Human Migration Maps

mtDNA Human Migration Maps

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_mitochondrial_DNA_haplogroup

http://www.worldfamilies.net/mtdnamap

http://www.worldfamilies.net/mtdnamap

http://www.myancestorsgenes.com/resource/migration_map_final.pdf

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

A Migration Map Video by the Bradshaw Foundation - http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/journey/

The Bradshaw Foundation website - http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/

ADDITIONAL MIGRATION DATA

Migration Models before & after the last Glacial Ice Sheet

(from 60,000 – 21,000 bce & after 14,000 bce) -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Models_of_migration_to_the_New_World


Origin of PaleoIndians after the last Ice Sheet (14,000 bce) -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_of_Paleoindians


South American (pre-Clovis) sites (60,000 bce and after) -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedra_Furada_sites


North American Clovis Culture –
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_culture

**************************
 

Old American theory is 'speared'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15391388

By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

October 20, 2011

An ancient bone with a projectile point lodged within it appears to up-end - once and for all - a long-held idea of how the Americas were first populated.

The rib, from a tusked beast known as a mastodon, has been dated precisely to 13,800 years ago.

This places it before the so-called Clovis hunters, who many academics had argued were the North American continent's original inhabitants.

News of the dating results is reported in Science magazine.

In truth, the "Clovis first" model, which holds to the idea that America's original human population swept across a land-bridge from Siberia some 13,000 years ago, has looked untenable for some time.

A succession of archaeological finds right across the United States and northern Mexico have indicated there was human activity much earlier than this - perhaps as early as 15-16,000 years ago.

The mastodon rib, however, really leaves the once cherished model with nowhere to go.

The specimen has actually been known about for more than 30 years. It is plainly from an old male animal that had been attacked with some kind of weaponry.

It was found in the late 1970s at the Manis site near Sequim, north-west of Seattle, in Washington State.

Although scientists at the time correctly identified the specimen's antiquity, adherents to the Clovis-first model questioned the dating and interpretation of the site.

To try to settle any lingering uncertainty, Prof Michael Waters of Texas A&M University and colleagues called upon a range of up-to-date analytical tools and revisited the specimen.

These investigations included new radio carbon tests using atomic accelerators.

"The beauty of atomic accelerators is that you can date very small samples and also very chemically pure samples," Prof Waters told BBC News.

"We extracted specific amino acids from the collagen in the bone and dated those, and yielded dates 13,800 years ago, plus or minus 20 years. That's very precise." It is 800 years or so before Clovis evidence is seen in the historical record.

The CT imagery reveals the extent of the wound and the shape of the buried point's end

Computed tomography, which creates exquisite 3D X-ray images of objects, was used to study the embedded point. The visualisation reveals how the projectile end had been deliberately sharpened to give a needle-like quality. And it also enabled the scientists to estimate the projectile end's likely original size - at least 27cm long, they believe.

"The other thing that's really interesting is that as it went in, the very tip broke and rotated off to the side," said the Texas A&M researcher.

"That's a very common breakage pattern when any kind of projectile hits bone. You see it even in stone projectiles that are embedded in, say, bison bones."

DNA investigation also threw up a remarkable irony - the point itself was made from mastodon bone, proving that the people who fashioned it were systematically hunting or scavenging animal bones to make their tools.

The timing of humanity's presence in North America is important because it plays into the debate over why so many great beasts from the end of the last Ice Age in that quarter of the globe went extinct.

Not just mastodons, but woolly mammoths, sabre-toothed cats, giant sloths, camels, and teratorns (predatory birds with a nearly four-metre wingspan) - all disappeared in short order a little over 12,700 years ago.

A rapidly changing climate in North America is assumed to have played a key role - as is the sophisticated stone-tool weaponry used by the Clovis hunters. But the fact that there are also humans with effective bone and antler killing technologies present in North America deeper in time suggests the hunting pressure on these animals may have been even greater than previously thought.

"Humans clearly had a role in these extinctions and by the time the Clovis technology turns up at 13,000 years ago - that's the end. They finished them off," said Prof Waters.

"You know, the Clovis-first model has been dying for some time," he finished. "But there's nothing harder to change than a paradigm, than long-standing thinking. When Clovis-First was first proposed, it was a very elegant model but it's time to move on, and most of the archaeological community is doing just that."

