The coronavirus pandemic has forced major professional sports leagues across North America to push the pause button. But even if the NHL, CFL, NBA or MLS are given the green light, many fans have reservations about returning to arenas until a vaccine for the virus is available.

While players are stuck in self isolation, they don’t need to worry about trying to stop Alexander Ovechkin’s “knuckleball” type shot.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford says the Toronto Maple Leafs' parent company has been in contact with the province about the possibility of Canada's biggest city serving as a so-called "hockey pod" for teams should the NHL resume its season.

Team Homan, Canada’s 2018 Olympic women’s curling team and the 2017 World Women’s Curling Champions have announced that the team has parted ways with lead Lisa Weagle. 

Team Homan's decision to part ways with Lisa Weagle dramatically changed the look of one of the country's top rinks and put the all-star lead at the top of curling's free agent list.

In the span of a few days, Canada's curling landscape has shifted dramatically. The country's past women's and men's Olympic teams and last year's women's world champion team have all split.

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.

A Toronto law firm has filed to launch a class action lawsuit against a Niagara Falls long-term care home where 18 residents have died from COVID-19, saying the home had a pub night in the midst of the pandemic.

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.

Normal life is slowly resuming as the city of Hamilton begins to relax tight measures set in place because of COVID-19. Mayor Fred Eisenberger said now it's up to the public to help the city move in the right direction by continuing to stay two metres apart from each other and be cautious.

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.

One of the main mechanisms of azole resistance of Aspergillus fumigatus is thought to be a reduction in the drug’s affinity for the target molecule, Cyp51A, due to its amino acid mutation(s). It is known that the azole resistance pattern is closely related to the mutation site(s) of the molecule. In this study, we tried to develop a simple and rapid detection method for cyp51A mutations using the endonuclease Surveyor nuclease. The Surveyor nuclease assay was verified using several azole-resistant strains of A. fumigatus that possess point mutations in Cyp51A. For validation of the Surveyor nuclease assay, blind tests were conducted using 48 strains of A. fumigatus (17 azole-resistant and 31 azole-susceptible strains). The Surveyor nuclease assay could rapidly detect cyp51A mutations with one primer set. Also, all the tested strains harboring different cyp51A single point mutations could be clearly distinguished from the wild type. The Surveyor nuclease assay is a simple method that can detect cyp51A mutations rapidly.

See volume, open interest, and other trading highlights for Fertilizer swaps and futures markets offered by CME Group.

Bank of Italy Working Papers by Concetta Rondinelli and Roberta Zizza

With partisan goggles, we plunge back into the muck.

Staying active and maintaining physical fitness has many benefits to all elements of wellness, including mental and emotional well-being that may be taxed during social distancing. At Penn State Mont Alto, the athletic department has been releasing weekly at-home workout and challenge videos that are accessible on our Facebook and Instagram pages to keep our student-athletes engaged.

Authoritarian rule may be just around the corner.

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues around the world, countries are extending periods of national lockdown and increasing the need for people to stay home. AppleInsider has compiled a list of free resources, apps, tools, and services that are still available to use while social distancing.

Instead of a theater release in May, or a digital rental period, Warner Brothers will release their new movie 'Scoob!' on iTunes for a $25 one-time purchase.

Repair site iFixit has shared x-ray photographs of the new Magic Keyboard for iPad Pro, and they reveal an accessory more complicated than it might appear from the outside.

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 is to reopen at least three of its stores in Germany on May 11, in line with the country's newly-announced measure for allowing shops to open with extra hygiene measures.

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.

Apple's next release in the AirPods family could be its long-rumored over-ear headphones, a leaker claims, with the larger personal audio accessory tipped to have the name "AirPods Studio."

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.

Apple is preparing to reopen all four of its Apple Stores in Switzerland on May 12, as part of the iPhone maker's bid to slowly return its retail efforts back to normal around the world.

No public playground exists in Bar, Montenegro. This year, OM Montenegro plans to build one with the help of an outreach team.

Four volunteers from Switzerland. One empty park. Ten days to build a playground. Could it be done?

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 7, 2020 / 10:48 am (CNA).- A Catholic nurse said the coronavirus pandemic has presented challenges she has never encountered before—and that a prayer life is critical to get her through her shift.

