essay about site of the first mass

University of the Philippines Diliman

Limasawa vs. butuan: the first easter mass.

(APR. 16) —The first ever Easter Mass in the Philippines – a landmark in the history of Philippine Christianity – was held in 1521 on the island of Mazaua, known today as Limasawa Island, Leyte.

This was the conclusion drawn by Dr. Antonio Sanchez de Mora, an expert on Spanish medieval history and head of the reference service at the Archivo General de Indias in Seville, Spain, after combing over sources in the archive pertinent to the initial encounter and first mass celebrated in an island called Mazaua and comparing them with other archival sources.

Mora presented his findings as the centerpiece of “500 th Anniversary of the Mass at Limasawa: The Confusion and Contention over Mazaua,” the second installment of the College of Social Sciences and Philosophy Department of History’s “Talastasan sa Kasaysayan” online lecture series held on Mar. 16, 4 p.m. over Zoom and broadcast over the the National Quincentennial Commission of the Philippines (NQC) portal.

Mora grouped his sources into four: documents written during Ferdinand Magellan’s historic expedition around the world; reports and testimonies of the survivors who managed to make it back to Europe; chronicles and other primary sources by authors who interviewed the survivors and who consulted their documents as well as maps and nautical charts; and secondary sources that years later interpreted the information provided by the primary sources and the testimonies transmitted over time.

Mora said the documents, primary sources and maps from the 16 th century confirm that the island of Mazaua was the site of an Easter Sunday Mass on March 31, 1521 and that on a hill on this island a cross was raised to be seen from afar.

“The geographical description, the analysis of the directions, the revision of the maps and the references to the island of Mazaua between 1521 and 1565 must identify it with [modern-day] Limasawa,” he said.

Up until 1921, it was believed that the event was held somewhere near the mouth of the Agusan River in what is today the municipality of Magallanes, Agusan del Norte. The shift to the Limasawa tradition happened following the publication of a transcription of a logbook from a pilot of the ship Victoria (one of the vessels in the Magellan expedition), stating that the crew placed a cross on an island called “Mazaua” whose location is closer to Cebu.

The change did not come without resistance, and the National Historical Institute (NHI) would convene no less than four separate panels in four different decades consisting of leading historians and intellectuals of the time to discuss, debate and decide on the issue. All of them came to the same conclusion as Mora.

Based on his research, Mora concluded that the confusion with the Butuan tradition “comes from an incorrect reading of the chronicles and the desire of some missionaries of 16 th and 17 th centuries to demand the conversion of the natives of Mindanao thanks to the preaching of the Jesuits.”

Mora concluded his presentation with a question: How important is which was the first mass and where it was celebrated? Not very much when in terms of effective historical evangelization according to guest reactor and Mojares panel member Fr. Antonio Francisco B. De Castro, S.J. of Ateneo de Manila University.

For Castro, whatever symbolic and theological value the mass had, the fact remains that “no lasting Christian community was set up” as “Magellan was given on clear missionary mandate” when he set out on his expedition. He said “it would take another four decades for systematic and durable evangelization to take place.”

The Talastasan lecture series is a featured event of the UP Diliman Arts and Culture Festival 2021 and is the first of a series of activities in line with the Department of History’s series of year-long activities that commemorate the quincentennial celebration of the Christianization of the Philippines.

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Limasawa Island: A Place of the First Mass in the Philippines

Limawasa, an island municipality in southern leyte, is a small yet flourishing town being the site of the first christian mass in the country and in asia. the first cross and the first mass shrine are some of the frequently visited spots that give tourists a rare experience of retracing the historic footsteps of the portuguese explorer ferdinand magellan in 1521 who paved the way for the beginning of christianity in the country..

“Mazaua” is the original name of this municipality. There are two assumptions how the municipality got its name:

Limasawa was created into an independent municipality on June 11, 1978 by virtue of Presidential Decree No. 1549. But this was not implemented due to some problems. Limasawa officially became a municipality on August 27, 1989 after the conduct of a plebiscite among the populace to ratify its independence.

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T. Opus Street, Maasin City, Southern Leyte, Samar / Leyte, Philippines

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Osmena Street, Sogod, Leyte

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How to get there

From Manila, tourists can reach Southern Leyte by riding a plane via Tacloban. Local airlines from Manila have trips going to Tacloban - the gateway to Southern Leyte.  Next from Tacloban, take an FX van going to Hinunangan - one of the town in Southern Leyte. 

There are buses from Manila particularly in Pasay or Cubao that have direct trips to Hinunangan.

Maasin City is the nearest gateway to Limawasa Island. From Maasin City, the island can be reached through a 30-minute ride to the municipality of Padre Burgos and another 40 minutes banca/boat ride to the island. Maasin City is 2-3 hours van/bus ride from Ormoc City and Tacloban City.

• http://www.nscb.gov.ph/ru8/Profiles/Municipal_Profile/Municipal_Profile_Limasawa.pdf
• http://www.leyteboard.com/how-to-get-to-leyte.php

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Resolving debate on site of first Mass in PH

Eight months into the official rites for the 500th anniversary of the first Mass in the country, a set of evidence was presented to refute historical accounts that the contingent of world voyager Ferdinand Magellan held the event in Limasawa, Southern Leyte.

