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Articles by John J. Cornwell
Redistricting Texas: A Data-Driven Path to Fair Representation
Texas congressional redistricting sparks endless debate, yet few maps begin with a fair baseline. Rather than focus on political maneuvering, we asked what happens if the process is left to the data. In this article we use a politically agnostic redistricting method to draw districts that are compact, contiguous, and population balanced, showing how data science can offer a clearer alternative. The redistricting process is often politicized, opaque, and legally contested.
An American pope for the global south
Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. The writer is author of ‘Hitler’s Pope’, ‘The Pontiff in Winter’ and ‘Earth to Earth’ What was he thinking? Leo XIV! A tribute clearly to Leo XIII, pope from 1878 to 1903, a major pin-up boy for Catholics through the first half of the 20th century.
Following the science on the Shroud of Turin: A skeptical scholar's overview of the surprising mound of evidence suggesting authenticity
Once again, history’s most mysterious relic is in the news. According to scientists at an Italian research facility, the Shroud of Turin is genuine: heartening its devotees, and dispiriting sceptics; puzzling those who feel they have no stake in the story either way. What are we to make of it? Back in 1988 I interviewed the late Professor Edward “Teddy” Hall, lead scientist in a once-and-for-all bid to date the shroud with a standard carbon-14 test.
The Virgin praying... for Ukraine
One spring morning in 1987, 12-year-old Maria Kyzyn, from the village of Hrushiv in west Ukraine, declared that she had received a vision of the Madonna and Child. The apparition, she said, hovered above the dome of the local wooden church of the Holy Trinity, once attended by members of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, or Ukrainian Catholics, until closed by the Soviets in the late Forties. Groups of local men and women began to gather in the churchyard.
Sir David Amess death: Catholic bishop calls for last rites to be recognized as ‘emergency service’
Shrewsbury, England, Oct 19, 2021 / 05:55 am A Catholic bishop called on Tuesday for greater recognition of the last rites as an “emergency service” in the wake of the killing of British lawmaker Sir David Amess. Bishop Mark Davies of Shrewsbury, western England, made the appeal on Oct. 19 after police reportedly turned away a priest who sought to administer the last rites to the Catholic Member of Parliament at the scene of the attack in Leigh-on-Sea, Essex.
A Catholic martyr for democracy – Sir David Amess 1952-2021 - Catholic Herald
As a good friend, whom I greatly admired, words cannot express my sense of sadness and loss over the murder of Sir David Amess. He was first elected in 1983, aged just 31, a year before myself, so our political careers – as fellow Catholic MPs – ran almost parallel. My prayers have been conveyed to his bereaved widow Julia and his five children. There will be a Requiem Mass and memorial. The tributes in the Commons reflected the great esteem in which David was held from all sides.
Cardinal leads tributes after Catholic MP Sir David Amess is murdered in terror attack
Cardinal Vincent Nicholas has led tributes to Sir David Amess, a Catholic MP murdered at his constituency surgery in Essex in a suspected terrorist attack. The Conservative MP for Southend West was knifed about a dozen times by a man who sprinted into Belfairs Methodist Church in Leigh-on-Sea shortly after 12 noon on Friday. Police declared the murder to be a terrorist incident and have arrested a 25-year-old British Muslim of Somali descent on suspicion of murder.
Catholic MP Sir David Amess stabbed to death at constituency surgery
Image caption: Sir David Amess on the Tributes are being paid to Sir David Amess, a Catholic MP stabbed to death at his constituency surgery in Essex. He was knifed repeatedly by a man who sprinted into Belfairs Methodist Church in Leigh-on-Sea shortly after 12 noon and died in hospital three hours later. Police arrested a 25-year-old man at the scene on suspicion of murder and have said they have recovered a knife and are not seeking anyone else in connection the murder.
Glimpses of glory
Will Todd is one of those rare musicians who shows that there is life still in liturgical and sacred music. Sir James MacMillan is another, and one of the most memorable concerts of the last year was the premiere of their separate musical reflections on Cardinal Newman’s meditations at Farm Street Church, courtesy of the Genesis Foundation. “What was nice,” says Todd, “was how different the pieces were.
Unrelentingly ominous but essential
In the year of 1259, after a run of bad weather in Italy, harvests failed and famine spread across the peninsula. Thousands of religious fanatics known as Flagellants took to the highways and byways, leading processions through towns and cities, whipping themselves into frenzies of self-harm. The movement was sparked by a letter reputedly sent from heaven via an angel. It contained a dire warning – that widespread neglect of the Sabbath had infuriated the Lord.
