National Anxiety and Depression Awareness Week 2010

May 2-8, 2010, is National Anxiety and Depression Awareness Week, created by the advocacy organization Freedom From Fear.  Due to a new baby in the house, new blog posts on mental health topics are not in the cards this year, so here are some articles that have appeared on this site about depression and anxiety disorders:

Four Anxiety Myths

Four Depression Myths

Anxiety and Depression Resources

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Saturday Evening Blog Post

For the first time, LTLO is participating in the Saturday Evening Blog Post, a (mainly Catholic) blog carnival in which bloggers share their favorite post from the past month.  For this month only, bloggers are invited to share their favorite post from all of 2009. Head over to Elizabeth Esther's blog to read other participating bloggers' posts, and to see which post was shared from LTLO.

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Christmas Cheer

Check out these recent Christmas posts:

• 2009 Parade of Bad Nativities: all-new crazy and kitschy manger scenes
• 2008 Parade of Bad Nativities (imported from the old blog)
• Keep Chi in Christmas: Don't be afraid to go Greek!

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The Immaculate Conception

In honor of the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, visit these two new pages:

• The Immaculate Conception Dogma, with the definition of the Immaculate Conception and Scriptural support.
• A feast for the eyes of artistic works with the Virgin Mary as their subject.

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August Roundup: Prayer Requests, Catholic Cats, and More

Summer is a time when many readers have less time to spend online. We're accomodating that with a smaller-than-usual number of articles.  This way, you can read them all instead of skipping the ones you don't have time for.

Site News

A new forum has been added for requesting prayer intentions.  If you have a special intention and would like other prayer warriors to help storm heaven, by all means post it here.  You will have to register a free account* first (look in the top left of your screen). 

Latest Features

• Ignoring the Elephant: Read this look at one of the differences—perhaps the greatest difference—between humans and animals.
• Are Boys and Girls Different?  Get the scoop on the latest study on the brain differences between the sexes.  This article also explores the actual importance of a single research study—and the way the media report science.
  
• Cat-holics: Which are better, cats or dogs? Mark Shea is a dog person, and now he's brought religion into the old debate. This lighthearted response explains how cats are good Catholics too.

*Your personal information is never shared. The only reason I require you to register an account before posting is so we know who's who. For more information, check our privacy policy. You can respond to forum posts (and articles) anonymously, but you need a free account to make new forum post.

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Roundup: What I've Learned About Marriage; Copyright Justice; Utilitarianism

Here is a roundup of the latest articles on Leave the Lights On:

I recently celebrated my tenth wedding anniversary with my wonderful husband.  Find out what it has taught me about this sacrament:

• Three Things I've Learned About Marriage

A federal court recently fined a single mother $1.9 million—for violating copyright on a few songs.  Most Americans think this fine was outrageous—but was it really?  Read my analysis:

• Jammie Thomas Rasset fined—was this justice, really?

Secularism can free the human mind to develop all kinds of new philosophies and ideas.  Unfortunately, the results of lofty "free thinking" without Christ's guidance can be deeply disturbing.  Uncover the strange beliefs of preference utilitarianism:

• Preference Utilitarianism

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The Old Blog (and Old Comments) Are Still There!

Summary of this post:  Information about the old blog, old comments, the site feed, and all that weird legalese you may have seen.

I have had a few questions about the old blog, including the old comments.  It seems I'm guilty of a major oversight:  telling readers where to find the old blog now that the domain points to this new site.  You can see all the old posts (including ones that have been moved here) and all the comments at this address:

• http://ginkgo100.blogspot.com/

Since I used Intense Debate for comments, I can export comments.  Eventually I want to bring them over here, if I can figure out how to do so.  I won't be using Intense Debate over here because I don't need to—the Injader comment system is far superior to Blogger.  Besides, some people complained that it was confusing, asking for a login even though anonymous comments were allowed.  By the way, the same is true here on the new site: anonymous comments are permitted, but user accounts are available too.

Other minor news:  I tweaked the site feed.  This affects those of you who receive posts by email or in a reader.  Sorry you got all that weird legalese about disclaimers and so forth (I didn't mean for that to go to the feed).  I used some free "boilerplate" policies just to protect the authors here, after having heard horror stories of humble bloggers being sued and financially ruined.  It's scary looking stuff, I know, but basically just means "don't sue me."  Also, read the Privacy Policy (link at the bottom of every page) if you want to know what happens to your information when you create a user account.  The bottom line:  Not much.  Nothing will ever be shared.

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Blogroll is Up: Is Your Link Here?

A list of "Recommended Websites" (blogroll) has been added to the left sidebar. If you think I missed a good one, (maybe yours), please let me know!

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Welcome to Our New Site!

Welcome to the new and improved home of Leave the Lights On.  If you are reading this via a feed reader or email subscription, make sure you click through to see the redesign.

Without further ado, I would like to point out the first new article available only on this new site:

Catholic Answers Sues the IRS: Turnabout is Fair Play

Here are a few of the new features:

CONTENT BY CATEGORY.  Along the top navigation bar, you'll see the main content categories, such as "Science," "Catholicism," etc.  Each of these has subcategories.  The subcategories are experimental; I would like to see if they help people navigate or just impede it.  Explore them and see what's there!

USER ACCOUNTS.  You can create a completely optional user account to solidify your identity in the community (look in the upper left corner of the page).  By doing so, you get a permanent dofollow link to your homepage with every comment you leave.  If you like, you can also upload an avatar and edit your profile to include personal details about yourself.  Comments on new posts are open to anonymous users.

COMMUNITY FORUMS.  A lot of the readers here already belong to a loose community of Catholic science bloggers and the larger community of general Catholic bloggers, science bloggers, etc.  The community forums are a place where we can have conversations that don't have to be tied to a specific blog post.  You have to create a user account to post here.

MULTIPLE FEEDS.  The main Feedburner feed will contain all new posts (articles), but not forum threads.  It also will not include items posted in the Home category.  You can subscribe separately to just the categories that interest you, or you can subscribe to the Home category to receive a periodic digest/wrap-up of recent posts.

MULTIPLE AUTHORS.  I'm not the smartest blogger or best writer out there—maybe you are!  Guest posters are wanted.  You get increased exposure, a permanent dofollow link to your website, and if you like, reciprocal guest posting (I would be happy to write a post for your blog).

STILL TO COME:  I need to get my blogroll over here ASAP, and other small changes will probably appear, as I work out any issues and bugs in this "beta" version of the new site.

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