BOOM! (UPDATE)

My summer plans have blown up in my face.

Starting from scratch. . .@#$%!

UPDATE:  looks like a solution is in the works. . .

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On the dangers of telling the truth

3rd Week of Easter (T)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

Podcast*

Stephen stands accused of blasphemy before the Sanhedrin. He faces conviction and execution. Rather than backtrack on his earlier remarks, Stephen goes for broke and tells the truth: “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always oppose the Holy Spirit [. . .] You received the law as transmitted by angels, but you did not observe it.” Like most people who are told an uncomfortable truth, the crowd is none too happy; “they were infuriated, and they ground their teeth at him.” At this point in the confrontation, Stephen's lawyer should have objected and called for a recess. His publicist should have released a statement to the media clarifying his remarks and calling for calm. Then Stephen could have called a press conference a few days later and apologized for his apparent intolerance, announcing that he was checking into into rehab for substance abuse treatment. All would have been forgiven. But b/c Stephen is filled with Holy Spirit and unable to lie, he says, “Behold, I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.” And b/c the crowd hates the truth and will not hear it, “they cry out in a loud voice, cover their ears, and rush upon him together.” Stephen is stoned to death, dying with the name of Christ on his lips, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. . .do not hold this sin against them.” Had his executioners been paying attention, they would have understood Stephen's death as a sign of God's presence; they would have received his dying words as a gift freely given. 

On a day sometime before Stephen faces his own hostile crowd, another group confronts Jesus with a demand: “What sign can you do, that we may see and believe in you? What can you do?” It's important to understand what they are asking for here. They aren't interested in words of wisdom, or profound teaching. They don't want a clever exegesis of the Law. The crowd is demanding a miracle, a performance that can only be explained as an act of God. And not just any old miracle but one that benefits them immediately. They note that God gave them manna in the desert. So, they want Jesus to do the same. They want concrete, irrefutable—and dare I say it, edible—proof that Jesus is who he says he is. Rather than promising them additional farm subsidies, or a new government food program, Jesus says, “I am the bread of life.” Eat this bread and never hunger; believe in me and never thirst. This is not the miracle they were hoping for.

Stephen, somewhere along the way, heard and believed. He ate the bread of life and drank from the cup of salvation. He was filled with the Holy Spirit and went out to preach the Good News. The crowd clamoring for his blood didn't see Stephen as a miracle, as a sign of God's presence. They saw a blasphemer, a condemned heretic. They wanted humble contrition from him, but they got the truth. Like the crowd that demanded a concrete sign from Jesus, they wanted a sign from Stephen that their lives were not about to be turned upside down. They wanted consolation, assurance, a guarantee that they everything they thought they knew about God was just right. Stephen disappointed them, so did Jesus. They got the truth, and it set their teeth on edge.

The crowds that gather before the Church now haven't changed in 2,000 years. Neither has the truth. Stephen didn't apologize nor did he clarify his remarks. Jesus didn't do any magic tricks nor did he argue a thesis. Confronted by demanding mobs, Jesus and Stephen do exactly what they were sent to do: they spoke the word of truth for all to hear. Stephen forgave his killers even as he died, revealing the way of mercy. Jesus reveals the way to salvation, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”

*I've had one report that this file hosting site tried to upload a virus.  Please let me know if this happens to you.  Monday's homily has been d/l'ed 46 times and there's only been one report so far.

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

U.S. reputation on the rise in the rest of the world. . .given the state of the rest of the world, this is not news to celebrate.  I wonder if the rest of the world realizes that the American foreign aid goodie baskets they are addicted to will disappear when the U.S. economy collapses.  

The Left needs racism. . .here's why.  This is not to suggest that there are no genuine racists out there; there are.  But no one takes these yahoo's seriously, so they don't serve the Left's purpose in smearing your average conservative American voter as a racist.

Herman Wouk, "Is God a Mathematician?" 