Now extinct, the mastodon was a large elephant-like animal

Related Stories

• Tools 'demand new American story' 24 MARCH 2011, SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENT
• Early man was 'ancient mariner' 04 MARCH 2011, SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENT
• Faeces hint at first Americans 03 APRIL 2008, SCI/TECH
• Mammoth dung clue to extinction 19 NOVEMBER 2009, SCI/TECH
• Footprints of 'first Americans' 05 JULY 2005, SCI/TECH
• Seafaring clue to first Americans 26 FEBRUARY 2004, SCI/TECH

Related Internet links 

• Science
• Center for the Study of the First Americans

Around the BBC

• Hands on History

The BBC is not responsible for the content of external Internet sites

Review: The Life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer DBWE

Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Preview
http://www.patheos.com/community/jesuscreed/2011/10/20/dietrich-bonhoeffer-sneak-preview/#more-21508

by Scot McKnight

October 20, 2011

This review is by our blog friend and regular commenter, Diane Reynolds, and is a sneak preview of a book coming out November 1: Theological Education Underground, 1937-1940 (Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, Vol. 15), ed. by Victoria J. Barnett. Dietrich Bonhoeffer has become a singular saint among many today, and I hope it leads to many reading his brilliant studies Life Together and Prayerbook of the Bible (Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, Vol. 5) and Discipleship (Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, Vol. 4).

I have been reading Bonhoeffer since about 1974, when I first read what was then called The Cost of Discipleship, but I also have found his Life Together to be a treasure trove of wisdom — derived in the most difficult of circumstances, life in hiding from Hitler.

Now to Diane’s fine introduction to various publications during those difficult times of Bonhoeffer’s life:

The years 1937 to 1940 marked a critical period in the life of pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer. During this time, he conducted his illegal seminary under increasingly dangerous circumstances in Nazi Germany, wrote two of his most famous books—Discipleship and Life Together—and decided to reject a secure haven in the United States to return to Germany on the eve of World War II. His departure after only a month in the U.S. catapulted him towards active resistance—and hence execution—as part of the July 20, 1944 plot to assassinate Hitler.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer on a weekend getaway with
confirmands of Zion's Church congregation (1932)

These years are chronicled in Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Theological Education Underground:1937-1940, volume 15 of the Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works English edition series (DBWE), to be released by Fortress Press on November 1. This book, the fourth-to-last of the 16 volumes (plus index) to be translated from German, chronicles Bonhoeffer’s struggles to respond to the horrors of Nazism and offers a riveting “fly on the wall” view of one individual’s wrestling with issues of conscience and discernment.

What do you think drives the current fascination with Bonhoeffer? What does Bonhoeffer mean to you?

In his notes on “sin,” in this volume, Bonhoeffer ponders issues that will preoccupy him for the rest of his life: “Because the essence of sin is to obtain praise for itself and to judge over good and evil, sin can never recognize its own sinfulness. … sin is a judgment of God, who calls sin that which people call good, namely, one’s own righteousness.”

Do you agree with this definition?

Can one’s own will to righteousness—our desire to preserve our own purity—be sinful?

Does God ever call us out to serve him by abandoning our purity?

Although Bonhoeffer became a pacifist during his year at Union Theological Seminary in 1930-31, from 1937-40 he was working out—and living out– the theology that would lead to the difficult decision to participate in an assassination attempt against Hitler.

True to form, Bonhoeffer was unflinching in not rationalizing his participation in this plot as somehow holy. For this Sermon on the Mount Christian, even killing someone as evil as Hitler potentially violated Christ’s witness. Bonhoeffer recognized that he was caught in a bind, but felt he could not be a Christian without acting in what he called a “this-worldly” way—and he hoped, but was never certain, that God would forgive him for his deed.

Is this the definition of courage? Or did he wrongly abandon his pacifism?

The letters and journal entries that lead us through Bonhoeffer’s 1939 decision to return to Germany—a choice so incomprehensible that one of his friends hopped a train from the Midwest to argue with him in person— and are a particularly poignant part of this volume. How many of us would return to Nazi Germany, given a chance to escape—and not only to escape, but with the opportunity to do meaningful work in exile?

How many of us, at a time when it was clear war was coming and unclear that Britain could withstand a German assault, would decline a chance to bring a beloved twin sister and her Jewish husband and daughters out of harm’s way? Bonhoeffer’s life challenges our easy rationalizations and our tendency to cast our decisions as pure.

Like the other meticulously edited DBWE volumes, this one does not disappoint, offering up a full feast of scholarship, including letters and papers unearthed since the German edition was published. As usual, the editors’ essays, in this case by Victoria J. Barnett and Dirk Schulz, are top notch. Further, the letters, sermons, notes and diary accounts build an intimate portrait of Bonhoeffer and chronicle, “up close and personal,” a fascinating period of history and a fascinating man.

