3.6 Gpa Accepted Columbia University

Obama's speech


TUCSON, Ariz.. - This is the text of Obama's long speech in memory of the five victims of the republic senator Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson, Arizona during his rally ended in a massacre by a deranged individual.
I tried to translate (as can be my faithful translation) the text, but I stopped when I came to less than half the speech! Too long ... but nice! Clicking on the title you can see the video from youtube.

"To the Families of Those we've lost; Who Called Them to all friends, to the students of this university, the public servants Gathered tonight, and the people of Tucson and Arizona: as I have here tonight as an American who , like all Americans, kneels to pray with you today, and tomorrow will stand by you.

the families of those we lost, to all those he had friends, students of this university, all the officials gathered here tonight, and the citizens of Tucson and Arizona: I came here tonight as an American who, Like all Americans, we kneel to pray with you today, and be with you tomorrow.

There is nothing I can say That will fill the sudden hole torn in your hearts. But know this: the Hopes of a nation are here tonight. We mourn with you for the fallen. We join you in your grief. And we add yours to Our Faith That Representative Gabrielle Giffords and the other living victims of this tragedy pull through. There

nothing to say who will fill the sudden hole dug in your hearts. But know this: the hopes of the nation are here tonight. We mourn with you for the fallen. We join you in your grief. And add our faith that your Representative Gabrielle Giffords and other victims and survivors of this tragedy can make it.
As Scripture tells us: There Is a River

Whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy
Place where the Most High Dwells.
God Is Within her, she will not fall;
God will help her at break of day.

The Bible tells us

There is a river whose course makes glad the city of God,
a sacred place where the Most High dwells.
God is within you, you will not fall;
God will help at the dawn of day.

[...]

Our hearts are full of hope and thanks for the 13 Americans who SURVIVED the shooting, the congresswoman Including many of Them Went to see on Saturday. I have just as from the University Medical Center, just a mile from here, where, Our friend Gabby courageously fights to recover even as we speak. And I can tell you this - she knows we're here and she knows we love her and she knows That we will be rooting for her throughout what will be a Difficult Journey.

Our hearts are full of hope and thanks to the 13 Americans who survived the shooting including the parliament, many of them had gone to see it Saturday. I just
rtornato the University of Medical Center, a few miles from here, where our amca Gabby fight bravely, even when as we speak. I can tell you this-you know we're here and you know that we love and she knows that tiferemo for her through what will be a difficult journey.

And Our Hearts are full of Gratitude for Those Who saved others. We are grateful for Daniel Hernandez, a volunteer in Gabby's office who ran through the chaos to minister to His boss, Wounds tending to her to keep her alive. We are grateful for the men who tackled the gunman as he stopped to reload [...].
Our hearts are full of gratitude to those who saved others. We are grateful to Daniel Fernandez, a volunteer of the Cabinet of Gabby who rushed to help their boss by taking care of the wounds to keep it alive. We are grateful to the men who stopped the killer in the omentum that he stopped to reload. These men and women

remind us That heroism is found not only on the fields of battle. They remind us That heroism does not require special training or physical strength. Heroism is here, all around us, in the hearts of so many of Our Fellow Citizens, just waiting to be Summoned - as It Was on Saturday morning.

Their actions, Their selflessness, Also put a challenge to Each of Us. It raises the question of what, beyond the prayers and expressions of concern, is required of us going forward. How can we honor the fallen? How can we be true to their memory?

You see, when a tragedy like this strikes, it is part of our nature to demand explanations - to try to impose some order on the chaos, and make sense out of that which seems senseless. Already we've seen a national conversation commence, not only about the motivations behind these killings, but about everything from the merits of gun safety laws to the adequacy of our mental health systems. Much of this process, of debating what might be done to prevent such tragedies in the future, is an essential ingredient in our exercise of self-government.

But at a time when our discourse has become so sharply polarized - at a time when we are far too eager to lay the blame for all that ails the world at the feet of those who think differently than we do - it's important for us to pause for a moment and make sure that we are talking with each other in a way that heals, not a way that wounds.