Dr. Potenciano Malvar, chair of the Butuan Calagan Historical Cultural Foundation, will assert that the first Mass was held at another site in Mindanao in the soon-to-be-published book, “Site of the 1521 Easter Mass, Butuan Not Limasawa.”

“It is my desire that this manuscript shall initiate the National Historical Commission of the Philippines to unlock and expose the concocted and fabricated published versions of the existing, disputable site of where the Easter Mass continued to be celebrated,” he said in the introduction to the 144-page draft.

Malvar, a 75-year-old doctor, spent five years of research in the country and abroad to help resolve a dispute that a 1959 law, two panels in 1998 and 2009, and several appeals had failed to settle.

“I conclude with complete confidence that it was Butuan,” he told the Inquirer in a recent telephone interview.

According to him, those determining the actual site should first have in mind that the goal of the voyage of the Magellan-led Armada de Moluccas was to reach the Spice Islands using the westward route and trade.

CELEBRATING CHRISTIANITY A monu of ment depicting fir the first Mass in st Butuan City fe Ma atures the images ss of Portuguese ex in plorer Ferdinan PH d Magellan with Rajah Kolambu, the King of Butuan, and his brother, Rajah Siagu, the King of Mazaua. The commemorative site is at Bood Promontory Ecopark, built on a hill overlooking Masao River, or El Rio de Butuan. —ERWIN MASCARIÑAS

‘Disguised’

On the order of Spain’s King Charles 1, Magellan, in a 1521 map, “disguised the island of Spice by putting the latitudes at 9 ⅔ degree latitude and cartographed those islands of Mindanao and Visayas by making South, North and East, West.”

The logs of six sailors of the three ships in the expedition also concealed the location of Butuan Island. “Magellan intended them to have contrasting latitude,” Malvar said. “So the 9 ⅔ degree latitude and the purpose of the cartographs were to conceal.”

He said the Limasawa proponents “need to explain why if the 9 ⅔ latitude was that land they wanted to go, why was there a need for Magellan to cartograph those islands that way?”

King Charles’ order on April 19, 1519, read in part: “I know for certain, according to the much information which I have obtained from persons who have seen it by experience, that there are spices in the islands of Maluco; and chiefly, you are going to seek them with this said fleet and my will is that you should straightaway follow the voyage to the said islands in the form and guise which I have said and commanded to you, the said Ferdinand Magallanes.”

A copy of the order is kept in the Archivo General de Indias in Seville, Spain.

Concealment was practiced for centuries by Arab and Chinese traders, Malvar said. An order, dated May 8, 1519, by the Casa Contratacion, also owned by the king, gave Magellan instructions on how to treat and trade with the natives.

Malvar said these negotiations were not known to the chronicler Antonio Pigafetta, who was taught by Magellan to keep secrets after warning that “unauthorized people caught with a chart from his cabinet in the ship faced death.”

The site where Magellan erected a cross with crown was documented by Francisco Albo, who kept an official logbook of the voyage.

It was “upon a mountain,” locating Butuan Island at 9 ⅓ degree North latitude. Later, King Charles referred to this as the proof of his conquest of the Spice Islands.

BISHOP’S ORDER The unpublished book “Butuan not Limasawa” features a copy of a 1581 edict (right) by Manila Bishop Domingo de Salazar, which declared “El Capella Butuan” as site of the Easter Mass celebrated on March 31, 1521 (Julian calendar), or April 8, 1521 (Gregorian calendar).

No ‘Limasawa’

Malvar said Mazaua, an island near Butuan, was replaced with the word Limasawa in the preface of the “First Voyage Around the World” by James Alexander Robertson and Emma Helen Blair that was published in December 1907.

The authentic Pigafetta manuscript has no word Limasawa, Malvar said, attributing the change to a third editor, Edward Gaylord Bourne.

“Limasawa at 9 degree 55’ latitude was very far north of the 9 ⅓ degree North latitude,” he noted to eliminate Limasawa.

Congressional archives of Republic Act No. 2733, the 1959 law that declared Limasawa as official site of the first Mass, showed “many irregularities,” Malvar said.

Of the 39 lawmakers, only 11 were present when the bill was approved.

Proponents, even Church leaders, were not invited to committee hearings. No ocular visits were done. The law did not bear the signature of then President Carlos Garcia.

Malvar also found out that the Gancayco panel, in its 1998 report, deleted six sentences in Pigafetta’s accounts because these would “debunk the Limasawa claim.” The panel was created by the former National Historical Institute in 1996 to resolve issues in the country’s history.

According to Malvar, among the deleted portions was that the Easter Mass happened in the domain of the first king, Raia Colambu, which was Butuan. Magellan’s setting up of tokens —cross and crown—was deleted although this confirmed the conquest. The items were not found though to this date.

The “bull’s eye” against Limasawa was the three actions that Pigafetta recounted but were deleted in the Gancayco report: “The ships fired all their artillery at once when the body of Christ was elevated, the signal having been [given] from the shore with muskets.”

These, Malvar said, could not be done all at the same time in Limasawa because Magellan’s shrine and landing are 700 meters apart.

