Resurgence of religion in public life: expressing Christianity through public service provision

Research on faith based organisations involvement in public service provision neglects to consider the personal faith convictions of those working in this field. Using a social constructionist epistemology I investigate if and how faith convictions of employees and volunteers working for Christian based service providers impact on the work they do. Data were collected in two stages using semi structured interviews. Stage one obtained a broad overview of the role of Christian service providers from the perspective of elite Christians representing Christian organisations that have a direct connection to welfare provision in the UK. Stage two took an in-depth look at the issues raised in stage one, seeking to understand them from the perspective of ordinary Christians who work for Christian based service providers. Findings from this thesis further sociological understanding of Christian involvement in religiously plural public spheres, and argues that faith is an intrinsic part of the delivery of public services by people working for faith-based organisations. Drawing on the theoretical concept of Individualised Religiosities as proposed by Luckmann, Bellah, Davie, Beck and others, and the concept of Lived Religion as developed by McGuire and Ammerman, this thesis examines participants constructed understanding of the Christian God and its connection with public service provision. It develops a complex, three fold sociological conceptualisation of Christian perceptions of the God figure as: 1) the Supreme Being, 2) as a parental figure, and 3) an embodied God. This broad conceptualisation illustrates how participants combine institutional activities, such as attending church sermons, with more autonomous religious activities, such as personal conversations with God, to construct a multidimensional understanding of the figure. The embodied God position takes on further significance when understanding that participants use public service work as a form of church . Public service can be viewed as a form of private worship, but by embodying God, they also take God to people that may not practice Christianity. These findings challenge assumptions that the practice of religion in public projects has declined in recent years and that faith organisations are reticent to push their faith when providing services. Religious pluralism results in political expectations that faith groups are religiously neutral when delivering public services. Using Framing Theory this thesis demonstrates that participants are framing faith discourses so that they resonate with discourses deemed acceptable in the public realm. It conceptualises these discourses in two action frames, the Love, and Inclusivity Frames. There are indications of a shift towards using profane terms instead of sacred terms to explain and indirectly promote aspects of the Christian faith. Moreover, Christian teachings of love, compassion and belonging are amplified to counter criticisms that Christianity is a threat to liberal rights and beliefs. These frames, which demonstrate the accommodation of Christian discourse to a religiously plural and/or neutral discourse, have implications for how we understand Christian involvement in the public sphere

Pre- and post-migration defect in primordial germ cells from Dazl knockout mice

Universidade Federal de São Paulo, São Paulo, BrazilMRC, Human Genet Unit, Edinburgh, Midlothian, ScotlandUniversidade Federal de São Paulo, São Paulo, BrazilWeb of Scienc

A New Tableau-based Satisfiability Checker for Linear Temporal Logic

Tableaux-based methods were among the first techniques proposed for Linear Temporal Logic satisfiability checking. The earliest tableau for LTL by [21] worked by constructing a graph whose path represented possible models for the formula, and then searching for an actual model among those paths. Subsequent developments led to the tree-like tableau by [17], which works by building a structure similar to an actual search tree, which however still has back-edges and needs multiple passes to assess the existence of a model. This paper summarizes theworkdoneonanewtool for LTL satisfiability checking based on a novel tableau method. The new tableau construction, which is very simple and easy to explain, builds an actually tree-shaped structure and it only requires a single pass to decide whether to accept a given branch or not. The implementation has been compared in terms of speed and memory consumption with tools implementing both existing tableau methods and different satisfiability techniques, showing good results despite the simplicity of the underlying algorithm

Aiming higher : the Plymouth and Peninsula Tri-Level Model (PPM) for school/HE links : putting the university into school and community

"This report outlines an innovative, effective model of school/higher education (HE) liaison, the Plymouth & Peninsula Model (PPM). The PPM is of major national and international importance. The defining quality of PPM is that it is a genuine partnership, with parity of esteem between HEIs, schools and local authorities (LAs), supported by other major stakeholders. The PPM is based upon firm research evidence, is highly cost effective and could be rolled out nationally to cover geographically all primary and secondary schools and college grouped in consortia" - page iii

