text:
Posted on July 21, 2016 by Shannon Emmett
Bastille Day Attack
By Shannon Emmett
Bastille Day, a day of joyous celebration commemorating the beginning of the French Revolution, resulted in an all too familiar feeling of devastation and loss when a lone man drove a lorry truck through a crowd of people in the coastal city of Nice, France. Just after a celebratory display of fireworks Thursday night on the Promenade des Anglais, 84 were killed and hundreds more injured as a trouble 31 year old Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel swerved from side to side in a pedestrian-only area at 50 miles per hour.
As of now, known victims include Fatima Charrini, who was slain within moments of the rampage, assistant head of Nice border police Jean-Marc Leclerc, father Sean Copeland and son Brodie (U.S.) who were vacationing in Nice. So far, only 35 of the 84 victims have been identified, and local hospitals are still caring for children in intensive care whose parents may have also been victims of the attack. Relatives and neighbors are growing angrier with how slowly the statuses of their loved ones are being released.
After firing at police officers with an automatic pistol from inside the lorry truck, Lahouaiej-Boulel was shot dead by police. Also in the truck with him were two replica assault rifles, and empty grenade, ID, cell phone, and bank card. Though these items made identifying the man responsible for the attack simple, it was information found on his computer that helped police delve further into who this man truly was.
Not only did his neighbors cite him as having a history of violence, mental instability and a drinking habit, but his browser history demonstrated a recent interest in radical Islamist movements. Since July 1, Mohamed's internet searches included the Koran, nasheeds (or jihadists propaganda chants) and the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Fitr. Investigators also found disturbing images of Osama bin Laden, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, the Islamic State flag, and the cover of an issue of Charlie Hebdo. Prior to the violent attack, he had researched Bastille Day, fatal traffic accidents, and other recent events in Orlando, Dallas, and Magnanville, Paris. In addition to these internet searches, the attacker drove to Promenade des Anglais twice, rented the 20 ton lorry truck on July 4 and picked it up on July 11. He also reportedly began growing a beard just a week before the attack, which he told friends was for religious reasons, and shared graphic videos with friends of beheadings committed by ISIS, showing no signs of the disturbance or shock most experience upon viewing such material. Despite this recently developed interest, there is no evidence that Mohamed was associated with or involved in any radical Islamic groups.
His troubled past increased in severity as time went on. Neighbors from his previous residence and birthplace in Tunisia recall him as a normal person with a wealthy family until he was thrown out of his home after abusing his wife, who was questioned by police but released shortly after. In 2010 and 2016 police intervened in incidents of violence and petty theft in which Mohamed was involved, and in March he had a postponed sentence for assaulting a motorist with a wooden pallet. He visited a psychiatrist only once, in 2004, when his behavior grew increasingly psychotic and his aggressive nature more outward. After only one appointment, Dr. Chamseddine Hamouda feels that this incident cannot be blamed on mental disorder, and that surely other events in his life since their last meeting had influenced him to act in such a violent and destructive manner.
It is still being determined whether or not the attacker was working alone, but 4 individuals including an Algerian couple suspected of aiding in logistics of the attack have been arrested and are being questioned regarding their involvement. While driving, Lahouaiej-Bouhlel sent a text message (recovered on his phone by police) requesting more weapons, but the recipient of the message has yet to be identified.
The attack occurred just hours after President Hollande announced an eventual lift of France's state of emergency later in July. The country is still recovering from the events in Paris, and as this attack has been labeled an act of terrorism, it has undoubtedly instilled again some of the fear French citizens have been trying to shake.
A powerful memorial service was held on the promenade which not only demonstrated the country's remorse for those lost in the attack, but the people's anger with the French government and their handling of the recent 3 terror attacks in the last 18 months. As over 200 have been killed in these 3 attacks alone, people are beginning to demand change in security. Applause emerged and fists pumped powerfully during the national anthem. In contrast to the cheering that resounded in honor of emergency personnel who responded to the attack, PM Manuel Valls was met with boos. An increased police presence was requested for the celebration on the promenade in light of the previous attacks, but Valls failed to grant the request. Many are calling for his resignation in addition to stricter security and anti radical legislation.


text:
Encourage Taking Play—and Learning—Outdoors
"It's such a nice day! Let's get the kids outside. Do something fun as a family. But what?"
Monica Wiedel-Lubinski and Karen Madigan—authors of "Nature Play Workshop for Families"—say the average child spends just 4 to 7 minutes a day outside and misses out on the opportunity to interact and learn from nature.
They encourage cultivating "nature play," which they define as the freedom for children to explore and play in nature at their whim and in their own way, without adult interference.
"Children are empowered when they can freely choose how and what to do during nature play," the outdoor teachers write. "The sensory-rich encounters in nature are curious or strange sometimes, other times exhilarating and unexpected.
The intensity of play, the creative scenarios children dream up and the moments of quiet discovery are enriched by natural materials and settings that can never be replicated or fully experienced indoors."
Rather than a fixed place or thing, the authors say nature is more aptly described as "us."
"Nature is not a place we must drive far away to visit," they write. "Nature is everywhere, and we are a part of it."
Time spent in nature—and specifically nature play—helps reinforce what it means to be alive, in and of the earth.
"The word 'play' describes the urges, instincts and interests children naturally have when given the freedom to make their own choices." they write, noting play is a universal passion of children and the basis for cognitive, social, emotional, physical, spiritual and linguistic learning.
With no instructions or narration from adults, children exhibit independence, curiosity, problem solving, creativity, resilience and fun when at play.
"Children instinctively know how to play and have ideas about what they would like to explore or try to do in any given setting," the authors state.
Nature play stirs a deep desire to connect with other living things—no matter how small—and to the land and its history, the complexities of the local ecosystem and its natural resources, the community, and others who explore and play together, the authors explain.
"Leaf by leaf, children grow their own personal understanding about what it means to be part of nature," they write. "Compassion, empathy, kindness and respect flourish as we live out the interconnectedness of this place we call home."
Excerpted from "Nature Play Workshop for Families" © 2020 by Monica Wiedel-Lubinski and Karen Madigan. Reproduced by permission of the publisher, Quarry Books, an imprint of The Quarto Group, Beverly, Massachusetts.
Key Benefits of Nature Play
The authors of "Nature Play Workshop for Families" list the following positives that come from children interacting with nature:
Fresh air.
Exposure to vitamin D from sunshine.
Exposure to naturally occurring bacteria in soil.
Improved fine and gross motor development from active physical-play opportunities.
Understanding of healthy foods and nutritional needs (foraging and edible gardening).
Healthy eye development.
Supported risk taking.
Improved cognition (higher-order thinking and executive functioning skills).
Space and time to observe, experiment and problem-solve.
Direct real-world links to curriculum.
Stress reduction and calming effects.
Opportunities to feel and express empathy, compassion, kindness, respect and gratitude.
Appreciation for the land, its history and indigenous cultures.
The chance to self-reflect and gain perspective.
Spirituality, a sense of belonging and connectedness.
Opportunities to experience, process and integrate sensory input.
Social and independent play that fosters determination, grit, perseverance and self-confidence.
Desire to act positively as caretakers who share the natural world and its resources.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
In the Name of Love: Africa Celebrates U2 | Village Voice
In the Name of Love: Africa Celebrates U2
by Ernest Barteldes
Bono, of course, has often used his celebrity to shed light on the suffering in Africa, bemoaning continental ills from AIDS to poverty. Such exertions haven't gone unrecognized: Producers Shawn Amos and Paul Heck (who's worked behind the scenes with the Red Hot Organization) here convene an A-list of African talent to pay tribute to U2 as the band approaches 30 years of existence. Benin's Angelique Kidjo kicks off In the Name of Love in style, with a spirited rendition of "Mysterious Ways," sung in French and Fon (her native tongue), reaching a climax with the chorus's English words. Nigeria's Keziah Jones takes on the difficult task of covering "One," rising above the tune's myriad cover versions by taking a more upbeat approach. South African singer-songwriter Vusi Mahlasela similarly takes ownership of "Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own," giving it a Ladysmith Black Mambazo feel. Also exemplary is Angola singer Waldemar Bastos's rendition of "Love Is Blindess," sung in English and Portuguese with a fado-like arrangement that takes advantage of his vocal dexterity. Most notable, though, are the Soweto Gospel Choir's wonderful take on the title track (blending American and African Gospel sensibilities) and Sierra Leone's Refugee All Stars' version of "Seconds," featuring Aerosmith's Joe Perry on lead guitar, just another mysterious way this tribute moves.
More:Angelique KidjoBono (Musician)Joe PerryKeziah JonesMusic News


