President Trump lashes out at the U.S. Postal Service. His attacks could threaten voting by mail; We look at the impact of the coronavirus on schools, universities, students, parents and teachers, and who is at the table to shape what happens next.

French economist Thomas Piketty on how the economic crisis triggered by the pandemic may be a catalyst to address global inequality; longtime WHO adviser Lawrence Gostin on Trump's order barring states from closing meatpacking plants with virus outbreaks.

Workers call for a general strike on May Day; Joe Biden denies Tara Reade's sexual assault allegations. We speak with her neighbor from the 1990s who says Reade told her the story decades ago; Protesters demand more COVID-19 relief & tests in Puerto Rico.

As meat plant workers get sick and die from COVID-19, workers protest conditions, and LULAC calls for Meatless May Mondays; McConnell seeks to protect corporations from liability; Dr. Richard Levitan says patients unknowingly suffer oxygen deprivation.

As the Navajo Nation suffers the third most COVID-19 cases, we talk to the partner of a 28-year-old victim and doctors treating patients; 80 percent of prisoners at Marion prison test positive; Prof. Ruth Wilson Gilmore on the case for prison abolition.

As President Trump starts to reopen the country, Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer Laurie Garrett predicts the pandemic will last at least 36 months; Did a former Green Beret mastermind a failed coup attempt in Venezuela? Two Americans were arrested.

We get an update from Moscow on the pandemic in Russia, which has the second-highest infection rate in the world; We look at who gets access to drugs like remdesivir being developed by pharmaceutical giant Gilead, which is poised to make massive profits.

Two white men are charged with the murder of Ahmaud Arbery, more than two months after his killing; The pandemic hits African Americans hardest. We speak with NYT Magazine's Linda Villarosa; Dr. Leana Wen on what the U.S. faces as states begin to reopen.

CBC Ottawa's latest roundup of key points during the coronavirus pandemic.

While traveling in Israel in 1948, Leonard Bernstein wrote a letter to his mother with beautiful illustrations by artist Jossi Stern. In anticipation of Mother's Day weekend, "In the Muse" highlights that digitized letter from the Leonard Bernstein Collection and encourages readers to send illustrated letters of their own.

Toronto Raptors guard Fred VanVleet was enjoying the best season of his career, and was set to strike it rich with a lucrative new deal this summer before the coronavirus brought the NBA and global sports to its knees in mid-March.

Distant notes |India Today Insight  India Today

Bengaluru's all-woman music collective Metronome to release a track for Mother's Day  Times of India

Happy birthday Vijay Deverakonda: Tollywood's 'Dear Comrade' who auctioned his first Filmfare Award for charity  The New Indian Express

Hobbies during quarantine: How they can help us in a pandemic  Today.com

How Do American Indians Celebrate Mother's Day? | Smithsonian Voices | National Museum of the American Indian  Smithsonian.com

Taking mom out for Mother's Day brunch is a tradition for many. But with people staying home and restaurants closed except for delivery or pick-up, this year's Mother's Day will be a little bit different. Food columnist Andrew Coppolino looks at options.

As part of the province's approach to curbing the COVID-19 pandemic, there are a number of rules in place that people have to follow. Kitchener and Waterloo bylaw officials offer some insight on what's allowed and what's not.

The San Francisco 49ers acquired one Pro Bowl left tackle and said goodbye to another as they traded for LT Trent Williams.

Florist Sam Solis said in 21 years of business, he’s never seen a busier Mother’s Day. He and other florists and bakers are working double time to help fete the mothers of British Columbia.

A Saskatchewan woman's helping hand — or window scraper — has gone viral this week, with a video showing her assist a beleaguered porcupine garnering more than 1.2 million views on Facebook.

UFC 249 will proceed as planned Saturday night despite Ronaldo "Jacare" Souza being ruled out Friday following a positive test for the coronavirus. He was scheduled to oppose Uriah Hall in Jacksonville, Fla.