Comments (9)

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Bonhoeffer in Germany, circa 1930s
Born	February 4, 1906 (1906-02-04) Breslau, Germany
Died	April 9, 1945 (1945-04-10) (age 39) Flossenbürg concentration camp
Education	Doctorate in theology
Church	Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union Confessing Church
Writings	Author of several books and articles (see below)
Congregations served	Zion's Church congregation, Berlin German-speaking congregations of St. Paul's and Sydenham, London
Offices held	Associate lecturer at Frederick William University of Berlin (1931–36) Student pastor at Technical College, Berlin (1931–33) Lecturer of Confessing Church candidates of pastorate in Finkenwalde (1935–37)
Title	ordained pastor

Exerpted from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietrich_Bonhoeffer

Imprisonment

For a year and a half, Bonhoeffer was imprisoned at Tegel military prison awaiting trial. There he continued his work in religious outreach among his fellow prisoners and guards. Sympathetic guards helped smuggle his letters out of prison to Eberhard Bethge and others, and these uncensored letters were posthumously published in Letters and Papers from Prison. A guard named Corporal Knobloch even offered to help him escape from the prison and "disappear" with him, and plans were made for that end. But Bonhoeffer declined it fearing Nazi retribution on his family, especially his brother Klaus and brother-in-law who were also imprisoned.

After the failure of the July 20 Plot on Hitler's life in 1944 and the discovery in September 1944 of secret Abwehr documents relating to the conspiracy, Bonhoeffer's connection with the conspirators was discovered. He was transferred from the military prison in Berlin Tegel, where he had been held for 18 months, to the detention cellar of the house prison of the Reich Security Head Office, the Gestapo's high-security prison. In February 1945, he was secretly moved to Buchenwald concentration camp, and finally to Flossenbürg concentration camp.

On April 4, 1945, the diaries of Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, head of the Abwehr, were discovered, and in a rage upon reading them, Hitler ordered that the Abwehr conspirators be destroyed. Bonhoeffer was led away just as he concluded his final Sunday service and asked an English prisoner Payne Best to remember him to Bishop George Bell of Chichester if he should ever reach his home: "This is the end — for me the beginning of life."

Execution

Bonhoeffer was condemned to death on April 8, 1945, by SS judge Otto Thorbeck at a drumhead court-martial without witnesses, records of proceedings or a defence in Flossenbürg concentration camp. He was executed there by hanging at dawn on April 9, 1945, just two weeks before soldiers from the United States 90th and 97th Infantry Divisions liberated the camp, three weeks before the Soviet capture of Berlin and a month before the capitulation of Nazi Germany.

Like other executions associated with the July 20 Plot, the execution was particularly brutal. Bonhoeffer was stripped of his clothing and led naked into the execution yard, where he was hanged with thin wire for death by strangulation. Hanged with Bonhoeffer were fellow conspirators Admiral Wilhelm Canaris; Canaris' deputy General Hans Oster; military jurist General Karl Sack; General Friedrich von Rabenau; businessman Theodor Strünck; and German resistance fighter Ludwig Gehre. Bonhoeffer's brother, Klaus Bonhoeffer, and his brothers-in-law Hans von Dohnanyi and Rüdiger Schleicher were executed elsewhere later in the month.

The camp doctor who witnessed the execution wrote: “I saw Pastor Bonhoeffer ... kneeling on the floor praying fervently to God. I was most deeply moved by the way this lovable man prayed, so devout and so certain that God heard his prayer. At the place of execution, he again said a short prayer and then climbed the few steps to the gallows, brave and composed. His death ensued after a few seconds. In the almost fifty years that I worked as a doctor, I have hardly ever seen a man die so entirely submissive to the will of God.”

Leaders - How’s Your Passion?

Leaders: Are You Tired?

http://asistasjourney.com/2011/10/12/leaders-are-you-tired/#more-1393

by Natasha S. Robinson

12WednesdayOct 2011

Comments

I attended a leadership course a couple weeks ago and the professor asked the class a trick question. “What’s the opposite of tired?”

Take some time to think about that for a moment.

“What’s the opposite of tired?”

I was waiting to see where he was going with this question when some of my classmates started offering their responses which included various forms of rest.

Some subconsciously thought that the opposite of being tired is being well rested. “Not so,” the professor continued.

“The opposite of tired is not rest; the opposite of tired is passion!”

Ah ha, that was a revelation. Part of the revelation is that on many levels we do have rest, safety, security in the comfort, care, and presence of our father, God. At the same time, faith in that relationship is evident in our work, and there is lots of work to be done.

My mind immediately flooded with the passages where Jesus basically stated that he had limited moments of physical rest and that the disciples should go and do likewise.

Jesus: “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nets, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head (Matthew 8:20 NIV).”

Jesus to the disciples: “As you go, preach this message: ‘The kingdom of heaven is near,’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give. Do not take along any gold or silver or cooper in your belts; take no bag for the journey, or extra tunic, or sandals or a staff; for the worker is worth his keep (Matthew 10:6-10).”

That’s a lot of work, and with no assurance of resources. Jesus is calling his disciples to a life of continuous sacrifice. He is calling for an emptying of ourselves and complete reliance on him.

The Holy Spirit within us does not tire; he does not grow weary; he does not need rest. On his strength we can rely completely.

Do you not know?

Have you not heard?

The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.

He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.

He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.

- Isaiah 40:28-29 NIV

That is the same strength and power that sustained Jesus as he went to the cross. We refer to his obedience as the Passion of the Christ or the Passion of the Cross. On that journey, he spoke the words,

“My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death (Matthew 26:38).”

