Christianity and Indigenous Communities Essay

?The question about Christianity and its full acceptance into Indigenous communities continues to linger on a fine line of whether Indigenous communities came to a consensus of compromising with the new religion or simply eradicating it by refusing to leave behind their traditional ways of believing and creating â€Å"spiritual† consciousness. Some scholars such as, Kevin Terraciano, in his chapter, â€Å"The People of Two Hearts and the One God from Castile,† argue that Christianity was not only rejected by acts of continuing Indigenous religious practices, but also mocked because it was thought to be a lie and inferior to the Indigenous people in Yanhuitlan and Coatlan; this new religion did not coincide with theirs . On the other hand, in her book, Biography of A Mexican Crucifx, Jennifer Hughes comes to conclude that Indigenous communities accepted Christianity through their own modes of seeing parallel paradigms of their life with the life of religious images such as the Cristo Aparecido from Totolapan. They came to see this image as a representation of their suffering , their colonial journey and their need for finding religious meaning in a newly evangelized land. In Terraciano’s, Two Peoples Heart, he subversively implies that Christianity was based on the idea that there had to exist some type of religious unity based on Catholicism. From this point, Indigenous population have been victims of racism, discrimination, disregard for their beliefs, uprooting and political marginalization. As Terraciano points out, in this process of â€Å"spiritual† conquest, domination can occur occur through methods of interrogation and punishment if found guilty, which was clearly the case during the Spanish Inquisition during the 16th century. Native lords were confronted both by friars, Dominicans and Spanish for their supposed allegiance to practicing â€Å"paganism,† and encouraging Indigenous communities to continue their reverence and offerings to their many â€Å"gods,† while on the surface make a menial space to pray to the â€Å"New God from Castile. † Terraciano explains how in order for Christianity to make itself dominant, the people of Yanhuitlan and Coatlan had to not only get rid of their ancestors images, burn them, but also force themselves to accept Christianity as their only â€Å"spiritual† choice. Nevertheless, Indigenous communities and to a great extent the native lords encouraged Indigenous communities to keep their faith intact . An example of this is given when, Don Fransciso, a native lord who was accused of â€Å"paganism, â€Å" and disruptive behavior stated that the people of Yanhuitlan were not to embrace Christianity, that their gods did not come from Castile, hence a result of this was the mockery of Yanhuitlan peoples both by verbal insults and gestures towards Native Christians, â€Å"There go the Christian Castile, the chickens,† (Terraciano, pg. 7) This shows us that the refusal to indoctrinate Christianity as part of a Yanhuitlan identity was obstruct by the continuing reinforcement that Indigenous communities e where reluctant to forgetting their ancient practices and beliefs. For instance when trialed, Don Francisco was asked if he knew any prayers in Latin, Castillan or Mixtec, he admitted that he knew two, but when asked to recite them, he said he could not remember them (Terraciano, 8). This once more reiterates through the examples given by Terraciano, that native lords saw Christianity as unimportant, they did not care to learn the way of Catholicism or become subservient to the â€Å"God of Castile. † â€Å"After mass, many nobles would drink pulque and joke around that they had not understood a word of the sermon† (Terraciano 8). Ultimately, with the â€Å"ambivalence† of Christianity also came the practice of certain ritual acts which often took place in small areas or carried out in a secluded place where the Indigenous people would be safe, as the lords began to denounce that their gods were angry and had brought upon drought and death to the Yanhuitlan community because some lords were weak enough to follow a â€Å"God† who could not save them from their hunger, even as he was called the almighty and powerful. In conclusion, what Terraciano delivers this idea of a power struggle that occurred within the communities of Yanhuitlan and Coatlan as to converting to Christianity and keeping their original religion as their primal way of religious consciousness and looking at Christianity with eyes of ambiguity and uselessness to their survival, both spiritual and physical. Nevertheless, for other scholars, their research has taken them to analyze the impacts of Christianity from a different perspective, one where both Christianity and Indigeneity mix, forming a culture of religious hybridism. As Jennifer Hughes states in her book, for the missionaries, Christianization in the â€Å"New World† was a genocide to all material of religious culture, it was a process of erasure, yet with this the Indigenous population was left with an spiritual emptiness, hence images such as the Cristo Aparecido became that fulfillement not only to their seek for religious authenticity, but also serving as some type of protective force against the legacy left by colonial conquest. For Hughes, the community of Tolopan accept this image of the Cristo Aparecido since the very beginning, to them