Poor visibility from winter-like weather has put a halt on the Snowbirds aerobatics team's plans to fly over southern Ontario on Saturday.

Here's a look at what's happening in our area on Thursday, May 7.

If you think it's cold this morning, just wait — the forecast low for Friday night is –3 C.

Here's a look at what's happening in our area on Friday, May 8.

Britons stood in silence and Queen Elizabeth addressed the nation on Friday's 75th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day, though the coronavirus dampened commemorations for the end of the Second World War on the continent.

Russia marked 75 years since the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in the Second World War on Saturday, but the coronavirus outbreak forced it to scale back celebrations seen as boosting support for President Vladimir Putin.

As British Columbians maintain physical distancing recommendations during the COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s Easter celebrations will have to change. In Kamloops, B.C., organizations are working to make sure Easter is as fun and social as it can be. 

With the effects of the pandemic playing out differently across the province, it's unlikely that all areas will reopen on the same timeline.

An inmate at the Calgary Remand Centre has tested positive for COVID-19, marking the first time a case has been reported at an Alberta correctional facility.

Flattening the curve has been so successful and two areas around Hamilton — Brant and Haldimand-Norfolk — haven't had a new case of COVID-19 in three days, and Burlington has only had two.

The COVID-19 pandemic may be keeping families physically distant, but that doesn't mean you can't show someone you care.

Flurries or rain showers are in the forecast for Hamilton on Friday, Environment Canada says.

Hamilton Conservation Authority is re-opening the Hamilton-to-Branford Rail Trail, while the city announced the reopening of the Hamilton Waterfront Trail, between Confederation Park and the Burlington Lift Bridge.

The post Rookie Tales from Formula SAE: Day 4 appeared first on SOLIDWORKS Education Blog.

The post 3DEXPERIENCE World – Building tomorrow today with our Education Community appeared first on SOLIDWORKS Education Blog.

Bank of Italy Working Papers by Concetta Rondinelli and Roberta Zizza

In what are the lowest prices we've seen on Mid 2019 15-inch MacBook Pros, Amazon-owned Woot has refurbished units discounted to as low as $1,579.99, with savings of up to $950 off. These units are refurbished by Apple, but come with a 1-year Woot warranty.

Apple frequently places movies on sale, and this week is no exception. Here's the latest batch of movies that you can get on the cheap for this Mother's Day weekend.

The fatherhood documentary "Dads" featuring actor Bryce Dallas Howard will be airing on Apple TV+ ahead of Father's Day, with the film set to be available to stream from the service from June 19.

Mother's Day may be tomorrow, but you can still grab a great deal on Apple hardware with prices starting at just $95. Take advantage of the return of the popular $100 discount on Apple Watch Series 5 styles, plus a new $375 markdown on 16-inch MacBook Pros and flash deals on iPod touch models.

Denver Newsroom, May 7, 2020 / 03:48 pm (CNA).- For the first time in over a century, the annual May 13 celebrations at the Fatima shrine will take place without the physical presence of pilgrims, the bishop of Fatima confirmed this week.

Cardinal Antonio Marto said in a May 3 statement that the celebrations for the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima “will take place as was announced April 6, without the physical presence of pilgrims, in the name of prudence to avoid the risk of spreading the novel coronavirus.”

“As planned in conjunction with the civil authorities, the May 12 and 13 celebrations for this year cannot have the physical presence of the pilgrims and will be transmitted by broadcast and digital media,” he continued.

The cardinal explained that hosting “an unpredictable multitude of people” gathering at a time when the coronavirus pandemic is still a serious threat would go against the efforts of health authorities to gradually lift restrictions imposed to slow the spread of the virus.

“We therefore respect, in an attitude of collaboration with the competent civil authorities, the guidelines for these celebrations to be held with a symbolic presence of participants,” Marto said.

