There are two ways to look at history. One way is to see it as a series of random occurrences. The other way is to view history through the lens of Kairos.

Why has Pope Francis been so willing to draw on the thoughts and words of a man whose radical ideas and actions so comprehensively contradict Catholic teaching?

When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of King Herod, behold, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star at its rising and have come to do him homage. (Matthew 2:1-2)

I believe in original sin, but theres nothing original about sin. Its deadly but dull.

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Some Motivation to Say the Liturgy of the Hours, Raising Your Children to Be Martyrs, and More! - National Catholic Register

In a recent survey, people who said social distancing and COVID-safety guidelines violated their personal freedoms responded more positively to these ideas when they felt a loved one might be at risk of severe illness.

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to ravage the world, messaging focused on shaming or pressuring people to wear a mask or avoid crowds are backfiring.

An and colleagues surveyed 1,074 people across the US about their attitudes toward the coronavirus.

They discovered two distinct sets of attitudes toward social distancing: Positive beliefs that largely mirror public health messaging and negative beliefs, including the idea that social distancing violates individual rights and freedoms.

Concern about a loved one's risk of severe COVID-19 infection was tied to both higher positive attitudes and lower negative attitudes toward social distancing.

"When people think about what protective behaviors to follow, negative beliefs -- the perception of external control -- override positive beliefs. This means that simply repeating that people should follow public health guidelines is unlikely to be effective," explained study author Kenneth Resnicow in a paper published in the journal Patient Education and Counseling.

The data showed that when people consider being a protector for others, they approach risk differently.

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Fear of Losing Loved Ones Can Motivate People to Get COVID Vaccine - The Quint

NAZARETH, Pa. - The Blue Eagles never got the chance to hoist the state title last season, or even compete for one. That unfinished business is what has motivated the Nazareth girls' basketball team all offseason and now as it prepares for the 2020-21 campaign.

As the COVID-19 pandemic halted their push for state gold in the spring, it now has paused the current season, just one day after it officially began and before most local teams played a contest.

After the resumption of the season, Nazareth will look to its newcomers this winter to make contributions, such as Courtney Paulson, who is back from injury, and Marina Falzone, who transferred from Moravian Academy.

Those new additions with a strong foundation of returners such as Kelly Leszcynski and Talya Brugler has the team's sights set on another bid for state gold.

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The Dodgers path to the 2020 World Series was anything but business as usual. After the year started with so much hope and promise in acquiring Mookie Betts, reality set it very quickly. The COVID-19 pandemic shut down the entire world by March, baseball included.

So while his team was left to wonder and wait, Dave Roberts made sure to leave them with a piece of wisdom. Before going into the Summer Camp restart, Doc imparted a quote on the team from Lakers legend Kobe Bryant.

The first thing I told our guys this past spring before we stopped before Summer Camp and the quarantine, I reference a Kobe Bryant quote. I was at his last NBA game, and he said The dream is the journey and I just really wanted our players to understand that the ups, the downs, the trials, the failures, the successesthats a part of it. And although we were still in a World Series or bust, we still needed to focus on the journey.

Even before his passing, Kobes words carried a lot of weight on any athlete, not just those playing in Los Angeles. But that wisdom to drown out the noise and move forward with your goal is ultimately what drove the Dodgers to their first title in 32 years.

Getting to be on a team as talented as the Dodgers only to face the shutdown of a sport could have been a devastating blow to Roberts and his guys. Instead, they picked up that Mamba Mentality and ran away with it. Did we really expect anything less?

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When 2016 United States Olympian and current unbeaten pro Charles Conwell signed up for this whole boxing thing, he probably never expected that he would one day be fighting in a parking lot.

No, not at all, laughed Conwell, who will be doing just that in Hollywood tonight when he faces fellow unbeaten Madiyar Ashkeyev in the latest installment of Ring City USA. I watched the fights in November, and it was awkward to me because it was in the parking lot.

What Conwell is really concerned about is that the December temps might hit the same lows hes been experiencing in his native Ohio. Well, it is 59 at the moment in Hollywood, which is better than 29 in Toledo, but perhaps its better to change the subject, especially since I was hoping Conwell had some story of a parking lot fight elsewhere.

That's a different type of fight, he laughs.

The 23-year-old Conwell is as comfortable as hes ever been around the media this year, perhaps a testament to being in the spotlight pretty consistently since he turned pro after the Olympics in 2017. Back then, lets just say Conwell wasnt exactly Bernard Hopkins in interviews. But he has settled in, is showing off his sense of humor, and when you add in the fighting style that has led him to a perfect 13-0 (10 KOs) record, hes got star potential at 154 pounds. Just dont tell him that 2021 is his year.

