Small-scale aquaculture, work safety and gender equality must be strongly encouraged. Small-scale and artisanal aquaculture includes ownership by a family or community which can contribute to poverty alleviation, food security and rural livelihoods. Meanwhile, safety and health issues for aquaculture workers remain unaddressed. Reducing farm hazards and establishing safety policies in the fishing sector could eliminate occupational health problems[10,11]. From a gender perspective, men have long dominated aquaculture as well as the academic world in marine sciences. Women's work is frequently unrecognized and unpaid. All scientists and aquaculture professional shave a responsibility to ensure that all projects and policies promote gender equality and women's empowerment.
Aquaculture continues to provide many benefits, including a valuable food supply and economic support for many countries. Establishing a smart aquaculture, which addresses health and social issues and is environmental friendly, should be a priority. Only under these conditions, aquaculture could contribute for a better world indeed.
1. Krause, G., Brugere, C., Diedrich, A., et al. A Revolution without People? Closing the People-Policy Gap in Aquaculture Development (2015) Aquaculture 447(1): 44-55.
2. Lee, K.K. Sustainable Aquaculture. (2015) J Marine Biol Aquacult 1(2): 1-2.
3. Smith, M.D., Roheim, C.A., Crowder, L.B., et al. Sustainability and Global Seafood. (2010) Science 327(5967): 784-786.
4. Sihag, R.C., Sharma, P. Probiotics: The new ecofriendly alternative measures of disease control for sustainable aquaculture. (2012) J Fish Aquat Sci 7(2): 72-103.
5. Mente, E., Karalazos, V., Karapanagiotidis, I.T. et al. Nutrition in organic aquaculture: an inquiry and a discourse. (2011) Aquacult Nut 17(4): e798–e817.
6. Xie, B., Qin, J., Yang, H., et al. Organic aquaculture in China: A review from a global perspective. (2013) Aquaculture 414-415: 243-253.
7. Edwards, P. Enhancing the contribution of small scale aquaculture to food security, poverty alleviation and socio-economic development. (2013) FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Proceedings No. 31. Rome, FAO pp: 255.
8. Townsley, P. 2013. Enhancing the contribution of small scale aquaculture to food security, poverty alleviation and socio-economic development. (2013) FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Proceedings No.31. Rome, FAO pp: 255.
9. Myers, M.L. Review of Occupational Hazards associated with aquaculture. (2010) J Agromedicine 15(4): 412-426.
10. Myers, M.L., Cole, H.P. Simple Solutions for Reduced Fish Farm Hazards. (2009) J Agromedicine 14(2): 150-156.
11. Piniella, F., Novalbos, J.P., Nogueroles, P.J. Artisanal fishing in Andalusia (II): Safety and working conditions policy. (2008) Mar Policy 32(4): 551-558.
12. Arensbergen, P., Weijden, I., Besselaar, P. Gender differences in scientific productivity: a persisting phenomenon (2012) Scientometrics 93(3): 857-868.
13. Williams, M.J., Agbayani, R., Bhujel, R., et al. Sustaining aquaculture by developing human capacity and enhancing opportunities for women. (2010) Farming the Waters for People and Food. Proceedings of the Global Conference on Aquaculture 785–874.
14. Williams, M.J. Why Look at Fisheries through a Gender Lens (2008) Development 51: 180–185.
15. Cole, D.W., Cole, R., Gaydos, S.J., et al. Aquaculture: Environmental, toxicological and health issues. (2009) Int J Hyg Environ Health 212(4): 369-377.


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Tennessee sheriff's office introduces high-tech drone command van
Cameras, sensors and tracking data produce empirical evidence
APB Team Published February 1, 2021 @ 5:14 pm PST
iStock.com/TriggerPhoto
The city of Los Angeles houses more than 4 million people and more than 23,000 surveillance cameras, which makes it the most watched city in the country — albeit that pales in comparison with Taiyuan, China, which has 465,255 cameras, nearly 120 devices per 1,000 people, according to Comparitech.
CCTV cameras have been capturing people's activities since the late 1940s when it was first implemented to monitor commercial spaces. Naturally, the devices have become an integral component to police investigations, but they're not the only recording equipment engaged by law enforcement. Technological advancements such as cameras on squad cars, acoustic sensors and cellphone programs that extract data all advance policing capabilities.
The digitization of traffic and streetlight cams have improved the quality of images, but it's been the proliferation of installations — estimated to exceed 1 billion worldwide this year — that offers additional surveillance value because of the more expansive coverage. Programs like Citizen Virtual Patrol expand accessibility, too. Users can pull up images of streets, sidewalks and building exteriors collected by publicly owned cameras from any laptop.
Also, police agencies across the country have deployed automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) on patrol vehicles. These compact cameras snap images of passing cars' license plates, simultaneously logging geospatial specifics. That data is then mined to identify stolen vehicles or cars alleged to be used in crimes.
Another technology gaining favor with law enforcement is the ShotSpotter, an acoustic sensor designed to recognize loud, impulsive sounds between 120 and 160 decibels, such as gunshots. When a suspicious sound is recorded, an alert triggers a human review, and if it's suspected to be shots fired, the local police department is notified and provided details of where, when and how many shots detected. Per the 2020 ShotSpotter National Gunfire Trends report, there was a 48% increase in gunshot incidents reviewed last year compared with 2019 based on data collected from more than 100 cities using the technology.
We all know smartphones hold a plethora of details that could prove pertinent to an investigation. Although court orders often are required, international mobile subscriber information (IMSI) software, such as Stingray, mimic cell towers and harvest metadata from phones in the area, including location, text messages, website browsing history and call logs, all critical to building cases.
Of course, with new technology come new concerns for privacy. For example, IMSI doesn't target specific suspects. Rather, Stingray casts a broad net over all phones in a given location at a given time, which includes individuals who may have nothing to do with an investigation. Opponents of the technology suggest the expectation of privacy by these innocent bystanders should be considered and protected. IMSI strategies engaged during last summer's protests also were roundly criticized for potential infringement of civil rights.
ALPRs have come under scrutiny for a variety of reasons, including privacy violations. However, last fall, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled that a vehicle's license plate, location and time are not considered personal identifying information, and therefore, the program is a legitimate policing tool.
There's additional concern over how long agencies hold onto the data and whether they share it with other departments, including federal agencies like Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Guardian reported that a 2019 audit of police agencies revealed departments regularly exchanged such data, in some cases passing it along to hundreds of other law enforcement organizations. Journalist Jon Fasman, author of We See It All: Liberty and Justice in an Age of Perpetual Surveillance, told NPR that ALPR regulations vary from state to state, and some states have no restrictions at all.
California State Senator Scott Wiener cited a 2019 audit of the Los Angeles Police Department ALPR files that showed only 400,000 of the 320 million images could be traced to vehicles of interest due to possible connection to crimes as reason for introducing the License Plate Privacy Act bill last month. If signed into law, it would require scheduled audits of departments use of ALPRs and prohibit retaining irrelevant data as well as restrict sharing of data.
"I'm not suggesting in writing about the dangers of ALPRs that we eliminate them, because it does help find stolen cars. It does help find cars used in crimes. The issue is what about the 99.99% of cars that aren't involved in crimes? What do you do with their data?" questioned Fasman.
Categories: Tech