Playing Active Video Games may not develop movement skills: an intervention trial

Background: To investigate the impact of playing sports Active Video Games on children\u27s actual and perceived object control skills. Methods: Intervention children played Active Video Games for 6. weeks (1. h/week) in 2012. The Test of Gross Motor Development-2 assessed object control skill. The Pictorial Scale of Perceived Movement Skill Competence assessed perceived object control skill. Repeated measurements of object control and perceived object control were analysed for the whole sample, using linear mixed models, which included fixed effects for group (intervention or control) and time (pre and post) and their interaction. The first model adjusted for sex only and the second model also adjusted for age, and prior ball sports experience (yes/no). Seven mixed-gender focus discussions were conducted with intervention children after programme completion. Results: Ninety-five Australian children (55% girls; 43% intervention group) aged 4 to 8. years (M 6.2, SD 0.95) participated. Object control skill improved over time (p=0.006) but there was no significant difference (p=0.913) between groups in improvement (predicted means: control 31.80 to 33.53, SED=0.748; intervention 30.33 to 31.83, SED=0.835). A similar result held for the second model. Similarly the intervention did not change perceived object control in Model 1 (predicted means: control: 19.08 to 18.68, SED=0.362; intervention 18.67 to 18.88, SED=0.406) or Model 2. Children found the intervention enjoyable, but most did not perceive direct equivalence between Active Video Games and \u27real life\u27 activities. Conclusions: Whilst Active Video Game play may help introduce children to sport, this amount of time playing is unlikely to build skill

Admission to NICU in air is more likely if nasal High Flow is used for stabilisation in preterm babies compared to face mask CPAP

Objective. To examine the success of stabilisation and the short term outcomes from the routine use of nasal high flow (nHF) on an unselected cohort of babies in the delivery room (DR). Design. Retrospective single-centre study Setting. Single-centre neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) Patients. Infants born at < 32 weeks gestation Interventions. Stabilisation and transfer to NICU of an unselected cohort of babies using nHF Main outcome measures. Success of stabilisation defined by successful transfer on nHF and clinical measures of stability at admission to NICU, including oxygen requirement, admission temperature, surfactant requirement, short term outcomes and whether infants were sustained on nHF by 72 hours of age. Results. There were 133 eligible babies. 54 were commenced on nHF in the DR (Group A), 47 were stabilised by face mask CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) (Group B), 26 were intubated (Group C); 6 required only minimal respiratory support (Group D). Median maturity varied between the groups (Group A 27+5 weeks, Group B 30 weeks, Group C 26+2 weeks, Group D 31+5). 72% of Group A and 75% of Group B remained on nHF for 72 hours (P=0.82). Fewer babies received surfactant in Group A versus Group B (29% vs 35%; P=0.67), however groups were not matched for maturity differences and Group A were significantly less mature and of lower birthweight (both P<0.001). Group A were significantly more likely to be in air at admission than Group B (P=0.03). Conclusion. Preterm babies can be successfully stabilised and sustained on nHF. The use of nHF for immediate stabilisation appears to be effective and, in this study, led to significantly more babies being in air on admission to the NICU compared to face mask CPAP stabilisation

Polo boxes and Cut23 (Apc8) mediate an interaction between polo kinase and the anaphase-promoting complex for fission yeast mitosis

The fission yeast plo1+ gene encodes a polo-like kinase, a member of a conserved family of kinases which play multiple roles during the cell cycle. We show that Plo1 kinase physically interacts with the anaphase-promoting complex (APC)/cyclosome through the noncatalytic domain of Plo1 and the tetratricopeptide repeat domain of the subunit, Cut23. A new cut23 mutation, which specifically disrupts the interaction with Plo1, results in a metaphase arrest. This arrest can be rescued by high expression of Plo1 kinase. We suggest that this physical interaction is crucial for mitotic progression by targeting polo kinase activity toward the APC