Holy Angels Research Articles

Sisters of the Holy Angels: Beating the Odds a Chicken at a Time

Sisters of the Holy Angels: Beating the Odds a Chicken at a Time

Sister Margaret Philomena Gannon, I.H.M. (Sister Mary Anina) (June 2, 1937–October 24, 2022)

Sister Margaret Philomena Gannon, I.H.M. (Sister Mary Anina) (June 2, 1937–October 24, 2022) Margaret M. McGuinness Click for larger view View full resolution Sister Margaret Gannon, I.H.M. (Sister Mary Anina), died October 24, 2022, at Our Lady of Peace Residence, Scranton, Pennsylvania. Until her retirement in 2014, she had been a faculty member in the Department of Social Sciences at Marywood University in Scranton. She is survived by two brothers, several nieces and nephews, and members of her religious congregation. Margaret Philomena Gannon was born in Brooklyn, New York, on June 2, 1937, to John and Josephine Gannon. In 1956, during her freshman year at what was then Marywood College, she entered the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (Scranton), and professed her final vows on August 15, 1963. Sister Margaret received a B.A. in history and English from Marywood, and later earned a M.A. and Ph.D. in history from St. John’s University, New York. Prior to joining the faculty at Marywood, Sister Margaret served in several elementary and high schools, including Holy Angels (Pittsburgh), Our Lady Queen of Martyrs (Forest Hills, New York), and St. Joseph’s High School (Williamsport, PA). [End Page 240] In addition to her work as a tenured professor of history at Marywood University, Sister Margaret held the positions of dean of the Undergraduate School for Women, coordinator of diversity efforts, and chair of the Social Science Department; she also founded the women’s studies minor at the university. Sister Margaret was awarded membership in Marywood’s Order Cor Mariae–Pro Fide et Cultura in recognition of her service and dedication to the university. Sister Margaret was especially interested in the life and work of Sister Theresa Maxis Duchemin, I.H.M., a founding member of both the Oblate Sisters of Providence (OSP) and the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. During the second half of the nineteenth century, the IHM’s erased the role Maxis, a Black sister, played in their establishment and history. As the three IHM congregations began to reclaim their history during the latter decades of the twentieth century, however, Sister Margaret (along with other members of the congregations) was instrumental in correcting the narrative to include Sister Theresa Maxis as one of the congregations’ founders. Paths of Daring Deeds of Hope: Letters By and About Theresa Maxis Duchemin (independently published, 2022) and Pilgrim: Let Your Heart Be Bold: Mother Theresa Maxis Duchemin, IHM (independently published 2018) lead to a better historical understanding of both Mother Theresa Maxis and the founding of the three congregations of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Along with her academic and administrative responsibilities, in 1995 Sister Margaret helped found the African Sisters Education Collaborative (ASEC), an organization that helps to educate African women religious planning to teach in their local communities. Sister Margaret participated in the ASEC’s first service trip to Tanzania and served as a board member for many years. After her 2014 retirement from Marywood University, Sister Margaret volunteered for Catholic Relief Services as a refugee resettlement volunteer and served on the board of directors of the United Neighborhood Centers of Northeast Pennsylvania. She was a prayer minister at Our Lady of Peace Residence from 2021 until her death. Sister Margaret Gannon, I.H.M., devoted her life to her students, her congregation, and social justice. May she rest in peace. [End Page 241] Margaret M. McGuinness La Salle University Copyright © 2023 The Catholic University of America Press ...

The Devil's Envy: On Christ as Angelic Justifier and Demonic Stumbling Block

AbstractAt least since Augustine, Christian theology, especially but not only in the Latin West, has been dominated by an account of angelic origins in which the Incarnation was a response to humanity’s fall, itself occasioned by the prior angelic fall, whose cause in turn was the proud desire to be like God. (We’ll call this the ‘pride‐account’). Nonetheless, that Augustinian view has been balanced from the beginning by an ‘envy‐account’, which stresses instead Wisdom’s claim, ‘Through the Devil’s envy, death entered the world’ (Wisd. 2:24). The earliest extra‐biblical versions of the envy‐account – developed in the Latin, Syriac, and Arabic ‘Life of Adam and Eve’ traditions – take the object of Satan’s envy to have been Adam in particular. In the thirteenth century, however, Robert Grosseteste, as part of his extended defense of the idea that the Son would have been incarnate even without sin, argued instead that the Devil and his angels fell in rejecting the to‐be‐incarnate Christ, whose merits serve to ‘justify’ not only unfallen humanity, but even the holy angels. On this view, which arguably has biblical roots in Hebrews 1 and Revelation 12, and which reached its apogee in Milton’s Paradise Lost, ‘the Devil’s envy’ was directed at the God‐man in particular.