They said that last year, he chuckles. They said 2020 was the year. I'm tired of people saying every year is the year and I'm tired of putting a day on it. I'm just gonna let everything play out. I know a lot of stuff happened (in 2020), but every time somebody says something's gonna happen, they're kinda jinxing it.

I do remind Conwell that the COVID-19 pandemic kind of put an asterisk on everybodys year, and he agrees, but he still got in a decent 2020 campaign after a 2019 that ended on a down note after the death of Patrick Day after their October bout.

At the beginning of 2020, it was a little rocky, Conwell said. Then it started picking up - I got to fight in October and now I'm fighting in December, so it's been starting to pick up for me. I think if it weren't for the pandemic, I probably would have had four or five fights this year, depending on cuts or injuries. So it was a rocky start, but it's gonna be a good ending.

Add in a February stoppage of Ramses Agaton, and Conwell could be 3-0 for the year by the end of Thursday night. And if he does reach that mark, it will be a big deal because Kazakhstans Ashkeyev is expected to be the Olympians toughest test to date. Then again, fans expected 12-0 Wendy Toussaint to be that test in October. Conwell knocked him out in the ninth round.

I think they just said that because of the person's record, he said. I don't think that was the toughest fight for me in my career so far. He was a good opponent, and he came out and fought, but at the end I got the job done and got the KO.

So what was the toughest fight so far?

The Pat Day fight was pretty tough and the fight before the Pat Day fight with (Courtney) Pennington. He was crafty. That was my first 10 rounder, so that was tough.

Will Ashkeyev be a similarly tough puzzle to figure out?

I think he's gonna be pretty tough, said Conwell. I think he's gonna be tougher than Wendy Touissant, but I know for a fact I can beat him. It's how I'm gonna beat him; that's what I'm waiting to see. I don't know if it's gonna be a knockout or if it's gonna be a decision, but I know I'm gonna beat him for sure.

Then Conwell can get on with the business of having that big year everyone keeps predicting for him. But first, its a trip home to Cleveland and the holidays with his six-month-old daughter.

It feels good, he said of fatherhood. It gets kinda sad because you miss a lot of growth, a lot of milestones that the baby's doing, but it's always good to see how far she came when you get to go back home.

Fatherhood is when boys become men, and Conwell wouldnt dispute that his maturity has a lot to do with the bundle of joy that came into his life in June.

To be honest, I really think that might be something to do with it, said Conwell, who admits to having talks with his Soul City Boxing teammates about what the future may hold. And with 2020 U.S. Olympic team member OShae Jones and hot prospects Otha Jones III and Isaiah Steen (who is Conwells brother) on the team, that future is a bright one. But before they get carried away, he stops them.

We always talk about what we're gonna do when we get there, but to be honest, we gotta get there first and we ain't there yet.

Yeah, not too bad for 23.

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Conwell Motivated To End Year Strong, Expects Tough Fight With Ashkeyev - BoxingScene.com

By Express News Service

NEW DELHI: With the government staying firm on the farm laws, Union ministers Amit Shah, Narendra Singh Tomar and Piyush Goyal went into a huddle with the BJP national general secretaries at the party headquarters, with indications emerging that it is gearing up for the political challenge thrown up by the farmers protesting at the Capitals doorstep.

Minutes after the meeting concluded, Tomar, Union Minister for Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, released a hard-hitting letter addressed to the farmers, singling out conspirators for fuelling anarchy.

The meeting also came in the midst of the outreach by BJP leaders across the country to explain their position on the contentious farm sector reform laws and the steps taken by the government for the benefits of the farmers.

There is clarity that certain elements who have consistently been at loggerheads with the Narendra Modi government are fanning the farmers protests for vested interests. The BJP will effectively respond to the motivated campaign, said a senior BJP functionary.

Unions to consult four top lawyers

Farmer unions said they will first consult four top Supreme Court lawyers Prashant Bhushan, Colin Gonsalves, Dushyant Dave and H S Phoolka before taking a call on the SC impleading them in the case and forming of an impartial committee to resolve the matter

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Farmers protest: Motivated campaign, says BJP, readies to fight it out - The New Indian Express

BOSTON, Dec. 17, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --Perigee, founded by a former NSA mathematician, combines network exploitation and machine learning expertise to stop malicious threats, improve behavior, and extend the life of connected devices in real-time. Today, Perigee announced the closing of their first institutional capital round of $1.5M.