The clarification over the Fatima feast day came as the Portuguese government gradually begins to ease restrictions that had been put in place in response to the pandemic, prompting speculation over whether the May 13 celebrations would be able to take place as normal. The annual event typically draws hundreds of thousands from around the world to the shrine.

The Portuguese Bishops’ Conference had announced earlier this month that public Masses could tentatively resume the weekend of Pentecost, May 30-31, in accordance with guidelines to be established by the country’s health department and the Catholic Church.

Cardinal Marto stressed that the decision to suspend public religious celebrations was based in a sense of responsibility toward the public health, as a way of loving one’s neighbor.

“[A]s much as our hearts would like to be in Fatima celebrating together in the same place, as has been the case since 1917, prudence counsels us not to do so this time,” he said, adding that Catholics can look forward to an end to the pandemic and an opportunity to gather together joyfully in the future.

Fr. Carlos Cabecinhas, rector of the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima, encouraged pilgrims who are unable to physically attend the events to make an interior pilgrimage, participating in the events of the Solemnity of Our Lady of Fatima through the internet or social media.

“This is a painful time: the shrine exists to welcome the pilgrims and we cannot do so, this is a cause for great sadness; but this decision is also an act of responsibility toward the pilgrims, protecting their health and welfare,” the priest said.

The shrine’s website offers four steps to guide people on this interior pilgrimage.

According to the website, “the celebrations of May 12 and 13 will maintain the usual schedule with recitation of the Rosary at 9:30 p.m. followed by the Candlelight Procession. On the 13th the Rosary will be prayed at 9:00 a.m. followed by the International Mass and the Farewell Procession.”

In March, 24 countries were consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima.

At that ceremony, Cardinal Marto recalled that Saints Francisco and Jacinto Marto, shepherd children to whom an angel, and then the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared in 1916 and 1917 at Fatima, both died amid the victims of the Spanish flu pandemic.

To date, Johns Hopkins University has reported 26,182 cases of novel coronavirus in Portugal, with 1089 deaths.

 

Washington D.C., May 7, 2020 / 04:30 pm (CNA).- The White House service for the National Day of Prayer on Thursday focused on protection from the coronavirus pandemic. President Trump said Americans will continue to pray for divine assistance as the nation faces “unforeseen and seemingly unbearable hardships.”

Sister Eneyda Martinez of the Poor Sisters of St. Joseph community in Alexandria, Virginia was one of the religious leaders present to lead attendees in prayer.

“Merciful Savior, heal and comfort the sick so that with health restored, they may give you praise. Divine Physician, accompany our caregivers, so that serving you with patience they may heal wisely. And through wisdom, guide our leaders, so that through seeking remedies they may follow your light,” Sister Eneyda Martinez prayed at the service in the White House’s Rose Garden.

The National Day of Prayer was designated by Congress in 1952, and scheduled in 1988 to be observed annually on the first Thursday in the month of May.

In attendance at the White House service were President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump, as well as Vice President Mike Pence and Second Lady Karen Pence, and Paula White, and other religious leaders from Catholic, Christian, and Mormon churches, and Jewish and Hindu faiths.

The prayer service emphasized prayer for protection from the coronavirus pandemic, as well as prayer for the sick and their families, and health care workers.

“Christ, the Anointed, protect us in body and in spirit, so that free from harm we may be delivered from all affliction,” prayed Sister Eneyda Martinez.

Vice President Pence urged Americans to be “persistent in prayer,” especially for the families of the dead, those sick with the virus, and health care workers, many who have “literally taken the place of loved ones” in being the only close contacts of COVID-19 patients.

On Thursday morning, Trump issued a proclamation, noting the importance of prayer during the pandemic.

“During the past weeks and months, our heads have bowed at places outside of our typical houses of worship, whispering in silent solitude for God to renew our spirit and carry us through unforeseen and seemingly unbearable hardships,” Trump stated.

“Even though we have been unable to gather together in fellowship with our church families, we are still connected through prayer and the calming reassurance that God will lead us through life's many valleys.”