Shut the F(AAH) Up: Inhibiting Fatty Acid Amide Hydrolase as a Novel Approach to Pain

Promising new therapeutic treatments using the fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH) inhibitor can be used to relieve symptoms in a patient suffering from a variety of conditions, including but not limited to insomnia, anxiety, fibromyalgia, migraines, arthritis, and other chronic pain conditions. FAAH is responsible for breaking down anandamide, which is an endogenous agonist of the CB1 cannabinoid receptor and analgesic neurotransmitter. The FAAH protein contains a catalytic triad of Ser 241, Ser 217, Lys 142 embedded in its center. The FAAH monomer assumes a twisted 11 strand β‐sheet in the middle of the monomer and 24 α‐helices surrounding the β‐sheets. The Divine Savior Holy Angels MAPS (Modeling A Protein Story) Team modeled the catalytic domain of FAAH using 3D technology. Inhibitors of the FAAH molecules perform better through noncovalent interactions with the triad active site. The inhibitors stop FAAH activity through hydrophobic interactions that result from the active site changing its shape. Noncovalent and reversible inhibitors bring higher selectivity and less unwanted side effects than already studied covalent inhibitors. Non‐covalent FAAH inhibitors are currently in development as analgesics lacking the adverse effects of opioid‐based analgesics. Further studies are being conducted with selective and potent FAAH inhibitors in order to reduce neurological pain suppression, reduction of cancer cells, and increase feeling of motivation. Currently, the United States is in an opioid crisis that caused 100,000 deaths in the last year, which is why new treatments involving FAAH inhibitors prove promising because they reduce the extreme effects opioid‐based drugs present.

Augustine on the Economy of Angels

Angelology is a major theme in Augustine’s important works such as The City of God, The Literal Meaning of Genesis and Enchiridion. This essay explains Augustine’s theology of angelic economy from three perspectives -- creation, governance and kingdom. 1) The relationship between the angelic economy and the creation: it is here argued that the economic ability of the angels is originated in the intellectual intuition of God and of the creation, as, even prior to creation, angels had already stored the created in their minds as concepts; 2) The relationship between the angelic economy and governance is originated in the concept of “divine apparition.” Angels govern as God’s agents, but their governance is impersonal; 3) The relationship between the angelic economy and the kingdom is originated in the union between the holy angels and the holy people, which occurs in God’s will. In this union, Angels act as guides leading human beings to the kingdom of peace. This essay also points out that Augustine’s angelology is related to his three major theological principles, i.e. the theories of creation, governance and salvation.

Saving the Walking Dead: The delayed effects of radiation and mitigation by blocking the TGFβ‐1 pathway

Fibrosis of the lungs in patients who have undergone radiation therapy is a silent killer, inducing dense scar tissue in injured areas. Transforming growth factor beta 1 (TGFβ‐1) plays a role in the development of fibrosis. Radiation fibrosis takes months to develop. Consequently, people who are exposed to radiation to their lungs can die suddenly from pulmonary fibrosis. Latent TGFβ‐1 is stored in the extracellular matrix and is activated by the binding of an AV integrin to the arginine, glycine, and aspartate (RGD) amino acid sequence in the prodomain. Inside of the TGFβ‐1 is a ring‐like structure containing a solvent. Two prodomain arms in the structure connect to form a crossed V‐shape surrounding the growth factor monomers. These arms connect to form a bowtie with disulphide links close to the RGD sequences. The arm domain is composed of two anti‐parallel, four‐stranded beta sheets which contain hydrophobic faces. Active TGFβ‐1 binds to receptors on the surface of cells which signal to other proteins called SMADs, by adding phosphates to the SMADs. This step is inhibited by the medicine currently being tested, IPW‐5371. To understand the long‐term effects of radiation and the structurefunction relationship role of TGFβ‐1, the Divine Savior Holy Angels High School SMART (Students Modeling A Research Topic) Team designed a model of TGFβ‐1 using 3D printing technology. Currently, research is being conducted into fibrosis from activated TGFβ‐1 due to radiation exposure and IPW’s ability to reduce delayed injury to many organs that are exposed to radiation.Support or Funding InformationNIAID award HHSN272201800012C to Innovation Pathways, Palo Alto and NIAID U01AI133594 to the Medical College of Wisconsin.