“If I don’t have my faith in me, I cannot give what I don’t have,” said Maria Arvonio, a registered nurse for almost 40 years and a board member of the National Association of Catholic Nurses. 

As the current night shift supervisor at Virtua Willingboro Medical Center in southern New Jersey—a COVID-19 “hot spot,” she says—Arvonio told CNA she and her colleagues were facing a new kind of disease.

Over the decades she has had experience treating previous diseases including the AIDS epidemic, before which nurses didn’t wear gloves. “I’m still standing—that is God,” she said.

Yet the new coronavirus pandemic is something unprecedented, she admitted. “It’s different in that it appears that no matter what we’re doing, it seems to just multiply,” she said.

As she treats COVID-19 patients, Arvonio told CNA that she leans on her prayer life to lead the team of nurses at the hospital.

“I cannot help those other nurses stand strong, if they look at me and I look afraid. Why would they want us to continue to work? I cannot show fear,” she said.

“I start my job with prayer. Before I even go into the workplace, I’ve already been either doing the rosary with someone, praying ‘Jesus, come and seal me in your most Precious Blood, Blessed Mother help me,’” Arvonio said.

Arvonio was one of several nurses to appear at the White House on Wednesday for National Nurses Day, and told President Trump of her experience treating patients in a COVID-19 “hot zone.” New Jersey has been one of the hardest-hit states by the virus, with nearly 132,000 confirmed cases and more than 8,500 deaths.

Treating the person, and not just the sickness, is part of the mission of nurses, she said at the event. “It’s not just our science, it’s our compassion.”

In an interview with CNA after her White House appearance, Arvonio said she pressed an official close to the President on the need for the administration to push for more access to COVID patients by hospital chaplains.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control has reportedly been working on guidelines for restarting religious services as states begin to loosen stay-at-home restrictions. CNA reported that on April 28 and 29, officials from the White House domestic policy council and the CDC had discussed the matter with four Catholic bishops who are resuming public Masses.

New Jersey, Arvonio said, has allowed golf courses and liquor stores to be open, but Catholics do not have public Mass. “That’s a problem,” she said.

The spiritual needs of the COVID-19 patients are just as real as their physical needs, she said. As a board member of the National Association of Catholic Nurses, U.S.A., Arvonio says that organization’s mission is critical now more than ever, to emphasize caring for the spiritual needs of patients. 

In the case of one patient who was heading to hospice, a priest could only talk to her remotely, on Zoom.

“She was in tears, an elderly woman worried to leave on hospice because her priest wasn’t there to give her the last rites. This is wrong! This is our right as a Catholic!” Arvonio said.

For some hospitals, chaplains cannot administer the sacramental anointing because of a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) available for them. Yet, Arvonio said, she has seen staff wearing PPE in situations where it’s not necessary.

“Look at how we’re using our equipment and give it to the essential personnel, which is the priest,” she said. “We need him in the hospital more than ever.”

“We need to start thinking about getting the spiritual care back to these patients. They need their priests, they need their pastor.”

She has started making care packages for patients to provide something tangible in the absence of the sacraments; for one patient she assembled a care bag with holy water, blessed oil, and plastic rosaries. “I said ‘he’s not alone. God always has somebody for every person,” she said.

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 7, 2020 / 02:40 pm (CNA).- The governor of Illinois has said he will continue to ban public gatherings of more than 50 people—including religious services—until a vaccine or treatment for coronavirus is available.

The announcement comes as the White House is reported to have shelved guidance from the Centers for Disease Control on gradually reopening sections of the American economy and society.

Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker announced Wednesday that gatherings of more than 50 people in the state would not be allowed until a coronavirus vaccine “or highly effective treatment” is “widely available.”

Public health officials, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, have cautioned that a COVID-19 vaccine is at least 12 to 18 months from being developed and made available.

According to Pritzker’s five-part plan for reopening the state, gatherings of ten or fewer people are not even allowed until phase 3, the “recovery” phase that can begin, at earliest, May 29. However, following a lawsuit last week, the governor has allowed citizens to leave their homes for religious services as long as ten or fewer people are gathered for worship.

