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Objectives: To provide faith-based clinics with a iPad mini for providers with a drug database, disease database, and a screening tool and to provide the clinics with a desktop to provide patient education information to their patients using MedlinePlus and to register patients for the Affordable Care Act. Methods: Each organization received two iPad minis and one desktop computer. The providers who received the iPads minis were given two hours of training on the databases provided and on MedlinePlus. The librarians will conduct a focus group three months post training to determine the utility of the devices to the clinics and to discover future avenues of collaboration. Results: Interviews were conducted at all faith-based clinics that received the iPad minis and desktops. Preliminary evaluation shows the clinics appreciated the devices, training, and support. Conclusions: Data are still being analyzed, but the program appears to be a success and will hopefully be replicated in the future.

One of the major issues which continues to receive attention in New Testament studies is the debate over the occasion and purpose of Romans. The present exegetical study enters into the "Romans Debate" by focusing on the text of Romans 14:1. It is our thesis that here Paul appeals to the predominantly Gentile Christian "strong" ones in Rome to exercise vigorous acceptance of the predominantly Jewish Christian "weak in faith" who, although sharing in the righteousness of God in Christ, continue to exhibit scruples about food and calendar laws. Our study contributes to the current debate by confirming the plausibility of a concrete situation in Rome which warranted the address of this text. We also demonstrate how our interpretation harmonizes with the major themes of the letter, which are clearly concerned with the relationship between Jew and Gentile in the redemptive historical moment inaugurated by God's action in Christ. By establishing the existence of a significant dimension of Jewish-Gentile relations in Rome, we enable a clearer understanding of Paul's motivation for writing not only the text in question, and the pericope which it introduces, but the entire letter. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

<p> In our search for an understanding of Old English cosmological conceptions we discover that the creation myth is central to the mysteries of the Christian faith, and that the Greek and Latin authors' interpretations of creation, known as "Hexaemera", provide much that is vital and influential to Old English poetic cosmology. My purpose in this dissertation is two-fold. The first is to provide for the Old English biblically-based poems an informing context of Greek and Latin hexaemeral writings drawn mainly from the Fathers of the Church. The second is to examine three Old English texts on creation and paradise as set against the background of the Mediterranean hexaemeral tradition. That a definite and complex accumulation of hexaemeral writings existed from the early patristic era through the Old English period (ca. A.D. 100-750) is confirmed by the wide variety of treatises, tractates, sermons, poems and hymns, assertive and didactic literary genres all revealing one major purpose -- the demonstration of intelligible order in the universe which is to be perceived through a vision of God's wisdom in creation.</p> <p> From this immense body of traditions about creation and paradise emerges a pattern which suggests to us the hypothesis that the Old English Christian poets, whose access to a broad range of such writings has been established, pondered and incorporated the hexaemeral features and conventions while adding their own variations to the creation theme. An important corollary to this hypothesis is that the Old English accounts of creation and paradise were influenced by an elaborate, lettered, and learned tradition which deserves special critical emphasis. Recent scholars have stressed the need for a comprehensive study of the potentialities of allusion in Old English poems to traditional Christian allegorical and tropological interpretations, as well as a study of the scholarly habits of perception which distinguished the monastic and ecclesiastical writings of the Middle Ages. This thesis is intended to fill a small aspect of this need in its exploration of the lettered traditions of creation which preceded and existed alongside Anglo-Saxon civilization.</p> <p> In order to develop this thesis I have categorized its two parts, respectively, as the patristic and poetic traditions. Part One offers an inquiry into the exegetical treatment of creation and paradise revealed in the Fathers, the Christian Latin poets, and related sources. The exploration is not intended to be comprehensive but representative in a critical mode directed towards illuminating our understanding of certain seminal concepts from which radiated further interpretations of creation in the Old English poetic canon. The figural levels of meaning perceived by patristic authors in such archetypal symbols as the primordial ocean, the green plain and golden groves of Eden, the luminaries of day and night, the fire and hail, snow and vapour of creation, contribute to our understanding of the Old English moulding of creation myths.</p> <p> In Part Two, the critical scope of the study focusses in three separate chapters on the creation :features of the Junius Genesis A and Christ and Satan, and the paradisal elements in the Exeter Phoenix. Equipped with a knowledge of the main features of the Mediterranean hexaemeral tradition, we are enabled to perceive the divergent treatment of creation themes in the relevant Old English texts. The intricacies of Christian exegesis can amplify our appreciation of the more concise Old English poetic hexaemeral in which the major emphasis is on tradition drawn from late classical antiquity, pagan Germanic concepts, and· biblical and patristic imagery. This assertion is not to imply that the Old English poetic texts merely present successive interpretations of creation and paradise without adding any new dimension. The hexaemeral tradition in the imaginations of the Old English poets loses the rigid character of dogma and develops into a vision of the world as cosmopoesy.</p> <p> The boundaries of investigation in this thesis are necessarily limited. I have selected a scope of study within the main documentable collection of traditions which aided in shaping Old English cosmogonic mythology. Throughout the study I argue for the significance of, and the indispensable need for, knowledge of Christian traditions in the area of Old English hexaemeral writings which constitute mythopoeic or imaginative literature in contrast to the homiletic character of influential patristic doctrine.</p> / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