text:
package nicehash

type Version struct {
	ApiVersion  string `json:"api_version"`
}

func (client *NicehashClient) GetVersion() (string, error) {
	version := &struct {
		Result Version `json:"result"`
	}{}
	_, err := client.sling.New().Get("").ReceiveSuccess(&version)
	if err != nil {
		return version.Result.ApiVersion, err
	}

	return version.Result.ApiVersion, err
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Ardatow – miasto w Mordowii w Rosji
 Ardatow – osiedle typu miejskiego w obwodzie niżnonowogrodzkim w Rosji

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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Eunice Mehan Thomas
Eunice Mehan Thomas, a native of Stamford, died on Thursday, May 19th at The Bristal Assisted Living facility in Armonk, New York at the age of 90. She was the only child of Anthony and Jennie Czescik Mehan. Eunice attended the Holy Name School and Stamford High School, graduating in 1942. She attended the University of Connecticut for two years prior to transferring to Cornell University-New York Hospital where she received her B.S. degree in nursing. During her tenure at Cornell she was a member of the United States Cadet Nurse Corps. She continued her studies in a Columbia University graduate program in public health. Active in the field of community health for over fifty years, Eunice was a staff nurse for the Greenwich Public Health Nursing Service, a nurse-teacher in the Darien School System working most of the time at Middlesex Junior High School, a geriatric case manager at Connecticut Community Care and a health coordinator for the Child Care Center of Stamford. Eunice was one of a group of nurse activists instrumental in unionizing Darien's non certified employees. As a geriatric case manager, she also received a citation from the governor of Connecticut naming her as an outstanding older worker. She was active in the League of Women Voters, American Association of University Women, Cornell University-NYH Alumnae Association, The National Organization for Women and Planned Parenthood. Joseph H. Thomas III, her husband of 63 years, predeceased her on September 9, 2015. She is survived by two sons, Brett and his wife Kathleen; Kent and his wife Susan; and by three grandchildren, Alexander, Zachary and Jennie. Donations may be made to Alzheimer Association's on her behalf at http://www.alz.org/ . Family will receive relatives and friends on Sunday, June 12th from noon to1pm at the Bosak Funeral Home, 453 Shippan Avenue, in Stamford, CT with a memorial service to be celebrated at 1pm. Burial will be private.
Eunice Mehan Thomas, a native of Stamford, died on Thursday, May 19th at The Bristal Assisted Living facility in Armonk, New York at the age of 90. She was the only child of Anthony and Jennie Czescik Mehan. Eunice attended the Holy Name School... View Obituary & Service Information
The family of Eunice Mehan Thomas created this Life Tributes page to make it easy to share your memories.
Eunice Mehan Thomas, a native of Stamford, died on Thursday,...
Share and view memories of Eunice...


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LOVE GAMES LIVE!
sun12feb8:00 pmsun9:30 pmLOVE GAMES LIVE!
LOVE GAMES LIVE! A night of live music and performance Date: Sunday, February 12, 2023 Doors: 7PM Showtime: 8PM Tickets: $25 - General Admission | $90 - VIP table for 2 About: Isaac Ray is a
LOVE GAMES LIVE! A night of live music and performance
Date: Sunday, February 12, 2023
Isaac Ray is a young ambitious and talented artist from Chicago, IL. In one of the greatest and most competitive musical cities, he has found himself rising to the top of the elite crop. This is in large due to his extreme work ethic, passion and precision to detail, and his ability to maneuver amongst the gifted masses, and still be heard loud and clear. Like most of the great singers before him, Isaac began his musical trek inside the four walls of the church. This, along with being a part of the groundbreaking gospel choir (Soul Children of Chicago), gave him the tools to travel around the country, including overseas Diversity, variety and the ability to adapt in multi music genres is one of Isaac's greatest strengths. He learned a great deal of this while attending the prominent Chicago High School for the Arts. This coveted institution allowed his natural gift to be infused with classical music, and vocal techniques. Currently Isaac is a full time professional artist, dancer, actor, vocal director and recording session singer. He has lent his vocal talents to artist such as Kierra Sheard, Kevin Gray, Walt Whitman, O.A.R, Johnathan McReynolds and Fantasia. In 2022, he released his long awaited EP entitled "LOVE GAMES" Welcome to the stage....ISAAC RAY.