Sheffield has been here before – Yorkshire Bylines
[[File:Sheffield Town Hall (27475677653).jpg|Sheffield_Town_Hall_(27475677653)]] Share EmailTwitterFacebook The local elections on 6 May were a poor result for Labour in many parts of the country and it was clear that the breached ‘Red Wall’ had not yet been re-fortified in many places in the north of England.
The unseen hook - Catholic Herald
Anyone reporting critically on the papacy, however objective their intent, risks being caught in the crossfire between the liberals and conservatives, the scruffies and the neats, as I call them, of our Church. Some years ago, the late Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, once thought of as a future pope, offered an explanation.
Catholic Herald Magazine - March 2021
Magazine The estimated reading time is 3 minutes Leaders Healing the American divide Poetic Justice for Geoffrey Chaucer Main Diary* by Antonia Fraser Tutti Frutti – Piers Paul Read on the paradoxes of Fratelli Tutti Miraculous ignorance – Niall Gooch on why there is no clash between religion and science Spiritual exercise – Ken Craycraft on the legal right to worship Vatican Fair – Serenhedd James on the papal book wars Saints and Sales – Our top 10 religious bestsellers Why I feel like an...
Catholic Organizations Address "The Elderly and the Future of Europe"
Two Catholic organizations organized a webinar on Monday to study Europe’s “demographic imbalance” — the growing number of elderly people and the dwindling number of children. “The Elderly and the Future of Europe” was the theme of the event, jointly hosted by the Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Union (COMECE) and the Federation of Catholic Family Associations in Europe (FAFCE).
Papal Attraction: the trials of pontifical biography
Several years ago, in the cosy bosom of Soho’s Academy Club, Patrick Reyntiens the preeminent stained glass artist and devout Catholic, stood on a chair (despite his 85 years) and delivered an impromptu reading from Ludwig von Pastor’s History of the Popes. Eventually he was halted mid-sentence by a piece of flying bread. It’s that kind of club. Reyntiens’s enthusiasm sent me back to Pastor, whom I first read in the library of Oscott College where I was once a seminarian.
18 dead in Myanmar as military crackdown escalates
State violence in Mynmar escalated when police opened fire on hundreds of protesters in the cities across the country, killing 18, according to a UN report. It is the largest number of deaths in a single day since the coup began. The police have increased their use of force in recent weeks, beginning with water cannons, tear gas before using rubber and then live ammunition. On Sunday, the police descended on groups of gathering protesters, rounding them up before marches began.
Benedict XVI to Italy's Corriere on Resignation (plus Biden, Draghi, Francis in Iraq)
In a new interview with Italian daily Corriere della Sera, Pope emeritus Benedict XVI repeats once more, “There are not two popes… there is only one Pope.” Speaking on the eve of the eighth anniversary of his resignation, which went into effect on 28 February 2013, the former pontiff says he is at peace with his decision. “It was a difficult decision.
The Sheffield City Batallion – The First and The Last - history
by John Cornwell The story of two volunteers in Sheffield’s own Pals’ Battalion, The 12th Battalion The York and Lancaster Regiment… Vivian Simpson was the first man to volunteer at the Town Hall on 2nd September 1914 for the new Sheffield City Battalion. He was exactly the sort of chap that those raising the City Battalion wanted to attract as they blatantly intended this to be a battalion of middle-class volunteers.
John J. students enjoy 'The Night Before Christmas' presentation
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A poet for times when the world falls apart
Until I was 20, I believed that “everything will be OK in the end”. That year, grief over the death of a child, following hard on the deaths of two friends, nearly overwhelmed me. Nonetheless, I kept my balance until I encountered a different kind of tragedy: to my horror I learned that not one, but two, friends had allegedly sexually abused children. “I thought life was fundamentally OK,” I wailed to my father when he found me weeping, completely undone by the news.
Rediscovering the stark power of the Penny Catechism
The Catholic Truth Society (CTS) has recently reproduced the old Penny Catechism in red cloth with gold lettering on the cover. It is now a handsome and durable copy of the little manual beloved of the Church before Vatican II. I have just read it straight through, bringing back memories of a convent education in the 1950s, when we reeled out the answers to Mother St Hilda.
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