The Word Becomes Flesh

(Excerpt) Mrs. Gahr, my teacher for several years in the one-roomed country school I attended, always said a word is really yours when you have used it correctly in a sentence three times. There is a sense in which we can say the living Word becomes ours when we use it Using the living word, however, is not just putting nouns and verbs and other parts of speech together. Using the living word correctly is not even just rightly dividing law and gospel. Using the living word must also involve actions and deeds. One of the ways the church uses the word correctly is what we have often called diakonia. Through its service within the community of faith and for the world, the church uses the word, making it flesh in the lives of people. And .as we use the word that way, we may well find that the word becomes not only flesh but also really ours

A Study Of The Deficiency Of Food Consumption In Twenty-Five Families In Two Communities In Brazoria County, Texas

Every child should have the privilege of having good nutrition. It is well known that sufficient quantity of good and wholesome food is the body\u27s first need. The famous Bill of Rights for children created by President Herbert Hoover, states that there should be no child in America to suffer from undernourishment. Many diseases may be traced to some fault in the diet or food habits of the individual. The underlying causes of malnutrition have been stated to be ignorance, lack of home control, and poverty. These are the home or community conditions responsible for the factors actually causing the malnutrition. In fact, living conditions among the wealthy are of such as to cause a high percentage of children from wealthy homes to be malnourished. On the other hand, if one has not the money to buy enough food, or to provide more expensive but essential foods such as milk, fruits, and vegetables, it is impossible to prevent malnutrition. Lack of ability to realize cause and effect relations, prejudices against certain foods or hygienic measures, ambition of parents to push the child too hard at school or in outside activities, refusal to recognize the child\u27s condition for what it is, ignorance of how to go about remedying it, are all variations of the ignorance factor. The hind and the amount of food a child eats and the habits which govern the taking of such food are vital matters. Health and disease, strength and weakness, usefulness and uselessness may be the results of feeding in childhood. The results of poor dietary habits may partly explain the high percentage of children in the United States who are suffering with malnutrition. Purpose of the Study- The community in which this research is centered is in Brazoria County on the Gulf Coast in South Texas. The climate and soil are of such nature that vegetables may be grown the entire year. A sufficient quantity of milk and milk products may be obtained if the home managers are interested

Promoting children's mental health at a whole-school level using action research

This study aimed to explore school staff’s, parents’ and children’s understanding of mental health and identify what risk and protective factors affect children’s mental health. The key aims were to gain information about how mainstream primary schools promote children’s mental health, and to explore children’s, parents’ and school staffs’ understanding of children’s mental health and factors which promote or demote development. All of the schools who responded to the questionnaire considered that mental health promotion should be carried out by specialist. The findings from this initial survey suggested that to achieve the active involvement of school staff, further support was required to enable school staff to feel competent, confident and knowledgeable in this field. The participants in the action research phase of this study identified a number of factors within the individual, the micro, exo- and the macro-systems which they believed affected children’s mental health. The integrated MacDonald and O’Hara Ten Element Map (1998) and Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological model (2005) which consider the individual to be at the centre of and embedded in a number of environmental systems, afforded effective frameworks for exploring the school community’s understanding of children’s mental health, for conceptualising the findings from a bioecological perspective, and for planning action steps through which to enhance the impact of schooling on children’s mental health

Complicated Conversations on the Dis/Ease of Mental Illness: The Ebb and Flow of Bipolar Disorder

This work is a conversation about mental illness, specifically bipolar disorder. It is a complicated, convoluted conversation that covers a broad spectrum of facets. The central theme is to uncover the role that bipolar disorder has played in impacting schools, communities, and families and how that role aggravates and perplexes students, teachers, parents, community leaders. This dissertation does not try to create any answers or solutions. It is an investigation, an exploration of why mental illness creates such confusion in our minds. How did this confusion develop and what perpetuates its continuation? Can or even should we, consider it a medical issue or a social issue or some of both? If there is a continuum between sanity and madness, normal and abnormal, what or who determines our own, or even another person\u27s placement along that line? The intent and focus of this research will be to uncover what cannot be covered over: the integration, the significance, the impact of the past on the present on the future. To separate the past, present, and future which are inextricably tied together is to fragment and dehumanize not only the process of education but individuals themselves. While curriculum theory [is] a distinctive specialization within the broad field of education (Pinar, 2004, p. 2), it includes a recognition of the importance of the psychic life of those involved, something that cannot be measured on standardized tests or other measures of accountability. It becomes, then, unconscionable and unethical to teach subject matter that covers over the individual\u27s matter, the unconscious, the memories (Morris, 2004, p. 84). Recognizing the messiness that occurs within the confines of a classroom, a home, a boardroom, these different realities urge one to delve deeper into the spaces that invite an examination of lived experience and an evaluation of its complicated role in teaching and learning. Incorporating a psychoanalytic framework and utilizing the work of disability theorists combine and surround the conversation by inclusion of the personal and the social, the internal and the external, including the physical and mental environment

Survey of estrogen concentrations in dairy and swine waste storage and treatment facilities in and around Tennessee