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2017 NSW Creative Achievement Awards nominations » NSW Government
March 31, 2017By adminAwards, NSW Arts News, Opportunity, Valuing the Arts
Know a creative who deserves an award for their partnership?
Nominations are open for the 2017 NSW Creative Achievement Awards. The awards celebrate and reward outstanding achievements of individuals and businesses that help raise the global profile of NSW Creative Industries. Highlighting established and emerging talent within our creative industries, the awards recognise the importance of our world-class creative industries and talent.
There are two main award categories:
NSW Creative Laureate: recognises a candidate that has demonstrated significant leadership and made a significant contribution to increasing the global profile of NSW creative industries.
NSW Emerging Creative Talent Award: recognises an individual, team or organisation that has shown originality and innovation and contributed to raising the global profile of NSW Creative Industries. This award offers a prize of $15,000.
More than 42 per cent of Australia's creative workforce lives in NSW, with over 200,000 people across the state employed in the industry.
Nominations close on Sunday, 9 April 2017. The finalists will be announced in the weeks leading up to the award ceremony on Wednesday, 14 June 2017 during Vivid Sydney.
Find out more about the awards and nomination process
Source: 2017 NSW Creative Achievement Awards nominations » NSW Government
Helpmann Awards 2017 Entries open now!
Quick! It's back! Arts Business subsidised TAFE Training


The campus story of the school season. Autumn leaves are the second short stories of Muzi's workshop, telling beautiful campus love stories. What is the most important thing in college life? Love? Friendship? Or the surging youth? In the autumn leaves, you will experience the different campus life with the leading characters.
The campus story of the school season. Autumn leaves are the second short stories of Muzi's workshop, telling beautiful campus love stories.
What is the most important thing in college life? Love? Friendship? Or the surging youth?
In the autumn leaves, you will experience the different campus life with the leading characters.
Autumn leaves are the second works after Muzi's workshop, following the spring breeze. Game is a linear story, mainly describing Chinese university campus life, love and friendship, because meet different people and change.
Thank you for your support. Autumn leaves is just a simple story. I hope you like it.


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Breaking Curses 1
Broadcast 3347
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Proverbs 26:2 (NET) Like a fluttering bird or like a flying swallow, so a curse without cause does not come to rest.
At 42, Dare was still unsettled in life. He wasn't married and was still moving from place to place, living with his friends who were now tired of housing him. By the time he turned 43, he did some personal reflection and realized that his inability to settle down and prosper was abnormal. He traced back and realized that this all started 8 years ago when his former pastor placed a curse on him.
He used to be a worker under this pastor when they had a falling out and Dare told him he wanted to leave the church. The pastor was so grieved that he said "you want to leave? You can go, but know you will never settle down in life".
This is what really happened: the church was moving to their new venue and bought some pricey musical instruments and equipment. Dare was the deacon who oversaw all of that, but there were allegations that he misappropriated millions during the process. His pastor got wind of the disturbing allegations and wanted to find out what was really going on. It was in the middle of this process that Dare informed his pastor that he was leaving the church. Indeed, Dare had used his position to divert millions of Naira into his personal account.
Eight years had passed, and it was now clear to Dare that his life was under the limiting force of a curse. He was now sorry for his conduct and wanted the curse to be broken.
That curse could alight on Dare's life because he was not guiltless but was a thief. He needed to repent of that iniquity in order to break free of that curse.
Many people are operating under curses because their lives have been warped by iniquity. In order to break free of such curses, there needs to be true repentance before God, and sometimes before man.
Go into today remembering that no curse can alight upon you if you walk uprightly before the Lord. Generational curses will only find expression in the life of the person who has not broken free from the generational iniquity that made it possible for that curse to alight.
Prayer: Ask the Lord to help you walk uprightly and above all curses and limitations. Repent of every transgression of God's law that can be used as a basis for curses.
Confession: I am free in Christ; Free of curses and limitations. I am blessed and prosperous. In Jesus' name.
—Abraham Dami Arigi
Bible In One Year: Jeremiah 42-46
Contact us here (WhatsApp): +15155195600, +2348138224547
Listen to our free 24/7 Online Radio: www.streamglobe.radio
By Streamglobe - June 28, 2022
Changing Labels
Learning from Cain and Esau
Be Strong and Confident
The Things of the Spirit
The one to whom we are accountable 2
The one to whom we are accountable
Abundant Grace 2
Abundant Grace
The Kingdom Principle Of Faithfulness
It Happened With God
The Holy Spirit 3
I Will Say of the Lord
Running to Win
Under The Shadow of the Almighty
Overcoming Your Fears 2
Love: The Key to Promotion
Overcoming Your Fears
God is the Judge
Filled with Praise 2
Filled with Praise
Protect What You Have
Caesar And The Christian
By Their Fruits


TalentSum is gaining traction as an alternative for companies looking for recruitment sourcing support.
Everyone here at TalentSum is focused on helping companies to be great at talent attraction and engagement.
Like never before—I believe we are right in the middle of a transformation in the way talent acquisition work is done.
New data from TalentSum shows working employees at Top Employer Brand Organizations are more likely to make quality recommendations.
Whenever something new and different comes along people try to describe it by comparing it with what they already know.
New Creative Talent Acquisition Consulting Firm launches to help clients measure and optimize across their talent acquisition landscape and improve in-house recruitment capabilities with flexible member plans and complementary set of talent acquisition services.
We've all heard that attracting talent, and keeping employees engaged and committed, is a critical business objective and yet, most companies fail in their efforts and continue to rely on the same outdated processes and solutions.
TalentSum, a talent acquisition consultancy and best practices implementation firm, combines strategy, marketing, technology, sourcing and analytics to deliver work in a way that transforms how our clients attract, engage and hire their people.
We do this because we believe strategic talent acquisition creates a real competitive advantage for the business, supports the objectives of talent leaders, hiring managers and recruiting professionals, and can lead to highly engaged employees and high-performing cultures.
© 2019 TalentSum LLC, and affiliates. All rights reserved.