The round was led by Outsiders Fund's Austin McChord and Teddy Seem, with additional investment from Westport, Contour Venture Partners, BBG Ventures, Innospark Ventures, Ray Rothrock, and Corey Thomas. The newly invested capital will be used to hire new talent, further develop the product, and grow the enterprise within environmental controls and beyond.

McChord, founder and former CEO of data backup service Datto, said, "Teddy and I are incredibly excited to work with such a talented team. This space is clamoring for new thinking and we are really excited to be backing Mollie and her vision around how the ever-changing security landscape can be improved."

Perigee's founder and CEO Mollie Breen previously led a team at NSA where she focused on critical infrastructure. With Perigee, she is extending that expertise to critical infrastructure across enterprises with a specific focus on connected devices.

The same brand of connected thermostats installed in the physician lounge and in the NICU will inevitably be a part of a different workflow and have a different risk profile. Perigee isolates threats unique to a specific thermostat, in real-time, in order to minimally impact an enterprise's critical operations.

"Connected devices are used to increase the ROI of certain critical operations by making them faster and automated, and we focus on increasing the ROI of the devices themselves by making them more trustworthy and longer lasting," Breen said.

Perigee is uniquely positioned to bridge IoT security and IoT analytics.

Breen said: "Analytics solutions are often not built with security in mind. We are a security-first solution, that quantifies improvements in a single device's overall behavior and hygiene, for all devices."

The company is focusing initially on devices within HVAC and environmental controls in critical industries like healthcare at a time when these sensors are of the utmost importance.

"HVAC and Environmental Controls play an important part in patient care. If you don't have those, especially now due to COVID-19, you're not taking care of them. These systems are just as important as your Electronic Medical Record. Secure them like it," said Mitch Parker, CISO of Indiana University Health.

The Perigee team sees HVAC and environmental controls as the optimal starting point to expand into the growing footprint of connected devices.

Breen said: "As real estate developers look to healthcare to set future standards for healthier buildings, working with hospitals means we understand the most critical devices today, and in the future too."

About Perigee

Perigee provides protection and enhancement for connected devices' entire life cycle. Perigee was founded in 2019 by former NSA mathematician Mollie Breen, CEO.Learn more at: http://www.getperigee.com

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Apple raised a lot of eyebrows this summer when it announced that it would stop using Intel processors. Its Mac computers would instead migrate to its own processors based on the Arm Instruction Set Architecture (ISA). Intel and AMD have been dominant in the PC laptop and desktop market for decades. For more than 15 years, Intel has been the sole supplier of processors for Apples Mac range. However, Apple has a long history with Arm.

Arm specialized in building energy-efficient processors that only used a few watts of power. This meant they were perfect for smartphones and tablets. From the very first iPhone right up until today, Apple has used Arm-based processors in its mobile devices. With that wealth of experience and expertise, the Cupertino company concluded that it could build processors that were energy-efficient, but also offered competitive performance. It, therefore, decided to expand the reach of its smartphone and tablet processors and move into the PC market.

See also: Want an Apple laptop? Here are the best you can buy right now

And so the Apple M1 processor was born. It is the SoC found in the new MacBook Air, 13-inch MacBook Pro, and Mac Mini. It is also the first of a series of processors that will see Apple completely replace Intel in every Mac model. This transition will take about two years and the three new M1 based devices are just the beginning.

But, is the performance of the M1 competitive, or did Apple make a mistake? Lets find out!

Credit: Gary Sims / Android Authority

The Apple M1 is an SoC. That means it has a CPU, a GPU, a Neural Engine, and I/O (like Thunderbolt). It has 16 billion transistors and is manufactured using a 5nm process.

The M1 has four performance cores, each designed to run a single task as efficiently as possible while maximizing performance. Four efficiency cores handle lighter workloads. There is also an eight-core integrated GPU. According to Apple, the M1 offers up to 3.5x faster CPU performance, compared to 1.2GHz Intel Core i7-1060NG7 found in the previous generation of MacBook Air.

If you want more information on the Apple M1 then you might find my Apple M1 and new Macsvideo useful.

Credit: Gary Sims / Android Authority

To test the performance of the Apple M1, I am using a MacBook Air with the 8-Core CPU/8-Core GPU variant of the processor along with 8GB of RAM and 512GB of storage.

