ROME — The questionnaire is being distributed to bishops worldwide in advance of their synod next fall. Family is the theme of that meeting, with bishops expected to grapple with how the church should address issues like divorce and same-sex marriage. In the past, the Vatican has determined the agenda for synods and sought opinions from bishops’ conferences around the world.

These days, only one-third of Americans say most people can be trusted. Half felt that way in 1972, when the General Social Survey first asked the question.<br>Forty years later, a record high of nearly two-thirds say "you can't be too careful" in dealing with people.

Annual education report says 46% of Israelis have higher education; report shows improvement in elementary, high school teachers' wages<br>Israel is the second-most educated country after Canada, a recent report published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said

The year’s notable fiction, poetry and nonfiction, selected by the editors of The New York Times Book Review.

A review of A Queer Political Economy of “Community”: Gender, Space, and the Transnational Politics of Community for Vietnamese Lesbians (les) in Saigon, by Natalie Newton.<br>Natalie Newton has written what is destined to be a classic book that expands multiple fields, including — but not limited to — studies on Southeast Asia, gender, sexualities, globalization, and transnationalism. She is the only scholar I can name who provides a much-needed study on Vietnamese female homosexual communities. This is not just a dissertation about Vietnam or the micro-practices of everyday life that many Vietnamese lesbian (les) experience. Instead, this dissertation examines how larger political, economic and global forces create communities and transform individual practices in local spaces.

Join journalists Peter Arnett, Mike Cerre, Santiago Lyon and Julie Jacobson, who have reported in conflicts from the Vietnam War to Afghanistan, in a panel discussion moderated by Robert Rosenthal.<br><br>This special program is presented by the Associated Press, in partnership with the Marines' Memorial Association and the World Affairs Council of Northern California.<br><br>By Pete Hamill, Associated Press $40.00<br>ISBN-13: 9781419708640<br>Published: ABRAMS, 10/2013

TIÊN HOA LỤC KHẢO CHÚ
by Đoàn Khoách
Giới thiệu, phiên âm, chú thích, hiệu đính, khảo dị
© 2008 by Đoàn Khoách
Hard cover, 620 pp. 6½" x 9½".

The work also include original Nôm page images from
VN.IV.470 of École des Langues et des Civilizations Orientales, Paris.

Contact:
Đoàn Khoách
18189 Moon Song Court
San Diego, CA 92127
Tel. (858) 674-9767
Email: khoach@hotmail.com

It is one of the achievements of Ari Shavit’s important and powerful book to recover the feeling of Israel’s facticity and to revel in it, to restore the grandeur of the simple fact in full view of the complicated facts. “My Promised Land” startles in many ways, not least in its relative lack of interest in providing its readers with a handy politics. Shavit, a columnist who serves on the editorial board of Haaretz, has an undoctrinaire mind. He comes not to praise or to blame, though along the way he does both, with erudition and with eloquence; he comes instead to observe and to reflect.

Majd, author of the critically acclaimed The Ayatollah Begs to Differ (2008) and subsequent The Ayatollahs' Democracy (2010) began writing about the Islamic Republic a decade ago after controls over dual-passport holders were relaxed, allowing him to travel frequently to Iran. Majd, the son of a diplomat and grandson of a prominent Ayatollah, was born in Tehran but raised around the world in Tunis, New Delhi, London, New York and elsewhere. After a career as a music industry executive, Majd gravitated toward journalism.