Naturally occurring estrogens in animal wastes may cause negative environmental impacts in some watersheds. However, there is little published data regarding the concentrations of these estrogenic compounds in full-scale animal waste treatment and storage structures, thus making risk assessment difficult. To address this knowledge gap, the research described herein explores estrogen concentrations at 19 animal waste storage and treatment structures at dairy and swine production facilities in and around Tennessee during the winter and summer months of one year. Samples were collected from eight dairy and eleven swine facilities, representing a range of waste storage and treatment structures typical of Tennessee, and much of the southeastern US. Swine waste samples were collected from both swine farrowing operations that are populated by farrowing sows and piglets, and swine finishing operations that are populated by growing, non-pregnant male and female pigs. Dairy waste samples were collected from dairy operations populated by lactating cows in various stages of their hormonal and reproductive cycles. The 17β-estradiol concentrations in all samples were assayed in triplicate serial dilutions by means of an enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). In addition, concentrations of 17β-estradiol, 17α-estradiol, and estrone were determined by gas-chromatography mass-spectroscopy (GC-MS). All samples were also assayed for total solids, volatile solids, ash, total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN), total phosphorus, potassium, and chemical oxygen demand. An estrogen to macronutrient (N, P, and K) mass ratio was determined for all waste samples. This was done because the raw waste value does represent the true estrogen pollution potential. Several tentative conclusions have been drawn from the data presented here, as follow; (1) Using ELISA to assay 17β-estradiol (E2), there were statistically significant differences (α=0.05) between all the farm types sampled (dairy, swine farrowing, and swine finishing) for E2/N, E2/P, and E2/K ratios (where N, P, and K represent nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium respectively). Swine farrowing operations showed the highest estrogen to macronutrient mass ratios, averaging 19.2 ppt E2/ppm N (1.1 sd), 65.6 ppt E2/ppm P (4.7 sd), and 24.3 ppt E2/ppm K (1.7 sd). Average swine finishing and dairy ratios were approximately 2 and 5 times lower, respectively. The same trend was seen in GC-MS 17β-estradiol, estrone, and total estrogen ratios (the sum of 17β-estradiol, 17α-estradiol, and estrone concentrations). In contrast, dairy operations had a significantly (α=0.05) higher estrogen to macronutrients mass ratio for GC-MS 17α-estradiol as compared to swine farrowing, averaging 16.5 ppt 17α/ppm N (5.7 sd), 62.6 ppt 17α/ppm P (6.9 sd), and 30.9 ppt 17α/ppm K (4.1 sd). (2) Dairy waste structures (holding ponds, dry stack-solid, and semisolid) did not have statistically significantly different (α=0.05) for ELISA 17β-estradiol and GC-MS 17β-estradiol and estrone ratios. However, dairy dry stack-semisolid waste had significantly (α=0.05) higher estrogen to macronutrients mass ratios for GC-MS 17α-estradiol than holding ponds and dry stack-solid structures. Dairy dry stack-semisolid showed the highest ratios for 17α-estradiol to P, which were 85.2 ppt/ppm (8.5 sd). Dairy dry stack-semisolid also had statistically significantly higher total estrogen to macronutrient ratios (α=0.05) than did the other structures. The highest values were for P, averaging 129.2 ppt total estrogen/ppm (27.1 sd). (3) Swine finishing lagoon structures had statistically significantly higher (α=0.05) estrone/N and estrone/P ratios than did swine finishing hoop structures. For example, swine finishing lagoons had P ratios of 202 ppt El/ppm P (40.8 sd) as compared to 13.2 ppt El/ppm P (47 sd) observed in swine finishing hoop structures. In contrast, ELISA 17β-estradiol ratios were not statistically significantly different for any of the swine finishing structures. GC-MS 17β-estradiol and 17α-estradiol concentrations were below the detection limits for the structures. These results suggest that it is probable that wastes from swine farrowing facilities pose the greatest threat as environmental estrogen pollutants. Specifically, swine farrowing wastes had statistically significantly higher (α=0.05) ratios of 17β-estradiol and estrone to the macronutrients N and P than did swine finishing and dairy waste. (Although dairy wastes had the highest ratios of 17α-estradiol to macronutrients, 17α-estradiol is not as potent an estrogen as 17β-estradiol and estrone.) Ultimately, the actual threat of estrogenic pollution posed by these wastes must be determined by additional runoff studies, supplemented by watershed-scale studies. This thesis helps identify the wastes most likely to cause problems, and therefore most worthy of additional study. Phosphorus-based application of the manures studied would result in lower mass application rates of estrogen to fields (ca. 2 - 3x). In this sense, the increasing trend toward P-based application will help mitigate the likelihood of estrogen pollution from the land application of animal manures

Online Self-Injury Forums, Social Support, And Psychological Distress

Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is a behavior being seen with increasing frequency among clinicians and the general population. Internet forums where people who engage in the behavior may discuss topics related to NSSI have become widespread. The effects of those websites on people who engage in the behavior have not been researched. This study used structural equation modeling to better understand the relationship between identification with these groups, time online, comfort discussing NSSI, social support, and psychological distress. The final model suggests a complicated relationship between Internet use and offline effects. Identification with such an online group appears to lead to both increases in feelings of social support and increases in psychological distress. Also, the model indicates that comfort with discussing NSSI leads to increased feelings of social support, decreased loneliness, and decreased psychological distress. However, time spent online may both decrease social problems and increase psychological distress. Implications and limitations of the study are also discussed

An experiment in history taking, 1941

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University, 1943. This item was digitized by the Internet Archive