text:
The Gifts We Give and Receive
Dec 21, 2017 | UUCABlog
Abundance was our church theme last month. We talk about our congregational themes with our Religious Education (RE) kids, too. Take a listen to what they said about what our church has an abundance of: chalices, fun, love, stories, kind people… kind people, indeed! I have been inspired this year to witness an abundance of wonderful gifts shared within our 2017-18 "under construction" Religious Education program.
We began the year strong with fully recruited teaching teams for our classes. Then, as Coming of Age mentors were needed or other jobs arose (like needing a rock star handywoman and organizational guru), people flexed and adjusted their commitments as we hoped they would to share their talents to meet the needs of our program and participants. As the year has progressed, our volunteer leaders have worked together and supported one another and their students beautifully. Our fabulous RE Council has been providing leadership as well, and is adapting to the evolving vision and work of the church.
A new kind of "call and response" emerged: when one member of the team had a need and called for help, other members always responded with compassion. And they have stepped forward with heart and thoughtfulness for parents or kids needing additional care, too. It has happened time and time again. We are living out our new mission: Our open and welcoming congregation connects hearts, challenges minds and nurtures spirits, while serving and transforming our community and the world and our core values of connection, inspiration, compassion, and justice. The support from one to another is a gift within our community.
And we see these gifts in our children and youth also. At 9:15, we have programming for all ages (kindergarten through adult – you are welcome to join us!), and that allows a special opportunity for multiage interaction and learning. During one of our stories recently, we had some participants sharing "who they are" in the story of Supriya's Bowl. From young to old, there were thoughtful responses and patient listening to what others had to say. (We have some really cool 6th graders who were attentive to hearing a 5 year-old's rationale for how the rice bowl got filled, and who shared their own thoughts with us, too.) When making our blessing bags, the big kids help the little kids with packaging goods and making notes or drawings for our neighbors in need. The Coming of Age youth volunteered at the church work day outside recently, raking leaves, moving stumps and rocks, etc. to beautify and winterize our campus; our Sunday worship chime ringers and chalice lighters are children and youth; when the multigenerational choir sings, our children and youth are giving to the church. You'll soon see the pageant with (hopefully) a good amount of kid participation. All of those are special gifts to our community.
We are hearing from families that the kids are bringing their parents to church because they want to be here! And why not?
Star Wars or Harry Potter yoga for all ages at 9:15
YRUU revitalization for 10th-12th graders
Neighboring Faiths curriculum, expanding horizons of 7th-8th graders
And so much more… every class has awesome stuff happening!
Plus, youth CONference attendance continues to grow
All of that takes volunteers – people who are sharing their time and talent – with UUCA. Presence is one of the greatest gifts a person can give or receive. We in RE have received many gifts this year, and we are grateful to all of you in the RE roles and in the many other ways our church is served by all of you. You are a gift.
And on that note, another important gift we can give and receive is affirmation. We have created a new bulletin board in Sandburg Hall to share that gift in our community. Like a little free library, we invite you to take or to leave a gift of affirmation. This is open to anyone: member, friend, regular or first-time visitors, youth, adult, or children. See more at the big GIFT bulletin board near the main office.
Jen Johnson, RE Staff
Sermon: There is Hope in Resistance (audio and text)
Dec 18, 2017 | Sermons
https://uuasheville.org/wp-content/uploads/171217-When-There-Is-Hope-In-Resistance.mp3
READING "The Legacy of Caring" by Thandeka
Despair is my private pain
Born from what I have failed to say
failed to do
failed to overcome.
Be still my inner self
let me rise to you
let me reach down into your pain
and soothe you.
I turn to you
to renew my life
I turn to the world
the streets of the city
the worn tapestries of
crack dealers
private estates
personal things in the bag lady's cart
rage and pain in the faces that turn from me
afraid of their own inner worlds.
This common world I love anew
as the lifeblood of generations
who refused to surrender their humanity
in an inhumane world
courses through my veins.
From within this world
my despair is transformed to hope
and I begin anew
the legacy of caring.
Resistance. What's that about? I think we all have an idea. I push, you push back, right? You get in my way. You refuse to comply.
It's a power dynamic, but subtler than outright opposition, at least at first, isn't it? Often that's because the party doing the resisting is at some disadvantage to the one they oppose. The other may be bigger, stronger, better funded, and deeply ensconced in a system constructed to keep them right where they are, calling the shots at the top of the heap.
And once perched there, it is their way, a la the Borg of Star Trek, to flaunt their power and warn us that "resistance is futile." And yet, as movements of liberation have learned across the ages, in truth it hardly ever is. Resistance accomplished with persistence, fueled by integrity and compassion, done with creativity and grit can undo the Borgs and the bullies, however fearsome they may seem to be.
To enter a conversation today about how that might be I'm inviting us to enter a great old story celebrated right now by our Jewish neighbors. It has its own cautions and challenges but also important lessons for the path of resistance.
It takes us back some 2,200 years to a tumultuous time for the Jewish people when they had to endure a succession of foreign despots with different designs on Palestine. And as you can imagine, as each arrived he found the Jews inconveniently opposed to his program. Each designed his own strategy to get around this. Some oppressed them, others sought to co-opt Jewish leaders and had some success, though many still opposed them.
The most radical program came from a Syrian named Antiochus Epiphanes, who in 168 BC sent soldiers to take over Jerusalem. Many Jews chafed at the increasing restrictions on Jewish practices that Antiochus ordered, culminating with widespread killings and the installation of Greek idols in the temple.
In response, a clan of Jewish priests known as the Hasmoneans, or Maccabees, then withdrew from Jerusalem and planned a revolt. In time, the revolt devolved into a civil war that took in not only the Maccabees and the soldiers, but also Jews who had adopted Greek practices. After a series of battles, the Maccabees prevailed.
On returning to Jerusalem, they discovered the Temple to be in shambles. The first book of Maccabees, an apocryphal scripture that was never included in the Jewish Bible, describes in detail how the Temple was restored. It was then that leaders declared that an eight-day festival of "Hanukkah," which translates from Hebrew simply as "dedication," should be held to purify and consecrate the temple.
The bit about oil found in a vessel that was enough to keep the flame on the menorah burning for a day lasting the full eight days of the festival is a nice bit of theater attributed to creative rabbis some seven centuries after the event. Still, it nicely turns the focus of the story away from a bloody civil war and back toward a more profound message that resistance can pay off, and even more that oppressed peoples have a right to self-determination, or, as our choir just reminded us, a right to freedom to be who they are.
It's a message that's especially fitting at this time when so many people in different settings are struggling for freedom and self-determination but also seeing some fruits of resistance.
I think, for example, of the recent senatorial election in Alabama. Much has been said about the political ramifications of this shift, which are huge. But as I watched election returns last week my thoughts turned to the celebrations that I attended two years ago of the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights march on Selma.
I remember at the time being deeply moved, standing on the Edmund Pettis Bridge, site of the bloody 1965 attack on civil rights workers, packed in with a racially diverse crowd laughing and singing freedom songs. But there was a wistfulness there, too. To be honest, there's not much to modern-day Selma.
Yes, its leadership is African-American, but economically it's a shell of what it once was, as are many communities with African-American majorities in Alabama. Yes, freedom came with the Voting Rights Act, but only freedom of a sort. Political and economic leadership still lies mostly in the hands of whites, and blacks continue to suffer.
But as the election returns rolled in last Tuesday, it became clear that black voters in numbers unprecedented in Alabama history were turning the election away from one man, a candidate of the white power structure who pined for a pre-Civil War U.S., and toward another a man, a candidate of the insurgents, who had successfully prosecuted men who in 1963 bombed a Birmingham church, killing four black girls, one of the defining outrages of the Civil Rights era.
And it seemed a bit of cosmic justice that it was Dallas County, home of Selma, that pushed that ex-prosecutor over the top in that Senate race. Not exactly the victory of the Maccabees, perhaps, since among other things we can't know how all this will play out in the long run. But for a moment it offers us a window into the power of resistance, of how even against long odds people can make a change.
And from here I want to point to one more movement of resistance that is roiling our nation. It may not have reached its Maccabees moment yet, but with the momentum, it's gathered so far there is reason to hope. I speak of the campaign against sexual harassment and abuse.
I like the way that Time magazine frames those who have brought the issue before us in its latest "Person of the Year" issue: The Silence Breakers.
Like every campaign for freedom, it is about standing up to people in power. Yet, this one is complicated even further since it's centered on sex, our most intimate selves, something private and close. Perpetrators learned to use that wish for privacy as a weapon to warn their victims with Bork-like assurance that "resistance is futile."
It took brave women willing to break the silence, to offer their own stories and risk ridicule, to report the stories of others and risk professional ruin, in order for the story to be told.
The fall-out has been both encouraging and dispiriting. Encouraging in that breaking the logjam of silence has encouraged many women to tell their own stories, opening paths to healing and renewal. New Internet memes – "I believe them" and "Me, too" – have helped amplify the campaign and give confidence to those taking the risk of telling their stories.
The campaign has also dislodged some notorious abusers from positions of power or authority. It's encouraged men to take stock of their behavior and opened conversations around practices in offices and other organizational settings.
It's been dispiriting, though, to see some abusers simply take shelter in denial. And while high profile cases make the news, many more stay in the shadows, where unchanged power dynamics put women who voice allegations of abuse at a risk they can't afford. The work of silence breaking remains, and for those of us, women and men, committed to changing the dynamic, we are challenged to find ways to raise the notion of resistance to another level.
In an essay in Time, the novelist Gillian Flynn writes that as much as she admires the courageous women who raised their voices, in her words, "I don't feel triumphant, I feel humiliated and angry."
Along with the stories bravery and perseverance, she writes, this campaign has also surfaced a toxic Internet culture of shaming and degradation and all the boys club abuses that are baked into corporate culture
"Threats to women abound," Flynn writes. "We are underrepresented everywhere, underpaid by everyone and underestimated all over."
All of this comes home to her, she says, when she looks at her children her 3-year-old daughter, who she describes as "fearless, vibrant," and perhaps even more her "sweet" 7-year-old son.
How to assure that they are neither, in her words, "crushed by this world" nor drawn in one way or another into the cycle of abuse swimming around them? It begins, she says, with how we choose to raise them.
"My son," she writes, "recently asked me, 'Why aren't there any shirts that say BOY POWER?'"
"I could have talked about male entitlement," she says, "and the male gaze, the wage gap and Weinstein. But I thought: If the myriad GIRL POWER shirts are meant to encourage female strength and confidence, a BOY POWER shirt might make male empathy and respect dynamic. There were no BOY POWER shirts, so I had to DIY (do-it-yourself) an iron-on. Now, there's at least one."
Resistance has many dimensions. It is in part naming and working to remove signs of oppression wherever we can. It is also work to reframe the ways that we are with each other, owning the stumbles we make, but holding in view like a polestar the truth at the center of our beings: our and each other's incalculable inherent worth and our and each other's right to be who we are.
It is the holy flame we each carry that even when dimmed by circumstance endures.
Like Thandeka, we may mourn and despair all that we have failed to say, to do, to overcome, but still within there is a source of renewal and strength, that invites us into new hope, entering the legacy of caring.
Last month, my nephew, Greg, called from Santa Barbara. "Hey, Uncle Dale," he exclaimed, "I won the lottery!"
"No way," I said.
"Way!" he said, "I won big time. No kidding."
"That's great. How much did you win?"
"A lot," he responded… Long pause…then the punch line. "I was born White in America."
No, Greg isn't a White Nationalist. Far from it. Greg realized that he had hit the jackpot by being born White in America.
Greg is a skilled carpenter. Often, he needs to hire an assistant. He drives to the corner in Santa Barbara where day-hires, largely Latino, hang out looking to catch a job. He recognizes that a roll of the dice put him on the hiring end of things, rather than on the street corner hoping to be hired. Greg recognizes the White American privilege that came to him by dint of his birth.
Last year, UUCA named "compassion" and "justice" as core values, and we recently voted to put those words into action by opting in a Special Congregational meeting to become a Physical Sanctuary congregation. We recognized that there are good people in our midst who are in need of temporary protection, and we are lucky enough to have sufficient space in 23 Edwin to host a guest. We collectively announced by that vote: "We can't turn our backs on those in need, let's do what our good fortune allows us to do!" I am extremely proud of that congregational decision.
The wheels are rapidly moving in the direction of turning the Sanctuary vision into a reality. Rev. Lisa has recruited a Sanctuary Steering Committee, and they have begun meeting to put together a list of all that must be done to prepare for a sanctuary guest. Lisa and Linda Topp have selected the room and adjoining bath at 23 Edwin that will serve as quarters. A donated washer and dryer have been installed in the basement. Rev. Mark has begun meeting with CIMA (Companeros Immigrantes de las Montanas en Accion), a local action group on behalf of immigrants, to inform them of our Sanctuary program and to learn more about their organization. We have received our first financial contribution from another congregation.
Soon it will be your, and my, turn to help. Let's do it. Let's, like nephew Greg, share our collective lottery winnings by aiding someone not so lucky.
Dale Wachowiak, Board of Trustees
Winter: The Season For Slowing Down
Dec 7, 2017 | UUCABlog
Up until now, it's been an odd autumn for this part of the world, with temperatures hovering around what we're more accustomed to for September. But in the last week, the early winter grey visited, and daytime highs tumbled to a more seasonal chill. And so it feels like finally, I can settle into the quieter, darker days of this season. As Rebecca Parker puts it, "let us go gently into the night, its dream-drenched, glittering stillness, a haven for our souls."
Just as the earth takes its rest at this time of year, we need to give ourselves some space from the hectic, screen-centered lives we've built for ourselves. So, isn't it just like the tone-deaf culture of consumerism that floods our lives to urge us instead in this holiday season to make our lives more frantic with rush to buy presents?
Giving should and can be joyful. It is a wonderful gesture that helps us express our gratitude to people we love or with whom we stand in some relationship. But it becomes less so when it's driven by a sense of fear or obligation. So, let me urge you to look for ways to turn down the pressure: look for gifts of services, rather than things; agree on limits to your purchases, and stick to them; be creative, have fun, and then be done with it.
Leave space for quietness, long walks, or casual, low-pressure gatherings with family and friends. There is a special beauty in these mountains in the winter time. Take time to get to know it. Maybe it's time to renew an acquaintance with a friend. Look for that which can reconnect you with your life, with what matters, and attend to it.
One of my favorite hymns for this time of year is "Dark of Winter," #55 in Singing the Living Tradition, by Shelley Jackson Denham. It closes with these words:
"Darkness, soothe my weary eyes that I may see more clearly.
When my heart with sorrow cries, comfort and caress me.
And then my soul may hear a voice, a still, small voice of love eternal.
Darkness, when my fears arise, let your peace flow through me."
May you find peace in this holiday season.
Rev.Mark Ward, Lead Minister
Sermon: Digging Back In (audio & text)
Dec 4, 2017 | Sermons
https://uuasheville.org/wp-content/uploads/171203-Digging-Back-In.mp3
From "You Can't Go Home Again" by Thomas Wolfe
"Pain and death will always be the same. But under the pavements trembling like a pulse, under the buildings trembling like a cry, under the waste of time under the hoof of the beast above broken bones of cities, there will be something growing like a flower, something bursting from the earth again, forever deathless, faithful, coming into life like April."
An Arundel Tomb by Philip Larkin
Side by side, their faces blurred,
The earl and countess lie in stone,
Their proper habits vaguely shown
As jointed armour, stiffened pleat,
And that faint hint of the absurd—
The little dogs under their feet.
Such plainness of the pre-baroque
Hardly involves the eye, until
It meets his left-hand gauntlet, still
Clasped empty in the other; and
One sees, with a sharp tender shock,
His hand withdrawn, holding her hand.
They would not think to lie so long.
Such faithfulness in effigy
Was just a detail friends would see:
A sculptor's sweet commissioned grace
Thrown off in helping to prolong
The Latin names around the base.
They would not guess how early in
Their supine stationary voyage
The air would change to soundless damage,
Turn the old tenantry away;
How soon succeeding eyes begin
To look, not read. Rigidly they
Persisted, linked, through lengths and breadths
Of time. Snow fell, undated. Light
Each summer thronged the glass. A bright
Litter of birdcalls strewed the same
Bone-riddled ground. And up the paths
The endless altered people came,
Washing at their identity.
Now, helpless in the hollow of
An unarmorial age, a trough
Of smoke in slow suspended skeins
Above their scrap of history,
Only an attitude remains:
Time has transfigured them into
Untruth. The stone fidelity
They hardly meant has come to be
Their final blazon, and to prove
Our almost-instinct almost true:
What will survive of us is love.
A year after the last presidential election we can hardly be blamed for feeling a bit like Thomas Wolfe's George Webber at the start of his famous novel "You Can't Go Home Again." Arriving in the early 1920s in "Libya Hill," the home of his boyhood (a thinly veiled reference to a place you know well), Webber discovers a boom going on.
Real estate speculation is making many people rich but not compassionate; in fact, the opposite. Everyone seems to be out for the main chance, corporate chieftains are martinets who seek to create needs, not satisfy them, and, as one reviewer put it, "salesmanship is the enemy of truth."
What's more, Webber discovers himself to be persona non grata for an earlier novel he wrote that exposed embarrassing secrets of his family and friends. Eventually, circumstances lead him to high-tail it out of town.
Soon afterward, the town finds its comeuppance with the arrival of the Great Depression, which wipes out much of the elusive wealth accumulated in previous years. And Webber takes off to Europe to sulk and brood. //
With the stock market last week soaring to new heights while tax legislation is moving through Congress that promises to enrich the wealthy, multiply the nation's ballooning debt and punish lower-income Americans, the picture Wolfe drew nearly a century ago is beginning to feel eerily familiar.
Add to that the culture of lying and deceit that is settling in in the halls of power in this country, and the perfidy and flagrant violation of trust of powerful men who blithely dismiss, diminish or deny well-documented allegations of assault and abuse, and we can hardly be blamed for, like George Webber, wanting to check out.
All the more reason, then, that we attend to the message that Wolfe offers to close his novel. Webber later discovers in Europe the same ills that led him to leave his home town, and on returning finds cause for hope. As the nation began to emerge from the Depression, its leaders wanted to cling to the past, Wolfe writes, "but they were wrong. They did not know that you can't go home again. America had come to the end of something and to the beginning of something else."
As he put it in the excerpt you heard earlier, "pain and death will always be the same," and still there is a force within us "growing like a flower . . . coming into life like April."
We are well aware of all the forces of division at work now, centered as they are in fear and the scape-goating of vulnerable people, and we can see them fueling movements toward separatism here and abroad.
All this is alarming and also nothing new. As historians point out, the last century offers chapter and verse on how easy it is for separatism to take root and how it can lead to monstrous evil. But here's the caveat: can, but needn't. There is nothing inevitable about any of this, and there are lessons for us in how we might nudge history in a different direction by digging back in and recommitting to values of compassion and hope.
Yale historian Timothy Snyder recently wrote about some of these learnings in a slim book entitled Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the 20th Century. Here are a few:
Do not obey in advance. We want to be good people and give our leaders the benefit of the doubt. But, Snyder says, we need to be wary of he calls "anticipatory obedience," where we compromise our principles at a new leader's bidding. What feels like a gesture of respect can end up being interpreted as a greenlight for leaders to do whatever they want.
Defend institutions. It is easy to criticize our fallible institutions, Snyder says, but it's worth remembering that they were created to preserve our freedom and dignity, and if they are to do that they need our help. They do not protect themselves.
"The mistake," he says, "is to assume that rulers who came to power through institutions cannot change or destroy institutions – even when that is exactly what they have announced that they will do." They can, and they do.
Take responsibility for the face of the world. "The symbols of today," he says, "enable the reality of tomorrow. Notice the swasticas and other signs of hate. Do not look away, and do not get used to them. Remove them yourself and set an example for others to do so."
Stand out. As Snyder puts it, "Someone has to. It is easy to follow along. It can feel strange to do or say something different. But without that unease, there is no freedom." And that doesn't necessarily means standing alone. Part of what we here exist to do is to help you find in community the hope, the faith, the courage to live into and proclaim your values.
Investigate. Figure things out for yourself. Steer clear of rhetoric. Demand facts. As Snyder puts it, "it is your ability to discern facts that makes you an individual, and our collective trust in common knowledge that makes us a society."
Make eye contact and small talk, and not just with your buddies. "This is not just polite," he says. "It is part of being a citizen and a responsible member of society. It is also a way to stay in touch with your surroundings, break down social barriers, and understand who you should and should not trust."
Be as courageous as you can. We each have our own limits to what we can do, yet even a little courage offered at the right time can have a stronger influence on events than we expect.
Learning the lessons of history is good practice. It teaches us the danger behind what Dictionary.Com declared as the word of year for 2017 – complicit: "choosing to be involved in an illegal or wrongful act." Perhaps it's a sign of a turning at work now that the Web site reported that there had been multiple spikes in the number of people looking up that word this year. Dictionary.com speculated that this may be, "Because of noteworthy stories of those who have refused to be complicit in the face of oppression and wrongdoing."
In the face of this, some of us will find our way to brave public acts. Others of us will be involved in what Matthew Fox called "the small work in the Great Work."
It is rising each day and putting our hearts and the little bit of genius that we are blessed with to work for what my colleague Victoria Safford calls "the larger Life and larger Love that some call holy, some call God, some call History, and others call simply larger than themselves."
In her essay, "The Small Work and The Great Work," Safford tells of a conversation she had with a woman who is a psychiatrist at a college health clinic. "We were sitting once not long after a student she had known, and counseled, committed suicide in a dormitory," she wrote. "My friend the doctor, the healer, held the loss very closely in those first few days, not unprofessionally but deeply, fully – as you or I would have, had this been someone in our care."
"At one point (with tears streaming down her face), she looked up in defiance (this is the only word for it) and spoke explicitly of her vocation, as if out of the ashes of that day she were renewing a vow, or making a new covenant. She spoke of her vocation, and of yours and mine.
"She said, 'You know I cannot save them. I am not here to save anybody or to save the world. All I can do – what I am called to do – is plant myself at the gates of Hope.
"Sometimes they come in; sometimes they walk by. But I stand there every day and I call out till my lungs are sore with calling, and beckon and urge them in toward beautiful life and love.'"
In one way or another, we all stand at those gates, bringing what gifts we have, beckoning and urging. It is, says Victoria Safford, "a sometimes lonely place, the place of truth-telling, about your own soul first of all and its condition, the place of resistance and defiance, the piece of ground from which you see the world both as it is and as it could be, as it will be; the place from which you glimpse not only struggle, but joy in the struggle."
It is the place in Seamus Heaney's poem where "hope and history rhyme," where we give up the denial that leaves us saying, "Oh, I'm sure everything will be all right," as well as the frantic despair that tells us that the world is going to hell so we might as well let it implode.
Thomas Wolfe was right: we can't go home again. The 0ld scripts that gave us comfort are outdated and need to be rethought, but the principles, the values that underlie them do not. They are soil from which something new must struggle to be reborn.
Meanwhile, those of us called to a larger life, a larger love, don't have the luxury of waiting for that birth. We must be its midwives. There is no manual for how we're going to do this. We're all amateurs here. But we have the tools we need. Staying in touch. Listening, Learning. Honing the tools of democracy. Honoring the worth and integrity of every human being. Marshalling the power of our collective trust in common knowledge. Standing at the gates of hope. Being as courageous as we can. And when the time comes, when the moment is right: to push!
It is said that Philip Larkin was uncomfortable with the fuss that was made of his poem, "An Arundel Tomb," especially its famous final line – "What will survive of us is love." He felt that readers who pulled the words out of the context of the poem mistook his intent. If you recall, Larkin's poem finds irony in those words being the lasting legacy of this couple, since he suspects that they didn't choose them, in fact probably never saw them, that they were likely added by the sculptor to fill out a phrase of Latin on the base.
"Time," he says, "has transfigured them into untruth. The stone finality they hardly meant has come to be their final blazon, and to prove our almost-instinct almost true."
His words – "almost-instinct, almost true" – tip the reader off to Larkin's wariness that we take the sentimentality of that phrase too seriously.
And it's true. Sugary sweet sentiment can so easily distract us from complicated truths that are harder to hear and yet crucial to our understanding. When the music swells and the happy talk starts, we need to be careful of how far we are carried along.
Still, it's interesting to reflect that when a gravestone marking Larkin's death was added to Poet's Corner in Westminster Abbey in 2016 the final words of "An Arundel Tomb" were inscribed there.
I wonder what Larkin would have thought of that. Was this a "stone finality that he hardly meant?" I don't think so. I think it's a fitting epitaph, for I think he was referring not to some mawkish sentimentality but to the deepest, strongest, most hopeful part of each of us, the love that casts out fear, the love that awakens us to the meaning of our lives.
In the end, I think he was right: when we add up the successes, the failures, the joys, the foibles of our brief lives, all that will have mattered is how we gave ourselves to love. When we look for a source of hope, we will find it in love. When we are called to rise from defeat or to find a way forward after loss, we will find it in the embrace of love. When we look for the strength finally to push, we will discover it in love.
Our task, then, is not to check out, not to let ourselves be discouraged, but to dig back in, to reaffirm the truths our hearts proclaim and find in them the hope that carries us on. Let us make of that our epitaph.