Scripture tells us that there is evil in the world, and that terrible things happen for reasons that defy human understanding. In the words of Job, "when I looked for light, then came darkness." Bad things happen, and we must guard against simple explanations in the aftermath.

For the truth is that none of us can know exactly what triggered this vicious attack. None of us can know with any certainty what might have stopped those shots from being fired, or what thoughts lurked in the inner recesses of a violent man's mind.

So yes, we must examine all the facts behind this tragedy. We cannot and will not be passive in the face of such violence. We should be willing to challenge old assumptions in order to lessen the prospects of violence in the future.

But what we can't do is use this tragedy as one more occasion to turn on one another. As we discuss these issues, let each of us do so with a good dose of humility. Rather than pointing fingers or assigning blame, let us use this occasion to expand our moral imaginations, to listen to each other more carefully, to sharpen our instincts for empathy, and remind ourselves of all the ways our hopes and dreams are bound together.

After all, that's what most of us do when we lose someone in our family - especially if the loss is unexpected. We're shaken from our routines, and forced to look inward. We reflect on the past. Did we spend enough time with an aging parent, we wonder. Did we express our gratitude for all the sacrifices they made for us? Did we tell a spouse just how desperately we loved them, not just once in awhile but every single day?

So sudden loss causes us to look backward - but it also forces us to look forward, to reflect on the present and the future, on the manner in which we live our lives and nurture our relationships with those who are still with us. We may ask ourselves if we've shown enough kindness and generosity and compassion to the people in our lives. Perhaps we question whether we are doing right by our children, or our community, and whether our priorities are in order. We recognize our own mortality, and are reminded that in the fleeting time we have on this earth, what matters is not wealth, or status, or power, or fame - but rather, how well we have loved, and what small part we have played in bettering the lives of others.

That process of reflection, of making sure we align our values with our actions - that, I believe, is what a tragedy like this requires. For those who were harmed, those who were killed - they are part of our family, an American family 300 million strong. We may not have known them personally, but we surely see ourselves in them. In George and Dot, in Dorwan and Mavy, we sense the abiding love we have for our own husbands, our own wives, our own life partners. Phyllis - she's our mom or grandma; Gabe our brother or son. In Judge Roll, we recognize not only a man who prized his family and doing his job well, but also a man who embodied America's fidelity to the law. In Gabby, we see a reflection of our public spiritedness, that desire to participate in that sometimes frustrating, sometimes contentious, but always necessary and never-ending process to form a more perfect union.

And in Christina...in Christina we see all of our children. So curious, so trusting, so energetic and full of magic.

So deserving of our love.

And so deserving of our good example. If this tragedy prompts reflection and debate, as it should, let's make sure it's worthy of those we have lost. Let's make sure it's not on the usual plane of politics and point scoring and pettiness that drifts away with the next news cycle.

The loss of these wonderful people should make every one of us strive to be better in our private lives - to be better friends and neighbors, co-workers and parents. And if, as has been discussed in recent days, their deaths help usher in more civility in our public discourse, let's remember that it is not because a simple lack of civility caused this tragedy, but rather because only a more civil and honest public discourse can help us face up to our challenges as a nation, in a way that would make them proud. It should be because we want to live up to the example of public servants like John Roll and Gabby Giffords, who knew first and foremost that we are all Americans, and that we can question each other's ideas without questioning each other's love of country, and that our task, working together, is to constantly widen the circle of our concern so that we bequeath the American dream to future generations.

I believe we can be better. Those who died here, those who saved lives here - they help me believe. We may not be able to stop all evil in the world, but I know that how we treat one another is entirely up to us. I believe that for all our imperfections, we are full of decency and goodness, and that the forces that divide us are not as strong as those that unite us.