I haven't commented on the latest circus antics of Chicago's Fr. Hollywood b/c there's little doubt I could manage to keep from cussing. 

HA!  Great letter to the editor. . .from a drunken sailor.  (H/T:  Chris Johnson)

Folks, please, be very, VERY careful with stuff like this.  Remember:  Jesus himself said that he doesn't know the day or time of his return.  If Jesus doesn't know, we don't either.

In Malta, the Holy Father calls the Church a "wounded sinner."  For those who know nothing about the Church (e.g. the media), this sounds like a monumental confession.  Those of us in the Church know that this a long-standing and perfectly accurate description.  

B.O. tells California voters that Barbara Boxer might lose her Senate seat in 2010.  Ah, that's a shame.  Frankly, I think Babs needs a break.

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Posting suggestions

A mille grazie to all those HancAquam readers who requested post-topics.  

Of the topics requested, there were six that I feel qualify to post something about. 

Some will require a bit more research than others, so I will tackle the more familiar topics first.

This week look for a post on "Dealing with Doubt."  If time permits, I will also put up a post on the limits of clerical creativity while celebrating the Mass.

Again, merci beaucomp!

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Novice of the SDP. . .Congrats Rudy!

Congratulations to Mr. Rudy Barba of El Paso, TX!  Rudy was admitted to the Southern Dominican Province's novice class of 2011 over the weekend.  He and his novice classmates will begin their novitiate in Irving, TX sometime in August.  I will post a pic of the full class once one is available from our vocations promoter.

Rudy is a former student of mine from U.D.  He was given the arduous task of being my campus ministry intern, i.e. "the one who made sure my over-caffeinated squirrel brain was focused just enough to get something done."  Rudy is a good friend, and now he will be a great brother!

Please pray for him and his novitiate brothers. . .

As you can see from this pic, Rudy possesses the most telling characteristic of any Dominican friar. . .he likes to eat!  However, he is too skinny to be entirely trusted.  ;-)

 

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In Government We Do NOT Trust

A chart for my non-U.S. readers. . .this is why the Tea Party Movement is growing. . .this is why ObamaCare is so unpopular:

4 out of 5 Americans do not trust their government

Public confidence in government is at one of the lowest points in a half century, according to a survey from the Pew Research Center. Nearly 8 in 10 Americans say they don't trust the federal government and have little faith it can solve America's ills, the survey found.

[. . .]

The survey found that just 22 percent of those questioned say they can trust Washington almost always or most of the time and just 19 percent say they are basically content with it. Nearly half say the government negatively effects their daily lives, a sentiment that's grown over the past dozen years.

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Podcasting is back!

Back by popular demand. . .Podcasting!  Or, something very similar. 

I found a free audio hosting site for my homilies.

We'll see how it goes!

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Working for food that endures

3rd Week of Easter (M)

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

Podcast

When an organization loses sight of its purpose, its leadership will come together and hammer out a mission statement, a declaration of the institution's goals, a description of its overall reason for being. More often than not, these statements are packed full of vague verbiage, lofty rhetoric, and completely unrealistic, if not outright unachievable, objectives. If the mission statement isn't simply ignored by the worker-bees of the organization, it is usually mocked or only quoted in the breach. Human resource trainers take it very seriously, but not many others do. The lesson for all involved is that refocusing the machinery of any organization to achieve its basic mission is tough work. The Easter season is not only a time for the Church to celebrate our Risen Lord, it is also a time for us to reconsider our mission as the Body of Christ and focus again on essentials. The crowd surrounding Jesus asks him, “What can we do to accomplish the works of God?” Jesus answered, “This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.” That's our mission: to believe in the One God sent to us.