So, you've installed wood flooring in your home or office, and you want to make sure that they look as great as they did the first day you installed it, in the long term. It's a common goal, and a smart one. After all, should it come time to sell your home, you're going to want your wood floor to be an ally in helping you get a good resale value. You don't want your floor to be faded, old, and bitter like a character in a Tennessee Williams play.
And there I go betraying my background as a former literature student.
In any case, here are a couple priorities to consider, and the first of course has already been stated. Preserving your investment in wood flooring is a good idea, be it the highest end solid hardwood floor, or the highest quality (yet most reasonably priced) laminate floor that you put in to suit your modest budget.
But second, there's the balance to be struck between preservation of your floor, and plain and simple living in your space without worrying too much about wear. You've got a high-performing floor, either because it's a hardy species in the case of real wood flooring, or it's been AC rated for your space in the case of a laminate. You've made a smart choice in wood floors, so there isn't too much to worry about, since you've done your research on where wood floors of the type you've chosen will thrive the best.
Yet to this last point, it makes sense to think about frequent foot traffic. Of all of the sources of wear your floor will experience over the course of its life, this is the area that will be the most pertinent issue in the long term. A lot of the time, if you haven't got a policy in place, the damage will be too gradual for you to notice. But, your visitors (and potential house-hunters) certainly will.
So, here are three strategies to consider when it comes to thinking about, and managing, frequent foot traffic on a your wood floor surface.
In the next few posts coming up, we'll explore each of these strategies in turn to help you bring these two priorities of preserving an investment while not worrying so much about it that it affects the enjoyment of your space. Because once again, your first quality wood floors are designed to be tough, either by nature or by manufacturing expertise.
When it comes to your wood flooring, think of yourself as an ally, not a protector. And stay tuned as we delve a bit deeper on these three areas above to help you do that, and be that.