That's what I believe, in part because that's what a child like Christina Taylor Green believed. Imagine: here was a young girl who was just becoming aware of our democracy; just beginning to understand the obligations of citizenship; just starting to glimpse the fact that someday she too might play a part in shaping her nation's future. She had been elected to her student council; she saw public service as something exciting, something hopeful. She was off to meet her congresswoman, someone she was sure was good and important and might be a role model. She saw all this through the eyes of a child, undimmed by the cynicism or vitriol that we adults all too often just take for granted.

I want us to live up to her expectations. I want our democracy to be as good as she imagined it. All of us - we should do everything we can to make sure this country lives up to our children's expectations.

Christina was given to us on September 11th, 2001, one of 50 babies born that day to be pictured in a book called "Faces of Hope." On either side of her photo in that book were simple wishes for a child's life. "I hope you help those in need," read one. "I hope you know all of the words to the National Anthem and sing it with your hand over your heart. I hope you jump in rain puddles."

If there are rain puddles in heaven, Christina is jumping in them today. And here on Earth, we place our hands over our hearts, and commit ourselves as Americans to forging a country that is forever worthy of her gentle, happy spirit.

May God bless and keep those we've lost in restful and eternal peace. May He love and watch over the survivors. And May He bless the United States of America. "

Cryptic Clues Place Names

estonia

TALLINN - An Estonian citizen has found a treasure of over a thousand pieces of silverware to his government declared that the year yielded almost € 100,000.
"According to the Estonian law, a person who finds and declares an ancient treasure to the authorities is entitled to half of its value, "
The identity of the lucky treasure hunter has not been made public.
"Most of the coins are almost 1000 from Germany and the rest from England, Sweden, Denmark and Hungary An Italian silver coin seems," said Mauri Kiudsoo so, expert at the University of Tallinn.

The man made the discovery on August 16 last year while digging in a farmer's field near Tallinn.
The treasure, packed in a broken earthen pot, made up of 1,329 silver coins and nine other silver objects.

Radioremote Wire Color

"... Soft ..." Michele Zaggia

What Is Know About Lugarics

Open doors between the church and the piazza San Francesco d'Assisi

Gianfranco Ravasi

"The world is like the eye: the sea is white, the earth is the iris, the pupil is Jerusalem, and the image reflected in it is the temple ". This ancient rabbinic aphorism explains in clear and symbolic function over time according to an intuition which is primordial and universal. There are two ideas underlying image. The first is the "center" cosmic sacred place must be, a matter on which the great scholar of religion Mircea Eliade (1907-1986) offered an extensive dossier documentary. The outer horizon, with its fragmentation and its tensions, and converge in an area that is appeased for its purity must embody a sense, the heart, the whole order of being.

In the temple, then, is "by concentrating" the multiplicity of reality that it is in peace and harmony: just think of the layout of some cities in radial stem from the sun "ideal represented by the cathedral in the mail central urban core (Milan, for example, "centered" on the cathedral is an obvious example, as New York is the testimony of a different view, more dispersed and Babel). From the temple, then, is "de-centering" a breath of life, of holiness, lighting that transforms the everyday and the daily unfolding of space. It is at this point that he enters the second theme underlying the above mentioned Jewish said.

The temple is the image that reflects and reveals the pupil. It is, therefore, a sign of light and beauty. In other words, we could say that the sacred space is the manifestation of cosmic and divine manifestation of divine radiance. In this sense sacred architecture who is unable to speak properly - indeed, "beautiful" - the language of light is not bearer of beauty and harmony is automatically invalidated by its function, it becomes "secular" and "profane." It is from the intersection of two elements, the centrality and beauty, blossoming what Le Corbusier called so dazzling "space indescribable", space truly holy and spiritual, sacred and mystical.

Of course, these two axes carrying with it many consequences: think of 'deafness', all'inospitalità, early, pull up the opacity of the many churches without regard to the voice and silence in the liturgy and assembly, watching and listening, all'ineffabilità and communion. Churches where you are lost as in a conference room, distracted as in a sports hall, rolled like a fronton, brutalized as a house pretentious and vulgar.