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control was reportedly drafting guidance for states to reopen public accommodations and religious services, but according to the Associated Press on Thursday, the document was buried by the administration.

That document reportedly advised against churches holding services if they were not in a “community no longer requiring significant mitigation.”

However, if that and other certain conditions were in place, churches should take precautions such as ensuring social distancing, wearing of masks by congregants, and intensifying cleaning of churches, the CDC document reportedly said.

State orders have varied in their restrictions on public gatherings during the pandemic; a Kansas stay-at-home order allowed religious gatherings of 10 or fewer people, while Illinois prohibited all religious gatherings.

After every U.S. diocese stopped public Masses during March, Catholic dioceses have started offering public Masses, beginning with the diocese of Las Cruces, New Mexico, with several other dioceses following suit in ensuing days.

Officials from the CDC and the White House spoke with four of the bishops on April 28 and 29 about the resumption of public religious services.

Denver Newsroom, May 8, 2020 / 05:29 pm (CNA).- Mother’s Day is going to look different for most families this year, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

For Catholics, some churches are in the process of slowly re-opening public Masses, but the dispensation from the Sunday obligation continues to stand, as the virus has not gone away and a cure or vaccine has yet to be found.

While most Catholics are eager to return to Mass, a small group of Catholics are relieved that they will not be sitting in a public pew this Mother’s Day.

“We actually heard from one woman who said, ‘I kind of feel badly about saying this, but I'm sort of glad that we won't be in the pews this year for Mother's Day,’” Ann Koshute, founder of Springs in the Desert Catholic ministry, told CNA.


“That's something that we hear and that everybody I think on the team has experienced at one point in this journey,” she said - the desire to avoid Mass on Mother’s Day. That’s because Koshute, along with other members of her ministry, have had painful experiences with infertility, and the customary Mother’s Day blessing given to mothers at many parishes that day can bring their grief and sense of loss poignantly to the fore.


“I think that so often people in our own families, our friends, and even our pastors don't really understand the full extent of the pain and the grief or even the full extent of the issue of infertility, of how many couples are really dealing with it,” she said.


The pain of infertility, and the lack of resources available to Catholics on the subject, was why Koshute and her friend, Kimberly Henkel, founded Springs in the Desert, a Catholic ministry to spiritually and emotionally support women and couples experiencing infertility and infant loss. Originally, Henkel and Koshute, who have both experienced infertility, thought they might write a book. But they decided to start with a ministry website and a blog that could bring people together and allow for other women and couples to share their experiences. The group is relatively new, and held its first retreat in Philadelphia in December. They were set to hold a second one this weekend - Mother’s Day weekend - in the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, when, well, the pandemic hit.

Now, they’ve moved the retreat online and opened it up to Catholics across the country - and they’ve been overwhelmed by the response.

“We thought that we would be really excited if maybe a couple dozen people found out about it and came. We are over 100 participants now. And it's free and it's going to be available all weekend,” Koshute said. The retreat is trying to address the emotional and spiritual experience of infertility and loss for a broad range of people, Henkel said - from mothers who have miscarried, to women who are past child-bearing years and still grieving the loss of infertility, to women “who feel like their biological clocks are ticking and just haven’t met the right guy.” But now that it's a virtual, pre-recorded, watch-at-your-leisure retreat, it also has the potential to reach a population that is often more reluctant to gather in groups and talk about their experiences of infertility: men. “It's mostly women who are emailing us (about the retreat), although we know that many of their husbands will watch with them. But we've also had a few men email us,” Koshute said.


“One in particular, it just really touched my heart. And he said that he was searching the web for help for his wife on Mother's Day. And I was just so filled with praise and thanksgiving to God for that, for a husband to see that hurt in his wife and to want to find a way to help her,” she added. Men and women typically experience the grief of infertility quite differently, Koshute noted. “For us women, it's so visceral because life is conceived within us and we carry that life. But for a man, it's so different,” she said.

