Group items tagged

UPDATE ON: 'In 1994, The New York Times reported on how those members, or "partners," as they called themselves, had settled into their first year of life as a community ("Retirement? For 11 Friends, It's Off to Camp"). It was one of a number of such experiments, known as cohousing communities, that were springing up around the country at the time, based on a Danish model developed in the 1960s.... How did the experiment turn out? On the 20th anniversary, the consensus was generally positive. As Helen Papke, 84, observed, it has been a lesson in patience. "When it's good, it's so good," she said. "And when it's bad, it's so bad, the angst and argument we have with each other. But we have a conviction to work it out - and we will." Dick Browning, 78, whose wife, Louise, died in 2007, was more effusive. "I love it," he said. "I love the community." Of the original 11 members, seven are still here, although apart from Ms. Browning, no one has died. (One couple and one woman left for personal reasons.) The community has taken on new members, so there are now 13 altogether...,'

UPDATE ON: 'In 1994, The New York Times reported on how those members, or "partners," as they called themselves, had settled into their first year of life as a community ("Retirement? For 11 Friends, It's Off to Camp"). It was one of a number of such experiments, known as cohousing communities, that were springing up around the country at the time, based on a Danish model developed in the 1960s.... How did the experiment turn out? On the 20th anniversary, the consensus was generally positive. As Helen Papke, 84, observed, it has been a lesson in patience. "When it's good, it's so good," she said. "And when it's bad, it's so bad, the angst and argument we have with each other. But we have a conviction to work it out - and we will." Dick Browning, 78, whose wife, Louise, died in 2007, was more effusive. "I love it," he said. "I love the community." Of the original 11 members, seven are still here, although apart from Ms. Browning, no one has died. (One couple and one woman left for personal reasons.) The community has taken on new members, so there are now 13 altogether...,'

'Raised in Pennsylvania, I grew up in the black church. My father was a religious leader in the community, and my sister is a pastor. I went to church every Sunday and sang in the choir. But for all that the church gave me - for all that it represented belonging, love and community - it also shut its doors to me as a gay person. That experience left me with the lifelong desire to explore the power of religion to transform lives or destroy them. I became interested in Uganda, an intensely religious country that attracts many American missionaries and much funding from United States faith-based organizations. The American evangelical movement in Africa does valuable work in helping the poor. But as you'll see in this Op-Doc video, some of their efforts and money feed a dangerous ideology that seeks to demonize L.G.B.T. people and intensifies religious rhetoric until it results in violence. It is important for American congregations to hold their churches accountable for what their money does in Africa.' - ROGER ROSS WILLIAMS

cf ABSimpson - focus is on building community

'I went on my first Christian radio show, a year ago, and the host set out to save me.... 'I have spent a lot of time thinking about the complexity of faith, and have tried to take theologically conservative faith seriously. As I did so, over a decade of research, I found myself more open to the idea of God, and more aware of the fragile human grasp on the real. '....It was a shock to have my host grill me about the state of my soul. It reminded me that one of the things that makes mutual respect between believers and nonbelievers difficult is that there is a kind of line in the sand, and you're either on one side of it or on the other. Skeptics do this too, of course.... 'Anthropologists have a term for this racheting-up of opposition: schismogenesis. Gregory Bateson developed the word to describe mirroring interactions, where every move by each side makes the other respond more negatively.... 'These days we Americans live not only with political schismogenesis, but also religious schismogenesis. 'Yet believers and nonbelievers are not so different from one another.... When I arrived at one church..., I thought that I would stick out like a sore thumb. I did not. Instead, I saw my own doubts, anxieties and yearnings reflected in those around me.... 'Many of my skeptical friends think of themselves as secular, sometimes profoundly so. Yet these secular friends often hover on the edge of faith. They meditate.... 'We need to recognize something of what we share, and to carry on a conversation - and if we can keep the conversation going, we will, however slowly, move forward. If we can't, we're in real trouble. '

'I went on my first Christian radio show, a year ago, and the host set out to save me.... 'I have spent a lot of time thinking about the complexity of faith, and have tried to take theologically conservative faith seriously. As I did so, over a decade of research, I found myself more open to the idea of God, and more aware of the fragile human grasp on the real. '....It was a shock to have my host grill me about the state of my soul. It reminded me that one of the things that makes mutual respect between believers and nonbelievers difficult is that there is a kind of line in the sand, and you're either on one side of it or on the other. Skeptics do this too, of course.... 'Anthropologists have a term for this racheting-up of opposition: schismogenesis. Gregory Bateson developed the word to describe mirroring interactions, where every move by each side makes the other respond more negatively.... 'These days we Americans live not only with political schismogenesis, but also religious schismogenesis. 'Yet believers and nonbelievers are not so different from one another.... When I arrived at one church..., I thought that I would stick out like a sore thumb. I did not. Instead, I saw my own doubts, anxieties and yearnings reflected in those around me.... 'Many of my skeptical friends think of themselves as secular, sometimes profoundly so. Yet these secular friends often hover on the edge of faith. They meditate.... 'We need to recognize something of what we share, and to carry on a conversation - and if we can keep the conversation going, we will, however slowly, move forward. If we can't, we're in real trouble. '