He said “Conquistas de las Islas Filipinas 1565-1615,” a chronicle of Miguel Lopez de Legazpi’s expedition by Gaspar de San Agustin, extolled the exploits of Magellan in Butuan, 44 years after the explorer was killed in Mactan.

“[The natives and king] built him a house and during Easter, the First Mass celebrated [on] these islands was held in Butuan and the First Cross was raised, which Ferdinand Magellan himself placed on a hill not very far from the beach … ”

The same chronicle mentioned Butuan, describing it thus: “That on Masagua there was a town located to the east with a port for the ships on the west side of the island.”

Disappeared

Malvar said the evidence that Mazaua Island existed was a 1683 map by Augustinian Recolletos. The island disappeared in a 1902 map because earthquakes had fused it with the mainland while siltation by floods filled it. The present day Mazaua is thought to be Barangay Masao, one of the 85 villages of Butuan City.

Using a 1739 map, Malvar tracked Pigafetta’s distance of 35 leguas (legua is an obsolete unit of length; 1 legua is equivalent to 3 miles, or 4.84 kilometers) from Mazaua to Gatigan to Zzubu. The distance between Limasawa and Zzubu was less than 20 leguas, however.

Malvar twice doubted if Limasawa could supply spice, citing the large haul of the ship Victoria when it returned to Spain. Also, the tadpole shape of Limasawa contrasted Pigafetta’s cartograph of Mazaua Island.

Jesuit priest Rey Pedro Chirino’s “Relaciones de las Islas Filipinas” mentioned the missionary activities of the Jesuits from 1581 and the Recolletos in 1622 in Butuan. Books by five missionaries dated 1663, 1667, 1787 and 1818 chronicled the growth and forms of Catholic faith in Butuan.

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Then, too, the first bishop of Manila, Domingo de Salazar, issued an edict in 1581 declaring “El Capella Butuan” the site where the Easter Mass was celebrated on March 31, 1521.

The edict was published in a special newspaper supplement published in 1926, a copy of which is in the archives of the Archdiocese of Manila.

In Butuan, there was also a group called “Folks of Magallanes” that celebrated the Easter Mass for 300 years until 2000 at the Carballo Monument. The date of the Mass was on April 8, 1521, following the Gregorian calendar.

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That 'First Mass' in Philippines in proper context

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The Supreme Court effectively abolishes the right to mass protest in three US states

It is no longer safe to organize a protest in Louisiana, Mississippi, or Texas.

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Share All sharing options for: The Supreme Court effectively abolishes the right to mass protest in three US states

The Supreme Court announced on Monday that it will not hear Mckesson v. Doe . The decision not to hear Mckesson leaves in place a lower court decision that effectively eliminated the right to organize a mass protest in the states of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas.

Under that lower court decision, a protest organizer faces potentially ruinous financial consequences if a single attendee at a mass protest commits an illegal act.

It is possible that this outcome will be temporary. The Court did not embrace the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit’s decision attacking the First Amendment right to protest, but it did not reverse it either. That means that, at least for now, the Fifth Circuit’s decision is the law in much of the American South.

For the past several years, the Fifth Circuit has engaged in a crusade against DeRay Mckesson , a prominent figure within the Black Lives Matter movement who organized a protest near a Baton Rouge police station in 2016.

The facts of the Mckesson case are, unfortunately, quite tragic. Mckesson helped organize the Baton Rouge protest following the fatal police shooting of Alton Sterling . During that protest, an unknown individual threw a rock or similar object at a police officer, the plaintiff in the Mckesson case who is identified only as “Officer John Doe.” Sadly, the officer was struck in the face and, according to one court, suffered “ injuries to his teeth, jaw, brain, and head .”

Everyone agrees that this rock was not thrown by Mckesson, however. And the Supreme Court held in NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware (1982) that protest leaders cannot be held liable for the violent actions of a protest participant, absent unusual circumstances that are not present in the Mckesson case — such as if Mckesson had “authorized, directed, or ratified” the decision to throw the rock.

Indeed, as Justice Sonia Sotomayor points out in a brief opinion accompanying the Court’s decision not to hear Mckesson , the Court recently reaffirmed the strong First Amendment protections enjoyed by people like Mckesson in Counterman v. Colorado (2023). That decision held that the First Amendment “precludes punishment” for inciting violent action “unless the speaker’s words were ‘intended’ (not just likely) to produce imminent disorder.”

The reason Claiborne protects protest organizers should be obvious. No one who organizes a mass event attended by thousands of people can possibly control the actions of all those attendees, regardless of whether the event is a political protest, a music concert, or the Super Bowl . So, if protest organizers can be sanctioned for the illegal action of any protest attendee, no one in their right mind would ever organize a political protest again.

Indeed, as Fifth Circuit Judge Don Willett, who dissented from his court’s Mckesson decision, warned in one of his dissents, his court’s decision would make protest organizers liable for “ the unlawful acts of counter-protesters and agitators .” So, under the Fifth Circuit’s rule, a Ku Klux Klansman could sabotage the Black Lives Matter movement simply by showing up at its protests and throwing stones.

