Wednesday's News & Ideas - 8/18/2021

Pope Francis encourages COVID vaccines in media campaign*
The New York Times: “Getting the vaccines that are authorized by the respective authorities is an act of love,” the pope says in a video from the Ad Council.
National Catholic Reporter: Pope joins ad campaign to encourage coronavirus vaccinations
NPR: In a message to Americans, Pope Francis says getting vaccinated is ‘an act of love’

What Christian aid workers want you to know about Afghanistan
Christianity Today: US forces are withdrawing after 20 years, but the story of Christian aid work goes far beyond military conflict.

Homeboy Industries takes ‘quantum leap’ in wake of funding bonanza
Religion News Service: The nonprofit founded by Jesuit Father Gregory Boyle has received a $20 million gift from billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott and $15 million in funding from the state of California.

New research suggests Christians see LGBT progress as threatening
Religion & Politics: Research recently published in the “Journal for Personality and Social Psychology,” the top empirical social psychology journal, suggests that many Christians (particularly conservative ones) feel that Christians are hurt by gains for LGBT people.

Church made famous by Paul Revere reckons with its ties to slavery
CNN: Boston’s Old North Church is famous as the place where, in 1775, two lanterns in the steeple signaled that the British were heading to Concord and Lexington, but it’s not well known that some of the church’s early congregants were slaveholders.
Associated Press: Historic American church set to integrate its slavery ties

The Spark

The ugliness of Comic Sans has a practical use
Because the shapes of ugly fonts are unfamiliar, because they are less legible, they make the mind work a little harder, says Lit Hub.

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