All that we do, say, think, feel, everything that we are flows out of our belief in Christ Jesus as the One sent by God to grace us with eternal life. The Fathers of the Second Vatican Council in their teaching on divine revelation, Dei verbum, tell us that God reveals Himself to us in scripture, through created realities, and, perfectly, in the words and deeds of Christ. They also tell us why He revealed Himself. Our Father unveils Himself for us in order to proclaim to us that "[He] is with us to free us from the darkness of sin and death, and to raise us up to life eternal”(4). To put this another way: the purpose of scripture, of creation, and of Christ himself is to show us, uncover for us, our Creator's mission among us: our freedom from sin and our lives with Him for eternity. Our mission is to believe His revelation and carry on doing the good works of God according to His will.

How do we do this? How do we carry on with God's work? Jesus says first we must believe in him. Why? How does believing in him first change the character of our good works? Good works are good works, right? Yes and no. Good works are good works. True. But note what Jesus says to the crowd: “Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life. . .” So, what distinguishes between “working for food that perishes” and “working for food that endures”? The distinction is made real when we believe that the work we do enacts God's revelation to His creation; when we think, act, feel in ways that show that God is working out our redemption through Christ Jesus. This is how we know and all who see and hear us know that the food we work for is food that endures, food given to us by the Son of Man for our eternal lives. If our good works are done for prestige, political advantage, public reputation, or money; if our good works are done out of any motivation but the working-out of God's revelation to us, then we work for food that perishes. 

Luke tells us in his Acts that “Stephen, filled with grace and power, was working great wonders and signs among the people.” Those who opposed his work could not withstand his wisdom b/c the Spirit was with him. When they brought him before the men of the Sanhedrin on charges of blasphemy, the men “saw that his face was like the face of an angel.” Stephen did not work great wonders and signs on his own. He didn't perform tricks to impress the gullible, or to build a profitable reputation for himself as a prophet. He worked as one who embodied divine revelation; he showed out God's holy purpose for His creation. Like Stephen, our mission, our goal is straightforwardly simple: show everyone that God is with us to free us from sin and death and to bring us all to eternal life. This is food that endures.

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Dei verbum: God's Self-revelation

The key to reading and understanding the documents of Vatican Two is reading and understanding the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, Dei verbum.

Christ is the Fullness of All Revelation:  In His goodness and wisdom God chose to reveal Himself and to make known to us the hidden purpose of His will by which through Christ, the Word made flesh, man might in the Holy Spirit have access to the Father and come to share in the divine nature. Through this revelation, therefore, the invisible God  out of the abundance of His love speaks to men as friends and lives among them, so that He may invite and take them into fellowship with Himself. This plan of revelation is realized by deeds and words having in inner unity: the deeds wrought by God in the history of salvation manifest and confirm the teaching and realities signified by the words, while the words proclaim the deeds and clarify the mystery contained in them. By this revelation then, the deepest truth about God and the salvation of man shines out for our sake in Christ, who is both the mediator and the fullness of all revelation (DV 2).

Divine Revelation through Created Realities:  God, who through the Word creates all things and keeps them in existence, gives men an enduring witness to Himself in created realities. Planning to make known the way of heavenly salvation, He went further and from the start manifested Himself to our first parents. Then after their fall His promise of redemption aroused in them the hope of being saved and from that time on He ceaselessly kept the human race in His care, to give eternal life to those who perseveringly do good in search of salvation. Then, at the time He had appointed He called Abraham in order to make of him a great nation. Through the patriarchs, and after them through Moses and the prophets, He taught this people to acknowledge Himself the one living and true God, provident father and just judge, and to wait for the Savior promised by Him, and in this manner prepared the way for the Gospel down through the centuries (3). 

Revelation through the Inspired Word and the Word Made Flesh:  Then, after speaking in many and varied ways through the prophets, "now at last in these days God has spoken to us in His Son." For He sent His Son, the eternal Word, who enlightens all men, so that He might dwell among men and tell them of the innermost being of God. Jesus Christ, therefore, the Word made flesh, was sent as "a man to men." He "speaks the words of God," and completes the work of salvation which His Father gave Him to do. To see Jesus is to see His Father. For this reason Jesus perfected revelation by fulfilling it through his whole work of making Himself present and manifesting Himself: through His words and deeds, His signs and wonders, but especially through His death and glorious resurrection from the dead and final sending of the Spirit of truth. Moreover He confirmed with divine testimony what revelation proclaimed, that God is with us to free us from the darkness of sin and death, and to raise us up to life eternal (4).