'The setting is simple, austere. The workspace occupied by the desk is small. I am impressed not only by the simplicity of the furniture, but also by the objects in the room. The spirituality of Jorge Mario Bergoglio is not made of "harmonized energies," as he would call them, but of human faces: Christ, St. Francis, St. Joseph and Mary.... 'I ask Pope Francis point-blank: "Who is Jorge Mario Bergoglio?" He...replies: "I ​​do not know what might be the most fitting description.... I am a sinner. This is the most accurate definition. It is not a figure of speech, a literary genre. I am a sinner." ' "...In the history of salvation, God has saved a people. There is no full identity without belonging to a people. No one is saved alone, as an isolated individual, but God attracts us looking at the complex web of relationships that take place in the human community. God enters into this dynamic, this participation in the web of human relationships.... ' "In Buenos Aires I used to receive letters from homosexual persons who are 'socially wounded' because they tell me that they feel like the church has always condemned them. But the church does not want to do this. During the return flight from Rio de Janeiro I said that if a homosexual person is of good will and is in search of God, I am no one to judge.... Religion has the right to express its opinion in the service of the people, but God in creation has set us free: it is not possible to interfere spiritually in the life of a person.... ' "The confessional is not a torture chamber, but the place in which the Lord's mercy motivates us to do better. I also consider the situation of a woman with a failed marriage in her past and who also had an abortion. Then this woman remarries, and she is now happy and has five children. That abortion in her past weighs heavily on her conscience and she sincerely regrets it. She would like to move forward in her Christian life. What is the confessor to do? ' "We c

'The setting is simple, austere. The workspace occupied by the desk is small. I am impressed not only by the simplicity of the furniture, but also by the objects in the room. The spirituality of Jorge Mario Bergoglio is not made of "harmonized energies," as he would call them, but of human faces: Christ, St. Francis, St. Joseph and Mary.... 'I ask Pope Francis point-blank: "Who is Jorge Mario Bergoglio?" He...replies: "I ​​do not know what might be the most fitting description.... I am a sinner. This is the most accurate definition. It is not a figure of speech, a literary genre. I am a sinner." ' "...In the history of salvation, God has saved a people. There is no full identity without belonging to a people. No one is saved alone, as an isolated individual, but God attracts us looking at the complex web of relationships that take place in the human community. God enters into this dynamic, this participation in the web of human relationships.... ' "In Buenos Aires I used to receive letters from homosexual persons who are 'socially wounded' because they tell me that they feel like the church has always condemned them. But the church does not want to do this. During the return flight from Rio de Janeiro I said that if a homosexual person is of good will and is in search of God, I am no one to judge.... Religion has the right to express its opinion in the service of the people, but God in creation has set us free: it is not possible to interfere spiritually in the life of a person.... ' "The confessional is not a torture chamber, but the place in which the Lord's mercy motivates us to do better. I also consider the situation of a woman with a failed marriage in her past and who also had an abortion. Then this woman remarries, and she is now happy and has five children. That abortion in her past weighs heavily on her conscience and she sincerely regrets it. She would like to move forward in her Christian life. What is the confessor to do? ' "W

The problem with teaching Physical Diagnosis in medical school without first teaching Communication Skills.

Most people in health care understand and accept the need for clinical hierarchies. The problem is that we aren't usually prepared for them; nor are we given protocols for resolving the inevitable tensions that arise over appropriate care. Doctors and nurses are trained differently, and our sense of priorities can conflict. When that happens, the lack of an established, neutral way of resolving such clashes works to everyone's detriment. This isn't about hurt feelings or bruised egos. Modern health care is complex, highly technical and dangerous, and the lack of flexible, dynamic protocols to facilitate communication along the medical hierarchy can be deadly. Indeed, preventable medical errors kill 100,000 patients a year, or a million people a decade, wrote Rosemary Gordon and Janardan Prasad Singh in their book "Wall of Silence."

...like SPV: independent living to ALF to SNF care.

"In a major encyclical addressing the economic questions raised by the upheaval in Eastern Europe in 1989, Pope John Paul II warned capitalist nations yesterday against letting the collapse of Communism blind them to the need to repair injustices in their own economic system. "The encyclical, "Centesimus Annus" ("The Hundredth Year"), includes the fullest, and in many ways the most positive, treatment of the market economy in any papal document. But praise is typically followed with qualifications and ringing reminders about economic failures in both developing and developed countries."

"...In tests of the real-life niche travel agencies in New York City and elsewhere that serve specific immigrant communities, pitched against the popular Web sites - like Expedia, Kayak, Vayama - nearly every time, travel agents bested the Internet big boys on both price (the objective part of the test) and service (what you might call the essay question). In other words, the agents suggested alternate routes, gave advice on visas and just generally acted, well, more human than their computer counterparts."

The conflict in Iraq and Syria is increasingly framed in communal terms. It is said that Shia-Sunni bloodletting is nothing new. Implicit in this simplistic approach is the solution: Let them fight it out among themselves. Reality is not that simple.

Especially Virgin Mobile's Novatel, via Sprint 3G (except no roaming) - only $40/mo. Only connection to desktop must be wireless (no USB connector for communication). Need wall charger. No contract; sign on & "pre-pay" as needed. Can provide high-speed for laptop OR computer.

Diverse patterns of belief & secularization, both with increasing wealth and post-Communism

Mark Lillo charts how both right and left libertarianism & radical individualism have led to "communities of like-mindedness"; and now to an angry movement that wants to be free from government agencies that protect their health, wealth, and well-being; free from problems and policies too difficult to understand; free from parties and coalitions; free from experts who think they know better than they do; free from politicians who don't talk or look like they do.