Klippel-Fiel Syndrome

Klippel–Feil syndrome is a very rare disease. It was reported for the first time in 1912 by Maurice Klippel and Andre Feil. It has been characterized by the fusion of any 2 of the 7 cervical vertebrae. The syndrome occurs in a heterogeneous group of patients unified only by the presence of a defect in the formation or segmentation of the spine. Klippel–Feil syndrome can be identified by shortness of the neck. Those with the syndrome have a very low hairline and the ability of the neck to move is limited or none.Some symptoms include: ?Scoliosis, which is a side-to-side curve of the spine, which is abnormal. The spine sometimes appears as a â€Å"C† or an â€Å"S†. ?Spina bifida is when the spinal canal and the back bone do not close completely during birth. ?Cleft Palate, which is a hole in the roof of the mouth ?Respiratory problems ?Heart malformations ?Short stature The actual prevalence of Klippel-Feil syndrome is unknown due to the fact that there was no study done to determine the true prevalence.Although the actual occurrence for the KFS syndrome is unknown, it is estimated to occur 1 in 42,000 newborns worldwide. In addition, females seem to be affected slightly more often than males Treatment for Klippel–Feil syndrome is symptomatic and may include surgery to relieve cervical or craniocervical instability and constriction of the spinal cord, and to correct scoliosis. The heterogeneity of this syndrome has made it difficult to outline the diagnosis as well as the prognosis classes for this disease.Because of this, it has complicated the exact explanation of the genetic etiology of the syndrome. The prognosis for most individuals is good if the disorder is treated early on and appropriately. Activities that can injure the neck should be avoided, as it may contribute to further damage. Other diseases associated with the syndrome can be fatal if not treated, or if found too late to be treatable. Although, surgery is an op tion it’s not highly recommended.My sister suffers from this disorder; therefore I see it every day. Surgery was given to my mother as an option but there were far worse side effects to the aftermath of the surgery than just living with the disorder for the rest of her life. She didn’t choose to have surgery because either it would have paralyzed her or could have possibly killed her. The disorder has affected her by not allowing her to use her neck at all, which makes it very difficult for her to do the things that we can.

Construction - Contemporary studies (sustainability, legislation, Essay

Construction - Contemporary studies (sustainability, legislation, built enviroment, protect plant and wildlife) - Essay Example Also, this would also help the public to understand the penalty applicable if any blatant violations of the regulations are made. European Commission in its sixth and the present action plan for the environmental management termed as â€Å"Environment : 2010 Our future Our Choice† has identified nature and the biodiversity as two priority areas that need to be given proper attention to ensure sustainable development in a region. In this connection various action plans in the form of regulations and community participative strategies are being formulated and put these ideas into practice. As builders and construction contractors are the most involved group with the nature and biodiversity , an awareness on the acts relating to the legislations and regulations would help the plan the development process without infringing the prevailing regulations and norms (Begon et al, 1996, Ratcliffe, 1977). The significant legislations by the UK government to manage construction while preserving the wildlife are as follows. This legislation is exclusive to England and Wales inorder to strengthen the protection given to Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) and other wildlife locations. The duty of its strict enforcement is rested with the government ministers and officials of both England and Wales. This is the important legislation that has strong implication on construction contractors. It is now considered as criminal offence to disturb and damage those nesting birds and species which is protected under various schedules. The legislation have been brought into force for England and Wales inorder to protect various species of the trees. The local planning authority would place a order on the protection of certain trees or their group for the proper conservation of these biomass for the purpose of better living environment. This regulation is applicable in England and Wales and provides adequate protection to

Real Data Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Real Data - Essay Example The data gathered can be used to perform a number of operations such as mean, standard deviation, variance, correlation etc. Therefore it is safe to say that real data makes it possible to make quantitative classifications. That is why we can say that real data makes it possible to run statistical analysis. The research has been carried out on the results of 2008 American Presidential Elections. The Exhibit 1 shows actual results of elections. The tables are divided according to percentage lead of each president according to states. The data in Exhibit 2 shows pre election polls for each candidate. The data in Exhibit 2 two has been divided according to agencies which had delivered results or conduction these pre election polls. Column D in Exhibit 2 reflects leads to each respective president in states of polls. The data presented is real in nature for Exhibit 2. This is because the format is percentages of actual responses received from the public. Exhibit 1 also shows actual historical data as the responses are shows as percentage of total votes received by each presidential candidate. In column E of exhibit 2 we have prepared another category denoted by numbers. This is a better way to convert real scale to nominal scale and then convert it to percentage to get a solution. The number ‘2’ represents a tie, ‘1’ lead of Obama and ‘0’ lead of McCain. If we calculate the percentage of ‘1’ to the entire population we can calculate how many polls considered Obama to win the elections. The percentage of polls that showed Obama as the winner were 71% where as only 10% predicted a tie of votes. This shows another quality of nominal data that it has to be converted into percentages to reach an analysis. The presidential elections did show a victory for president Obama which reveals that analysis using real data was successful in predicting election results. Nominal data can lead to only qualitative