Humanity
Pope honors grandparents on first World Day for elderly
VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis celebrated the Roman Catholic Church’s first World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly on Sunday. Francis solicited a round of applause from the faithful in St. Peter’s Square and urged people everywhere to reach out to older generations. Francis was supposed to have led a celebration Mass for grandparents…
‘Eye of Sauron’ volcano and other deep-sea structures discovered in underwater ‘Mordor’
Home News (Image credit: 3D imagery courtesy of CSIRO/MNF, GSM)Researchers exploring the Indian Ocean have discovered the remains of a collapsed underwater volcano with an uncanny resemblance to the all-seeing "Eye of Sauron" from J.R.R. Tolkien's famous fantasy series "The Lord of the Rings," as well as two other seafloor structures named after places in…
Mexican Archaeologists Forced to Bury an Unusual Discovery Made in Old Aztec Capital
In a strange turn of events, researchers in Mexico have announced they plan to rebury an unusual archaeological monument found in the outskirts of Mexico City – covering up an important historical discovery until some unknown time in the future. The discovery in question is a tunnel built centuries ago as part of the Albarradón…
Gordon Conwell seminary alumni and staff protest loss of Black professor
(RNS) — A group of alumni and staff of Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary and other regional clergy are expressing concern that the school decided not to renew the contract of its sole Black full professor. The Rev. Emmett Price III was the founding executive director of the seminary’s Institute for the Study of the Black…
ACNA leaders to take over abuse investigation in Upper Midwest diocese
(RNS) — A group of leaders from the Anglican Church in North America will take over an investigation into alleged abuse at an ACNA church in Illinois. Mark Rivera, a former lay leader at Christ Our Light Anglican, an ACNA startup congregation in Big Rock, Illinois, west of Chicago, has been charged with felony child…
Philosopher Spotlight: Jess Flanigan
Thanks to Jess Flanigan for contributing this guest post, sharing her interesting and provocative work, as part of my ongoing "philosopher spotlight" series. Enjoy!* * *My published research falls into three categories. I am interested in rights and their enforceability, public health policy, and economic justice issues. In this post I’ll say a bit about my…
How Jesse Owens Foiled Hitler’s Plans for the 1936 Olympics
In 1933, shortly after assuming power as chancellor of Germany, Adolf Hitler moved forward with plans to turn the 1936 Summer and Winter Olympics into showcases for his regime. He ordered the construction of a massive new stadium in Berlin and channeled funds toward the completion of an airport to welcome international visitors. Additionally, the…
How Title IX Transformed Women’s Sports
Title IX, the landmark gender equity law passed as part of the Education Amendments of 1972, banned sex discrimination in federally funded education programs. Its protections would open doors for girls and women in admission, academic majors, teaching positions, vocational programs and individual classes, and help ensure equal access and treatment once they got in.…
10 Famous Horse Racing Scandals
Horse racing has been called the “Sport of Kings,” and, just like royalty, racing has a scandal-filled history. Some misconduct has been about manipulating races, whether by influencing jockeys or the recurring phenomenon of horse switching. While attention has also fallen on the treatment of racehorses, including the use of performance-enhancing and pain-masking drugs. Here…
A Serge of Interest
By Ben Granger. When choosing sides in the great ideological clashes of the last century, few escape free of guilt. Corpse mounds gather wherever you look. The Holocaust here, the gulag there, then rather further from view, the Bengal famine, the genocides of the Congo, Armenia and Indonesia; and the faceless countless casualties of poverty.…
How the 1914 Battle of Tannenberg Emboldened German Forces at the Start of WWI
There have been two epic battles at the place known as Tannenberg. The first, in 1410, saw the defeat of a German religious order called the Teutonic Knights at the hands of Slavs and Lithuanians. Five hundred years later, Germany got its revenge in one of the earliest battles of World War I when a…
A mystery novel by a pseudonymous author arrives with a warning: “Advance Promotional Copy: Do Not Read.” Was it just a ploy for virality, or something else?
It arrived at the height of the pandemic, in a brown envelope with no return address and too many stamps, none of which had been marked by the post office. It was addressed to me at my parents’ New York City apartment, where I haven’t lived in more than a decade. My mother used the…
Who was the original Falstaff or Iago? So iconic are these characters, it’s hard to imagine the actors who originally performed them
A common legend in the theater holds that by 1599 William Shakespeare had grown tired with the clowning antics of the actor William Kempe. As a member of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, Kempe played Launcelot Gobbo in The Merchant of Venice, Dogberry in Much Ado About Nothing, and Peter in Romeo and Juliet. His greatest…
To cool down, seals urinate on themselves, bees vomit, storks defecate. We sweat, for better and worse
Books of The TimesCredit….When you purchase an independently reviewed book through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.In “The Joy of Sweat,” an entertaining and illuminating guide to the necessity and virtues of perspiration, the science journalist Sarah Everts points out that plenty of people pay good money to exude sweat while also paying good…
In Japan, Greek-influenced Olympics meet another kind of pagan heritage
(RNS) — The lighting of an eternal flame, the spiritual aura of heroism and triumph, the parades at once boisterous and solemn: The Olympic rituals that stir our hearts each time the Games roll around all take their inspiration from pagan Greek religious life, as interpreted by the classics-besotted Europeans who revived the event in…