Thoughts:

God spoke the Word of Creation.

He sent the Word Made Flesh to redeem His Creation.
And we have the Word of Witness in scripture, an account of Christ's words and deeds.

At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit gave birth the Church, the living Body of Christ, thus making the Church the living, breathing, thinking, acting Word in the world--the Sacrament of God's Self-revelation for all to see and hear.

In Christ, we have the perfection of God's Self-revelation -----> the Church on pilgrimage in history
In created realities, we have the divine revealed in the natural -----> reason, science
In scripture, we have a record of our ancestors meeting God -----> words, deeds of the faithful

Why did God reveal Himself in these different ways?  

One reason:  to proclaim that "[He] is with us to free us from the darkness of sin and death, and to raise us up to life eternal."

Alleluia!

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

That Icelandic volcano with the Klingon name is still spewing.  If this keeps me from going home in June, I will be most disappointed.

Why is it that Dems only seem to fret about anti-government rhetoric when one of their guys is in the White House?  We need to distinguish between "anti-gov't rhetoric" and "anti-administration" rhetoric.  I'm a big fan of republican (little "R") government.  Just not a big fan of the B.O. administration.

Changes in the tax law and B.O.'s budget proposals will reduce charitable giving.  This is planned.  If charitable organizations go bust, guess who gets to pick up the slack:  Big Government!

Report on the embarrassingly weak turn-out for the Tea Party Crashers.  Like most lefty astro-turfing it was all blow and no hard.  Also, the Partiers shunned the GOP Washington hierarchy, thus putting the lie to the MSM meme that the T.P. is all about Republican astro-turfing.

Hmmmmm. . .forget the Kindle and the iPad. . .what sort of handgun would be right for the discerning friar?

An interview with the woman who helped dioceses and religious orders hold their clergy accountable to the norms in sexual abuse case:  "Several men I know have “tested” the CDF (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) and found no tolerance for sexual abuse in the priesthood and no sympathy for the cleric who disagrees with programs of prayer and penance. Evidence of where Pope Benedict XVI stands can be found in the following examples:  here."

102 Things to Remember if you ever become an Evil Overlord.  My fav is #34:  "I will never turn into a snake.  It never helps."  Hey, that's just good practical advice for every day living.

Foreign Accent Syndrome. . .I wonder if there's a part of the brain you can whack that will  start  you speaking French?

According to complexity evolutionists, if you leave them alone for a billion years they will eventually grow into a real boy.

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Order your HancAquam post!

Here's your chance to order up a HancAquam post!

When  I started the blog five years ago, my only purpose was to post the texts of my homilies.  With the encouragement of my boss at U.D.'s campus ministry, Denise Phillips, I moved to podcasting.  My natural soap-boxing tendencies compelled me to comment (sometimes crankily) on all things liturgical, theological, and political.  Then, I started getting questions from readers about doctrine, history, pastoral problems.  Eventually, HancAquam turned into an all-purpose Catholic blog with a daily average of about 450 hits.

Since my public preaching has been reduced to a once a week thing with the promise of an un-preached Sunday homily in there somewhere, the original focus of HancAquam has shifted rather dramatically. 

I want this blog to be user-friendly.  As a Dominican preacher and teacher, I want readers to go away knowing more about their faith then when they arrived.  

So, if you could order up a HancAquam post. . .on most any subject. . .what would you order?  I can't promise to fulfill your order, but there's a good chance you'll get your wish!

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Christian, brilliant, and probably teaching near you

A list of the 20 Most Brilliant Christian Professors in the U.S. 