For the past ten years I have worked in the area of Christian education in an ecumenical context. This has afforded me the privilege of participating in many communities of faith as well as the challenge of ministry and leadership in diverse situations. These responsibilities, involving me in the lives and personalities of fellow human beings and the necessity of personal growth to meet the demands of my own life's situations have forced me to examine repeatedly the premises of my own faith and its relevance to life.

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The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between religiosity and broadcast news usage. This study examines the level of religiosity of individuals and its correlation to broadcast news exposure. The correlation between religiosity and perceptions of violence on broadcast news was also measured. Two theories were applied in this study. Uses and Gratifications asserts the active character of the audience to choose what they watch, how often, etc., and Selective Exposure defends the ability of the individual to select media that coincides with personal value systems. These two theories complement each other and provide support in the evaluation of religiosity and broadcast news exposure. A survey was posted on-line through various message boards. Twenty-five questions were used to determine religiosity, broadcast news exposure, broadcast news and perceptions of violence on broadcast news. In sum, all hypotheses were supported and the general idea that as religiosity increases broadcast news exposure decreases was confirmed. Nevertheless, due to the small effect size the study also indicates that religiosity does not explain a great percentage of the behavior of an individual towards broadcast news exposure. Therefore, the results of the study indicate that even though religiosity is not a good predictor of broadcast news exposure in general, religiosity affects to a small degree the choices of a more religious individual to expose himself to broadcast news. The perception of violence in broadcast news is also greater in religious than non-religious individuals.

This qualitative thesis brings attention to a phenomenon that is largely neglected in the world of higher education: the faith-intellect relationship. The main purpose of this multiple-case study is to provide a rich description of what a highly spiritually strengthening learning environment in higher education looks and feels like to those participating. In essence, the researcher provides a vicarious experience for the reader. A learning environment that fosters spiritually strengthening experiences for the students is one in which the student-teacher interactions are of high quality and in which the attributes possessed by both the professor and students are manifest through those interactions. The researcher discusses the role the professor and students play, separately and together, in developing such an environment. These findings contribute to the small amount of research already done on the topic of spirituality in higher education. The researcher presents vignettes of four cases in which a spiritually strengthening experience was shared by its participants, offers suggestions about application in academic contexts that extend beyond the four studied, and concludes by proposing areas for potential research in the future. Regardless of subject discipline and religious affiliation, this thesis provokes thought and offers hope for all faculty and administrators concerned with the holistic development of the student.

This study presents the analysis of Mormon characters in seven young adult novels: Emily Wing Smith's The Way He Lived and Back When You Were Easier to Love, Louise Plummer's A Dance for Three, A.E. Cannon's Charlotte's Rose, Kimberly Heuston's The Shakeress, Susan Campbell Bartoletti's The Boy Who Dared, and Angela Morrison's Taken by Storm. The characters in these novels are negatively stereotyped as typical Mormons. In four of the novels, the characters are stereotyped by other Mormon characters. In two of the novels, the characters are stereotyped by non-Mormon characters. The Mormon narrators in six of the novels prove the stereotypes incorrect, but the last novel, Taken by Storm, portrays a Mormon character fitting the stereotype. In all of the novels, the faith of the characters influences how they act, think, and speak.