The Fifth Circuit’s Mckesson decision is obviously wrong

Like Mckesson , Claiborne involved a racial justice protest that included some violent participants. In the mid-1960s, the NAACP launched a boycott of white merchants in Claiborne County, Mississippi. At least according to the state supreme court, some participants in this boycott “engaged in acts of physical force and violence against the persons and property of certain customers and prospective customers” of these white businesses.

Indeed, one of the organizers of this boycott did far more to encourage violence than Mckesson is accused of in his case. Charles Evers, a local NAACP leader, allegedly said in a speech to boycott supporters that “ if we catch any of you going in any of them racist stores, we’re gonna break your damn neck .”

But the Supreme Court held that this “emotionally charged rhetoric ... did not transcend the bounds of protected speech.” It ruled that courts must use “extreme care” before imposing liability on a political figure of any kind. And it held that a protest leader may only be held liable for a protest participant’s actions in very limited circumstances :

There are three separate theories that might justify holding Evers liable for the unlawful conduct of others. First, a finding that he authorized, directed, or ratified specific tortious activity would justify holding him responsible for the consequences of that activity. Second, a finding that his public speeches were likely to incite lawless action could justify holding him liable for unlawful conduct that in fact followed within a reasonable period. Third, the speeches might be taken as evidence that Evers gave other specific instructions to carry out violent acts or threats.

The Fifth Circuit conceded, in a 2019 opinion , that Officer Doe “has not pled facts that would allow a jury to conclude that Mckesson colluded with the unknown assailant to attack Officer Doe, knew of the attack and ratified it, or agreed with other named persons that attacking the police was one of the goals of the demonstration.” So that should have been the end of the case.

Instead, in its most recent opinion in this case, the Fifth Circuit concluded that Claiborne ’s “three separate theories that might justify” holding a protest leader liable are a non-exhaustive list, and that the MAGA-infused court is allowed to create new exceptions to the First Amendment. It then ruled that the First Amendment does not apply “where a defendant creates unreasonably dangerous conditions, and where his creation of those conditions causes a plaintiff to sustain injuries.”

And what, exactly, were the “unreasonably dangerous conditions” created by the Mckesson-led protest in Baton Rouge? The Fifth Circuit faulted Mckesson for organizing “the protest to begin in front of the police station, obstructing access to the building,” for failing to “dissuade” protesters who allegedly stole water bottles from a grocery store, and for leading “the assembled protest onto a public highway, in violation of Louisiana criminal law.”

Needless to say, the idea that the First Amendment recedes the moment a mass protest violates a traffic law is quite novel. And it is impossible to reconcile with pretty much the entire history of mass civil rights protests in the United States.

In fairness, the Court’s decision to leave the Fifth Circuit’s attack on the First Amendment in place could be temporary. As Sotomayor writes in her Mckesson opinion, when the Court announces that it will not hear a particular case it “expresses no view about the merits.” The Court could still restore the First Amendment right to protest in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas in a future case.

For the time being, however, the Fifth Circuit’s Mckesson decision remains good law in those three states. And that means that anyone who organizes a political protest within the Fifth Circuit risks catastrophic financial liability.

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Examining lunar soil for moon-based construction

• Weinberg College

Most people are familiar with the iconic photograph of astronaut Buzz Aldrin’s boot print on the surface of the moon. But what, exactly, is in the soil that holds the imprint of that famously “small step for man”?

The answer to this question is more than a fleeting curiosity — it’s essential knowledge for NASA’s Artemis program, which aims to build a permanent base on the moon. While researchers understand the general makeup of the lunar soil, Northwestern University mineralogist Steven Jacobsen has received funding from NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center to further unravel the mystery of the dubious dust.

Because the cost of bringing traditional building materials from Earth is incredibly high, NASA has partnered with robotics and artificial intelligence company ICON Technology Inc. to explore new methods for building a lunar outpost using the moon’s own resources. But before ICON can build structures with the moon’s soil, the team first needs to understand the soil’s exact composition, which can change drastically from one sample to the next.

Just as the first bricks on Earth were made out of terrestrial soil, the first bricks on the moon will be made out of lunar soil. ”

To characterize these samples, Jacobsen is working closely with his former student Katie Koube, now a materials scientist at ICON, to analyze various samples using Northwestern’s facilities. Their end goal is to create a library of potential sample compositions, which will be used to optimize parameters for the building process.

“Off-world construction comes with many challenges,” said Jacobsen, the project’s principal investigator. “The moon’s soil is not like that on Earth. On the moon, soil is formed from meteoroid impacts that have crushed the surface. So, the moon is essentially coated in a thick layer of pulverized flour. The types of minerals and glass found in lunar soil depend on many factors. The material can vary widely within even a small area.”

Jacobsen is a professor of Earth and planetary sciences at Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences . He also is a faculty affiliate with the Paula M. Trienens Institute for Sustainability and Energy and the Center for Engineering Sustainability and Resilience . Members of the project also include Laura Gardner and Tirzah Abbott, who are Ph.D. candidates in Jacobsen’s lab .

The dangers of dust

  With plans to travel back and forth to the moon more regularly, NASA first needs a reliable landing pad. Otherwise, every time a lunar lander makes contact with the moon’s surface, it will kick up destructive dust that could gum up equipment and damage the surrounding habitat.