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Hundreds of Activists to Protest Construction of Underground Animal Research Facility at The University of Washington
By Sparrow
Seattle, WA — This Saturday, April 25, 2015, at 2pm PT, hundreds of activists are expected to take the streets to protest The University of Washington (UW) and Skanska Construction, who are attempting to construct an underground animal research facility designed to expand the University's cadre of primate and canine subjects exponentially.
Creative actions and protests, coordinated in part by the No New Animal Lab campaign, have intensified scrutiny regarding UW's animal research, including the 2014 USDA findings that they improperly cared for their animals.
Saturday's protest is part of the World Week For Animals in Laboratories international week of action.
What: Mass protest and rally against The University of Washington
When: Saturday, April 25th,at 2pm PDT
Who: No New Animal Lab campaign and northwest animal advocates
Where: University of Washington Campus, Red Square near Kane Hall, 4069 Spokane Lane, Seattle, WA 98105
For more information visit http://nonewanimallab.com
Photo Credit: Jo-Anne McArthur, WeAnimals
No New Animal Lab Fights Back Against Skanska Injunction with Anti-SLAPP Motion to Strike


For next month's ENA magazine.
I'll be participating in ISKC's Kick for Cures this Sunday.
Please sponsor me for a good cause. Even a couple bucks will do.
I'll be sharing a table at Wizard World Chicago next week with Melly (Miss Monster) Curphy.
Artist's Alley table #4420 August 6-9.
Recession priced at only five bucks!
This isn't from Sketch-B-Que, we'll just call it new and improved. Mostly improved.
I'm trying out a new online store featuring my sketchbook: Peeking Duck as well as a few prints. Keep checking back for more updates and thanks for your support!
More Disaster Man For next month's ENA magazine.


This session will cover experimental and theoretical works on spectroscopy and radiative transfer. Papers are solicited on results of observational, experimental, theoretical and modeling studies in the Spectroscopy, Retrieval Techniques and Radiative Transfer areas applied to the characterization of planetary atmospheres.
- the characterization of solar system and extrasolar planetary spectra.


For thousands of years the indigenous people of Papua New Guinea have mined and traded stone implements and ochre, and used clay to make pottery. Gold was first discovered in Papua New Guinea in 1852 as accidental traces in pottery from Redscar Bay on the Papuan Peninsula.
From their earliest sightings of New Guinea, Europeans assumed they would find gold. The geography of the landscape, rugged mountains, denseness of vegetation and the unknown interior seemed to convince explorers that there was treasure. A small amount of gold was found on the Gira river and on the Yodda trail near Kokoda in 1890. But it took until the early 1900s for the more successful gold discoveries.
At the start of World War One Australia took possession of the German colony of New Guinea, which was administered from Rabaul at that time. In 1922, New Guinea was made a Mandated Territory of Australia by the League of Nations. In the same year, a mining ordinance was put in place to legalise prospecting.
Australian Gold mine owner Cecil John Levien (1874-1932) took out the first miner's right issued in the Territory of New Guinea in 1923. In 1923-24 Levien took out leases at Bulolo flats.
Levien, was a District Officer in Buka and Morobe turned miner, and important in the process of making New Guinea significant in gold mining between World War One and Two. He was also instrumental in New Guinea's commercial aviation history.
Levien had trained at the Royal Military College, Duntroon, and served as a lieutenant in the military administration in New Guinea in 1919-21. He recognized that New Guinea might offer prospects for a better life. His access to German official records indicated that payable alluvial gold might exist in the Watut River area.
In 1919 Levien opened a new government station at Buka. In 1921 he organised his posting as district officer to Morobe, where southern tributaries of the Markham River had once again become a focus for prospecting.
He carefully plotted all reports of gold, and was the officer-in-charge in 1922 when Park struck rich alluvium in Koranga Creek, which flows into the upper Bulolo River. His powers under the Mining Ordinance of 1922 gave him a unique opportunity to monitor the promise of the field.
In 1923 he began quietly financing Park and his partner, J. Nettleton; he also acquired alluvial leases in his wife's name. Recognizing after some months the conflict of interest, he resigned from his position and on 31 December and took out the first miner's right issued in the Mandated Territory.
Aircraft played an important role in the development of New Guinea. The finding of gold at Edie Creek in an inland mountainous inland region with no roads was also important in the development of air transport in New Guinea. When Bill Royal washed up the first dishes of gold from Edie Creek in 1926 it became obvious that there was a need for a faster and easier way to reach the gold mining area. It was an exhausting six hour trek to get supplies like rice and equipment like shovels into the camp, and to transport the thousands of ounces of gold out of the area.
After a year of gold production Edie Creek was wealthy and popular enough to support an airstrip and planes. In 1928 the first planes were shipped from Australia. Another important date in prospecting and gold mining came in 1927 with the first Lae to Wau (near Edie Creek) aeroplane flight.
Cecil Levien also became a director and major share holder of Guinea Airways Limited, New Guinea's pioneer aviation company. Originally started under the name Guinea Gold, with a DH37 biplane called 'Old Faithful', Guinea Airways Ltd was registered on 4th November, 1927.
From 1932, Bulolo Gold Dredging, floated by a precursor of the international Canadian gold mining company Placer Dome, constructed eight dredges at Bulolo and Wau from dismantled parts flown in using three Junkers aircraft. This resulted in a total airlift of 39,417 tons of freight, for production of 1.3 million ounces of gold, until the planes were destroyed by Japanese fighters in 1942.
The use of Junker planes allowed the exploitation of the Morobe Goldfields and assembly of the huge gold dredges on Bulolo flats.
Dredging for gold at Bulolo began on 21 March, 1932, with all of the heavy dredging equipment transported in pieces by Junker planes flying from the port city of Lae. In the year ending 1932 Guinea Air carried 3947 tons of freight, a larger amount than the combined total for France and Germany over the same time.
Dredging operations were interrupted by the war in 1941, and were not resumed until six years later. Gold production in 1952 amounted to 122,035 ounces, valued at £1,311,241, and constituted 77 per cent of the gold produced in New Guinea in that year. Almost all of the mining in PNG has been gold mining.
Geological map of the Territory of Papua / by Evan R. Stanley ; drawn in the Northern Territory Branch, Department of Home and Territories.