A High Achieving Inner-City School: An Ecological Analysis

Holy Angels, a high achieving, African American, urban, elementary school in Chicago, Illinois offers a model for successful education of ethnic minority children. Despite coming from predominantly welfare supported, single-mother homes, located in crime ridden inner-city Chicago, during the period bounded by this study, 1969 to 1979, Holy Angels’ students produced test scores among the highest in the nation. The results of semistructured interviews of administrators, teachers, and former students and archival document analysis suggest that three major elements, namely, a high expectation–high help environment, emphasis on life preparation, and iconic leadership—uniquely interwoven, were distinguishing features of Holy Angels School.

Modeling TRPV1, a Detector of Thermal and Chemical Stimuli, Producing Pain: No Capsaicin Sensation

According to the Institute of Medicine, 100 million Americans suffer from chronic pain every year and the US spends over $500 billion trying to treat them. Pain begins as a stimulus that is detected by nociceptors, which are nerve fibers responsible for the detection of noxious mechanical, thermal, or chemical stimuli that give rise to pain sensations. These nociceptors transmit pain signals from the periphery to neurons in the spinal cord and brain. The Transient Receptor Potential Vanilloid 1 (TRPV1) is a nociceptive ion channel activated by capsaicin (the spicy component of hot peppers), heat, and endogenous pain molecules. Therefore, creating an inhibitor that partially blocks TRPV1 could treat chronic pain. The amino acids in the active site of TRPV1 are Y511, S512, M547, and T550. In addition, E600 controls the selectivity filter at the top gate of the channel and the hydrophobic seal mediated through I679 controls the lower gate. When capsaicin binds to the channel, a conformational change occurs that pulls the I679s on each subunit away from each other, opening up the lower gate. Understanding how activation of TRPV1 occurs may lead to the discovery of novel inhibitors of TRPV1 to help treat those suffering from chronic pain and reduce healthcare spending. The Divine Savior Holy Angels SMART (Students Modeling A Research Topic) Team modeled TRPV1 in a partially activated state using 3D printing technology. Program supported by a grant from NIH‐CTSA.

Book Review: How to See The Holy Spirit, Angels and Demons: Ignatius of Loyola on the Gift of Discerning of Spirits in Church Ethics, written by Gordon Klingenschmitt

Book Review: How to See The Holy Spirit, Angels and Demons: Ignatius of Loyola on the Gift of Discerning of Spirits in Church Ethics, written by Gordon Klingenschmitt

Kappa Opioid Receptor‐Based Treatments for Pain (LB88)

Dangerous painkillers may cause serious problems for those who fall into drugs’ addictive trap, such as former NFL quarterback Brett Favre. The addictiveness of painkillers such as OxyContin and Vicodin is largely attributed to the response they trigger in proteins such as mu opioid receptors (MOPs). This receptor activates cellular signaling pathways responsible for dulling pain; however, the protein also has the ability to stimulate cellular signaling pathways that makes MOP‐based painkillers rewarding. An alternate target that alleviates pain but does not produce reward is the kappa opioid receptor (KOP). Unfortunately, many KOP agonists also activate signaling pathways that produce hallucinogenic effects. To investigate the changes that occur when KOP binds to different ligands, the Divine Savior Holy Angels SMART (Students Modeling A Research Topic) Team has used 3D printing technology to model the active site of the KOP with salvinorin A, to see how the induced fit changes the signal transduction pathways in a neuron. Manipulating receptor proteins like the KOP to inhibit pain pathways without the addictive effect of MOP‐targeting painkillers would be a breakthrough in chronic pain management. Computer‐aided drug design helps streamline the development of KOP ligands that activate this receptor in ways that result in less hallucinogenic effects.Grant Funding Source: Supported by a grant from NIH‐CTSA.

A Comparative Study on Behavioral Problems of Preschool Children among Working and Non-Working Mothers

Introduction: Children are the nation’s most important assets. Preschool period is a fantastic time for a child to learn things. At the same time, they become easily frustrated. A large number of children suffer from behavioral problems at one time or the other during their development. Mothers should try to devote some time for their children to make them feel loved and special. Mothers should be able to detect any behavioral changes at the earliest. Objectives: The objectives of the study were to assess the behavioral problems of preschool children among working mothers, assess the behavioral problems of preschool children among non-working mothers, compare the behavioral problems of preschool children between working and non working mothers and find out the association between behavioral problems of preschool children with selected demographic variables. Design: Non-experimental comparative survey design. Setting: Smart Kids Play School, Bharati English Medium School and Holy Angels Higher Primary School, Mangalore Sample: 30 working and 30 non-working mothers of pre-school children Interventions: Demographic Proforma and Behavioral Problems Assessment Rating Scale were administered to both working and non-working mothers. Results: Mild level of behavioral problems were reported by 40% of working mothers and 83.3% of nonworking mothers, whereas 16.7% of non-working mothers and 60% of working mothers reported moderate level among their children. There was significant difference in the level of behavioral problems of preschool children among working and non-working mothers.There was significant association between behavioral problems of preschool children and gender of the child. There was also significant association between behavioral problems of preschool children among working mothers and age of the child. Conclusion: Preschool children of working mothers have more behavioral problems than those of nonworking mothers. Nurses can play a major role in diminishing the behavioral problems by providing guidance and counseling for the children and their mothers.