According to the official Geekbench results, the MacBook Air with the M1 scores 1,690 for the Single-Core test. That means that the new MacBook Air has better single-core performance than every Intel Mac that exists. Not just every Intel MacBook Air, but every Intel-based Mac.

The new MacBook Air has better single-core performance than every Intel Mac that exists.

For multi-core, the M1 based MacBook Air scores 7,304. With just eight cores, this isnt going to be earth-shattering. The late 2019 Mac Pro has a 28-core Intel Xeon processor, so the mere eight-core MacBook Air isnt going to beat it. However, it does beat every other Intel-based Mac that isnt a Mac Pro. The only exceptions are the very high-end 27-inch iMacs from 2019 and 2020. Very impressive for Apples first laptop processor!

Cinebench is a real-world test that evaluates a computers processor by running CPU only rendering tasks and measuring the performance. Cinebench R23 gives the M1 based MacBook Air a score of 1,515 for single-core performance. That is higher than the Intel Core i7-7700K, higher than the Intel Core i7-1060NG7, better than AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2990, and just below the 11th generation Intel Core i7-1165G7.

Credit: Gary Sims / Android Authority

As with Geekbench, the multi-core score isnt going to be revolutionary. It scores 7,326, which interestingly beats the Intel Core i7-7700K and the Intel Core i7-1060NG7 (from the previous generation of MacBook Air). But there are plenty of processors with 16, 24, 32, or more cores. These naturally score higher.

Speed Test G is our custom performance testing system that takes the best parts of traditional speed tests and combines them with the benefits of benchmarks. It runs primarily on Android (although there is a version for iOS) and measures performance by launching a series of apps that perform both single-core and multi-core tasks. As in real life, not everything is single-core, but neither is everything multi-core.

Speed Test G PC, a reimagining of Speed Test G this time for desktops and laptops gives the MacBook Air a run time of 56 seconds. That is faster than the 2019 MBP 16-inch with the i9-9980HK and faster than the 2019 MBP 13-inch with the i7-8569U.

The MacBook Air has no fan or active cooling. This makes it a perfect candidate for testing the thermal properties of the M1 chip. Does the processor slow down when it heats up? If so, by how much?

After a night of sitting in my office, the MacBook Air had a surface temperature of around 20C. I then ran several programs to stress the CPU and GPU to the maximum. This included Speed Test G PC and the Unity benchmark from the mobile version of Speed Test G (but built for the M1 on macOS). It was also connected to the mains, generating heating as a side product of charging. As the processor started to heat up, the bottom of the laptop became warm (due to the passive cooling), particularly in the center towards the back. This heat spread slowly outwards from that middle point.

Apple has managed to jump directly into the laptop and the small desktop market at a competitive level.

After an hour of heavy load, the temperature on the underside of the device hit 41C. Additionally, the battery stopped charging (although it wasnt full or even near the smart battery level of 80%). This was due to the heat. There is likely some software that detects the thermal situation and stops the charging to ensure that the device doesnt become too hot. Once the stress on the processor was reduced, the laptop started charging again.

While the laptop was nice and warm, I ran the multi-core test from Cinebench R23 again. The result was a 7,110, down from 7,336 less than 5%.

What this means is that the processor generates heat under heavy loads, as does every processor, but the passive cooling is able to disperse that heat efficiently. The overall impact on performance is minimal.

Credit: Gary Sims / Android Authority

Apple has managed to jump directly into the laptop and the small desktop market at a competitive level. The M1 is fast. Is it the fastest chip on the planet? No, but it isnt designed to be. Is it the fastest processor ever used in a Mac laptop? Absolutely. Will it handle your workloads? Almost certainly.

Opinion: Dont be duped by performance, Apples M1 silicon is all about platform control

It also means that Apple has successfully made the first steps in replacing Intel processors in its Mac range. The next iteration of processors those that will be used by the iMac will be very interesting, as Apple will be trying to loosen Intel and AMDs grip on turf that is traditionally their stronghold. Can Apple do it? If the M1 is a measure of the companys potential then the answer is a resounding yes.

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Apple M1 tested: Performance benchmarks and thermal throttling - Android Authority

By KC Ifeanyi2 minute Read

Theres a scant history of posthumous Oscar winners, but Chadwick Bosemans performance in Netflixs Ma Raineys Black Bottom is a shoo-in for a nominationand could possibly clinch a win on the power of one scene alone.

Adapted from August Wilsons 1984 play, Ma Raineys Black Bottom stars Boseman as Levee, a hot-tempered trumpet player in legendary blues singer Ma Raineys band. A recording session is fraught with mounting friction as Levees volatility leads to a devastating incident.