So now the LORD my God has me curious, I know of a few other places in the Bible that I've seen this phrase, but where else could it be and what exactly is He trying to tell me through the thorns today?
So, I started with a simple word search through www.BibleGateway.com. There were 53 instances of the word "thorn" in both the New and Old Testament, several of them looked familiar while others were new. Numbers 33:55 sounded mighty familiar, I wonder why… "But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then those of them whom you let remain shall be as barbs in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall trouble you in the land where you dwell." I was beginning to see the theme here! In each mention of the thorns, so far, God is talking about driving out the current inhabitants of the promised land. Hmmmm… I think it's time to dig a bit deeper into this my friends.
In studying the Bible there is something each student must remember, the Bible defines itself. What I mean is, if something in the Bible reaches out and grabs your attention look at where else in the Bible it might be mentioned. By doing this the Bible will end up explaining itself. For example, the word thorn literally jumped off the page at me today, grabbed me by the neck and said "pay attention to ME!" And while I can glean quite a bit of information from that one mention of the word "thorn" in today's reading. I will glean considerably more if I look at all the other stories where the word "thorn" is mentioned. Another example of this is in Jesus' telling of the parable of the Sower and the Seed. In Mark chapter 4 we find Jesus teaching from a boat just off shore to a very large crowd. He shares with them the parable of a farmer, or sower, who goes out to his field to sow his seed. As he tosses the seed on the ground, some of the seed falls on the path where the birds come along and eat it. Some of the seed falls on rocky ground where it quickly grows but then whithers just as quickly because it has no root. Some of the seed falls among thorns and they grow up around the seed choking it and causing the seed to yield no grain. But then there is the seed that falls on the good fertile soil that produces grain and yields a huge harvest for the famer. After the crowd has left for the day and Jesus is left alone with his twelve closest disciples they ask Him about the parable and its meaning. His response to them is a huge key for us today! "Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables?" This is Jesus telling them that this particular parable is particularly important in translating many other parables, symbols and messages within the entire Bible.
– "The sower sows the word." This tells us that anywhere in the Bible where the word "seed" is mentioned, it can also be assumed that it is a parable and the seed is referring to the Word or messages from God, spoken or written.
– "And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them." I personally had this happen to me when God spoke His first words of His radical Grace into my life, and I can vouch for the ferocity in which those words are snatched away from you, with talons that tear the flesh! There are times in life when our heavenly sower is sowing His word into our life and we can feel it hit the flesh of our hearts. As we are just barely beginning to wrap our brains around the concept, or hoping that maybe God really is that kind of good, when the Enemy comes along and snatches that hope right back replacing it with his Doubt, Fear and Ignorance. He snatches Words of Hope with his biting words of Hate and Greed before we ever really even know fully what we had in our hands to begin with. There's a commercial out right now, I think it's for satellite TV, where a woman is just stepping off her porch with her little dog to go for a walk on this nice bright sunny day when a huge bird of prey swoops down out of nowhere, snatches the dog away from her and flies away with it in its talons. That is precisely what the Enemy does. God's word is a great gift of Light, and Love and Hope for His people. It is food for our souls, but the Enemy doesn't want us to actually eat it because if we do, we will grow and bear fruit making it harder for him to stop us. So he snatches it away before it can ever take root in our hearts and become imbedded into our souls.
– "And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. And they have no root in themselves, but endure for a while; then, when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away." In this instance the seed, or personal message from God, is not immediately snatched away, but rather is allowed to grow briefly. I experienced this with the second instance that God sowed His words of radical Grace into my heart. This time, it sank in deeper than the first, and I entertained it briefly. I wondered if God could really love me that much, if He could forgive me that completely, I hoped that He could. And yet life would creep in and bring me into hot situations where Doubt would convince me that His goodness wasn't really "that good". And I would wither away again.
-"And the others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful." Ahhhh… here we are, back to the thorns and on to the third time that God sowed His word of Radical Grace into my life. I'll never forget the day; at least I pray that I don't! It was my 32nd birthday. I was sitting in my red recliner in front of the TV watching a sermon on grace. The pastor shared his own personal testimony of how God's radical Grace finally caught up with him. He was young and passionate about the Lord, desperate to please Him in any way that he could. I could TOTALLY relate to this! I was so on fire for God and yet having been steeped in legalism my entire life I was desperate to be perfect in order to please God. Little did I know, that's not what pleases Him. In fact, my perfection is what kills Him. That day I sat and listened to the pastor's story through tears, his story was my story. I was so desperate to please God and adamant about never sinning that I was constantly sinning. I was so focused on being good for Jesus that I had completely stopped looking at Jesus and was completely focused on myself and my sin. In trying to please Him, I left Him. I became so focused on what I was doing that I was totally missing what He was doing…and more importantly I had completely missed what He has done.
Some sects of Christianity are so focused on the Law, the Ten Commandments, and following them to the letter, that we have lost the whole point of the Gospel message, GRACE! Jesus didn't come to abolish the Law, He came to fulfill it! Do you know what that means? It means that the Law was a prophecy of the perfection of God that would literally put on flesh and walk among us. It means that Jesus was the fulfillment of the Law in the most perfect way! Just like when a prophecy is fulfilled it is finished, so too is the Law finished in Christ! When the Law was given on Mount Sinai, it was given as a picture of what was to come and God told the Israelites to follow these commands. But then when Jesus came what was it that He told His chosen Disciples? "Follow Me". Jesus is the total embodiment of the Law, only MORE perfect. If the Old Covenant had been completely perfect then there would have been no need to create a New Covenant now would there? But that is precisely what Jesus came to do! He came to give us a New Covenant with a New Command. "Love one another as I have loved You." "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul and all your mind. Likewise, Love your neighbor as yourself. In these two all the Law is summed up." While the original Law consisted of thou shalt not's, the new command is not a don't, but a DO. Why? Because God knows how He created us! He knows how Satan works! If God tells us don't eat from this tree, then the first thing Satan is going to do is tempt us with all his seductive ways to get us to eat from that tree. The Law alerts us to sin. If there is no command that tells us not to covet, then we are so much less likely to covet. Those without the law are a law unto themselves.
On the day that Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of stone 3,000 people died because of their sins. On the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit of Jesus came down and filled His people, enabling them to do what He had called them to do, 3,000 people were saved and brought into eternal Life. There is a reason they call those Ten Commandments the Law of death, it's because it kills. But the Spirit of God brings Life! And with that Spirit, and focusing on the death of Jesus instead of ourselves and our own sinfulness, we are brought out of darkness into His marvelous Light!
Does that mean that we should go out and murder because we no longer follow the Law? NO!!! It means that we follow the Spirit of the Living God because we have been forgiven so completely that the slate that held our sins was wiped clean by the blood of Jesus before we were even born!
Our sins are no longer ours when we give ourselves over to Christ. In that very moment they belong to Him. Our sins are part of who we are, and when we surrender our lives to Him, they belong to Him too; every single one of them, past, present and future. And in that moment we become like Him, sinless and pure in the eyes of God. We are forgiven COMPLETELY without spot or blemish. Now do we look like that to the world, no way! Do we see ourselves like that? Not usually. But should we?
This reading has been an excerpt from Tamar's book Waiting…, if you would like to read more it is available HERE in multiple formats.