“Each particle of dust on the moon is jagged and angular,” Koube said. “When you think of grains of sand on Earth, they are rounded because weathering removes all those rough edges. Without weathering, the particles remain bumpy and sharp. So, if a rocket lands directly on the moon’s surface, it stirs up abrasive dust that basically sandblasts the whole area.”

In November 2022, NASA selected ICON for a $57.2 million grant to develop lunar construction technology. The contract builds upon previous NASA and Department of Defense funding for ICON’s Project Olympus to research and develop space-based construction systems to support planned exploration of the moon and beyond. ICON’s Olympus system is intended to be a multipurpose construction system primarily using local lunar and Martian resources as building materials to further the efforts of NASA as well as commercial organizations to establish a sustained lunar presence. ICON is already using its advanced 3D-printing technology to build homes on Earth. By putting multipurpose in situ resource utilization (ISRU)-based lunar construction systems on the moon, the team aims to use lunar resources as the building blocks for construction.

“It’s not feasible to send traditional Earth-based construction equipment and materials to the moon,” Jacobsen said. “The payload would be too heavy. So, this plan is a lot more practical. Just as the first bricks on Earth were made out of terrestrial soil, the first bricks on the moon will be made out of lunar soil.”

Simulated soil samples

After ICON received NASA’s funding, Koube, who graduated with a dual degree from Northwestern’s materials science and Earth and planetary sciences programs in 2014, contacted Jacobsen to lead sample analysis. The pair assembled a team that works with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, under the Space Technology Mission Directorate’s Moon to Mars Planetary Autonomous Construction Technologies (MMPACT) project.

At Northwestern, analysis is already underway. Gardner and Abbott currently are using various microscopy techniques to analyze eight lunar simulants — faux moon soil that is designed to mimic the real thing — and synthetic plagioclase, a brittle, greyish-white mineral that is a major constituent of moon rock. Then, the team will compare the lunar simulants to actual samples collected from the Apollo missions.

“Of course, we know from Apollo missions what’s in lunar dirt — and that it’s very heterogenous (or variable),” Jacobsen said. “Our job is to anticipate the likely variability in lunar soil and come up with a way to measure it on the fly, onboard the 3D printer.”

So far, the researchers have noticed vast differences among the lunar simulants. In some minerals, the team has detected hydrogen — a component of water, which is not abundant in minerals on the moon. They also are on the lookout for mineral impurities in the simulants that are not expected on the lunar surface. The team can then focus on materials and chemical variations that the construction processes are more likely to encounter.

No scoop is the same

After determining variability in realistic samples, the researchers will probe how the composition of dirt can affect the melting process used in robotic construction. Once on the moon, ICON’s multi-purpose ISRU-based lunar construction systems will scoop up lunar soil and melt it for printing. After printing, the melted dirt will harden and cool into a ceramic material.

“On Earth, you can gather clay and fire it in a kiln to make ceramics,” Jacobsen said. “But the properties of lunar soil are such that it needs to be melted first. Different minerals in lunar dirt melt at different rates, so the 3D-printing process is very sensitive to changes in mineralogy.”

And, of course, no sample is the same. One scoop of lunar dirt might have a different melting point than the next scoop. The 3D-printing technology needs to be nimble enough to know how to handle these subtle differences. That’s where Jacobsen’s sample library comes into play. By enabling the 3D printer to be prepared for all potential compositions, it can perform diagnostics of each scoop and then adjust its laser parameters for heating and cooling.

“Without understanding the characteristics of the soil, it’s difficult to understand the variability of the final printed materials,” Jacobsen said. “Using the library that we create from simulants — cross-checked against the lunar soil — the printer will know how to process each piece to produce the best ceramic. That detailed library of information will play a part in making the imagined outpost a reality.”

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Two Elaine Marieb College of Nursing students have won the 2024 Sarah B. Pasternack Nursing Student Essay Contest . Ameneh Arzheh (PhD Nursing) and Shaely Lora-Brito (BSN) won the respective graduate and undergraduate categories in the contest. They will each receive a $500 prize and will read their essays during a Nursing Archives Associates meeting later this spring.

Both students responded to the prompt: "Why is understanding nursing history important to the future of nursing?" Lora-Brito opens likening the history of nursing to the unfolding pages of a diary.

"Understanding the history of nursing is like unfolding the pages of a diary that holds the secrets to the soul of healthcare... Knowing the history of nursing isn't just a look back into the past; it's a guiding light that illuminates the way to the future." 

Lora-Brito goes on to discuss the historical importance of Mary Eliza Mahoney, the first African-American licensed nurse, writing, "Mahoney's story teaches us that nursing is not just about the skills and knowledge we acquire but also about the values we embody and the changes we strive to make, not only in healthcare but in society as a whole."

Arzheh also opens with the perspective that understanding history allows us to shape the future of nursing with an informed lens, with a specific focus on nursing theory.

"Nursing theory played a pivotal role in establishing the profession's unique identity... Nursing theories contribute significantly to shaping the profession by offering unique worldviews that enrich our understanding of nursing practice."

Using theory by which to evolve the profession and industry, Arzheh writes, helps shape nurse self-awareness, too. "This self-awareness becomes a catalyst for developing a deeper and more empathetic connection with patients," Arzheh argues.