“My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will (Matthew 26:39b, 42, &44).” Notice that he prayed these words three times!

Then he returned to his disciples and stated, “Are you still sleeping and resting (Matthew 26:45)?”

This is a warning to us, as Christians and leaders that we should not be sleeping or resting in the moments when Christ calls us to be awake. We should not sleep on the issues where God calls us to action. We should not rest in the time with God’s name is at stake. We are redeemed for a passionate response particularly in the critical moments. These last days are critical!

In our human flesh, will our physical bodies tire? Certainly. Are there times that we need to sleep and rest? Most definitely.

In those moments of weakness, however, we need to be more passionate in prayer, more reliant on the Holy Spirit, and more spiritually awake than ever, for Jesus said to his disciples, “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak (Matthew 26:41)?”

Are you tired, rested, or spiritually awake? How’s your passion?

© Natasha S. Robinson 2011

Geroge Herbert, "Easter Wings" (poem)

Easter Wings from The Temple (1633), by George Herbert The same poem turned about on itself forms a pair of wings  The poem is usually printed in modern anthologies as seen above. In the 1633 edition. the poem is printed as seen in the scanned copy below, making it look more like its title. For a different placement here are copies of the Williams Manuscript (also called MS. Jones B 62 in Dr. Williams Library) The Bodleian MS (also called MS Tanner) page 1 of "Easter-wings"  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Bringing Christian classic books to life http://www.ccel.org/ George Herbert, The Temple - http://www.ccel.org/h/herbert/temple/TempleFrames.html George Herbert, The Priest to the Temple - http://www.ccel.org/ccel/herbert?show=worksBy George Herbert - (1593-1633), Poet and divine George Herbert was born to a noble family in Wales; his mother was patron to John Donne who dedicated his 'Holy Sonnets' to her. He was educated at Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge, where in 1620 he was elected to the prestigious post of Public Orator. His first two sonnets were sent to his mother in 1610. On the theme that the love of God is a worthier subject for verse than the love of woman. They foreshadowed his future religious and poetic inclinations, but at first Herbert seemed bent on a secular career, much involved in court life and Member of Parliament for Montgomery in Wales from 1624-5. His only published verse during this period was in Greek and Latin, for formal occasions. In 1627, however, he resigned as Orator and was ordained a priest, becoming rector at Bemerton in Wiltshire where he was noted for his diligence and humility, traits reflected in his poetry which also expresses the conflict between the religious and worldly life. When he realized he was dying of consumption, he sent a collection of his poems in manuscript to his friend Nicholas Ferrar to judge whether to burn them or publish them. The result was The Temple, religious poems using common language and rhythms of speech, published to enormous popular acclaim and running to 13 editions by 1680. Also published after his death, in 1652, was A Priest to the Temple: Or the Country Parson, his Character and Rule of Life homely, prose advice to country clerics. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Related Criticism to Herbert's poem, "Easter Wings" http://www.ccel.org/h/herbert/temple/Easterwings.html Joseph Addison, in The Spectator, No. 58, Monday, May 7, 1711, argued against ancient Greek poems in the shape of eggs, &c. as false wit. He continued: Mr. Dryden hints at this obsolete kind of Wit [shaped poems] in one of the following Verses in his Mac Fleckno; which an English Reader cannot understand, who does not know that there are those little Poems abovementioned in the Shape of Wings and Altars. . . . Chuse for thy Command Some peaceful Province in Acrostick Land; There may'st thou Wings display, and Altars raise, And torture one poor Word a thousand Ways.  This Fashion of false Wit was revived by several Poets of the last Age, and in particular may be met with among Mr. Herbert's Poems; . . . . Professor's rebuttal (without degrading Addison's perception or gift for expression): When devices are dropped into/on to a work, they are just ornaments scattered on pseudo-art/kitsch (in this Addison rings true). When ornaments are integrated into the meaning of the work, they loose their ornamentation and become part of the meaning, working together in the poem. Herbert converted the use of popular devices and tricks of his day into his vision of the world, giving an understanding beyond the mundane. [In a similar way that God takes clay and makes something better out of it.] (JRA) Art Student's Addenda: This is the difference between Baroque and Classical Art. Baroque art is famous for its ornaments, but details support the concept of the work in Classical Art. Music Student's Coda: The history of music classes Bach as baroque, but his "ornaments" advance and echo the message of the piece and hold the entire work together. As Albert Schweitzer shows concerning the Preludes for Organ. In this way Bach was closer to the Classic Period than most give him credit. The following is quoted "as is" from a University of Texas at Austin page no longer on the Internet: Interchange 7 on George Herbert Herbert II Leslie Barnett remarks on "Easter Wings": "With thee Let me combine, And feel this day thy victories: For, if I imp my wing on thine, Affliction shall advance the flight on me." I feel that this poem is saying that you can't just "create" someone then leave them on their own to grow. They will not grow into a strong person with good qualities. A person needs nurturing, love, and support before they can take "flight" on their own. the last line says this more directly, if he puts his