GIF Sundsvall barely saved the elite class status last term, but they will be nowhere near the danger area this time around thanks to a spell of super strong displays so far in the season. They sit 7th in the league ladder being as many as 17 points clear off Brommapojkarna in the relegation play-offs spot.
Giffarna have been doing really well of late. They will host Kalmar undefeated in three straight outings, including an impressive goalless draw away at the reigning champions Malmo FF last weekend. The head coach Joel Cedergren can truly be proud of the phenomenal job he has done with the team so far in the season. The squad showed a textbook example of a defensive-minded approach eight days ago in Malmo. Kalmar will thus likely struggle in the build-up play on Monday when they travel to NP3 Arena.
The head to head record completely favours Kalmar who lead the tie by eight wins coming into the 19th encounter against Giffarna.
However, it's GIF Sundsvall who came on top when the two teams last took on each other in mid-July this year (0-2 away at Guldfageln Arena).
Both teams scored just once in last four head to head outings.
Kalmar come into this in a completely opposite atmosphere. They are winless in last seven games in all competitions, a streak which includes two defeats and a single draw in last three Allsvenkan matches.
Losses came away to Malmo (4-0) and at home to Hacken (1-2), while the draw was also a disappointing one, coming against relegation strugglers Brommapojkarna last weekend at home (1-1).
The visitors are, however, still on a fair distance from the drop zone being nine points off Brommapojkarna in 14th.
We just have to see Sundsvall as clear favourites based on the current form and we do find the value in backing the home win at the odds of 1.80.
Sundsvall to keep a clean sheet @ 2.50 (6/4).


text:
Curated by Anita Ratnam, Devi Diaries is a vibrant digital dance festival celebrating goddesses
Anita Ratnam talks about non-traditional goddesses in the spotlight for the digital dance festival, Devi Diaries, offering a performing space for dancers from across the country
Sabrina Rajan Published : 22nd October 2021 12:00 AM | Published : | 22nd October 2021 12:00 AM
Anita Ratnam
If we have learnt one lesson through the pandemic — it is that the arts cannot be contained within four walls. From online poetry reading to virtual plays — now even as we talk about hybrid ways — we have an immersive dance festival to hold our attention and satiate our hunger for some exquisite performances. Presented by Narthaki.com and Anita Ratnam for Navaratri, the Devi Diaries is a digital event that features performances by young and renowned dancers from across India and is on till October 31. Devi Diaries was launched in October 2020 inspired by the writings of Sri Aurobindo's The Mother. We catch up with the prolific danseuse Anita Ratnam to explore the trajectory of the performing arts post pandemic — in the new reality.
Do tell us the process that led to the curating of the performances for the Devi Diaries.
With a wide range of experiences in presenting and organising festivals and conferences for the past 30 years, I have developed a network of dancers across styles and age. Which means classical, neo classical and contemporary — so curating was never a problem. What was going to be the content for Devi Diaries, what was the idea behind the sacred feminine, what is called the divine feminine energy — those were the criteria that we kept in mind when we reached out to dancers.
What can we expect? Especially, considering the showcase celebrates the goddesses from all regions.
We wanted dancers to explore languages that were close to their geographical locations. T hat means — Malayalam, Kannada, Bhojpuri, Manipuri, Assamese, Odia, Braj, Prakrit, and of course Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam if they are doing it in Bharatanatyam , Kuchipudi, Mohiniyattam or Kathakali and other dance forms. But linguistically we wanted diversity and we told the dancers to look at non-traditional goddesses. Not just Durga, Lakshmi and Saraswati — the trinity. But, also various other village goddesses — what we call the gramadevatas — Goddesses who were not necessarily sweet and benign, but also the fierce goddesses who are filled with action.
What were the challenges you faced when putting together this event?
The challenges faced were — the health of the artistes or sometimes the health of the technical people, the editors, the camera people — so many people had COVID -19 or were recovering from it or their family members had it. So, those were the challenges. Not the willingness or the theme — those fell into place very quickly. The dancers said yes, immediately. Many dancers were able to send it (videos) just in the nick of time. Some were not able to send at all! Due to huge problems like rain in Bengaluru... the dancers are still not able to shoot.
Do you think that this 'new normal' of remotely presenting your work has an advantage too?
Dance needs a live audience. A dancer gets reduced to an ant-size if you watch it (the performance) in a hand held device or at the most on your laptop. Rarely do we play it on the big screen. But the big advantage is that you have a global audience. And once you have the advantage of a digital performance — it stays on and you can watch it at your leisure, a day or a week after it has premiered. So, the longevity and the reach of a digital space and presence have their own merits.
On till October 31. narthaki.com
Anita Ratnam devi diaries