text:
Q: Como usar uma tag customizada dentro de uma tag IF? Pessoal como uso uma tag customizada dentro de uma tag if?
ex:  {% if {%outraTag  x y z %} == "Sucesso" %}

meu custom_field_tag
@register.simple_tag
def outraTag(x,y,z):
  r=x+y+z
  if r ==3:
    return "Sucesso"
  else:
    return "Errado"

A: Acredito que você esteja perguntando sobre JINJA, a linguagem de template do DJango. E o desejo seja usar uma tag HTML diferente dependendo de uma condição
Simplesmente use algo como:

  {% if athlete_list %}
    {% for athlete in athlete_list %}

{{ athlete.name }}

    {% endfor %}
  {% else %}

Sorry, no athletes in this list.

  {% endif %}

Retirado da documentação do DJango
De mesma sorte, você poderia usar
{% if condicao %}

{% else %}

{% endif %}
   Qualquer coisa
{% if condicao %}

{% else %}

{% endif %}

Esta solução me parece um pouco estranha, porém não conheço o seu projeto e pode resolver sua questão.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Burned again
Second historic building in three months lost to fire on old Diamond Match property
By Mark Lore
The old fire house sits behind the burned remnants of the lumber warehouse at the former Diamond Match property.
Up in smoke:
A decade ago the city of Chico paid $90,000 to purchase the timbers used in construction of the lumber warehouse. With the future of the property up in the air at the time, city officials reasoned the purchase would help preserve the building. And even if it were eventually torn down, at least the wood, milled a century ago in Stirling City, would be salvaged.
Not much remains of the lumber warehouse destroyed by fire on the property of the old Diamond Match Company Nov. 20.
While an investigation continues, Chico Fire Chief Steve Brown said his department is calling Saturday morning's blaze a "suspicious fire" likely started by a human hand, whether by accident or not.
It's the second fire in a little more than three months to destroy a century-old building on the property. An early-morning blaze Aug. 2 took down the building known as the apiary, where beehives were once made. Just like the apiary, the lumber warehouse had no utilities hooked up, ruling out natural causes such as an electrical malfunction or a gas leak.
Brown said the extent of the damage, which turned the 34,000-square-foot building into a bed of twisted metal and smoldering embers, has made it difficult to find clues and that investigators will likely have to depend on leads from the community.
There have been various reports from neighbors, the chief said, over the last two weeks claiming they had seen or heard things in the area.
"Unfortunately it's a very attractive nuisance," Brown said of the property that has also been subject to trespassing and graffiti over the years.
The Chico Fire Department answered the initial report from nearby neighbors at approximately 2:30 a.m. Saturday. Brown said the fire had been burning for "a fair amount of time" because the entire inside of the building had already been consumed and the roof was on the verge of collapse when he arrived.
According to the CFD report, the insured salvage value of the lumber warehouse building is around $100,000.
The century-old warehouse before the fire. It was slated to become an integral part of the new Barber Yard development, probably an open-air market.
The fire also caused minor damage to the remaining two nearby structures. The engineering building sustained 11 burned wooden windows in its upper story, and the carpenters' building received minor roof damage.
The 145-acre property is owned by Jeff Greening, who purchased it from Louisiana-Pacific Co. in 1999. L-P bought the land from Diamond in 1984. Seven years later, under court order, L-P consolidated an estimated 32,000 cubic yards of arsenic-contaminated soil into a two-acre site that was then capped with asphalt. The arsenic was used to control weeds along the railroad tracks that border the west side of the property.
In 1997 pentachlorophenol was pumped from an underground plume on the property. The Department of Toxic Substances has declared the site clean.
About a year ago, Greening and members of Barber Land, LLC unveiled a plan to develop the land into a residential-commercial project that would include 1,200 living units and a town square to be anchored by the 100-year-old remaining buildings.
Jim Stevens, a civil engineer with NorthStar Engineering and spokesman for the project, said the latest fire will most likely force existing plans to be "rethought out." Stevens spoke on behalf of Greening, who was out of town when the fire occurred.
"He's pretty devastated right now," Stevens said. "He really wanted to do this for the community."
The lumber warehouse was intended to be part the cultural center of the proposed Barber Yard Development, named after Ohio Columbus Barber, who built the Diamond Match Company plant 100 years ago. Stevens said the building is irreplaceable from a historical perspective.
"It was kind of a cultural element to the plan," Stevens said. "It would have been a display. We would have sandblasted it, whitewashed it and used it as an open-air market."
Stevens said it is not clear how the new City Council will receive the ambitious plan to in-fill this part of Chico but noted it was what the General Plan calls for.
In the meantime, he said Greening has offered a $5,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the suspected arson.
"He's really pissed," Stevens said of Greening. "He doesn't know what else to do."
It's becoming liquid gold
Are the feds fostering water ranching?
Solar project blacked out indefinitely
Butte College's solar energy project is halted to to litigation by irate neighbor.
Effort to honor MLK rolls on
Activists to continue effort to rename park in honor of Martin Luther King.
Chico State to invest big-time in fundraising veep, office.
Hate crime in Paradise.


