George Fox: A Man of Fiery Passion on a Mission for Jesus

Impassioned by his personal experience of the “light of Christ” Fox became a dynamic, fanatically sincere speaker. He would speak the “truth” anywhere that God provided an opportunity for him to “convince” people that it was possible for them to “experience” the indwelling light of Christ to change their lives. He was not particular about where he spoke, for he would preach in barns, houses, fields, and in churches after the pries was finished. His ministry began in the northern part of England where he would preach, pray, and protest without reservation. Because he often denounced creeds, forms, rites, external sacraments, and man-made ministry, he was not popular and was often persecuted and imprisoned for his beliefs. Nevertheless Fox and his movement “the Society of Friends” (Quakers) would grow and flourish in England and beyond. Being both a Spirit anointed preacher and a prolific writer by the time of his death, his followers would number approximately 50,000 and the impact of his teaching and call to repentance would be felt as far away as the United States as well as several other countries. Beginning with his childhood this article will attempt to examine how Fox came to have the kind of impact that would infuriate the orthodox ruling class, the religious leaders of his day, and at the same time appeal to the common masses

George Fox: A Man of Fiery Passion on a Mission for Jesu

Impassioned by his personal experience of the “light of Christ” Fox became a dynamic, fanatically sincere speaker. He would speak the “truth” anywhere that God provided an opportunity for him to “convince” people that it was possible for them to “experience” the indwelling light of Christ to change their lives. He was not particular about where he spoke, for he would preach in barns, houses, fields, and in churches after the pries was finished. His ministry began in the northern part of England where he would preach, pray, and protest without reservation. Because he often denounced creeds, forms, rites, external sacraments, and man-made ministry, he was not popular and was often persecuted and imprisoned for his beliefs. Nevertheless Fox and his movement “the Society of Friends” (Quakers) would grow and flourish in England and beyond. Being both a Spirit anointed preacher and a prolific writer by the time of his death, his followers would number approximately 50,000 and the impact of his teaching and call to repentance would be felt as far away as the United States as well as several other countries. Beginning with his childhood this article will attempt to examine how Fox came to have the kind of impact that would infuriate the orthodox ruling class, the religious leaders of his day, and at the same time appeal to the common masses

Spontaneous Isotropy Breaking: A Mechanism for CMB Multipole Alignments

We introduce a class of models in which statistical isotropy is broken spontaneously in the CMB by a non-linear response to long-wavelength fluctuations in a mediating field. These fluctuations appear as a gradient locally and pick out a single preferred direction. The non-linear response imprints this direction in a range of multipole moments. We consider two manifestations of isotropy breaking: additive contributions and multiplicative modulation of the intrinsic anisotropy. Since WMAP exhibits an alignment of power deficits, an additive contribution is less likely to produce the observed alignments than the usual isotropic fluctuations, a fact which we illustrate with an explicit cosmological model of long-wavelength quintessence fluctuations. This problem applies to other models involving foregrounds or background anisotropy that seek to restore power to the CMB. Additive models that account directly for the observed power exacerbate the low power of the intrinsic fluctuations. Multiplicative models can overcome these difficulties. We construct a proof of principle model that significantly improves the likelihood and generates stronger alignments than WMAP in 30-45% of realizations.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figure

“True fan = watch match”? In Search of the ‘Authentic’ Soccer Fan.

Academics have created typologies to divide association football (soccer) fans into categories based upon the assumed ‘authenticity’ of their fandom practices. One of the main requirements of ‘authentic’ fandom has been assumed to be match attendance. The goal of this paper was to critically assess this assumption through considering how fans themselves talk about the significance of match attendance as evidence of ‘authentic’ fandom. In light of the fact that the voices of English non-league fans on the ‘authenticity’ debate have so far been overshadowed by the overbearing focus of much previous research on the upper echelons of English soccer, an e-survey was conducted with 151 members of an online community of fans of English Northern League (NL) clubs (a semi-professional / amateur league based in North East England). Findings revealed that opinion was divided on the constituents of ‘authentic’ fandom and match attendance was not deemed to be the core evidence of support for a club by 42% of the sample. Elias (1978) suggested that dichotomous thinking hinders sociological understanding and it is concluded that fan typologies are not sufficient for assessing the ‘authenticity’ of fan activities