wing just over the other persons then their strenght will push him to be strong and begin his own flight. The reference to the Lord's creation of man is only symbolic, I feel that he is speaking indirectly about parenting and society's affect on a person. Cecile Coneway: I do not understand what the last line ("Affliction shall advance the flight on me") is saying. How does affliction fit into it? Todd Erickson: Why is the reference to the Lord's creation only symbolic?? Colleen Ignacio: Knowing Herbert, it was probably strictly about religion. Leslie Barnett: i think affliction means like friction, when the one wing moves and begins flight the other will recieve the initial push to do the same. Todd Erickson: Cecile Flight could have multiple meanings: uplifting of spirit, or running away Shannon Byrne: I felt that he was talking about man and the creation. I thought he was saying that God created man and gave man everything, yet man "foolishly" lost what he gave and became more and more corrupt. The poet is asking for God to let him sing the Lord's praises and by so doing he will fall in the sight of others and this fall will enable him to be closer to God. Todd Erickson: Shannon why does he use 'fall'??? That sounds so counterproductive , when he's wanting to fly. Alicia Lane Jones: Correct me if I am wrong,however, if we look at the title, maybe THIS poem reflects the second coming of Christ - didn't that happen on Easter - or does easter refer to something else? Kalisha James: Affliction seems to mean some sort of punishment in this passage. It advancing the flight in me refers to punishment maybe leading the speaker to do right and therefore advancing his flight to heaven. Shannon Byrne: I thought affliction meant that if he is hurt by others because he is "flying" with God his "flight " will advance or his life will be happier. Chad Dow: I think that he is asking God to forgive him for all the wrong things he has done. He is simply wanting to be ackowledge by God and asking for help and strength to change and correct his life, so that he can sing wonderful praises up to God. Jignesh Bhakta: Alicia, you are right it is a poem of the second coming of Christ Shannon Byrne: Todd: I'm not really sure except maybe he means fall from the graces of society. Maybe he's thinking that if he follows God he will be persecuted. Leslie Barnett: another part that seems to support this interpretation would be: "And still with sickness and shame Thou didst so punish sinne, That I became Most thinne." it seems to be refering to societies tedency to shy away from those that need help the most. when someone looks sickly we don't want to help and that only makes it worse. agood example would be the homeless. Xavier Alfaro: colleen ....i agree, it had to be about religion. he must be casting a sermon down. the wings will only protect you for so long. soon you must make choices. make the right one or else. what the else is, i do not know Kalisha James: Alicia, I think you're onto something. Easter is about the rising of Christ. It coould, in fact be speaking of the second rising of Christ. Shannon Byrne: Alicia, I think your right. Jignesh Bhakta: What is the deal with the shape of the poem? Alicia Lane Jones: you know when you are born you don't have any memory of God - it may take a while to find him again. Maybe this is saying that at his tender age he was foolish and not looking in the right places, but now he has found God and wants to fly Todd Erickson: wings wings Chad Dow: Jignesh, I think it is to symbolize the wings and the uplifiting flight the guy is about to go on. Leslie Barnett: i feel that in both "redemption" and this poem i failed to see the religious connections/interpretations but what shannon said about this poem and what we discussed in class do make sense. Shannon Byrne: Alicia, wha does That I became most thinne mean? Xavier Alfaro: Alicia....you are getting pretty deep. I kind of agree though Kalisha James: Jignesh, I think the shape resembles a bird, possibly a dove. A dove is used a lot in the Bible to symbolize some sort of overcoming or redemption, the title does also have the word "wings" in it. Cecile Coneway: I thought the quote "And still with sickness and shame\Thou didst so punish sinne,\That I became\Most thinne" is illustrating God's way of letting people deal with their sins and suffer their consequences regardless of their physical state. Leslie Barnett: looking at your interpretation i think maybe he became thin because sin was punished with sickness and he was sinning by not believing or following? Kalisha James: Shannon, I know you asked Alicia, but i think of "thinne" meaning a moral thinness. Obviously the speaker has done some wrongs in order to be punished. Shannon Byrne: Cecile, Is "Thinne" thin or thine Colleen Ignacio: I think in his own personal way, he's renewing his vows with God. Easter probably had something to do with it. He says: "My tender age in sorrow did beginne. . .that I became most thinne." He's remembering what part God plays in his life and wants to continue down that path. Cecile Coneway: Shannon: I think it's thin. Xavier Alfaro: i do to Cecile Coneway: It's kind of neat the way the poem's shape becomes the narrowest when it says "Most thinne". Shannon Byrne: Kalisha, If its moral thinness what do the lines before it mean Alicia Lane Jones: Do you all think thinne refers to thin or thine? Leslie Barnett: what is thine? Xavier Alfaro: thin. what's thine Jignesh Bhakta: thine? Leslie Barnett: oh, maybe most his? Kalisha James: Alicia, Are you saying that before we are born we know God, but when we are born we forget Him? Shannon Byrne: thine means that this poet is God's Cecile Coneway: Most his? Leslie Barnett: thy, thine Alicia Lane Jones: thine means yours Vocal arrangement of Easter Wings (White, Medium-high voice and piano, 430-411 For Sale.) Background: song of a true lark Optional music: Welsh folksong "Rising of the Lark" arranged by Red Dragon