At this point we would like to propose a reflection of nature which has the most specific reference code exactly those Biblical Scriptures were indeed "the great code" of Western civilization itself art. It is indisputable that the relief they have a "theology" of space, even though - as you will - it is indeed a theology in higher education, the time and history (the Incarnation sums up these two dimensions put back in their hierarchy).

"For Your servants are expensive stones of Zion" (Psalm , 102, 15). This profession of love of the ancient psalmist could be the motto of the Christian tradition that the sacred space that has always reserved a special importance, since the "stone" of the Holy Sepulchre, a sign of Christ's resurrection, which is built around a emblematic of the temples of all Christianity. Among other things, it is curious that symbolically the three monotheistic religions is based on three keepers in Jerusalem sacred stones, the Western Wall (popularly called "the Tears "), a sign of the Solomonic temple for the Jews, the rock of the ascension to heaven of Mohammed Omar in the Mosque for Islam and, indeed, the stone rolled back to the Christianity of the Holy Sepulchre.

course is that without spirituality and Christian liturgy, the history of architecture would have been much more miserable: just think of the clarity of the early Christian basilicas, the refinement of Byzantine ones, the monumentality of the Romanesque, the mysticism of the Gothic churches of the radiance Renaissance, the opulence of the baroque, the harmony of the sacred buildings of eighteenth-century neo-classic to the nineteenth century, leading to the simple purity of some contemporary works (an example for all: the charming church of that Le Corbusier in Ronchamp).

Thus, there is in Christianity a constant celebration of space as a forum open to the divine, starting from that supreme temple that is the cosmos.

A great historian of theology Marie-Dominique Chenu (1895-1990), at the end of his life he regretted he had reserved too little space to both literary and figurative arts and architecture in its history of religious thought, because "They are not only aesthetic representations, but genuine theological subjects." Relegated to the anonymity in which the great cathedral builders just need to emerge, for example, an architectural and artistic genius Sugero as the abbot of Saint-Denis (XIII century).

That said, however, in the Christian concept is a very heavy component - as mentioned - the theological center of gravity moves from space to time. And it is this aspect that we now wish to fix our attention. Last page of the New Testament, when John the Seer overlooking the floor plan of the new Jerusalem of perfection and fullness, is faced with a given at first sight puzzling: "I saw no temple in it for the Lord God Almighty and the ' Lamb are its temple " (Revelation , 21, 22). Between God and man no longer need any mediation space, the meeting is now between people, you meet the divine life with human directly. From this discovery, we trace back through a sequence of scenes just as unexpected.

Imagine chasing this red wire to the head by grasping the opposite extreme. David decides to build a temple in the capital of newly created, Jerusalem, in order to have God as well as the citizen in his kingdom. But here's the surprising answer given by the prophet Nathan oracular negative: the king will not build any "home" to God but the Lord will give a "home" to David, "You the Lord will do great, because a house will make you the Lord "(ii Samuel, 7, 11). In Hebrew it plays on the ambivalence of the term Bayit," home "and" family. "God, therefore, to sacred space of a house-church prefers the presence in a house-house, is in the history of a people, the Davidic dynasty that will color the messianic tone.

course, space is not desecrated.'s son David, Solomon, will raise a temple that the Bible describes with admiration and emphasis. Yet when he is pronouncing his prayer of consecration, it must necessarily ask: "Is it really true that God can live on earth? Behold the heaven and heaven of heavens can not contain, much less this house that I built! "(1 Kings , 8, 27). The church, then, is just the context of a personal encounter and life (not for nothing in the Bible speaks of "the tent of meeting") that sees God bend "the place of his abode, from heaven" of his transcendence to the people who rushed into the sanctuary of Zion with the reality of his painful history of which lists the various dramas.

The prophets will come to the point of undermining the foundations of the temple and its religious worship if it is reduced to just be a magical and sacred space, dissociated from life the civic square, which is ethical and existential commitment, and given only to present a purely ritual and hypocritical.