Ma Raineys Black Bottom marks Bosemans final onscreen performance since he passed away from colon cancer in August. Watching his frenetic and searing portrait of a deeply troubled musician serves as a heartbreaking reminder of the magnitude of talent cinema lost.

While Boseman is magnetic throughout the film, theres one monologue in particular thats practically gilded with Oscar gold.

After Levee shows an exuberant amount of deference to the white recording studio owner, Levees bandmates playfully rib him on how he talks a big game but is spooked by the white man. As playful as they were with their jokes, Levees temperament rapidly darkens before exploding into a heart-wrenching story explaining his tortured relationship with white men. When he was just eight years old, a gang of white men broke into his home and raped his mother in the kitchen. What followed was a slow-burn revenge plot his father carried out against the perpetrators that brought some justice for the crimes but ultimately ended in his murder.

Boseman masterfully carries the scene with an intensity of barely contained rage, which is only magnified by the fact that its a five-minute monologue with little editing.

But, as screenwriter Ruben Santiago-Hudson explains, that scene almost turned out differently.

I wanted to keep it simple and just deal with Levee and his eyes and the eyes of the other men, Santiago-Hudson says.

However, he received notes to add more elements to the scene to break up the long shots.

They felt that in movies, you dont just sit on one character for three pages, he says.

He tried to incorporate more people in the scene or even just hands performing various actions relating to Levees story as sort of an abstract way to add more beats to the scene. But in the end, Santiago-Hudson pressed for his original idea to keep it as simple as possible, and thats what made the final cut.

I said, Trust it: the actor can do it. Augusts words can do it. [Director George C. Wolfes] direction can do it, Santiago-Hudson says. Im directing when Im writing. I dont tell George, You gotta use this camera or that lens. But Ill say, The camera begins to slowly creep in on Levees eyes. Occasionally well cut back to the other characters. You see how theyre absorbing the story. His rage grows. His eyes intensify.'

The most recent actor to earn an Oscar after his passing was Heath Ledger, who won as best supporting actor in 2008 for The Dark Knight. Boseman, who was undergoing surgeries and/or chemotherapy during filming, is equally deserving of the honor.

There was a transcendence about Chads performance, but there needed to be, said Viola Davis in an interview with The New York Times. This is a man whos raging at God, whos lost even his faith. So [Boseman has] got to sort of go to the edge of hope and death and life in order to make that character work. Of course, you look back on it and see that thats where he was.

KC covers entertainment and pop culture for Fast Company. Previously, KC was part of the Emmy Award-winning team at "Good Morning America," where he was the social media producer.

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Chadwick Boseman should win the Oscar for this scene in Netflix's 'Ma Rainey's Black Bottom' - Fast Company

The loan disbursement of below Rs 50,000 ticket size has grown five times in the last two financial years, a report by the CRIF India shows. As per the report, the trend is seen in low-income families and borrowers are opting for personal loans for consumption needs and not for emergency purposes.

As per the CRIF India report, the small-ticket personal loans are primarily driven by non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) and fintech startups.

NBFCs and neo-age lenders or fintechs are increasingly targeting young, low-income, digitally-savvy customers who have small-ticket and short-term credit needs, and no or limited credit historycustomers who are generally avoided by the incumbents because of their high perceived risk," the report said.

As of March 2020, the report shows that more than 50 percent of volume share in small loans is of Rs 5000 or less segment which is a strong indication that the concept of checkout finance and payday loan is catching up.

As per the loan disbursal trends by age of the borrower, it is seen that personal loans demand is largely being driven by millennials and young borrowers in the age group 18-30 years with an increase in share from 27 percent to 41 percent in annual originations in the last 2 years.

In FY20, the proportion of loans disbursed to those with income of below Rs 3 lakh has grown over the last three years, reaching 69 percent in new loans in FY20.

In terms of volume, NBFCs continue to grow and have doubled their market share in the last two years, observed at FY2020 end. Their current market share as of August 2020 is 42 percent. Public sector banks and Private banks have lost significant volume share over the last 2 years.

In terms of value market share at the end of FY 2020, there is no significant shift in the last two years for NBFCs.

However, in FY 2020-21, disruptions due to COVID-19 have led to an increase in share of mature borrowers while younger borrowers have demanded lower volume of personal loans.

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Personal loan: Small-ticket disbursements up five times in 2 years - Moneycontrol.com