Previously, religious services of any kind in the state—including drive-in and in-person services—were curtailed during the pandemic, and even other forms of sacramental practice such as drive-in confessions were not allowed.

The Archdiocese of Chicago announced on May 1 that public Masses with 10 or fewer people would resume.

Other dioceses across the United States have already begun rolling back total suspensions on the public celebration of Mass. 

Last week, CNA reported that the White House Domestic Policy Council held a series of conference calls with bishops who had begun the process of reopening churches in line with local public health orders.

During the calls, administration officials expressed their hope to be able to support faith communities with “sensitive and respectful guidance” to help restore public worship “as soon as it is feasible.”

The bishops were told that the Centers for Disease Control hoped that issuing guidance could help inform state and local leaders about the “essential” nature of religious practice, while still allowing for localized responses to the coronavirus and provide “helpful parameters” for state and local governments who are trying to safeguard public health. But, on Thursday, AP reported that the Trump administration had shelved a 17-page report titled “Guidance for Implementing the Opening Up America Again Framework.”

That document included a section on “Interim Guidance for Communities of Faith.”

According to AP, CDC officials expected the guidance to be released at the end of last week but were instead told it “would never see the light of day.” 

Peter Breen, executive director of the Thomas More Society,  told CNA that “policymakers that are making plans based on the development of a vaccine or other cure to this coronavirus are engaging in magical thinking.”

“While there is always a possibility that some miracle cure may emerge, that is entirely uncertain and should not be the basis for setting policy, especially policy in relation to our communities of faith,” Breen stated.

On April 30, the Thomas More Society filed a lawsuit on behalf of The Beloved Church in Lena, Illinois, and by that night, attorney Peter Breen told CNA, a paragraph had been added to an executive order of Pritzker’s allowing for people to leave their home for religious services.

“He [Pritzker] has at least brought churches out of the abyss of ‘non-essential,’ but he has not fully elevated them to the heights of being an ‘essential’ business or operation,” Breen told CNA on Wednesday, noting that businesses deemed “essential” to remain open were not subject to the 10-person rule.

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.

CNA Staff, May 8, 2020 / 12:30 pm (CNA).- A federal judge in Arkansas on Thursday upheld the state’s requirement that women obtain a negative coronavirus test before having an abortion.

Calling the decision “agonizingly difficult,” Judge Brian Miller for the Eastern District Court of Arkansas said the state’s testing mandate—which applies to all elective surgeries and not just abortions—is “reasonable” during the public health emergency and was not done “with an eye toward limiting abortions.

The judge noted that “it is undisputed that surgical abortions have still taken place.”

The abortion clinic Little Rock Family Planning Services had requested a temporary injunction on the state health department’s requirement that elective surgery patients obtain a negative new coronavirus (COVID-19) test result within 48 hours before the procedure.

Previously, the health department ordered a halt to non-essential surgeries on April 3 to preserve resources for treating COVID-19.

The Little Rock abortion clinic performed abortions while claiming they were offering “essential” procedures, and after the health department ordered them to stop on April 10, the clinic challenged the state in court. The diocese’s Respect Life Office noted that women were traveling to the clinic for abortions from nearby states such as Texas and Louisiana.

The clinic won its case for a temporary restraining order at the district court level, but the Eighth Circuit appeals court subsequently overruled that decision and sided with the state.

The April 3 directive was updated April 24 to allow for some elective surgeries provided certain conditions were met. Elective abortions were included in the “non-essential” surgeries that were allowed to continue on April 24.

These conditions included no overnight stays, no contact with COVID-19 patients in the previous 14 days, and a negative COVID-19 test for patients within 48 hours of the surgery.

According to the clinic, which asked for a temporary injunction, three women were seeking to obtain “dilation and evacuation” abortions but were prevented from meeting the state’s testing requirmenet. One woman said she was unable to get a COVID-19 test; another said the lab could not guarantee she would receive results in 48 hours. The third woman was unable to get an abortion in Texas, and drove to the Little Rock clinic; she was told the results of her test would not be available for several days.

In response, the state’s health department said that four surgical abortions had still been performed at the clinic between April 27 and May 1, with COVID-19 test results having been obtained within 48 hours of the abortions, and thus the directive was not an “undue burden” on women seeking abortion.