Fully multi-coated lenses provide enhanced photopic transmission, which in turn provides a bright crisp image. The well balanced, phase coated, roof-prism design makes them comfortable and easy to hold, even during periods of prolonged viewing. Ergonomic placement of the diopter adjustment lever on the center focus wheel makes adjusting diopter settings to meet each user's specific needs fast and easy. Armored, waterproof, and nitrogen filled, Leupold BX-2 Acadia binoculars are well protected against field conditions and feature the Leupold Limited Lifetime Warranty. Includes a case, quick detach neoprene neck strap, eyepiece covers and tethered objective lens covers.


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Kruti–a flavour of India, supports artisans of five states of India and aims to provide livelihood security to the tribal artisans in an inclusive manner by eliminating middlemen. Kruti curates every product to ensure the highest quality whilst also ensuring that these age-old tribal art forms that date back to the Mohenjodaro days remain alive.
Drishtique Worldwide is a Human Capital Consulting firm, that offers customising solutions for their clients. Drishtique work in the areas of designing and setting up an HR Centre of Excellence, Leadership Development, Learning and Development, Coaching and Counselling, Assessments.
Drishtique Worldwide is celebrating their first ever Corporate Social Responsibility event, an NGO exhibition for Kruti.
The exhibition by Drishtique Worldwide and Kruti will showcase the Madhubani paintings of Bihar, Pattachitra and Saura art of Odisha, Warli of Maharashtra, miniatures of Rajasthan, hand painted Sarees and apparel of the same art forms, the Dokra tribal jewellery and handicrafts.
Venue : Drishtique Worldwide, H-11 Everest, 9th floor, 156 Tardeo Road, Mumbai-400034 on 23rd August' 2014 from 1-6 pm.


text:
package org.apache.samza.storage

import java.io._
import java.util
import scala.collection.{JavaConversions, Map}
import org.apache.samza.util.Logging
import org.apache.samza.Partition
import org.apache.samza.system._
import org.apache.samza.util.Util
import org.apache.samza.SamzaException
import org.apache.samza.container.TaskName

object TaskStorageManager {
  def getStoreDir(storeBaseDir: File, storeName: String) = {
    new File(storeBaseDir, storeName)
  }

  def getStorePartitionDir(storeBaseDir: File, storeName: String, taskName: TaskName) = {
    // TODO: Sanitize, check and clean taskName string as a valid value for a file
    new File(storeBaseDir, (storeName + File.separator + taskName.toString).replace(' ', '_'))
  }
}

/**
 * Manage all the storage engines for a given task
 */
class TaskStorageManager(
  taskName: TaskName,
  taskStores: Map[String, StorageEngine] = Map(),
  storeConsumers: Map[String, SystemConsumer] = Map(),
  changeLogSystemStreams: Map[String, SystemStream] = Map(),
  changeLogStreamPartitions: Int,
  streamMetadataCache: StreamMetadataCache,
  storeBaseDir: File = new File(System.getProperty("user.dir"), "state"),
  loggedStoreBaseDir: File = new File(System.getProperty("user.dir"), "state"),
  partition: Partition,
  systemAdmins: Map[String, SystemAdmin]) extends Logging {

  var taskStoresToRestore = taskStores
  var changeLogOldestOffsets: Map[SystemStream, String] = Map()
  val fileOffset: util.Map[SystemStreamPartition, String] = new util.HashMap[SystemStreamPartition, String]()
  val offsetFileName = "OFFSET"

  def apply(storageEngineName: String) = taskStores(storageEngineName)

  def init {
    cleanBaseDirs
    setupBaseDirs
    validateChangelogStreams
    startConsumers
    restoreStores
    stopConsumers
  }

  private def setupBaseDirs {
    debug("Setting up base directories for stores.")

    val loggedStores = changeLogSystemStreams.keySet

    (taskStores.keySet -- loggedStores)
      .foreach(TaskStorageManager.getStorePartitionDir(storeBaseDir, _, taskName).mkdirs)

    loggedStores.foreach(storeName => {
      val loggedStoragePartitionDir = TaskStorageManager.getStorePartitionDir(loggedStoreBaseDir, storeName, taskName)
      if(!loggedStoragePartitionDir.exists()) loggedStoragePartitionDir.mkdirs
    })
  }

  private def cleanBaseDirs {
    debug("Cleaning base directories for stores.")