Only two winning essays are selected each year for this prestigious contest. The winning essays will eventually be published in full on the Nursing Archives Associates website. The contest is in honor of Sarah Pasternack, MA, RN, who "served as the President of the Nursing Archives Associates for more than 20 years. She received the Living Legend Award from the ANA Massachusetts in 2014. Sarah was an Assistant Professor at Boston University School of Nursing and a Nursing Patient Services Director and an Advanced Practice Nurse in Patient Safety and Quality at Boston Children’s Hospital," according to AAHN .

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NPR defends its journalism after senior editor says it has lost the public's trust

David Folkenflik

NPR is defending its journalism and integrity after a senior editor wrote an essay accusing it of losing the public's trust. Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

NPR is defending its journalism and integrity after a senior editor wrote an essay accusing it of losing the public's trust.

NPR's top news executive defended its journalism and its commitment to reflecting a diverse array of views on Tuesday after a senior NPR editor wrote a broad critique of how the network has covered some of the most important stories of the age.

"An open-minded spirit no longer exists within NPR, and now, predictably, we don't have an audience that reflects America," writes Uri Berliner.

A strategic emphasis on diversity and inclusion on the basis of race, ethnicity and sexual orientation, promoted by NPR's former CEO, John Lansing, has fed "the absence of viewpoint diversity," Berliner writes.

NPR's chief news executive, Edith Chapin, wrote in a memo to staff Tuesday afternoon that she and the news leadership team strongly reject Berliner's assessment.

"We're proud to stand behind the exceptional work that our desks and shows do to cover a wide range of challenging stories," she wrote. "We believe that inclusion — among our staff, with our sourcing, and in our overall coverage — is critical to telling the nuanced stories of this country and our world."

NPR names tech executive Katherine Maher to lead in turbulent era

She added, "None of our work is above scrutiny or critique. We must have vigorous discussions in the newsroom about how we serve the public as a whole."

A spokesperson for NPR said Chapin, who also serves as the network's chief content officer, would have no further comment.

Praised by NPR's critics

Berliner is a senior editor on NPR's Business Desk. (Disclosure: I, too, am part of the Business Desk, and Berliner has edited many of my past stories. He did not see any version of this article or participate in its preparation before it was posted publicly.)

Berliner's essay , titled "I've Been at NPR for 25 years. Here's How We Lost America's Trust," was published by The Free Press, a website that has welcomed journalists who have concluded that mainstream news outlets have become reflexively liberal.

Berliner writes that as a Subaru-driving, Sarah Lawrence College graduate who "was raised by a lesbian peace activist mother ," he fits the mold of a loyal NPR fan.

Yet Berliner says NPR's news coverage has fallen short on some of the most controversial stories of recent years, from the question of whether former President Donald Trump colluded with Russia in the 2016 election, to the origins of the virus that causes COVID-19, to the significance and provenance of emails leaked from a laptop owned by Hunter Biden weeks before the 2020 election. In addition, he blasted NPR's coverage of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

On each of these stories, Berliner asserts, NPR has suffered from groupthink due to too little diversity of viewpoints in the newsroom.

The essay ricocheted Tuesday around conservative media , with some labeling Berliner a whistleblower . Others picked it up on social media, including Elon Musk, who has lambasted NPR for leaving his social media site, X. (Musk emailed another NPR reporter a link to Berliner's article with a gibe that the reporter was a "quisling" — a World War II reference to someone who collaborates with the enemy.)

When asked for further comment late Tuesday, Berliner declined, saying the essay spoke for itself.

The arguments he raises — and counters — have percolated across U.S. newsrooms in recent years. The #MeToo sexual harassment scandals of 2016 and 2017 forced newsrooms to listen to and heed more junior colleagues. The social justice movement prompted by the killing of George Floyd in 2020 inspired a reckoning in many places. Newsroom leaders often appeared to stand on shaky ground.

Leaders at many newsrooms, including top editors at The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times , lost their jobs. Legendary Washington Post Executive Editor Martin Baron wrote in his memoir that he feared his bonds with the staff were "frayed beyond repair," especially over the degree of self-expression his journalists expected to exert on social media, before he decided to step down in early 2021.

Since then, Baron and others — including leaders of some of these newsrooms — have suggested that the pendulum has swung too far.

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New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger warned last year against journalists embracing a stance of what he calls "one-side-ism": "where journalists are demonstrating that they're on the side of the righteous."

"I really think that that can create blind spots and echo chambers," he said.

Internal arguments at The Times over the strength of its reporting on accusations that Hamas engaged in sexual assaults as part of a strategy for its Oct. 7 attack on Israel erupted publicly . The paper conducted an investigation to determine the source of a leak over a planned episode of the paper's podcast The Daily on the subject, which months later has not been released. The newsroom guild accused the paper of "targeted interrogation" of journalists of Middle Eastern descent.

Heated pushback in NPR's newsroom

Given Berliner's account of private conversations, several NPR journalists question whether they can now trust him with unguarded assessments about stories in real time. Others express frustration that he had not sought out comment in advance of publication. Berliner acknowledged to me that for this story, he did not seek NPR's approval to publish the piece, nor did he give the network advance notice.