“(Men are) kind of distant from that experience until the child is actually born. And so I think many times men, the grief and the burden that they carry is their wife's. They really carry her sadness and I think feel at a loss because they want to make everything right. They want to fix this, and they want to make her whole. And the mystery of infertility is that it's not that simple. And that's one of the things that makes it so difficult,” she said. Henkel said she experienced her own difficulties in trying to discuss infertility with her husband. Now that they’ve experienced the joy of growing their family through adoption, she said, he is much more open to inviting other men to share their experiences. Henkel said she is hoping that an additional benefit of this retreat being online is that it will facilitate discussions between couples watching the videos together. Both Henkel and Koshute said that while the experience of infertility and loss is painful, and they want to help couples acknowledge and accept that pain, they also want Springs in the Desert to be a positive and supportive experience for couples and women, where they can find hope and redemption even in their suffering. One of the topics they focus on is how all women are called to motherhood in their lives, whether it is spiritual or biological.

“My experience has shown me that my motherhood is really engaged in so many ways that I never considered before,” Koshute said.

“Not just with my godson or with other children in my family, but with women who are older than I who are friends and who might come to me with a difficulty or problem and I can help them,” or by helping family members in need or through charitable works, she added. “That's one of the messages that we try to get across to women and to couples as well, that those kinds of things, what we would maybe refer to as spiritual motherhood, is not illegitimate,” she said.

“It's not second-place. It's a real way of engaging and living out our motherhood. It's also not a replacement for a baby. So it's not as if you go out and volunteer in your community and now you won't have this longing for a child anymore. But we've really found through our own experience and through talking with other women that the more we kind of put ourselves out there and give ourselves to others, the more that we can begin to see that motherhood enacted in us.”

Henkel said she also likes to encourage couples to look at the ways God is calling them to be fruitful in their marriages outside of biological children.

“We really encourage these couples that they are not forgotten, they're not being punished. That God loves them so much and that he has something amazing for them. He's using this to draw them near to him and to allow them to cry out to him and ask for him to guide them, to lead them, to give them his love and show them what fruitfulness he has for them, what place in ministry and mission he has for them.” Henkel and her husband in particular like to share with couples their experience of foster care as one example of where God might be calling them to be fruitful. After a frustrating and expensive experience with some adoption agencies, Henkel and her husband decided to look into giving a home to children through foster care.

“Here is a situation where these children really need families,” she said. “It's hard because there's no guarantee you're going to get to keep this child, so there's a sense of this new greater level of having to learn how to trust God.” “I think that with a couple discerning that fruitfulness, it's also discerning - where is God really calling you? There's so much need in this world. And he wants to use us.”

Couples interested in the Springs in the Desert Mother’s Day weekend retreat can sign up for free online at the Springs in the Desert website. Content will be uploaded and available for anyone who registers, Henkel said, even if they register late. The retreat team will also be hosting a live talk on Sunday, May 10 at 2 p.m. Eastern on the ministry’s Facebook page.

“There's a place for you in Springs of the Desert,” Henkel added. “There's so many women who have reached out to us in Philly. We added several more women to our group, to our team, our official team, women who came to the retreat. One woman had come there and she said she had had a miscarriage, and neither one of us has experienced that. So we said, please join us. We want your voice.”

“We're trying to really bring the voices of many different women to our team so that people will feel there is somebody that is talking they can really relate to. Because there are all of these different situations, but they've got obviously a very similar undercurrent.”

OM short-term workers visit a Muslim family and enjoy food and conversation, which they hope will help lead the family to the truth.

The Africa Trek ladies connect with local ladies in a village, who want to know more about Christ after watching the Jesus film.

"[The village] didn’t know about the cyclone." OM worker Macdonald tells how his village experienced Cyclone Idai.

A group of 16 people from a church in USA sees lives changed during their short-term outreach in Kiel, Germany.