In his decision on Thursday, Judge Miller said that the pandemic is a serious threat, noting that at the time of the opinion more than 70,000 people had died in the U.S. from the virus including more than 3,500 people in Arkansas.

He said the case “presents the tug-of-war between individual liberty and the state’s police power to protect the public during the existing, grave health crisis,” and noted that the three women as well as others “are very troubled. There is a strong urge to rule for them because they are extremely sympathetic figures, but that would be unjust.”

CNA Staff, May 8, 2020 / 04:15 pm (CNA).- As parishes and dioceses across the country deal with a drop in collections and the prospects of layoffs amid the pandemic, many parishes have managed to avail themselves of government loans designed to cover eight weeks of payroll expenses.

CBS News reported Friday that an estimated 12,000-13,000 of the 17,000 Catholic parishes in the U.S. had applied for Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) payroll loans from the Small Business Administration (SBA), and 9,000 so far had received them.

Guidance from the SBA on eligibility for the loans states that “no otherwise eligible organization will be disqualified from receiving a loan because of the religious nature, religious identity, or religious speech of the organization.”

Religious organizations are eligible for the loans as long as they meet the requirements of Section 501(c)(3) nonprofit and employ 500 or fewer people, the SBA said.

“The PPP isn't about the federal government assisting houses of worship or churches,” Pat Markey, the executive director of the Diocesan Fiscal Management Conference, told CBS News.

“PPP is about keeping people on payrolls, and a large segment of our society [in] the not for profit world...are churches and houses of worship. And they have people on payrolls too. So, if what this is about is keeping people on payrolls, then we all should have availability to do that.”

The Diocesan Fiscal Management Conference did not reply by press time to CNA’s request for additional comment.

Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act March 27 to help relieve the economy during the coronavirus pandemic.

The CARES Act initially authorized some $350 billion in loans to small businesses, intended to allow them to continue to pay their employees. The loans were given on a first come, first serve basis.

The second round of funding, with some $310 billion in additional funds available, began April 27.

The loans were capped at $10 million, were open to businesses with fewer than 500 employees per location, and were intended to cover two months of payroll costs.

The federal government promised to forgive the loans if a business used at least 75% of the funds to maintain its payroll at “pre-pandemic levels” for eight weeks after the loan is disbursed, the New York Times reports.

The remaining money could be used only to pay for certain expenses, such as a mortgage, rent, and utilities, according to the Times.

A survey of Protestant pastors by LifeWay Research found that about 40% had applied for PPP loans with more than half of them reporting being approved.

NPR reports that synagogues have also applied for government funding, though in a smaller proportion— of nearly 4,000 synagogues in the United States, about 250 were approved for PPP loans in the first round of lending, according to surveys by the Jewish Federations of North America and the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America.

The PPP has been subject to some criticism since its launch, including from those who say business owners with criminal records have been excluded from the program thus far.

In addition, several large companies, such as Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse, have received multi-million dollar loans through the program. Some of these large companies, such as Shake Shack, have since returned their loans.

Two New York dioceses— Rochester and Buffalo— are suing the Small Business Administration for access to PPP funds, after they were denied loans because of their bankruptcy status.

An SBA rule stipulated that the funds would not go to bankruptcy debtors. Both the dioceses of Rochester and Buffalo have filed for bankruptcy in the past several months, after being named in hundreds of clergy sex abuse lawsuits filed under New York Child Victims Protection Act.

 

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.”

Larry Shover, Efficient Advisors

Dan Deming, KKM Financial

Todd Colvin, Ambrosino Brothers

Todd Colvin, Ambrosino Brothers

Larry Shover, Efficient Advisors

Dan Deming, KKM Financial

Dan Deming, KKM Financial

Todd Colvin, Ambrosino Brothers

Many designers use golden ratio in their artworks as it can create organic and aesthetically pleasing composition. You can easily find examples in daily life such as shell, flower and logos. We can also use golden ratio in SOLIDWORKS. It

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CNA Staff, Apr 14, 2020 / 02:00 pm (CNA).- Cardinal George Pell has said culture wars and anti-Catholic sentiment could have played a part in the decision of Victoria police to pursue charges against him, even while they lacked supportive evidence of the allegations in his case.