The subject of my thesis, the Rev'd. John Polkinghorne is listed, so is the legendary U.D. English professor, Dr. Louise Cowan.

Also, note the number of accomplished scientists on the list.

H/T:  Newadvent

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

And yet another reason for the U.S. to either ignore the U.N. entirely or withdraw:  proposal to institute "eco-thought crimes."

Sensible suggestions for dealing with Tea Party crashers.  The idea of crashing a Tea Party is to provoke Partiers into angry/violent reactions that get caught on video and provide "evidence" to the MSM that their stereotypes are true.  Since it is clear that crashers are not interested in reasoned political discourse, rhe absolute best way to deal with them is quick exposure and ridicule.

Another tactic that Partiers ought to adopt: proudly embrace the "Tea Bagger" slur as your own.  It worked for the gay rights movement.  Yes, I know what "tag bagging" is. . .but English is a nearly infinitely malleable language.  It will contain the multitudes.  (NB.  Ten brownie pts to anyone who can identify the allusion in the last sentence.)

I am quite proud of the fact that lawyers in my home state of Mississippi are attacking ObamaCare with a novel legal theory:  individual mandates violate privacy rights.

A reasonable clarification from the Vatican on Crdl. Bertone's controversial remarks.

Diogenes asks:  "Now, did you ever wonder why so many Irish bishops were forced to resign within weeks of the Irish report on sex abuse while no US prelate resigned after the release of the John Jay Report?"

Great Moments in Alternative American History:  the battle G. Washington never fought. 

This pic thawed my normally icy heart.  Ahhhhhhhhhhhh. . .

Beautiful butterfly sculptures made from beer cans.

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Truth spoken and done in the light

2nd Week of Easter (W): Reading

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

What does it mean to live under a spirit of salvation? First, let's think about what it means to live “under a spirit.” If we take “spirit” to mean something like “what animates one's mind and body,” or “the vital force of a person,” we understand spirit to be a neutral term, being neither negative nor positive. One's mind and body could be animated by a spirit bent on destruction. And a person's vital force could be sacrificial love. Some Christian communities use phrases like “a spirit of sickness,” “a spirit of rebellion,” “a spirit of mercy,” to describe basic personality traits in individuals, enduring dispositions that characterize a person and describes the condition of a soul. We might think too about how one's spirit constitutes a fundamental way of taking in the world, processing the information our senses gather up, and using all that data to make decisions, choose actions. Medieval physicians often used the theory of humors to classify types of diseases. Depending on the relative levels of the four humors in your body, you could be sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric, or melancholic. This theory has the advantage of diagnosing the overall condition of the person by accounting for both the state of the body and the state of the soul. Though we no longer use the humors to diagnose disease, we still talk about someone's melancholic or sanguine spirit. Given all these different uses for the notion of the spirit, what does it mean the Christian soul to live “under a spirit of salvation”?

John teaches us that “. . .God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him will not be condemned. . .” Anyone who believes in His Son is given eternal life; they are saved from eternal perishing. But before those who have been saved from an everlasting death die their natural deaths they live on and do so under a spirit of salvation. If we are saved in Christ—who is the way, the truth, and the life—then we are participants in his truth, intimate players in the life of human salvation. Christ's truth is not a warm bath to lazily soak in, or a prize bed for us to linger in but an active, enlivening force, a vital spirit that animates us to not only speak the truth but to act truthfully as well. To speak and act out of the fullness of his truth that fills us to overflowing. If our truthful speech and acts are to be ministerial, a service to others, then they must be done in the light for all to see.