text:
With Putin buying some EU states and bullying others, Britain cannot expect a united front on sanctions
21 August 2018 • 7:52pm
Jeremy Hunt has criticised Russia's 'malign' behaviour Credit: SAUL LOEB/ AFP
Commercial interests preclude a united European front against Russia
We should welcome the stance of our new Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, on Vladimir Putin's antagonistic regime. In Washington, he has said that the EU should stand "shoulder to shoulder" with the US on a joint approach. Hunt is right on Russia. However, whether he can persuade Europe to continue that journey is another matter.
The US has announced additional sanctions on Russia, following its finding that the Salisbury poisoning was organised by Putin's regime. More will automatically come into place soon unless Russia complies with US requests, which is unlikely to happen. The UK's sanctions are weaker than those of the US. Where we have let oligarchs close to Putin float their firms on the London Stock Exchange, Washington sanctions them.
A clear and unambiguous stance is not about being anti-Russian, but pro-democracy. One of the great issues for our generation is how free societies deal with authoritarian states and how those states, notably Russia and China, use the freedoms of open societies to undermine them.
The reasons we have sanctions in place are clear. Russia has annexed Crimea, instigated a proxy war in eastern Ukraine, conducted a failed putsch in Montenegro and led Georgia to war in 2008. The Kremlin also attempted to manipulate the 2016 US Presidential Elections, a story which has yet to reach its explosive denouement. This is all against a backdrop of subversive information campaigns waged via Kremlin-controlled media, mass killings in Syria and continual cyberattacks on multiple Western targets.
Effectively, the German taxpayer has been paying for Russia's wars in Georgia and Ukraine as well as its general rearming
But let's be realistic about our European neighbours. In future it may be more difficult to get a united response from EU states. That's in part because Putin's political warfare tactics are working. He is playing European nations off against each other. His aims are to weaken Nato and the EU, to split the US from Europe and to build up Russia's sphere of influence in eastern Europe.
So, for example, Putin's United Russia party is allied to two former fringe groups which are now in power in both Austria and Italy. He is forging closer ties with Greece, Hungary and Turkey. Russian money – dirty or otherwise – is a highly significant force in Cyprus. Russian loans have been used by the French Front National.
Russia has supported anti-EU politicians in the EU Parliament on both the Left and Right fringes. Yet the Baltic republics feel threatened by the Kremlin. Sweden and Finland have increased defence budgets or produced mass mobilisation plans. Russia appears to be rearming Bosnian Serbs, possibly for a "managed conflict" in the Balkans.
At a glance | EU's "five guiding principles" for dealing with Moscow
The net result of this campaign to bully some while buying others may be that, if Putin threatens Nato members in eastern Europe, Nato members in southern or central Europe will refuse to support them. At that point Nato becomes a paper tiger and is dead in all but name, achieving one of Putin's strategic objectives.
However, the Kremlin needs to achieve its disruptive aims while keeping Russian gas flowing into Europe and receipts flowing to its Treasury. Although states such as Poland and Lithuania have weaned themselves off Russian energy, Germany is partially dependent – 75 per cent of its natural gas supply comes from Russia. Effectively, the German taxpayer has been paying for Russia's wars in Georgia and Ukraine as well as its general rearming.
Putin's political warfare tactics are working. He is playing European nations off against each other
In the next few years Russia wants to double its energy supply capacity by building the geopolitically critical Nord Stream II pipeline to Germany. Officially Russia and Germany see this project in commercial terms. In reality, it is one of the most politically divisive infrastructure projects in European history. It will arguably give Russian gas even greater importance in European energy supplies at a time when EU states should be looking elsewhere.
However, all is not well in America. While it is true to say that the US is tougher on Russia than the EU, the Trump administration has a unique conflict – with its own president. After his painful press conference with Putin at Helsinki, US media outlets as well as Republican and Democrat politicians are asking if President Trump has indeed been compromised. Thankfully, Trump cannot withdraw sanctions unilaterally.
All this means that Britain's consistency and sense of purpose are more important than ever. The UK remains a nation which is global, Atlanticist and European. Our task should be to help align the US and Europe as well as allies throughout the world for the mutual security of all.
That implies much more work and thinking on Global Britain than has been the case thus far, as well as a governmental rethink on the balance of hard and soft power tools and how they are best coordinated. I hope Hunt's team get to grips with this important work. They will not succeed without doing so.
Robert Seely is the Conservative MP for the Isle of Wight and sits on the Foreign Affairs Committee


Whether you're a serious cycling enthusiast or simply enjoy the occasional ride, this hand sculpted wire bicycle by Design Ideas with vibrant silicone accents will satisfy your need for speed when you're not on the road. It even has an adorably functional kick stand!
Product Dimensions: 10.5 x 2.1 x 7 in.


text:
The inspiration of historical Turkey Tour
By KENNETH D. MILLER Executive Editor
It has been more than 50 years since legendary boxing promoter, indefatigable advocate for peace and women's rights Don King decided to expand his philanthropy with his traditional Turkey Tour that will return to his home town of Cleveland on Monday Dec. 18.
King's giving back to the community was inspired by Benny Mason, of the "B&M" policy house, and Buster Mathews of the "Goldfield" policy house, who were the main kingpins of the numbers game in 1930s and 1940s Cleveland.
Mason, who was owner a neighborhood grocery store, and Matthews made donations to Black churches and gave money to Black students for education in addition to buying coats for the homeless during the frigid winter season.
King rose from the Cleveland ghetto and numbers business and ascended into the greatest boxing promoter of all time and international figure who is on a first name basis with global leaders and United States Presidents past and present.
Today, he owns Don King Productions in addition the Cleveland's institutional icon Call & Post Newspaper, in addition to maintaining the historical Turkey Tour, which has expanded to six cities including Cleveland, New York, New Jersey, Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Florida.
For the past two year's the Turkey Tour has been hosted by King's publication the Call & Post at its offices on Shaker Blvd. in Cleveland.
Each year thousands of individuals and their families receive turkeys for the holiday season.
Here in Cleveland, the call began pouring into the Call & Post in advance of Thanksgiving inquiring when the event will take place.
King was born and raised in Cleveland and he resonates with generations of Clevelanders, thus the event is more than just an opportunity to receive a turkey but also to meet the legend himself.
The Turkey Tour is arguably the longest running individual turkey give away of its kind in America and depending on the city, individuals will brave the snow, fleet or rain to get theirs.
It is an exhausting exercise that begins with King, but includes scores of organizations, volunteers and community stake holders to make it possible.
This all happens because King learned early on the difference between doing things right, but the greater lesson is doing the right.
The greater good is taking the blame when things go wrong and less of the credit when things go right.
Action is indicated in your deeds and not just your words and because of the examples of giving back to communities of color by both Mason and Matthews, they would say, "Job Well Done."
Black News Channel in 'The Red Zone' ready for launch
All About Your Health 9th Annual Girls Health Summit


text:
New study reveals why some women might have multiple miscarriages
Mar 8th 2016 11:24AM
Researchers at a British university say the reason some women continually have miscarriages may be from a lack of stem cells in the uterus, or womb.
As many as 25 percent of pregnancies end in miscarriage. About 1 percent of women suffer from three or more in a row, which is the definition of a recurrent miscarriage.
SEE ALSO: A British scientist just got approval to begin gene-editing embryos
In a comparison of 183 women, the researchers found recurrent miscarriage patients showed several signs of having fewer stem cells in the womb.
The cells in a woman's uterus reportedly go through cycles, renewing themselves after each miscarriage or successful birth. But having fewer stem cells is linked to a quicker aging of the tissue, which makes it harder for an embryo to develop.
Because of the obvious ethical issues controlling a miscarriage would pose, the study is correlational instead of an experiment.
That means we can't be completely sure fewer stem cells are to blame.
However, the researchers are confident enough in their findings that now they're shifting their focus to developing a treatment for recurrent miscarriages.
'General Hospital' star Kimberly McCullough reveals she suffered a late miscarriage
Woman donates 92 gallons of breastmilk after heartbreaking miscarriage
Real mothers speak out on breastfeeding


text:
NHL 09 — восемнадцатая игра в серии NHL от EA Sports. Последняя игра серии, вышедшая на PC и PS2.

Новые возможности
По сравнению с предыдущими играми, в NHL 09 добавилось несколько новых возможностей, такие, как альтернативная форма и расширенные составы чешской экстралиги и российской суперлиги. В честь столетнего юбилея команды «Монреаль Канадиенс» была добавлена сборная команда её лучших игроков за 100 лет. Помимо этого, компания EA Sports добавила ностальгический стиль управления, такой же, какой использовался в NHL 94.

Версия для ПК
Как и в двух предыдущих играх серии, версия для ПК не аналогична версиям для консолей: она отличается от неё более слабой графикой и отсутствием поддержки широкоэкранных разрешений. Для следующих игр серии версии для ПК уже не выпускались. На официальном форуме по этому поводу было выложено следующее заявление от разработчиков:

«Мы можем подтвердить, что EA не будет делать NHL 10 для PC и PS2 из-за текущего экономического климата и продолжающегося снижения количества продаж на спортивном рынке PC. Мы собираемся сосредоточиться на том, чтобы сделать самый лучший хоккей для PS3 и XBOX-360, но мы будем продолжать думать, как оживить ПК для спортивных игр»

Лиги и сборные
Всего в игре представлены семь лиг и двадцать одна сборная.

Лиги
   НХЛ
   АХЛ
  Российская хоккейная суперлига (игру начали разрабатывать до того, как Российская суперлига была переформирована в КХЛ).
  Немецкая хоккейная лига
  Шведская элитная серия
  Чешская экстралига
  Финская СМ-Лига

Дополнительные команды
  ХК Давос
  Лучшие игроки «Монреаль Канадиенс» за 100 лет

Сборные

Звук в игре

Музыка в меню
Музыка в меню включает в себя 17 композиций, любую из которых можно отключить.

Оценки

Награды
 IGN:
 Лучшая спортивная игра для Xbox 360
 GameSpot:
 Лучшие спортивные игры
 Номинация — Игра года
 Номинация — Лучшая спортивная кооперативная игра
 Spike TV Video Game Awards:
 Лучшая спортивная кооперативная игра
 Номинации от GameTrailers:
 Лучшие спортивные игры
 Номинация — Лучшая игра для Xbox 360

Комментаторы
В английских версиях игры для ПК и PlayStation 2 матчи комментируют  и Крэйг Симпсон. Гэри Торн и Билл Клемент присутствуют в версиях для PS3 и Xbox 360. В русской версии матчи комментируют Александр Ткачёв и Дмитрий Савин (хоккейные телекомментаторы), а также диктор Валентин Валентинов.