Cardinal Pell described Victoria police as having “advertised for business” against him in an April 14 interview with Sky News Australia. Pell was asked about the decision by Victoria police to launch an open-ended investigation into him, despite having received no complaints of a crime.

The interview was Pell’s first televised appearance since his release last week after more than 400 days in prison. On the evidence of a single accuser, Pell was convicted in December 2018 of sexually assaulting two choirboys at the Melbourne Cathedral in 1996.

On April 7, the Australian High Court unanimously ruled that the evidence presented during the trial would not have allowed the jury to avoid reasonable doubt and ordered Pell’s acquittal and release.

On the day of his release, Pell told CNA that “The only basis for long term healing is truth and the only basis for justice is truth, because justice means truth for all.”

Pell spoke with Sky News’ Andrew Bolt about the decision by local police to bring 28 allegations of sexual abuse against him, only to see 27 of them dropped before reaching court. The remaining allegation resulted in Pell’s conviction by a Victoria jury and eventual acquittal by the High Court.

Asked directly if he thought police were “out to get” him, Pell said he did not know.

“I don’t know how you explain it, but it is certainly extraordinary,” Pell said.

Asked if he thought there was an anti-Catholic bias at work in the decision of police to charge him and by judges at the Victoria Court of Appeal to sustain his conviction, despite the evidence which eventually led to his exoneration, Pell said it was a possibility.

“I’ve seen too many people [make the leap] from possible to probable to fact. Certainly, people do not like Christians who teach Christianity, especially on life and family and issues like that.”

“The culture wars are real,” Pell said. “There is a systematic attempt to remove the Judeo-Christian legal foundations [on for example] marriage, life, gender, sex.”

“Unfortunately, there’s less rational discussion and more playing the man, more abuse and intimidation, and that’s not good for a democracy.”

During the interview, the cardinal was also asked if he believed that there was any connection between his work to reform the Vatican finances during his time as Prefect for the Economy and the emergence of charges against him in Victoria.

“Most of the senior people in Rome who are in any way sympathetic to financial reform believe that they are [connected]. But I have seen too much from people, as I said, going to possibility to probability to fact – I don’t have any evidence of that.”

“But one of my fears was that what we had done [to reform the Vatican finances] would remain hidden for ten years or so, and they’d would be revealed and the baddies would say ‘Well, Pell and Casey [Pell’s chief advisor] were in charge then, they turned a blind eye and did nothing to it.’”

“Thanks be to God all that’s gone, because there was a flurry of articles just before Christmas exposing all sorts of things like a disastrous purchase – actually a couple of them – in London, and it was very clearly demonstrated that we tenaciously opposed those things.”

“What we were pushing and saying has been massively vindicated,” Pell said. “Now you can see why they sacked the auditor [Libero Milone], why they got rid of the external auditors.”

Asked how high up in the curial hierarchy financial corruption goes, Pell said “Who knows? It’s a little bit like [anti-Catholicism] in Victoria, you’re not quite sure where the vein runs, how thick and broad it is, and how high it goes.”

But the cardinal also made clear that, in financial reforming efforts, Pope Francis had “absolutely” supported him and that “at the feet of the pope we’ve got Cardinal [Pietro] Parolin, he’s certainly not corrupt. Just how high up [the corruption goes] is an interesting hypothesis.”

Pell said that despite the difficulties he faced in prison, where he was held in solitary confinement for much of the time for his own safety, he bore no anger towards his accuser.

“I’ve got no anger, no hostility towards my complainant, I never have,” said Pell.

“I am called to forgive what happened to me that might have been a little unjust, and there is this heroic Christian call to forgiveness in the most appalling circumstances.”

But, Pell said, he had no hesitation in condemning the terrible scandal of sexual abuse in the Church.

“I totally condemn those sorts of activities [of abuse] and the damage that it has done to people – and I have seen the damage that it has done to people.”

“One of the things that grieves me is the suggestion that I’m anti-victim or not sufficiently sympathetic. I devoted a lot of time and energy to trying to get [victims] justice, and to get them help and compensation.”