John writes, “. . .whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God.” The apostles have been imprisoned by their religious enemies. The Lord sends an angel to free them. This same angel instructs them on how to use their newly gained freedom: “Go and take your place in the temple area, and tell the people everything about this life.” They do exactly that. For those who have been freed from the prison of sin, those who would walk the way of Christ's truth, their words and deeds must be spoken and done in the light so that a witness may be given. This not to be playacting or street theater but a genuine expression of a soul living under the spirit of salvation, the words and deeds of one who is infused to the bone with the truth of Christ's saving mercy. The spirit that animates you as a person, the vital force that drives you must be the spirit of Christ resurrected—a new life risen from death, freed from sin, given to you so that you can bring those enslaved by darkness to the light. 

Lest we bear false witness to those whom God loves and intends to save, we must be Christ's truth always and always in the light.

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Cardinal Bertone is Mistaken

The AP is reporting on controversial remarks made by the Holy Father's right hand man, Crdl Bertone in Chile:

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican's secretary of state, made the comments [linking pedophilia to homosexuality] during a news conference Monday in Chile, where one of the church's highest-profile pedophile cases involves a priest having sex with young girls.

"Many psychologists and psychiatrists have demonstrated that there is no relation between celibacy and pedophilia. But many others have demonstrated, I have been told recently, that there is a relation between homosexuality and pedophilia. That is true," said Bertone. "That is the problem."

If the translation of Crdl Bertone's comments is correct, then I believe he is mistaken about there being a link between homosexuality and pedophilia. 

Some distinctions are necessary to make his mistake clear.  The very definition of the word "homosexual" is "one who is sexually attracted to one's own sex," perhaps even exclusively so attracted.  "Pedophilia" is a sexual attraction to children (pre-pubescents, non-adolescents) with no indicated preference for one sex over another.  Psychologists do not distinguish between "homosexual pedophiles" and "heterosexual pedophiles."  If any such term were to be used, it would be "bisexual pedophiles."

Pedophiles tend to be opportunistic, molesting when the chance to do so arises.  Generally, they also regard certain physical characteristics (hair and skin color, precociousness) as the most important in choosing their victims.  

The sexual attraction to adolescents is called ephebophilia.  In the U.S. clerical abuse cases, the overwhelming number of victims were adolescent males, mostly in the 15-17 year old range.   In classical Greece a sexual relationship between an adult male and an adolescent male was called pederasty and was accepted as a positive stage in the younger male's education as a citizen.  Once the boy became a man, the relationship stopped.  If it did not, the couple was often subject to public humiliation and risked being socially ostracized.  There was nothing more damning to a Greek man's virtue than to be though of as a woman.

It is clear from the evidence gathered by the John Jay Study on the Church's abuse scandals in the U.S. that there is a direct link to be drawn between sexually active homosexual priests and the sexual molestation of adolescent males.  This does not mean that all homosexual priests are molesters.  Nor does it mean that most homosexuals in the general population are molesters.  In fact, the overwhelming majority of molesters in the U.S. identify as heterosexual.

The media persists in calling clergy involved in the abuse of adolescents "pedophile priests" b/c they are loathe to draw attention to the politically incorrect fact that a vast majority of abusers were "ephebophile priests," thus avoiding an emphasis on the link between the sexual abuse cases and clerical homosexuality.  

By the same token, some in the Church have wrongly concluded that a homosexual inclination (exclusive of behavior) is a sufficient reason to exclude a man from seminary or religious formation.  This sort of exclusion fails to take into consideration that not all homosexual men experience their sexuality in exactly the same way.  The "kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out" approach to excluding same-sex attracted men from seminary is uncharitable and unjust.  By excluding homosexual men who are capable of living chastely in sexual continence, the Church is depriving herself of the service of potentially exemplary priests and encouraging those called to priesthood to begin their ministries under a shadow of deceit.  The emphasis in formation needs to be squarely and heavily placed on chaste, celibate continence, regardless of sexual orientation. 

It is entirely possible that Crdl Bertone is confused about the terminology he is using, or perhaps he is trying to point out that the current crisis is mostly about sexually active homosexual clergy.   Whatever he may have intended, it is wrong to suggest that there is a link between homosexuality and pedophilia.  They are two completely different burdens.

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