Our offerings this week range from a peek at football coach Brian Kelly’s favorite painting to a professor’s defense of Catholic higher education. There’s lots more, including something about coach Mike Brey in a kilt.
Why do parents of girls divorce more often than parents of boys? ND Psychology Professor Anita Kelly examines the phenomenon in her Psychology Today blog, “What Psychologists Know that You Don’t.”
In an article at the Times Higher Education website titled Defender of the Faith, Felipe Fernandez-Armesto, Notre Dame’s William P. Reynolds Professor of History, tells British academia why he is pleased to teach at a Catholic university such as Notre Dame. Times Higher Education is described as “the UK’s prime destination for academic news, analysis and employment.”
In his recent New York Times Opinionator blog post ND Professor of Philosophy Gary Gutting argues that “philosophy and religion can and must speak to each other.”In a certain sense, Gutting underscores the wider argument of his colleague Professor Fernandez-Armesto (see above) that a Catholic university is a very good thing because questions of faith and secular concerns can be equally addressed.
Want to know what makes people tick? Glean interesting bits of information about a wide array of topics at Neuroanthropology, a Public Library of Science blog co-authored by ND anthropologist Dan Lende. Recently, Lende has looked at everything from addiction to good study habits. While the blog is geared towards professional anthropologists, if you don’t mind wading through a little technical jargon from time to time there’s some interesting information there.
At the Commonweal website, an anonymous Notre Dame alumna contrasts her experiences as a gay Catholic raising two adopted sons with that of the recent Colorado case in which church authorities dismissed the children of gay parents from the parish school. Read her views.
Each year, before the Michgan-ND football game, Chicago’s classical music station WFMT airs a “fight song challenge” pitting the ND “Victory March” against Michigan’s “Hail to the Victors.” This year, as part of the challenge, the station aired “Kyrie” from the “Missa de Nostra Domina Victory,” a classical composition by Michael Anderson ’97, a professor at Rochester’s Eastman School of Music. Anderson’s composition can be heard on iTunes. It contains the full lyrics of the Victory March in a 16th century melodic style. Read more about the WFMT challenge.
When ND football coach Brian Kelly saw the painting “The Fighting Irish” by Revere LaNoue ’99, Kelly decided he had to have a copy for his office. See what caught the coach’s eye. And view more of LaNoue’s artwork.
Finally, would you give $50 to a worthy cause to see ND Men’s basketball coach Mike Brey in a kilt? The coach is hoping you will. As part of a fundraiser for Michiana’s Ronald McDonald House Charities, Brey is one of 12 local celebrities vying to be the best dressed man in a kilt. As an added incentive, if he wins the competition, Brey has promised to wear the kilt during the first half of the first exhibition game. To cast a vote, go to men in kilts.