Some of Berliner's NPR colleagues are responding heatedly. Fernando Alfonso, a senior supervising editor for digital news, wrote that he wholeheartedly rejected Berliner's critique of the coverage of the Israel-Hamas conflict, for which NPR's journalists, like their peers, periodically put themselves at risk.

Alfonso also took issue with Berliner's concern over the focus on diversity at NPR.

"As a person of color who has often worked in newsrooms with little to no people who look like me, the efforts NPR has made to diversify its workforce and its sources are unique and appropriate given the news industry's long-standing lack of diversity," Alfonso says. "These efforts should be celebrated and not denigrated as Uri has done."

After this story was first published, Berliner contested Alfonso's characterization, saying his criticism of NPR is about the lack of diversity of viewpoints, not its diversity itself.

"I never criticized NPR's priority of achieving a more diverse workforce in terms of race, ethnicity and sexual orientation. I have not 'denigrated' NPR's newsroom diversity goals," Berliner said. "That's wrong."

Questions of diversity

Under former CEO John Lansing, NPR made increasing diversity, both of its staff and its audience, its "North Star" mission. Berliner says in the essay that NPR failed to consider broader diversity of viewpoint, noting, "In D.C., where NPR is headquartered and many of us live, I found 87 registered Democrats working in editorial positions and zero Republicans."

Berliner cited audience estimates that suggested a concurrent falloff in listening by Republicans. (The number of people listening to NPR broadcasts and terrestrial radio broadly has declined since the start of the pandemic.)

Former NPR vice president for news and ombudsman Jeffrey Dvorkin tweeted , "I know Uri. He's not wrong."

Others questioned Berliner's logic. "This probably gets causality somewhat backward," tweeted Semafor Washington editor Jordan Weissmann . "I'd guess that a lot of NPR listeners who voted for [Mitt] Romney have changed how they identify politically."

Similarly, Nieman Lab founder Joshua Benton suggested the rise of Trump alienated many NPR-appreciating Republicans from the GOP.

In recent years, NPR has greatly enhanced the percentage of people of color in its workforce and its executive ranks. Four out of 10 staffers are people of color; nearly half of NPR's leadership team identifies as Black, Asian or Latino.

"The philosophy is: Do you want to serve all of America and make sure it sounds like all of America, or not?" Lansing, who stepped down last month, says in response to Berliner's piece. "I'd welcome the argument against that."

"On radio, we were really lagging in our representation of an audience that makes us look like what America looks like today," Lansing says. The U.S. looks and sounds a lot different than it did in 1971, when NPR's first show was broadcast, Lansing says.

A network spokesperson says new NPR CEO Katherine Maher supports Chapin and her response to Berliner's critique.

The spokesperson says that Maher "believes that it's a healthy thing for a public service newsroom to engage in rigorous consideration of the needs of our audiences, including where we serve our mission well and where we can serve it better."

Disclosure: This story was reported and written by NPR Media Correspondent David Folkenflik and edited by Deputy Business Editor Emily Kopp and Managing Editor Gerry Holmes. Under NPR's protocol for reporting on itself, no NPR corporate official or news executive reviewed this story before it was posted publicly.

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China’s Economy, Propelled by Its Factories, Grew More Than Expected

China’s big bet on manufacturing helped to counteract its housing slowdown in the first three months of the year, but other countries are worried about a flood of Chinese goods.

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By Keith Bradsher and Alexandra Stevenson

Reporting from Beijing

The Chinese economy grew more than expected in the first three months of the year, new data shows, as China built more factories and exported huge amounts of goods to counter a severe real estate crisis and sluggish spending at home.

To stimulate growth, China, the world’s second-largest economy, turned to a familiar tactic : investing heavily in its manufacturing sector, including a binge of new factories that have helped to propel sales around the world of solar panels, electric cars and other products.

But China’s bet on exports has worried many foreign countries and companies. They fear that a flood of Chinese shipments to distant markets may undermine their manufacturing industries and lead to layoffs.

On Tuesday, China’s National Bureau of Statistics said the economy grew 1.6 percent in the first quarter over the previous three months. When projected out for the entire year, the first-quarter data indicates that China’s economy was growing at an annual rate of about 6.6 percent.

“The national economy made a good start,” said Sheng Laiyun, deputy director of the statistics bureau, while cautioning that “the foundation for stable and sound economic growth is not solid yet.”

Retail sales increased at a modest pace of 4.7 percent compared with the first three months of last year, and were particularly weak in March.

China needs robust consumer spending to bring down persistently high youth unemployment and to help companies and households cope with very high levels of debt.

Economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York warned last month that China is experiencing a “sugar high” of factory construction fueled by heavy bank lending.

For the year, China has set a growth target of about 5 percent , a goal that many economists had viewed as ambitious, although some have recently upgraded their forecasts. Last year, China’s economy grew 5.2 percent .

Output was 5.3 percent higher in the first three months of this year than during the same period last year, the statistics bureau announced on Tuesday, exceeding economists’ forecasts.

A breakneck pace of factory investments, up 9.9 percent from a year ago, was central to China’s growth. Strong exports early this year also helped.