Conductive Learning Center: Children with Traumatic Brain Injury, Cerebral Palsy, Spina Bifida

80-90% of CLC's Child Population has Cerebral Palsy, Spina Bifida or Traumatic Brain Injury

http://conductivelearningcenter.org/

To provide opportunities for preschool and school age children with motor challenges to achieve optimal physical, cognitive and social independence through the application and promotion of conductive education principles.

Children and families can be taught problem solving skills that will allow them to develop unconventional ways of accomplishing motor tasks that families never thought their child would do. A child can gain control of their movement, increase strength resulting in an increased level of independence. Because Conductive Education promotes development of the whole person, including physical, social, cognitively and psychological aspects, this intervention is not viewed as a traditional therapy but rather a multi disciplinary approach to improving the quality of life for children and their families.

    

http://conductivelearningcenter.org/

Chuck and Sue Saur give new meaning to parental involvement in education. With an unwavering commitment to their son, Dan, who has cerebral palsy, the Grand Rapids couple made conductive education a reality for Michigan children with motor impairments by working to establish what is now known as the Conductive Learning Center (CLC).

Conductive education is a Hungarian-based educational program for children with motor disorders like cerebral palsy and spina bifida. In 1995, an announcement about a conductive education camp in Ontario, Canada, dramatically altered the direction of the Saurs’ lives. They returned from the camp with a renewed vision of increased physical independence for Dan, who uses a wheelchair.

The Saurs’ vision fueled a grassroots effort in the late 90′s to bring conductive education to West Michigan and earned the support of Aquinas College, a private, liberal arts college in Grand Rapids. Aquinas is the only institution in the United States that offers a POHI methodology teacher training program utilizing the conductive education method. The Conductive Learning Center was established as the labschool for these prospective teachers to do their practical training.

Chuck Saur attributed a recent accomplishment by his son to conductive education. Saur admits he was caught off guard when Dan spoke his first clear words asking, “Where’s mom?” “I stopped what I was doing to have a conversation with Dan,” he says. “It was the beginning of a whole new father-son relationship that changed the way I looked at him.”

In 1995, the Saurs took a second mortgage to finance an intensive six-month program for Dan in Budapest. Sue Saur traveled with both of her sons to Hungary, where she couldn’t speak the language. She recalls carrying her lanky, fifty-five pound son up and down the stairs when the elevator didn’t work.

With Dan immersed in conductive education in Budapest, Chuck Saur knocked on doors in West Michigan garnering support for a pilot program. The dean of education at Aquinas College, was willing to listen. In 1997, the Saurs joined forces with other parents of motor-impaired children to create the first summer program in conductive education in Michigan.

The Saurs worked even harder once they won the support of powerful friends. Keith Konarska, former director of special education for Kent Intermediate School District (KISD), and Kathy Barker, former director of special education for Grand Rapids Public Schools and the new director of the Aquinas -Peto School (CLC) for Conductive Education, became involved. The additional support of the past president of Aquinas, Dr. Harry Knopke, President of Aquinas College, further solidified Aquinas’s commitment to creating an international center for conductive education. Today, under the joint direction of Aquinas College and the Peto Institute in Budapest, the Saurs’ dream has a respected educational backing and a solid research component. The Conductive Learning Center (CLC) has served hundreds of children with motor impairments since it’s inception back in 1997.

He remembers the exact moment Dan first cast his own fishing rod into the lake, a task Chuck Saur had always performed for his son. Today Dan can write his own name and take steps with support. He can sit up in bed and rub the sleep from his eyes with his once rigid hands. He verbally joins in his bedtime prayer.

“It’s hard to explain the magnitude of what conductive education has meant to our family,” Chuck Saur explained. “We’ve gone from thinking about what we can do for Dan to celebrating what he can do for himself, and that difference is huge.”

This article first ran in the November 1999 issue of C.E.N. Newsline and was written by Judy Winter, author of Breakthrough Parenting for Children with Special Needs.

Fifth Third River Bank Run Charity Partner

Conductive Learning Center

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kG1v16-FpZM

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FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions

http://conductivelearningcenter.org/

Do I have to stay with my child in the classroom?