Fish bile and cautery: trachoma treatment in art

Fish bile and cautery: trachoma treatment in art

Emily Meynell Ingram and Holy Angels, Hoar Cross, Staffordshire: A Study in Patronage

Almost from the moment of its consecration, on 26 April 1876, the church of the Holy Angels at Hoar Cross in Staffordshire was spoken of as an exceptional building. There was more than local pride in a contemporary newspaper report of its unveiling, which declared it to be ‘one of the most beautiful churches in the kingdom … the dignity of the conception, the beauty of the proportion, and the elaborate care lavished on even the minutest detail, carry one back to those days which have left us such memorials as the Percy shrine or the Beauchamp chapel’. That perceptive reference to those medieval sources of inspiration suggests one of the reasons why the church made such an immediate impression. It was the first complete embodiment in a rural setting of a new ideal in the Gothic revival, which in the previous decade had turned its back on the exotic and eclectic style now called High Victorian and had returned to English architecture of the mid-fourteenth century as the point of departure for modern churches. At Hoar Cross, Bodley and Garner, the architectural partnership which had taken the lead in that movement, worked in close collaboration with an exceptional patron, Emily Meynell Ingram, to help realize a compelling new visual identity for the nineteenth-century Anglican parish church.

The Register of William Melton, Archbishop of York, 1317-1340 (review)

This fifth volume (Capitula) of Melton's register has not quite reached the halfway point of the total work (595 folios). Unfortunately, none of the five volumes contains more than a cursory introduction. This volume (folios LXVI to CXXII) "covers the cathedral chapter, the chapters of the collegiate churches ofBeverley, Howden... Ripon, and Southwell, and the collegiate chapel of StMary & Holy Angels.. ." (p. vii). Some of the 526 documents aretranscribedin full in Latin; more are calendared in English. Most of the documents record routine administration, for example, visitations provisions,excommunications, conflicts with the dean and chapter of York, grantingof indulgences, permissions to preach and hear confessions, licenses for non-residence, and controversies over prebends. As with other sources of this kind, several documents throw interesting sidelights on medieval times. For example, a chapel yard wasdedicated at Haxby because of problems of distance and terrain; atleast one corpse had fallen into the Foss River while being transported. Thereareseveral commissions for penitentiaries to hear confessions even in reservedcases "except poaching in [the] archbishop's parks and raping or havingsexual intercourse with nuns" (#223). The editor has added two indices;hisalmost one thousand footnotes attest to his careful scholarship. A word processor would have helped construct a more thorough subject index sincesome specific examples are missing, for example, a number of references to excommunication, and several entire topics, including preaching, poaching, and rape.

Landing peace theory on solid ground

Peace, being the goal of almost everybody's struggle, becomes everybody's business, including in spheres such as health or education. There may be specialists and savants such as peace researchers or doctors or teachers but the preoccupation with these issues cannot simply be restricted to the experts or their expertise. As Western medical science leaves out spiritual health, and modern education ignores self‐actualization, contemporary peace research deals just with socioeconomic‐political peace and fails to include personal peace, spiritual peace, inter‐species peace, planetary peace, or cosmic peace within its purview. A broad thematic study of war and peace is not always helpful for individuals engaged in a personal quest for peace. As medical science is only a part of broader health science, or schooling but an element of self‐actualization, peace research is only one aspect of a life‐long search for peace and fulfilment. Peace search then becomes a larger life process in which we concern ourselves with both general and universal peace and unique particular peace. Leaving the study of peace just for peace researchers is like letting just the doctors deal with all our health. Peace researchers are a small number of individuals around the world with academic degrees and honors, stable jobs, steady incomes, and all the other securities in life. Put tersely, such peace research smacks of a brahmanical air of exclusivity and sophistication. When not followed by actual application, research becomes an exclusivistic, pedantic, and normative exercise which focuses mainly on the intellect rather than the equally important emotive and cognitive aspects. This is not to mean that peace researchers are unnecessary, just as doctors or teachers do not become non‐essential. Theories of peace cannot afford an unproblematic subject‐object binary opposition and the observer—observed model cannot be a very valid form of peace search. After all, peace researchers are not some kind of holy angels who descend on the earth, discern the human issues, and hand out remedies; on the contrary, they are also part of the problem and hence they try to be part of the solution. If peace search is a constant struggle involving the whole of humanity, peace researchers are moving within it, witnessing the process, analyzing it, and acting about it with the whole of humanity. So we are all searching for peace in our own ways with our own means for slightly varying ends.

