Watching the World
German Churches Admit Holocaust Blame
January 1995 marked 50 years since the liberation of the concentration camp at Auschwitz, Poland, where Nazis engaged in the systematic persecution of Jews, Slavs, Gypsies, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and others. Some churches in Germany accept a share of the blame. Süddeutsche Zeitung reported that the German Bishops Conference described the “guilt-ridden history of our country and also our church,” admitting that “there was much error and guilt among Catholics. Not a few let themselves be won over to the National Socialist ideology and remained indifferent to crimes.” The chairman of the Council of Protestant Churches in Germany confessed that “in this bitter process of realization, we have become aware that even Christian theology and the church participated in the long history of alienation and enmity toward the Jews.”
A Shrine for Breakups
People hoping for a divorce or a breakup in other unwanted relationships are flocking to a Shinto shrine in Ashikaga, 50 miles [80 km] north of Tokyo. Known as the Tie Severing Shrine, it purports to be the only Shinto temple in Japan to accept petitions for divorce, says the newspaper Asahi Evening News. Every day, scores of worshipers arrive. Each writes his or her plea on an ema, a thin wooden board, hangs it up in the shrine’s precincts, and prays that the gods will answer. The newspaper explains that about a hundred years ago, when the shrine was founded, “the wives of rich local merchants wrote prayers asking that their husbands leave their lovers and come back to them.” Today, though, the earnest pleas offered are no longer for reconciliation.
Eyes Do Double Work
The human eye has more than one function, researchers say. One, of course, is to give us conscious vision. The other, recently discovered and reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, is to register light impulses that regulate the body’s internal daily clock. Because this second function operates independently of the ability to see, even people who are totally blind and without perception of light can have normally functioning biological clocks. The finding could lead to changes in treating the blind. For example, one common practice is to remove the eyes of totally blind people and replace them with artificial eyes that are cosmetically more appealing. Also, totally blind people are usually not checked for such conditions as glaucoma, which blocks the retina’s ability to register light. As a result, said Dr. Charles A. Czeisler, the head of the research team, most of these people are no longer able to regulate their internal clocks to the 24-hour day-and-night cycle, resulting in a permanent sleep disorder that mimics jet lag.
A “Patron Saint” for Films
The film industry will soon boast its very own “patron saint,” reports El País, a Madrid, Spain, newspaper. To mark the first centenary of the movie industry, the Vatican is evaluating possible candidates. The favorite is Francis of Assisi, the inventor of the nativity scene, which some filmmakers consider to be an embryonic “Hollywood set.” Another name put forward is Juan Bosco, a Salesian priest who used entertainment as a tool for teaching children. One film director suggested “Saint Domingo de Guzmán, who invented the Inquisition, one of the first great shows.” Television, a more recent phenomenon, already has “Santa” Clara as “patron saint.” She was nominated because she used to attend Mass by looking through the window of the cell where she was confined. There is, however, no evidence that saints have power over programming.
Afterlife or Hallucination?
The media often publicize accounts of “near-death experiences,” wherein patients who were near death later claim to have glimpsed the afterlife. The experiments of a team of German neurologists recently suggested that such experiences are due to oxygen deprivation, which causes hallucinations. According to the Dutch newspaper De Gooi en Eemlander, the team studied 42 healthy youths who were rendered unconscious for a maximum of 22 seconds by hyperventilation. Afterward, the youths described sensations and visions remarkably similar to “near-death experiences.” Some reported seeing vivid colors and lights, seeing themselves from a bird’s-eye view, seeing loved ones in a pleasant setting, and so on. Most youths described the sensations as pleasant and peaceful—so much so that they did not want to return to consciousness.
Half the Earth Untouched
“Despite mankind’s best endeavours, just over half of the land surface of planet Earth is still wilderness,” reports New Scientist magazine. A new study “found that 90 million square kilometres [35,000,000 square miles] of land, about 52 per cent of the total land area, is still undisturbed.” Why is this so much higher than the results of a 1989 survey, which listed only a third of the planet as wilderness? Because this latest study, by Lee Hannah of Conservation International, included areas as small as 400 square miles [1,000 sq km], instead of the 1,500-square-mile [4,000 sq km] minimum used previously. “An even finer grained study would be likely to uncover a still greater percentage of the planet untouched by humans,” the article stated. However, Hannah pointed out that a good portion of the undisturbed land is “rock, ice and blowing sand,” inhospitable to both humans and wildlife. “Natural habitat has been displaced by human disturbance over nearly three-quarters of the habitable surface of the planet,” he said. The survey’s three categories were: undisturbed (52 percent), partially disturbed (24 percent), and dominated (24 percent).
Gamblers for God?
Every year, some 29 million people stream to Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S.A., from all over the world. Most, of course, are there to gamble, but many of them want to pray and worship as well. So the Catholic diocese in the region recently built a $3.5 million, 2,200-seat church a mere block away from four of the city’s largest hotel-casinos, reports The New York Times. As some 80 percent of the worshipers at the church are tourists, most of them in town to gamble, the church invites them to put casino chips in the collection plate. The church also has a gift shop, where patrons are invited to use their chips as currency. The shop even offers a souvenir gaming chip bearing an image of Jesus Christ. For a time the church employed a Franciscan friar to make weekly rounds to all the casinos in order to cash in the chips donated to the church. He was dubbed the chip monk.
Disadvantages of Bed Rest
“Prolonged bed rest can do patients more harm than good,” claims The Times of London. Some 50 years ago, physician Sir Richard Asher questioned this standard medical practice and drew attention to such health dangers as thrombosis, muscle wasting, loss of calcium in the bones, kidney stones, constipation, and depression. Studies have since confirmed this warning, and autopsies show that the risk of thrombosis followed by a lethal pulmonary embolism is directly related to the length of bed rest before death. On the other hand, doctors advocate bed rest in cases of acute back pain with sciatica and late complications of pregnancy. Indeed, with other acute and serious illnesses, there may well be no alternative but to rest. Doctors believe that once the crisis has passed, however, getting up and moving about accelerates recovery.
World’s Richest Nations
Switzerland is the world’s richest nation, according to a report by the World Bank. Its per capita gross national product—the value of all goods and services produced—was $36,410 in 1993. This was almost $12,000 more than that of the United States, which placed seventh in the list. Following Switzerland were Luxembourg, Japan, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, the United States, Iceland, Germany, and Kuwait. Mozambique remained the poorest nation in the world, producing only $80 per person. Notably missing on this latest top ten list were a number of Middle Eastern oil-producing nations, reflecting declining oil prices. However, the list changes if you consider purchasing power. Because prices are lower in the United States than in most wealthy countries, Americans get more for their money than any other nation except Luxembourg. The list then changes to: Luxembourg, the United States, Switzerland, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Hong Kong, Japan, Germany, Singapore, and Canada.