Pell noted that as archbishop in the 1990s he set up the Melbourne Response to deal with sexual abuse in the Church and bringing about justice and compensation for victims.

“I worked hard,” Pell said, “when it wasn’t easy or fashionable, to get something in place – not run by clerics – that would give some protection and redress to these people, and I have worked consistently at that since at least the middle 90s.”

The cardinal said he had kept the same routine while in prison that, as a bishop, he had often urged on priests who found themselves “in a bit of trouble;” getting up early and at a set time, praying, exercising, and eating well.

“If you can’t pray when you are in trouble, your faith is very weak indeed.”

Asked if he had ever asked God, in the words of Christ on the cross, “why have you forsaken me?” Pell responded “No.”

“But I have said ‘My God, my God, what are you up to?’”

“One of the strangest teachings about Christianity – and the most useful – is that you can offer up your suffering,” Pell said. “Suffering is not just a brute fact. A Christian can offer that up to the Good God.”

Washington D.C., Apr 24, 2020 / 02:00 pm (CNA).- The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) covered up the spread of the new coronavirus within the country, suppressing the real rate of infection and violating the rights of its citizens as it did so, a Chinese human rights activist told a forum at The Catholic University of America on Friday.

“It is time to recognize the threat the Chinese Communist Party poses to all humanity. The CCP represses and manipulates information to strengthen its hold on power, regardless of the toll on human lives,” human rights lawyer Chen Guangcheng said April 24 during an online forum on the CCP and the new coronavirus.

The forum was hosted by Faith & Law in partnership with the Institute for Human Ecology at the Catholic University of America. Guanchen is Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Catholic University’s Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies.

Guangcheng is a blind human rights lawyer from China, who received sanctuary in the U.S. in 2012 after he was targeted by the CCP for his advocacy work. Guangcheng has sharply criticized the party for its human rights abuses, including from its one-child family planning policy.

He was sent to prison and subject to house arrest, during which he claims he and his family were repeatedly beaten and denied medical treatment.

On Friday, the lawyer warned audience members against suggestions that other countries should emulate China’s authoritarian response to the new coronavirus (COVID-19).

There are currently more than 2.7 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the world.

The city of Wuhan is recognized as the epicenter of the global pandemic, and the government on Jan. 23 instituted a strict lockdown in the city of 11 million people. Guangchang cited reports of Chinese families being barricaded inside their own homes, and the group Human Rights Watch compiled stories of residents reportedly dying from lack of access to care during the lockdown.

“Whole families have been found dead in their apartments because they could not get out,” he said, noting that despite the CCP’s claim that it has the virus under control, lockdowns are currently in force in the city of Harbin.

“This is despite the authorities ordering everyone back to work and telling the outside world that they have the virus under control,” Guangcheng said. “The resurgence is directly related to the CCP hiding the truth, and cracking down on people who tried to share information on the virus.”

He also claimed that the CCP has been using the crisis caused by the pandemic to crack down on dissent, detaining human rights activists at separate “so-called quarantine sites.”

The wife of one human rights lawyer—who had just been released from prison told The Guardian that she feared the government was putting her husband under house arrest near where he was imprisoned, 400 kilometers away from her, under the guise of a quarantine.

According to World Health Organization (WHO) statistics, China’s number of COVID-19 cases rose considerably through January and February to 79,389 on Feb. 29 with 2,838 deaths, before its daily increase in case numbers slowed to a trickle in March including just one new reported case on March 22 in the country of more than 1.4 billion people.

Just 3,352 deaths were reported on April 16 before the reported number jumped to 4,642 the next day.

“There is nothing about the CCP’s numbers that are believable,” Guangcheng said. “What people are calculating is that roughly 700,000 may have died in China—in terms of people who have been infected, no one knows the numbers.”

For instance, he said, during the Wuhan lockdown citizen journalists claimed that the situation was far worse than the CCP was reporting; they recorded people collapsing in the streets and hearses and vans carrying body bags at all hours of the day.

“In summary, the CCP is the biggest and most serious virus of all, with over 193,000 people dead worldwide from the coronavirus,” the lawyer said. “There should be no question of the regime’s threat.”