Ссылки
 Официальный сайт

Примечания

Игры для Windows
Игры для PlayStation 2
Игры для PlayStation 3
Игры для Xbox 360
Компьютерные игры 2008 года
Компьютерные игры о Национальной хоккейной лиге
Компьютерные игры, локализованные «СофтКлабом»
Компьютерные игры, локализованные 1С

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Tampa Theatre is proud to announce The Exorcist: Live Discussion with Linda Blair and Screening of The Exorcist.
THE EXORCIST: LIVE DISCUSSION WITH
LINDA BLAIR AND SCREENING OF THE EXORCIST
LIVE AT TAMPA THEATRE
Tickets Go On Sale at Noon Friday, Sept. 25 for the October 29 Show
Tampa Theatre is proud to announce The Exorcist: Live Discussion with Linda Blair and Screening of The Exorcist LIVE on the Theatre's historic stage at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, October 29 (doors open at 6:30 p.m.)Tickets will go on sale at noon Friday, September 25 at the Tampa Theatre Box Office, located at 711 N. Franklin Street in downtown Tampa, and online at www.TampaTheatre.org. Reserved-seating tickets are are $43 and a limited number of VIP Meet & Greet tickets at $103.50, plus applicable fees.
VIP POST-SHOW MEET & GREET
The limited number of VIP tickets include preferred seating and a VIP Post-show meet and greet with Linda Blair where guests can receive an autograph and a photo with the Hollywood icon herself!
Listed as "the scariest movie of all time" by Entertainment Weekly, The Exorcist endures as a defining classic that still shocks and haunts today. Join Academy Award nominee and breakout star Linda Blair (Regan) for a screening of the original ultimate horror movie which premiered back in 1973. Watch The Exorcist on a huge movie screen the way it was meant to be seen. Immediately following the film will be a moderated discussion and audience Q&A with Linda where she will share behind-the-scenes stories from the filming of this classic, worldwide phenomenon. A portion of the proceeds will benefit The Linda Blair WorldHeart Foundation. You'll have to pay for the whole seat but you'll only be using the edge!
The Exorcist has been called "the scariest film of all time" by Roger Ebert, AFI, Variety, Movies.com, & AMC. In 2010, the "Best Picture" nominated film was selected by the Library of Congress to be preserved as part of its National Film Registry.
Linda Blair has been a Hollywood icon for over 40 years. Her roles as a young actress included several pictures and television programs including The Exorcist, Born Innocent, and Sarah T. - Portrait of a Teenage Alcoholic. She had the lead in two cult classics: the women-in-prison film Chained Heat and the femme fatale vigilante action film Savage Streets. In 1997, she took to the Broadway stage and starred as "Rizzo" in the revival of Grease. Linda's hit Fox Family TV series Scariest Places on Earth followed Linda as she visited notorious "haunted" locations around the world. Linda's love of animals has led her to create the Linda Blair WorldHeart Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to rescuing and rehabilitating abused, neglected, and abandoned dogs from the harsh streets of the Los Angeles area, as well as from the overcrowded and overwhelmed city and county animal shelters


text:
Praise for J'Nai's Metropolitan Opera debut as Nefertiti in Philip Glass's 'Akhnaten'
J'Nai made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Nefertiti in Philip Glass's 'Akhnaten', November 8 – December 7, 2019, with a flood of media coverage and rave reviews accompanying it.
Media Features:
"How A Fast-Rising Opera Singer Prepared for her MET Debut" – New York Times Magazine
"J'Nai Bridges, 'The Beyonce of Opera," Makes Her Debut As Nefertiti" – BET
"From Carmen to Nefertiti, J'Nai Bridges is the Next Big Voice in Opera." – The Root
"How An opera Singer Dresses for Work" – The Cut
"The vocal blend of Costanzo's Akhnaten with mezzo J'Nai Bridges as his wife, Nefertiti, and soprano Disella Lárusdóttir as his mother, Queen Tye, was sublime. Just enough alike and just enough different, they sang as individuals and spoke as one voice depending on the moment in the score." – NY Classical Review
"J'nai Bridges as Nefertiti sounded warm and lush; Dísella Lárusdóttir's high, bright soprano as Queen Tye, Akhnaten's mother, blended hauntingly with the royal couple in their otherworldly trio." – Bachtrack
"…J'nai Bridges, whose Met debut leaves the audience craving much, much more." – Vulture


text:
Sascha Priester (* 10. April 1972 in Eggenfelden) ist ein deutscher Klassischer Archäologe, Historiker, Journalist und Manager.

Leben
Sascha Priester studierte nach dem Abitur am humanistischen Hans-Carossa-Gymnasium in Landshut von 1992 bis 1997 Klassische Archäologie, Alte Geschichte und Provinzialrömische Archäologie in München und Köln. Nach seiner Magisterarbeit zu Mythenbildern an römischen Grabbauten forschte er im Rahmen eines mehrjährigen Aufenthalts am Deutschen Archäologischen Institut in Rom zu antiken Hochhäusern und veröffentlichte zu diesem Thema seine Dissertation. Ein Schwerpunkt war die Erforschung und Neubewertung von Architektur und Ausstattung antiker insulae, unter anderem der noch mehrgeschossig erhaltenen Insula dell'Aracoeli am Kapitolshang. Während seines Italienaufenthaltes arbeitete er in der Redaktion der archäologischen Fachpublikation Römische Mitteilungen.

Ab 1997 schrieb Priester für das Geschichtsmagazin P.M. History, für das er ab 2002 als Redakteur und später als Leitender Redakteur arbeitete. Veröffentlichungen und redaktionelle Mitarbeit bei den Magazinen P.M. Fragen & Antworten, Geo Epoche, Stern und dem italienischen Focus Storia folgten.

Ab 2007 war Sascha Priester Redaktionsleiter von P.M. History. 2008 und 2009 kamen zu seinem Verantwortungsbereich das Sonderheft P.M. History Special sowie das Wissensmagazin P.M. Perspektive (Teilauflage mit DVD) hinzu. Von 2010 bis Mitte 2012 war Sascha Priester Chefredakteur von P.M. History, P.M. Perspektive, P.M. Biografie sowie der von ihm begründeten Sonderhefte P.M. History Special und P.M. History Collection. Die von ihm Print wie Online betreuten Wissenstitel und Medienmarken der P.M.-Gruppe wurden im Verlagshaus Gruner + Jahr in der Verlagsgruppe München redaktionell erstellt und veröffentlicht.

In Zusammenarbeit mit dem dtv konzipierte er von 2004 bis 2007 die Buchreihe Geschichten zur Geschichte und präsentierte dabei ausgewählte Beiträge von P.M. History-Autoren im Taschenbuchformat. In Kooperation mit der audio media verlag GmbH veröffentlichte er 2009 und 2010 mit Unsere großen Momente. Deutsche Geschichte von 1945 bis heute und Das Alte Ägypten zwei P.M. History-Hörbücher als CD-Boxsets, bei denen Sascha Priester auch als Sprecher in Erscheinung trat.

Sascha Priester ist Wissenschaftlicher Beirat des Pay-TV-Senders HISTORY. Für die Verleihung des HISTORY-Awards, der sich mit einem Aufruf zu multimedialen Geschichtsprojekten an Schülerinnen und Schüler richtet, engagiert er sich als Mitglied der Jury und regelmäßig auch als deren Sprecher, unter anderem zu den Themen "Mauerfall" (2009), "Mensch und Umwelt. Eine Beziehung mit Geschichte" (2012) und "Ein kleiner Schritt für Dich, ein riesiger Sprung für die Menschheit" (2019). Daneben tritt er in Print, Hörfunk, TV und Internet als Ansprechpartner zu historischen Themen und Fragestellungen auf. Zu geschichtlichen, politischen oder musisch-kulturellen Aspekten verfasst Sascha Priester auch als Autor Artikel, Bücher und Interviews (u. a. mit Luigi Coppa, Hans Hass, Max Mannheimer, Wolfgang Niedecken, Thilo Sarrazin und Katharina Wagner).

In der dreiteiligen Dokumentarfilmreihe Guardians of Heritage – Hüter der Geschichte wurden im Jahr 2017 Menschen und Projekte vorgestellt, die sich für den Schutz oder die Wiederherstellung von Kulturgut sowie das kulturelle Welterbe einsetzen; Sascha Priester erläuterte als HISTORY-Experte in einer mehrteiligen Online-Video-Reihe Begriffe und Zusammenhänge dieser Themen. Für die siebenteilige TV-Doku-Reihe History's Greatest Mysteries, die im Jahr 2021 im deutschsprachigen Raum startete, von Laurence Fishburne präsentiert wurde und neue Erkenntnisse zu berühmten historischen Ereignissen vorstellte, ging Sascha Priester unter anderem auf den Untergang der Titanic ein. Dabei beleuchtete er die Rolle des Mythos bei unserer Vorstellung von dieser Katastrophe, die in der Literatur, von der bildenden Kunst über Hollywood-Verfilmungen wie Titanic bis zur Musik von Bob Dylan in Songs wie Desolation Row oder Tempest weitererzählt und auch umgedeutet wurde.

Als Lehrbeauftragter für Klassische Archäologie führt Sascha Priester seit dem Jahr 2002 Lehrveranstaltungen an der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München durch; dazu kommen Seminare im Rahmen von Lehraufträgen am Institut für Klassische Archäologie der Universität Regensburg. Sein aktueller archäologischer Forschungsschwerpunkt liegt auf der Transformation der stadtrömischen Topographie; weitere Schwerpunkte sind antike Skulptur sowie die Vermittlung von Archäologie, Geschichtsforschung und Wissenschaft in der Öffentlichkeit. Seit 2015 unterrichtet er an den Münchner Kunsthandwerkerschulen Bau- und Kunstgeschichte sowie medial-digitale Präsentationstechniken und engagiert sich seit 2018 als Projektkoordinator für das Erasmus+-Programm und die Internationalisierung der schulischen Einrichtungen. Seit April 2022 ist er für das Römische Institut der Görres-Gesellschaft, das sich der Pflege der Wissenschaften und dem interdisziplinären Austausch in Rom widmet, als Referent für das Fachgebiet Archäologie zuständig.

Sascha Priester ist redaktionell, konzeptionell und in beratender Funktion in der freien Wirtschaft tätig, unter anderem arbeitete er von 2016 bis 2018 als Leiter Public Relations und Marketing für die Wirtschafts- und Strategieberatung (wbpr). Für den Telekommunikationsexperten TDT AG leitet er seit 2019 den Bereich Corporate Communications; seit Sommer 2022 verantwortet er als Vorstand im Unternehmen die Bereiche Finanzen und Unternehmenskommunikation.