Parents are provided an environment to learn with their child in the Parent & Child program, which is for the youngest children. Overall the decision to have parents in the classroom, made by the conductor team includes several factors, such as the age of the child and the child’s/family’s needs.

What can I expect my child to achieve in the program?

The program works with the whole child; that is, the child’s developmental needs are addressed from a cognitive, psychological, emotional and physical perspective. After the child is assessed by a conductor, parents, the child and the conductor decide on specific goals for the child. Each child’s route and timeline toward maximum independence depends on many factors, including the support of the family, the child’s motivation, the type and severity of the disability and the age of the child. At the end of the session extensive reports are produced detailing methods and strategies used with the child. Each activity is described and photo documented. These reports are sent home for use with all care givers involved with the child. This helps insure continuity and continuation of CE principles even after the child is discharged from the program.

Why does the program use a group setting?

Conductive education uses the dynamics of group interaction. This setting provides the opportunity for children to motivate and learn from each other, while in an age appropriate setting that allows social interaction.

Do I have to continue with the exercises while at home?

Parents should encourage the child to use the movements learned in class that improve the everyday functioning of the child. An example of these life skills would be for parents to give the child the opportunity to use silverware when eating, instead of a parent feeding the child.

What type of disability does this program best help?

Conductive education works best with about 80-90% of the child population that has cerebral palsy, spina bifida or traumatic brain injury.

What keeps children motivated for 3 to 6 hours a day?

The program is planned daily with age appropriate academic themes and motivation techniques of repetition, music, singing, and game-like activities in a group setting. A child’s educational environment includes daily living skills of eating, toileting, putting on shoes and socks, etc. Children respond positively to these activities.

What specialized training do the conductors have? Are they therapists?

Conductors have been trained at Aquinas College in a POHI teacher program or at the International Peto Institute in Budapest, Hungary. These teachers all have elementary education and special education credentials, which are recognized in the U.S. While the conductors are not credentialed therapists, the training received at Aquinas and the Peto Institute parallels many parts of what physical, occupational and speech therapists receive.

Are there parents available who can give specifics about their child?

Yes. Please go to the “Success Stories” area of the web site. This section provides a series of letters from parents speaking about their child and the program.

Is the program available in other states?

Yes, there are other programs in the U.S., but the Conductive Learning Center has the only program directed and supervised by the International Peto Institute.

Are any doctors supporting this program?

Yes, there are doctors in the U.S., who have provided written support for conductive education. Locally, the Conductive Learning Center collaborates with Mary Free Bed Hospital in providing services to children enrolled at Conductive Learning Center.

If I don’t live near Grand Rapids, can I still participate in the program?

Yes, many of our out-state and out-of-state parents stay at the local Ronald McDonald House or area hotels, offering discounted rates, while their child attends a scheduled intensive session of four to eight weeks in length.

The Conductive Learning Center
of Grand Rapids, 2009

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9iIlQz0Upg

America's New Evangelicals

What's New Is Old: 'America's New Evangelicals'

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2011/october/review-americas-new-evangelicals.html

Today's politically liberal evangelicals may not be as different as some imagine.

Review by Matthew Lee Anderson | posted 10/14/2011 09:07AM

book link

The 2008 election of Barack Obama reinvigorated an ongoing discussion within evangelicalism about the nature of its relationship to the political order. It is a discussion that will almost certainly receive a new infusion of energy during the 2012 election cycle. But analyses of evangelical captivity to politics and purported generational shifts in ideology have come close to reaching a saturation point, bringing evangelical introspection to the edge of exhaustion. Of the writing about evangelicals and politics, there is apparently no end.

Marcia Pally's America's New Evangelicals: Expanding the Vision of the Common Good (Eerdmans) is one of the latest attempts to understand the direction of evangelicalism's political priorities. For Pally, the emergence of the "new evangelicals"—figures like Tony Campolo, Shane Claiborne, and David Gushee—reveals important shifts, in both substantive beliefs and habits of engagement. She sees this movement as "new" because its members embrace "beliefs and practices that have advanced religion, liberal democracy, and just economic distribution." She contrasts the new with the "old evangelicals" (though Pally does not call them that), whose political engagement she believes has been sullied by allegedly "prototheocratic yearnings" and an attachment to free-market capitalism. The new evangelicals, she argues, allow religious convictions to shape their political vision, but nevertheless "support pluralism, economic justice, and liberal democratic government." Whether the new evangelicals are championing ideals wholly different from their forebears, or simply imbuing them with different meanings, is not always clear. Pally's presumption, for instance, that "economic justice" is antithetical to free-market economics is astonishing, given the enormous debate over the question.

While Pally presents the "new evangelicals" as an antidote to perceived evangelical vices, her narrative is occasionally given to overstatement.