"The Holy Angels Are in Their Council": the Exclusion of Deformed Persons From Holy Places in Qumranic and Rabbinic Literature

The comparison of Qumranic and rabbinic halakhah, now an integral part of scholarly research, yields results enriching our understanding of both fields. On occasion, later rabbinic literature facilitates the interpretation of poorly preserved or laconic earlier sectarian halakhot; in other cases, Qumranic writings reveal alternative interpretive options for rabbinic sources. This applies particularly where intuitive associations sparked by sectarian law contribute to a new reading of early rabbinic sources that differs from their interpretation by later rabbinic authorities. Furthermore, the Qumranic material enhances our ability to isolate the different strata of rabbinic literature, thereby elucidating the

Jesus and Isolt

IN THE PALACE OF HEAVEN God's holy angels were touching and fondling one another, gently and mutually, just as St. Augustine says they do, and laving their hair with oil of myrrh. But the Lord Jesus watched them with a scowl. He said to his Mother, who sat on her throne of pearl, Divinity is a leash to me, I miss the unquenchable days of living and dying, my old quarrels and victories among the Jews-I won't be bound by my own nature. Mild and flawless Mary smiled and with her small white hand stroked Jesus' brow in a gesture of permission. So Jesus left the company of the Virgin and her angels and abandoned his divine form. His Mother gave him a pair of soft gray leathery wings, and a compact furry body with strong haunches and gloved forepaws like a raccoon's. In the form of a ciclogriff, with his divine eyes gazing from above the severe beak of an eagle, Jesus flew down to earth. He flew down through the cool aethereal stars of heaven and past the fiery material stars of creation, and down through the clouds of a night sky over the North Sea. The black ocean churned and tilted under him. Swells of wind caught his wings and sent him careening through the night. Jesus felt the cold air split over his clenched beak, riffling through his fur, and the joyful pulse of risk and adventure was restored in him. With unfaltering wing strokes he brought himself down to the tower over the surf where Isolt stood at the railing wrapped in her cloak, looking out over the waves. At first Isolt thought that the creature flapping down to her side was a seabird blown from its perch, or a bat from its cave in the cliffs that rose beachless from the waves. The ciclogriff shuddered water from its outspread wings and folded them around its body. Then like a tame rabbit it hopped quietly to Isolt's side. When the creature laid its beak against her knee and stretched its neck to look up into her face, Isolt petted it. She let her hand rest on the ciclogriff's round furry head, and with a finger traced the cool surface of his beak, while she looked out at the water where Tristram had sailed.

Holy Angels: Pocket of Excellence

Welcome to Holy Angels School in Chicago, the largest all-Black Roman Catholic school in the nation, attended by thirteen-hundred children-from preschoolers and kindergartners to high schoolaged students. Upon initial examination, Holy Angels appears a throwback to the 1940s and early 1950s, where schools for Blacks embraced the children of working-class, upwardly mobile families whose values of education mirrored those of their teachers. The children at Holy Angels demonstrate respect for adults and schoolmates, neither swearing nor fighting is allowed, and responses to adults of yes and no are accompanied by ma'am or sir. The Reeboks, miniskirts, affected walks, and hip talk of the street are left behind for the duration of the school day. School rules are rigorously adhered to and the students-alert, proud, responsive, and happy to be part of the Holy Angels family-strive to complete their assignments first, fast, and best. Approximately one hundred years old and fully accredited by the state of Illinois, Holy Angels was founded by Irish immigrants just before the turn of the century. The south-side neighborhood and parish surrounding the school grew to such affluence in the late 1920s that the church had a bishop as its leader. With the Great Depression came massive Black migration from the South and White flight from the inner city. By the end of World War II, the transition from White to Black in the Holy Angels neighborhood was complete. The neighborhood has declined steadily since then. In its present depressed condition, it contains the greatest number of Chicago families in federally supported dwellings. The main sustenance of most of these families, two-thirds of which are headed by single parents, is welfare. The incidence of crime in this community is the highest in the city, largely due to drugs and gangs. The astoundingly successful Holy Angels program, which runs