Publikationen (Auswahl)
 Mythenbild und Grabbau. Alkestis, Orest und die Bilderwelt der römischen Nekropole von Sempeter. Kölner Jahrbuch für Vorgeschichte und Frühgeschichte, Bd. 31, 1998 (Magisterarbeit)
 L' Excubitorium della VII Coorte a Trastevere (Roma): Nuova analisi delle fonti manoscritte e di quelle edite in den Rendiconti della Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei Ser. 9 Bd. 10, 1999, 523ff. (zusammen mit M. C. Molinari als Mitverfasserin)
 Ad summas tegulas. Untersuchungen zu vielgeschossigen Gebäudeblöcken mit Wohneinheiten und insulae im kaiserzeitlichen Rom. Verlag L'Erma Di Bretschneider, 2002 (Dissertation)
 Alexandrias verschollene Schätze. Auf der Suche nach Tempeln, Gräbern und Palästen, P.M. History 08/02, 52ff.
 Echnaton und Tutanchamun, P.M. History 03/03, 16ff.
 Von The Velvet Underground bis Janet Jackson: Musikstars im Bann der Venus, P.M. History 05/04, 94f.
 Ist der Koloss von Rhodos gefunden – oder zumindest das, was von ihm übrig blieb?, P.M. History 05/08, 60ff.
 Ein stiller Teich als Paradies. Claude Monet und sein Meisterwerk Nymphéas (1903), P.M. History 10/09, 94f.
 Der einsame Tanz der schwarzen Himmelsboten. Vincent van Gogh und sein Meisterwerk Kornfeld mit Krähen (1890), P.M. History 11/11, 94f.
 Archäologie. Medien und Unterricht. Wo wir im Alltag auf Spartacus & Co. treffen, München 2014 (zusammen mit Tobias Bitterer als Mitverfasser)
Von Angesicht zu Angesicht: Gedanken zum Porträt und seinem Betrachter unter dem Dach der Athena, in: F. S. Knauß (Hrsg.), Unter dem Dach der Athena. Eine Bildhauerschule in der Schule für Bildhauer, Ausstellungskatalog der Glyptothek München, 2018, 8ff.

Weblinks
 Sascha Priesters Klappentext auf dem historischen Roman Die Tore der Welt von Ken Follett
 Sascha Priester zusammen mit seinen HISTORY-Jurykollegen und Hans-Dietrich Genscher bei der Verleihung des HISTORY-Awards 2009

ARD-Audiothek zu Die "Barbaren" auf Netflix - Was wissen wir über die Varus-Schlacht? Diskussionsrunde von Heidrun Derks (Museum und Park Kalkriese), Reinhard Wolters (Universität Wien), Sascha Priester und Gregor Papsch (SWR2)