Suffice it, among the many prophetic passages of similar content, read this section of the prophet Amos (eighth century before the Christian era): "I hate, I despise your feasts, and I do not like your meetings. Even if you offer me burnt offerings I do not accept your gifts. Victims of peace even look at them fat. Far from me the noise of your songs, the sound of your harps I can not stand it! Rather flows like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream! " (5, 21-24).

But let Christianity in a direct way. Christ, like any good jew, like the Temple of Jerusalem. Do not hesitate to challenge and to lead a whip blows against the merchants who desecrate with their businesses, he attended the liturgy in the various solemnity, as will his disciples that they will reserve a space for them even in the so-called "Portico Solomon. " Yet Christ himself in that sunny afternoon at Jacob's well, in front of Mount Gerizim, the sacred place of the community of Samaritans, not afraid to say that the woman is drawing water, "Believe me, woman is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father ... It is time, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth "(John , 4, 21-24).

There will be another turning point that will install the divine presence in the same" flesh " humanity through the person of Christ, as stated by the famous prologue of the Gospel of John: "The Word became flesh and pitched his tent among us" (1, 14), with obvious reference to the "tent" the temple of Zion. Among other things, the greek word eskénosen , "pitched tent" reflects the radical skn the word Hebrew which is called the "Presence" of God in the Temple of Zion, Shekinah. Jesus will be even more explicit: "Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it."

The evangelist John writes: "He spoke of the temple of his body" (2, 19-21). Paul goes further and, writing to the Christians of Corinth, he would declare: "Know ye not that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you ... Therefore honor God with your body!" (I, 6, 19-20).

"A temple of living stones," therefore, as St. Peter writes, "used to build a spiritual house" (I, 2, 5) a sanctuary not extrinsic, material and space, but an existential, a temple in time. The temple architecture will therefore always necessary, but must have within itself a function of the symbol is no longer an untouchable sacred and magical, but only a necessary sign of divine presence in history and life of humanity. The temple, therefore, does not exclude or exorcised the square of civilian life but fruitful, transforms, cleanses the existence, giving it a further meaning and transcendence. That is, once they reach full communion between the divine and human, the temple in the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of hope, will dissolve and "God will all in all "(1 Corinthians , 15, 28).

conclude our discussion with three examples. The first summarizes the steps of the speech made so far. It is a chant reminiscent of medieval Jewish Kabbalistic various steps to find the place where God is truly meets the chorus in Hebrew, assonant refrain that is repeated in each stanza: hu 'hammaqôm shel-maqôm / we'en hammaqôm meqomô. a play on words and intuition striking it says: "He, God, is the location of every place, / but this place does not take place."

The second witness is linked to the figure St. Francis and is derived from Chapter 37 of the second Life of Thomas of Celano, Abruzzo Franciscan. A monk said to Francis: "We have more money to the poor." Francis replied: "Rake the altar of the Virgin and Vendin furniture, if you can not otherwise meet the needs of those in need."

She added: "Believe me, the Virgin will be more expensive it is to observe the gospel of his Son and his bare altar, rather than see the ornate altar and despised son in the Son of Man" . We must, therefore, only remains of the temple and its beauty? No, because Francis is convinced that God will give us time again, with all the trappings: "The Lord will send people to return to the Mother as it gave us on loan for the Church."

The third and final consideration is offered to us by the Orthodox spirituality. A well-known Russian lay theologian of the twentieth century lived in Paris, Pavel Evdokimov, stated that between the square and the temple there should be a locked door, but open to a threshold where the scrolls of incense, chants, prayers of the faithful and the glitter of lights are reflected in the square ring where laughter and tears, and even the blasphemy and the cry of despair of the unhappy. In fact, the wind of the Spirit of God has to run between the sacred hall and the square where human activity takes place. It is found, so genuine and profound soul of the Incarnation that weaves itself in space and infinite, and eternal story, and absolute quota.

(© L'Osservatore Romano 17 to 18 January 2011)