The value of exports rose 7 percent in dollar terms in January and February from a year earlier, and 10 percent when measured in China’s currency, the renminbi. But the actual contribution from exports to the country’s economy was considerably greater, as falling prices obscured the full extent of China’s export gains.

Guo Tingting, a vice minister of commerce, said at a news conference last month that the physical volume of exports had climbed 20 percent in January and February over last year. Exports faltered somewhat in March, however.

With street festivals and other activities, the government has encouraged families to spend more even as many in China have stepped up their savings to offset a recent nosedive in the value of their apartments.

Domestic tourism spending and box office ticket sales both rose during Lunar New Year in February, easily exceeding levels before the Covid-19 pandemic. Smartphone sales have also climbed — although not for Apple — as Chinese buyers increasingly choose local brands.

Broadly falling prices, a phenomenon that can become entrenched in deflation, continue to be a problem, particularly for exports and at the wholesale level. Chinese companies have been vying to cut export prices and win a bigger share of global markets, even when this means incurring heavy losses.

During top-level meetings earlier this month with Chinese officials, Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen warned that flooding markets with exports would disrupt supply chains and threaten industries and jobs. Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany expressed similar concerns while on a visit to China, though he also cautioned against protectionism in Europe.

China is, meanwhile, experiencing a deep slump in housing construction and apartment prices. The construction of homes — and the production of steel, glass and other materials for them — was the biggest driver of growth in China for many years.

But sales of new apartments have fallen fairly steadily since the start of 2022. Few construction projects are now being started, as dozens of insolvent or nearly insolvent developers struggle to finish dwellings they have promised to buyers. Investment in real estate projects plunged 9.5 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier.

Chinese officials attribute weaknesses in the Chinese economy partly to high overseas interest rates engineered by the Federal Reserve to combat inflation in the United States. Those rates have made it more attractive for Chinese families and companies to move money out of China, where interest rates are low, to foreign countries where rates are higher.

“The negative impact of the high interest rate environment on the economy is continuing,” said Liu Haoling, the president of the China Investment Corporation, which is China’s sovereign wealth fund. He spoke in late March at the China Development Forum, a meeting in Beijing of policymakers and executives.

China’s manufacturing juggernaut, underpinned by years of policy directives and financial support from Beijing to local governments and companies, has made the country’s goods among the world’s cheapest. The U.S. government disclosed last week that average prices for imports from China were down 2.6 percent in March from a year earlier.

China has required companies to invest more in research and development, in the hope that a wave of innovation will spur economic development.

The country is also requiring factories to pursue greater automation. “By 2025, we will have realized a new type of industrialization,” Jin Zhuanglong, the minister of industry and information technology, said at the China Development Forum.

Many Chinese households have borrowed heavily to invest in apartments and are responding to falling home prices by cutting back their spending. That makes China more dependent on exports to sell its fast-rising industrial output.

“Chinese companies, across a wide range of sectors, now produce far more than domestic consumption can absorb,” the Rhodium Group, a consulting firm, said in a report in late March.

People’s wariness about spending is something Li Zhenya sees daily. He manages Izakaya Jiuben, a Japanese restaurant in the Beijing neighborhood of Wangjing, once home to some of China’s biggest tech companies.

A few years ago, workers lined up outside the restaurant, pouring out of nearby offices to spend their hard-earned money in short breaks between long shifts. These days, many of the restaurant’s seats are empty at lunch and dinner.

“People’s desire to consume is not that high now,” Mr. Li at Jiuben said. The restaurant, he said, pulls in about $2,156 a day in revenue, about half its sales just a few years ago.

“I’m losing money running the restaurant,” he said.

Jiuben is on the fourth floor of Pano City Mall, where restaurants advertising Korean, Japanese and Chinese food operate next to empty storefronts. Some places look abandoned: The lights are off but a pile of takeaway boxes sits by the till, lamps still hanging or chairs and tables intact.

Centered around three curved, pebble-like buildings designed by Zaha Hadid, the neighborhood of Wangjing was once a hub of activity for the capital’s busiest workers. Restaurants and shops benefited from the presence of companies like Alibaba, JD.com and Meituan.

“The lights used to be on when nighttime fell, but now at least half of the lights are off,” Mr. Li said.

A government crackdown starting in 2020 pushed companies to cull jobs. Others left Wangjing. Covid-19 restrictions that froze the neighborhood for weeks at a time made it hard for small businesses in Wangjing to recover.

“The epidemic led to a cautiousness in consumption,” said Kou Yueyuan, the owner of Smoon Bakery, down the street from Pano City. “Customers are obviously quite price-sensitive,” Ms. Kou said.

Ms. Kou started her business more than eight years ago, selling baked goods like bitter melon bagels and ube mochi twists. Now she places less emphasis on developing new baked goods with different flavors. Instead, she focuses on keeping costs low so that the bakery can offer cheaper prices.

Li You contributed research.

Keith Bradsher is the Beijing bureau chief for The Times. He previously served as bureau chief in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Detroit and as a Washington correspondent. He has lived and reported in mainland China through the pandemic. More about Keith Bradsher

Alexandra Stevenson is the Shanghai bureau chief for The Times, reporting on China’s economy and society. More about Alexandra Stevenson