Einzelnachweise

Journalist (Deutschland)
Person (München)
Deutscher
Geboren 1972
Mann


Recently, one of my new followers here on One Man's Wonder (let's call her Lucy) commented on how much she'd enjoyed my post on "screen-bound" kids and their growing alienation from Nature.
Almost as an aside, Lucy asked why I seldom refer to God in my writing. To be honest, I hadn't really thought that much about it, but as I've reflected on her question I realize I have something of an answer.
It's true, you'll seldom see the word "God" in my posts, and when you do it's likely the kind with a small "g." A word you'll see far more often—always capitalized—is "Nature." This is very deliberate.
Don't get me wrong; I do believe in a god. When you get right down to it, I suppose I even believe in the God, whatever that means. But, ultimately, one's notion of what God is and how to portray and follow that idea is a very personal matter.
Still, as varied as our spiritual paths may be, doesn't every one of us who believes in any higher power at all come to that conviction by way of needs, hopes and instincts that originate in exactly the same place? It seems to me that place either is, or has something to do with, what we might call "the" God—a single, universal God.
Where most organized religions get it wrong is not in their core values. After all, everyone with a heartbeat wants basically the same things: to live in peace and harmony, to experience love, to do something of value, and to be reasonably happy.
What happens, though, is that faiths somehow always manage to lose their focus on those principles, allowing a few of their leaders or proponents and their self-serving agendas to hijack their missions. They fool people into losing touch with love; in its place, fear and negativity start seeping in.
I don't know about you, but no god I could worship would have time for all that nonsense.
Religions expend way too much of their resources on defining and defending their differences, and too little on pursuing the values they share. They focus more on what they—or even worse, others—can or can't or shouldn't do instead of who they are and what they can become.
So you see, it's all become way too complicated. Instead of spiritual, it's gotten all intellectual, hierarchical, political. They've squeezed the joy out of being spiritual.
I don't know about you, but I'm confused and disappointed with organized religion. No god I could worship would have time for all that nonsense. This is why I find my god—what I suspect is indeed "the God"—in Nature.
For most of my life I believed in, and prayed to, what I thought was "the" God. It was a concept I'd been taught as a child—someone else's concept. God was an abstract presence, a faceless, formless, lifeless power that supposedly existed at once everywhere and nowhere. And whatever communication I had with him consisted of prayers that felt very much like shots in the dark. It was pretty much a monologue.
Since my gradual conversion, though, I converse with my god—Nature—all the time. Like a good old friend, he's approachable; he accepts me for who I am, not for who I should be; he commands my respect not for his power, but for his wisdom, integrity and constancy.
Notice I said "converse." Indeed, I chat with animals and birds; I listen to trees; I touch the wind and pour my heart out to the skies. As with any good conversation, my dialog with my Nature/god is often less about talking and more about listening and wondering.
Every day, I discover new evidence that everything—and I mean everyone and every thing—is connected, and that each creature, thing or place, large or small, is nothing less than holy.
What do I hear from Nature? I hear wisdom in its timeless patterns and rhythms; humility in its power and scale; inspiration in its sublime beauty. I find as much wisdom and guidance in that counsel as I would in any book—including one supposedly written by or through "the" God (though this is yet another bone of contention among man-made religions).
The more I practice this Nature-as-God faith, the better I get at seeing that the conversation extends far beyond my dialog with my immediate surroundings. Every day, I discover new evidence that everything—and I mean everyone and every thing—is connected, and that each creature, thing or place, large or small, is nothing less than holy.
Lest you wonder if my Nature-based religion has any place for the human species, let's just say that, for the most part, I see us as just another species of animal, in the end no more or less worthy of God's blessings than any other.
Does Nature care if I get through the day safe from harm?
Does this mean that Nature doesn't care about me and whether I get through the day healthy and safe from harm? Probably no more than "the" God cares if Tim Tebow completes the game-winning pass.
All my god cares about is that everything fits in the whole, divine Scheme of Things—that magic that explains everything from the birth of the universe, to the great interconnectedness of life, to eternity. In that context, I'm powerful only to the extent of my ability to love and create. To the universe that might not seem like much, but it does matter, and to another human being it may be everything.
Again, it's all a very personal matter, but for me Nature is a way—possibly the only way—of interpreting God that I know is both immediate and timeless; that both surrounds me and fills me; that teaches me both how small I am in the whole scheme of things and how powerful love can make me. And, as far as I can tell, Nature is the only god I can trust to remain always true, honest and positive.
So, since God is everywhere and every thing, shouldn't we be able to find him wherever we choose? I suppose I could look for him in buildings, on Sunday mornings. I could honor him in doctrine and ceremony created by human beings. I could study him in books—again, a medium of our making, not his.
Or I can experience God at the source, at places that show his true countenance, places where there are no walls around my awe; where the ceremony is life itself, where all the wisdom is written in his own hand; places where I can not only speak to him, but literally become one with him.
That place, that sacred state of mind, is Nature. That's where my God and I find each other.
POSTSCRIPT – My new friend, Lucy—that woman who commented on my blog—suggested, when I tried to summarize my religious beliefs, that I might be a pantheist. I looked it up; it's someone who identifies God with the universe and who acknowledges the validity of all gods. I try to avoid labels—they tend to manipulate and/or limit thought—but if I have to wear one, perhaps pantheist is as good as any.
Where do you find the face of God? Is it floating around you in the air, or is it in something or someone? Is it a kindly countenance or a stern one? Does your god care about you?
Great post. I couldn't find anything I would disagree with. When I am out walking the dog, in the silence on a quiet hill there I feel god/God. When I look at the men in their opulent red robes and funny hats above I feel nothing, except maybe a sense of human arrogance.
I wouldn't call myself anything. I evolve and change with each new idea I'm taught and refusing to settle allows me to remember that I know nothing - only my stupid human opinions and will therefore remain an open minded student.
Hey Daisy - Thanks for your very kind words. THis was a hard, but rewarding, piece to write. I knew it would generate some discussion.
Good morning, OSC -- I like a man who knows how little he knows. There's way too much knowing out there...and too little asking.
Thanks for your comment and your encouragement!
Hi there, Pea -- I don't think you have to call yourself anything. You know what you are.
Any open-mindedness is a great asset -- don't lose it. Thanks so much for your faithful following and participation!!
I really like what you say here. You said it simply and clearly; no frills; just how you feel. And I feel similarly. I try not to overly define concepts as big as "god." When we do that, we limit our unfolding understanding and connection.
Hi John -- It's a great honor to have you visit my site. I've noticed your thoughtful comments (mostly on FB, I think) for quite some time.
Thanks for your kind words. I think you've already articulated much of what I was trying to say in your posts -- most recently the one dealing with the unraveling of a golf ball to discover what's there.
All this reminds me that I need to take more regular looks at your great site, Zen Moments!
A lot of what you wrote here reminds me of what Joel Olsteen preaches. He focuses on the lessons, not on the doctrine. good stuff - thanks for sharing it.
ha HA! I love this! I SO SO SOOOOOO love this!
SO simple! SO LASER to the truth of Being!!!
And so relate! Thanks for allowing us to breathe for a moment, and See (without contempt) the divisive nature from most things "human"...and moving us back to what IS in all things Nature/god. To me..that IS our very god/nature....not fear, but love. LOVE!! Our true nature.
Just look at babies!! They know only LOVE as the move/return/birth themselves into this realm! And then? Humans teach, learn, reproduce, and seem to replicate fear under so many well-intentioned dogmas and institutions. (Some of them--not so well intentioned lol). But Nature..or god...our "nature"...the god that is me...that surrounds and I embody and embodies me...is truly love. Love is inherent. It's what we come forward, return, and are borne to and resides within us. Waking up to that, remembering, allowing that to be...seems to be...our Being. You just woke me up again! THANK You so much Jeffrey!
Awesome awesome awesome post. Thanks SO much for taking the effort to put it out there.
SUCH Such sweetness!!! in this realm exists! And blazes SO bright!
You bring JOY! JOY! JOY! Keep on Jeffrey! You ARE One's Wonder!
PS--isn't it cool Lucy kind of agreed to be an (unintended) instigator to all this joy!?! YES! Thank LUCY! Thank Jeffrey! Thank god and Thank NATURE! lol!
Hi Robin -- It's so good to hear from you! I've missed being in touch very much.
Though I don't feel I deserve such lavish praise, I'm glad you were moved by my post. I feel good about having stuck my neck out while trying to articulate my Nature-faith, and so far it's met with a good, positive response.
Charlie - Thanks much for dropping by here...and for your comment.
I'm not familiar with Joel Olsteen, but it sounds like I could learn from him -- I'll check it out.
Glad you liked the post, and hope you'll come back now and then.
Hi Steve -- Welcome to One Man's Wonder, and thank you so much for all that generous praise! It sounds like we're kindred spirits for sure!
Good point about the blessing "Lucy" gave all of us with her question. I'll have to thank her!
Wow!! Look at all the amazing comments here! So good to read them. And yes, You and Steve Appleton (he commented here as "Steve!!! said") are definitely kindred. Steve is one of THE MOST spectacular souls I've ever met. He definitely lives the exquisite insights and realities that you have expressed SO SO beautifully here. If you don't know him, he is on Facebook as "Steve Appleton". He is a healthy and vibrant mix of full-on buoyant life and mind blowing insight.
Thank you so much again Robin for your amazing generosity of spirit. As you know, we don't write for the praise, but it sure feels good!
Also, I want you to know what an inspiration you've been to me and my work. I think of you and things you said in Naked In Eden often.
I found much to be inspired about in your essay; so much of what you say is lovely and true. You have such an open-hearted soul! But I am sad that you seem to have rejected a whole incredibly rich dimension of life, which is true companionship with God. In discussing why you reject religion, you only talk about "organized religion." But pictures of imposing cathedrals and cardinals in funny hats are not Christianity, any more than pictures of hospitals and scrub outfits are medicine. Invented by flawed human beings, they have little or nothing to do with Christ's teachings or God's message to us in his Son's life and death. One must consider the message of the religion, not the often-flawed human messengers. At the same time, there are millions of wonderful Christians out there who are truly doing God's work.
I think perhaps your childhood disappointment with religion has been quite a negative influence. I know many people who were ruined for God at an early age by terrifying hellfire thundering from the pulpit and harsh churchy rules and regs of correct behavior. For sure, some Christian leaders are terribly misguided and obnoxious. But many are incredibly giving,loving people.
Today it is absolutely possible to find a church and a church community of people who know what God is really about. God's focus is the same as your focus in your post: love. God is about loving us so much that he desires, not only to relate in real one-on-one communication in our lives, but he wants to have a reunion with us in the afterlife. How bizarre is that?
I didn't understand any of this really until a few years ago, when I started going to some Bible studies with some regular people who have had amazingly close encounters with God. Some have had great tragedy in their lives; some have not. I was struck by their belief in Christ and how their faith and closeness to him and his loving help has been a lifeline even in terrible times.
I began to read and discuss the Bible and to experience what I call God "nudges" and God "wallops." I found that if I opened my heart to him through prayer and study of his Word, he opened himself to me.
Then I started my blog, www.godsayshi.org, to explore some of the outrageous, creative ways God reaches out and says hi to us – in the miracle of his creation, in events in our lives, even in the daily headlines. And in nature.
Sorry this post is so long – but this is something I'm passionate about. Your readers seem to be seekers, genuinely curious about things spiritual.I love it when people like that visit my blog, www.godsayshi.org, to have a conversation. This week I compare the Mega-Millions lottery with the Easter jackpot. I think you will find it entertaining as well as thought-provoking.
Dear "Lucy" -- Other readers will recognize you as the new friend who inspired my The Nature of God post.
Thanks for sharing your ideas and your considerable passion about your spiritual journey. I respect it...and you.
The only thing I'd question is your conclusion that, in my Nature-as-God experience, I've "rejected...true companionship with God." Perhaps I didn't describe my relationship with God very well, but it's one of quite a rich companionship. It feels pretty real to me.
So you needn't feel sad for me. As I tried so hard to say, I think you and I worship exactly the same god -- and I have no problem with our calling it God. It's just that we've found different ways of appreciating that incredible, all-knowing force.
And, yes, I understand that there are millions of kind, loving Christians doing wonderful work in home towns and around the world. But wouldn't you agree that there are just as many good-hearted Muslims, Hindus, Jews, pantheists...and, God knows, even atheists, also living good, caring, giving lives?
After all, what does it matter to God what we call ourselves -- or even whether or not we believe in him -- as long as we live in peace and love.
Oh Jeff, what a fabulous and thought provoking post and I can totally relate to what you are saying. As I travel through this incredible, mystical, magical journey, discovering and learning new things all the time, I have come to believe that WE ARE ALL LOVED.... Loved by Mother Earth, loved by the Great Spirit, loved by God....... There is no separation from any higher power, for they are all LOVE...a universal God. And I say "we" because we are all one. No religion is better or less worthy than any other if it is love that is being gifted.
Hi Marghanita - I'm happy to see your smiling face here this morning! Thanks for those generous words and for reinforcing them as you always do so well.
So you want to dance? Well, the music's started, at least here: trill of mild spring breeze, brassy blare of sun, rhythm of heart and breath, and cymbal clash of fresh, explosive green. Hope the music's half as sweet where you are.
Jeff, your concept of an all-encompassing God who everyone worships in nature (if I'm correctly interpreting what you're saying) is very attractive in our modern age – indeed this is the ONLY God which fits today's philosophical insistence on tolerance and diversity. Doubtless you and most of your readers also believe that all religions – Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, etc. – worship the same God. But the reality is that I doubt you can find even a handful of Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, or Buddhists who agree with you! They are believers in these specific religions because they believe their religion, and their religion alone, is truth. Those who believe all truth is relative, that there is no ultimate truth, cannot accept this and thus deplore those who have chosen a faith, often branding them as narrow-minded.
But studying different religions reveals that they are very different, no matter what our desires for that lovely kumbaya of universal brotherhood. For instance, the Buddhist and Hindu religions have hundreds of Gods, though these religions are essentially "paths" of right behavior, with the goal of suppressing human desire so one won't continue to be reincarnated into this horrible earthly existence. At its core, these are deeply pessimistic religions.
For me, this view doesn't fit what I know of the joy of life here and the God who gave us all this beauty and the incredible opportunity to know Him. I believe in the Christian God, who I have found to be playful, creative, challenging, trustworthy, and incredibly good to us. And he is also a moral God. In all other faiths, man reaches up to find God; in Christianity, God is reaching down to make contact with us. The best way to find out about him is to read his best-selling biography; he intended this book to reveal himself and his personality to us. And in getting to know him, he draws us into an intimate relationship with him.
For me, it's all about story. This Christianity just makes sense to me in view of our human lives and predicament. Jeff, you "see us as just another species of animal, in the end no more or less worthy of God's blessings than any other." But my God says we are totally unlike the animals; he says he created us "in his image" and the entire universe as our playground. He tells us we humans are the apex and the ultimate goal of all his creation. How wild is that.
But we are a fallen creation because we ignore him or disobey him. If you look at the cruelty of people to each other in the daily headlines, you can see that we screw up all the time and thus are in need of redemption. We wouldn't act this way if we listened to God. We can't "cure" ourselves (despite volumes by the latest TV gurus instructing us on self-fulfillment) because of our flawed and fallen human nature. So we turn to God who has given us a way for us to get back to him. That way is Jesus Christ, his Son, sent to pay the price we can never pay to be in harmony again with a Holy God.
All we have to do is believe that God loves us so much he was literally willing to die for us so we can spend eternity with him. Does your God want to spend eternity with you? For millions of people, this story makes sense as they look at their own lives. For millions of people, and many people I know, belief in and a radical personal relationship to this Christian God has transformed their lives, change their destructive behavior, and given them hope and peace.
When you say, "All my god cares about is that everything fits in the whole, divine Scheme of Things—that magic that explains everything from the birth of the universe, to the great interconnectedness of life, to eternity" -- yes, that's what my God cares about too. And that's why he has created this deeply personal plan involving his Son and salvation and eternal life with Him, a plan that he longs for us to discover.
That's what Easter is all about – Happy Easter!
Hey Lucy -- While I respect and in some ways admire your obviously well-thought-out and well-stated views, I must admit that mine are still very much a work in progress.
All I can say is that much of what you say makes sense to me, and it's now become part of the ongoing internal simmering of ideas that make up who I am. For that I thank you.
One general thought does rise to the top, though, and that is that I don't see faith and uncertainty as being mutually exclusive. For me, seeking elusive truths -- perhaps even changing or even multiple truths -- is, if not the soul, at least the heart of my faith.
The seeker in his seeking is usually seeking after truth and ultimately if his quest is successful, will be rewarded when he finds it, with a strong faith. But of course faith always is tinged with some doubt and uncertainty. We are human after all.
Other seekers drift from Buddhist belief system to New Ageism to Oprah's latest guru and never really give their allegiance to any religion. There is no urgency in their search, no belief that it may really be a matter of life and death.
This is typical of those who find in the occasional unfortunate pronouncements of a Pat Robertson, or the fall from grace of a Jim Bakker or a Ted Haggerty, or the sexual abuse of some priests, a reason to reject the saving message of Christianity.
Often as they grow older, these people will have a mortality twinge that leads to a change of spiritual heart.
Here is a door, behind which, according to some people, the secret of the universe is waiting for you. Either that's true, or it isn't. And if it isn't then what the door really conceals is simply the greatest fraud, the most colossal "sell" on record. Isn't it obviously the job of every man (that is a man and not a rabbit) to try to find out which, and then to devote his full energies either to serving this tremendous secret or to exposing and destroying this gigantic humbug?


This special offer by FHWS makes it possible to connect theory and practice in a unique way. Depending on the type of dual cooperative studies, academic studies are either connected to a vocational training ("Verbundstudium", Combined Studies) or to intensified internship periods at a company ("Studium mit vertiefter Praxis", Studies with Intensified Practice).
The general application procedure applies.
All information mentioned above is available as download from our form centre.
If you plan to or already have concluded a training contract for combined studies, please submit a copy of it together with your application documents to FHWS.
If you received a letter of admission from FHWS, but cannot take this university place because you first have to complete one year of practical training, you are considered as admitted in advance for the following year.
has been admitted to the degree programme at the beginning or during the vocational training.
If you start a vocational training, please apply in the same year (between 1 May and 15 July) for a place at FHWS. If you get a letter of admission, you may not be able to take up studies, but instead you will be admitted in advance for the following year. This admission in advance is only possible at the higher education institution from which you received the letter of admission.
To make use of this admission in advance, it is necessary to again apply in the following year with all documents in due time and properly at FHWS between 1 May and 15 July. Please attach proof of participation in the Combined Studies by the Chamber of Industry and Commerce ("Industrie- und Handelskammer") as well as the letter of admission from last year. Therefore: Keep every letter of admission in a safe place!