Evolutionary History of Animal Domestication | Evangelicals Cool to Conversion Therapy

Green Beings

Men in Charge

Animal Domestication: Taming the Wild National Geographic

Images from photographer Vincent J MusiImages used in National Geographic article are ‘Domestication’ series on Vincent J Musi website

The exercise of dominion over plants and animals (and AOC adds women) is arguably the most consequential event in human history. Along with cultivated agriculture, the ability to raise and manage domesticated fauna—of which wolves were likely the first, but chickens, cattle, and other food species the most important—altered the human diet, paving the way for settlements and eventually nation-states to flourish. By putting humans in close contact with animals, domestication also created vectors for the diseases that shaped society.

Related reading

Lab-grown meat would cut greenhouse gas emissions and save energy, research suggests Science Daily

Researchers in the Netherlands believe that ‘cultured meat’ could be part of the solution to feeding the world in the future, and vastly improving impact on the environment at the same time. Without focusing on whether people would eat ‘cultured meat’, the researchers contend that it would involve “approximately 7-45% lower energy use, 78-96% lower greenhouse gas emissions, 99% lower land use, and 82-96% lower water use depending on the type of meat.”

Boys Club

Sins of Our Fathers

70-Year-Old Queens prison chaplain arrested for paying inmate for oral sex NY Daily News

Getty imagesQueensboro Correctional Facility chaplain Frank De Tucci, 70, was doing more than penance, kneeling Sunday in front of a prisoner and most likely not doing penance or saying the rosary for the man’s soul. The chaplain had $200 in his shoe and another $153 im his wallet when detained by a guard.

In question chaplain De Tucci admitted that on July 5 he paid the same inmate $120 and $150 for two separate sessions of oral sex at the minimum-security Long Island City facility.

De Tucci, who has been a chaplain for 27 years in the state correctional system, faces up to four years in prison on a variety of charges. He is also a deacon at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church in Astoria.

Philadelphia Gets New Archbishop

Amid American church abuse scandal, Philadelphia stands out CNN Belief Blog

Philadelphia Archbishop Justin Rigali stepped down today, after the Vatican accepted his resignation and appointed Archbishop Charles Chaput to take over the Philadelphia position.

“What makes Philadelphia devastating is allegations that priests who were facing credible accusation of sex abuse were still working in parishes as recently as February,” CNN senior Vatican analyst John Allen said. “This is not about misconduct that happened 50 years go. This is about the failures of today.”

Early in 2011, a Philadelphia grand jury not only charged four priests and a parochial school teacher with raping and assaulting boys in their care. The grand jury also charged a Catholic church official with failing to take proper actions in reports of sexual abuse.

Evangelicals and Homosexuality

Amid Bachmann controversy, many Christians cool to conversion therapy for gays CNN Belief Blog

Presidential candidate Michele Bachmann and her husband Marcus, who says his counseling business uses conversion therapy for clients who request it.Responding to science that suggests homosexuality may be innate, many evangelicals who once viewed conversion therapy as key way to deal with homosexuality, no longer support the practice.

“Evangelicals, in quiet ways, are shifting to this position to where there is just not a lot of support for the change paradigm,” said Warren Throckmorton, an influential voice in the world of Christian counseling, referring to so-called change therapy.

In issuing their 2009 position paper condemning conversion therapy, The American Psychological Association did urge therapists to consider the religious beliefs of clients when they sought counseling for homosexual desires.