Take, for instance, those supposedly "prototheocratic yearnings." True, Pally's stance later softens into suggesting that evangelicals have "at times" attempted to "use the state to impose religious views on the nation." But even this skirts the boundaries of hyperbole. Unless Pally thinks that evangelical opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage are exclusively theological in nature—a highly debatable contention—she is left only with school prayer as an example of such attempts. Evangelical activism may have sectarian underpinnings, but evangelicals have shown a remarkable willingness to abide by the rules of liberal democracy in working—through legislatures, courts, and grassroots initiatives—to "impose" their views.

Not So New

Pally makes no attempt at any statistical survey, instead approaching her subject through blogs, newsletters, sermons, and other expressions of the "new evangelicalism." Transcripts of interviews with prominent figures like Richard Cizik and Joel Hunter punctuate her commentary, lending the reader a firsthand familiarity that is both interesting and illuminating.

Yet whether the new evangelicals are really new depends upon our understanding of what came before them. And unfortunately, Pally's understanding makes it difficult to discern what's actually new about the movement. For instance, she argues that the new evangelicals practice a "third way" of political engagement, avoiding the twin traps of theocratic ambition and privatized piety. They do this through "voluntarist associations" that "advocate for their positions through public education, lobbying, coalition building, and negotiation."

This "civil society activism" is a commendable approach, but couldn't Pally apply the same description to the Religious Right? Historically, this movement was propelled by a cluster of voluntary parachurch organizations—many of them avowedly non-sectarian in their approach—that worked to influence society by means of lobbying and public persuasion. Moreover, and somewhat ironically, traditional approaches to limited government have often been justified precisely because they leave room for the mediating institutions of civil society, rather than relying upon the coercive powers of the state. Because Pally conflates conservatism with what amounts to libertarian economics, she overlooks the possibility of a mutually reinforcing relationship between "civil society activism" and limited government principles.

What's more, Pally passes over any discussion of "compassionate conservatism," the more activist school of thought espoused by George W. Bush and cheered on by many fellow evangelicals. (Conservative commentator Fred Barnes famously re-labeled it "big government conservatism.") The advent of compassionate conservatism suggests that evangelicals, in their association with the Republican Party, have not, for good or ill, hewed inflexibly to a libertarian orthodoxy. Widespread evangelical support for the 2008 campaign of Mike Huckabee, who was (perhaps unfairly) spurned by mainstream Republicans for being too comfortable with government involvement, confirms this point.

Evangelical activism may have sectarian underpinnings, but evangelicals have shown a remarkable willingness to abide by the rules of liberal democracy.

Closer to the heart of the book, though, is Pally's suggestion that the new evangelicals are distinguished by their endorsement of "church-state separation and constitutionally based law." Here again Pally's lack of substantive argument about the "old evangelicals" makes it hard to discern where the differences actually lie. With respect to "church-state separation," Jon A. Shields demonstrates in The Democratic Virtues of the Christian Right (2009) the great pains to which evangelicals have gone to present their views on abortion in non-sectarian terms. And as for endorsing the principle of "constitutionally based law," this does not preclude working, through constitutionally legitimate channels, to reform or undo laws deemed unjust. In this regard, evangelicals' abortion and same-sex marriage, both in the courtroom and at the ballot box, seem to exemplify the highest respect for constitutionally based law.

Keeping Vigilant

Pally's chapter on the new evangelicals' underlying beliefs departs noticeably from her generally dispassionate, scholarly approach. She quotes virtually no new evangelical activists or theologians, and instead develops Anabaptist theologian John Howard Yoder's concept of "revolutionary subordination," analyzing how Scripture understands Jesus as a political actor. It is an odd moment of normative political theology in the middle of a book that presents itself as examining the beliefs of others.

Strangeness aside, the chapter is excellent and very well balanced. Pally suggests that Christian political engagement should obey "positive law in all but extreme circumstances, defend its country under the extreme condition of invasion, and [spend] most of its time serving those within the church, the stranger, and the enemy." This is wise counsel, so far as it goes, but ought we simply to infer that new evangelicals would endorse Pally's principles?

The answer isn't clear. On the one hand, in presenting their underlying beliefs, Pally comes close to describing a consistent, unified framework out of which policy decisions might be made. But in presenting this belief system in her own voice, she leaves it unclear whether the new evangelicals understand and abide by their own framework. After all, Pally repeatedly underscores the issue-by-issue approach that often characterizes young evangelical politics. It can be difficult to discern whether new evangelical activism arises from a unified moral philosophy, or whether its piecemeal approach reflects a more pragmatic spirit.

Pally makes clear, though, why evangelicals will and must continue reflecting on their relationship with state authority. In a liberal society, marked by a crowded and contentious public square, an impulse toward introspection helps preserve a proper ordering of religious faith and political power. The new evangelicals certainly understand that such vigilance is a price worth paying for liberty. But so too, I suspect, do their counterparts of "old."

Matthew Lee Anderson is the author of Earthen Vessels: Why Our Bodies Matter to Our Faith (Bethany House). He blogs at MereOrtho doxy.com.

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