    taskStores.keys.foreach(storeName => {
      val storagePartitionDir = TaskStorageManager.getStorePartitionDir(storeBaseDir, storeName, taskName)
      info("Got logged storage partition directory as %s" format storagePartitionDir.toPath.toString)

      if(storagePartitionDir.exists()) {
        debug("Deleting default storage partition directory %s" format storagePartitionDir.toPath.toString)
        Util.rm(storagePartitionDir)
      }

      val loggedStoragePartitionDir = TaskStorageManager.getStorePartitionDir(loggedStoreBaseDir, storeName, taskName)
      info("Got logged storage partition directory as %s" format loggedStoragePartitionDir.toPath.toString)

      var deleteLoggedStoragePartitionDir = false

      val offsetFileRef = new File(loggedStoragePartitionDir, offsetFileName)
      if(offsetFileRef.exists()) {
        debug("Found offset file in partition directory: %s" format offsetFileRef.toPath.toString)
        val offset = Util.readDataFromFile(offsetFileRef)
        if(offset != null && !offset.isEmpty) {
          fileOffset.put(new SystemStreamPartition(changeLogSystemStreams(storeName), partition), offset)
        } else {
          deleteLoggedStoragePartitionDir = true
        }
        offsetFileRef.delete()
      } else {
        info("No offset file found in logged storage partition directory: %s" format loggedStoragePartitionDir.toPath.toString)
        deleteLoggedStoragePartitionDir = true
      }
      if(deleteLoggedStoragePartitionDir && loggedStoragePartitionDir.exists()) {
        Util.rm(loggedStoragePartitionDir)
      }
    })
  }

  private def validateChangelogStreams = {
    info("Validating change log streams")

    for ((storeName, systemStream) <- changeLogSystemStreams) {
      val systemAdmin = systemAdmins
        .getOrElse(systemStream.getSystem,
                   throw new SamzaException("Unable to get systemAdmin for store " + storeName + " and systemStream" + systemStream))
      systemAdmin.validateChangelogStream(systemStream.getStream, changeLogStreamPartitions)
    }

    val changeLogMetadata = streamMetadataCache.getStreamMetadata(changeLogSystemStreams.values.toSet)
    info("Got change log stream metadata: %s" format changeLogMetadata)

    changeLogOldestOffsets = getChangeLogOldestOffsetsForPartition(partition, changeLogMetadata)
    info("Assigning oldest change log offsets for taskName %s: %s" format (taskName, changeLogOldestOffsets))
  }

  private def startConsumers {
    debug("Starting consumers for stores.")

    for ((storeName, systemStream) <- changeLogSystemStreams) {
      val systemStreamPartition = new SystemStreamPartition(systemStream, partition)
      val consumer = storeConsumers(storeName)
      val offset =
        Option(fileOffset.get(systemStreamPartition))
          .getOrElse(changeLogOldestOffsets
            .getOrElse(systemStream, throw new SamzaException("Missing a change log offset for %s." format systemStreamPartition)))

      if (offset != null) {
        info("Registering change log consumer with offset %s for %s." format (offset, systemStreamPartition))
        consumer.register(systemStreamPartition, offset)
      } else {
        info("Skipping change log restoration for %s because stream appears to be empty (offset was null)." format systemStreamPartition)
        taskStoresToRestore -= storeName
      }
    }

    storeConsumers.values.foreach(_.start)
  }

  private def restoreStores {
    debug("Restoring stores.")

    for ((storeName, store) <- taskStoresToRestore) {
      if (changeLogSystemStreams.contains(storeName)) {
        val systemStream = changeLogSystemStreams(storeName)
        val systemStreamPartition = new SystemStreamPartition(systemStream, partition)
        val systemConsumer = storeConsumers(storeName)
        val systemConsumerIterator = new SystemStreamPartitionIterator(systemConsumer, systemStreamPartition)
        store.restore(systemConsumerIterator)
      }
    }
  }

  private def stopConsumers {
    debug("Stopping consumers for stores.")

    storeConsumers.values.foreach(_.stop)
  }

  def flush() {
    debug("Flushing stores.")

    taskStores.values.foreach(_.flush)
  }

  def stopStores() {
    debug("Stopping stores.")
    taskStores.values.foreach(_.stop)
  }

  def stop() {
    stopStores()

    debug("Persisting logged key value stores")
    changeLogSystemStreams.foreach { case (store, systemStream) => {
      val streamToMetadata = systemAdmins(systemStream.getSystem)
                              .getSystemStreamMetadata(JavaConversions.setAsJavaSet(Set(systemStream.getStream)))
      val sspMetadata = streamToMetadata
                          .get(systemStream.getStream)
                          .getSystemStreamPartitionMetadata
                          .get(partition)
      val newestOffset = sspMetadata.getNewestOffset

      if (newestOffset != null) {
        val offsetFile = new File(TaskStorageManager.getStorePartitionDir(loggedStoreBaseDir, store, taskName), offsetFileName)
        Util.writeDataToFile(offsetFile, newestOffset)
        info("Successfully stored offset %s for store %s in OFFSET file " format (newestOffset, store))
      }
      else {
        //if newestOffset is null, then it means the store is empty. No need to persist the offset file
        info("Not storing OFFSET file for taskName %s. Store %s backed by changelog topic : %s, partition: %s is empty. " format (taskName, store, systemStream.getStream, partition.getPartitionId))
      }
    }}
  }

  /**
   * Builds a map from SystemStreamPartition to oldest offset for changelogs.
   */
  private def getChangeLogOldestOffsetsForPartition(partition: Partition, inputStreamMetadata: Map[SystemStream, SystemStreamMetadata]): Map[SystemStream, String] = {
    inputStreamMetadata
      .mapValues(_.getSystemStreamPartitionMetadata.get(partition))
      .filter(_._2 != null)
      .mapValues(_.getOldestOffset)
  }
}