Henry Akingbemisilu was ordained as a Deacon earlier this year. He serves as a Self-Supporting Minister in Thamesmead, London, in the Diocese of Southwark – alongside working in Data Science.
Henry is shown in his clerical robes smiling
Henry was born in Nigeria, coming to the UK to study mathematics and computer network engineering. His journey to ordination started in 2008, but it was only in 2015 that he finally started the official discernment process with Southwark Diocese.

In the years that preceded this, he was involved in his church – in the choir, in prayer ministry groups and as Church Warden for eight years but felt a ‘calling’ to do more.

“You know, when God is calling, you just won’t be at peace with yourself until you give in,” he explained.

“It took me so many years.

“I asked myself is this God or is it me making things up?

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‘I was fighting it’ an AI scientist’s 12-year journey to ordination.https://t.co/ZS1soxh8yR

— Southwark Diocese (@SouthwarkCofE) November 22, 2021

Asia First does not mean Asia Alone. That is the hard lesson the world is busy teaching the Biden administration and the U.S. In Europe, American diplomats last week scrambled to respond to Belarus’s weaponization of migration on its border with Poland, warned that Russia is positioning itself to invade Ukraine, and worked to defuse a crisis in the western Balkans. In the Middle East, as Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin tried to reassure key allies about America’s continuing commitment to their security, U.S. naval forces participated with Israel, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates in the unprecedented joint Arab-Israeli military exercises in the Red Sea.

This shift from an Asia First policy to Global Engagement isn’t something the Biden administration is voluntarily choosing. It is a change forced on the U.S. by the actions of adversaries who believe that by keeping America off-balance and overcommitted, they can hasten the process of American decline.

President Biden’s original plan to focus on Asia made good political sense. Progressive Democrats are dead-set against the military spending and political engagement that a truly global American foreign policy would require. And it isn’t only progressive Democrats who are weary of endless wars, freeloading allies, and American diplomatic and sometimes military engagement in faraway hot spots like the western Balkans and Sudan. If we could get Iran back into the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action nuclear deal and reach at least a temporary understanding with Russia on some issues, Team Biden hoped, reduced engagement in Europe and the Middle East would help make a tougher China policy easier to sell back home—and to pay for.

Team Biden is right about that. Unfortunately, China, Russia and Iran understand the situation as clearly as the White House does, and these powers want Mr. Biden and the nation he leads to fail.

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The “pivot to Asia” is failing as an American grand strategy because our adversaries are willing and able to disrupt it, writes @wrmead https://t.co/0VmKPSpV3G

— Wall Street Journal Opinion (@WSJopinion) November 23, 2021

On a recent November morning, more than 20,000 western monarch butterflies clustered in a grove of eucalyptus, coating the swaying trees like orange lace. Each year up to 30% of the butterfly’s population meets here in Pismo Beach, California, as the insects migrate thousands of miles west for the winter.

Just a year ago, this vibrant spectacle had all but disappeared. The monarch population has plummeted in recent years, as the vibrant invertebrates struggled to adapt to habitat loss, climate crisis, and harmful pesticide-use across their western range.

Last year less than 200 arrived at this site in 2020 – the lowest number ever recorded – and less than 2,000 were counted across the California coast.

But ahead of the official annual count that takes place around Thanksgiving, early tallies show monarchs may be thriving once again across California. The rise has sparked joy and relief, but the researchers, state park officials, and advocates say that doesn’t mean the species is safe.

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GREAT NEWS: It is exciting that monarch butterflies may be thriving after years of decline. Is it a comeback? Data show monarchs may be thriving once again across California. The rise has sparked joy & relief, but that doesn’t mean the species is safe. https://t.co/9RQHx9Qkug

— Dr. William J. Ripple (@WilliamJRipple) November 22, 2021

In many western countries, politicians, soldiers and veterans gather every November to pay tribute to comrades killed fighting for their country. Among those commemorated this year were more than 3,500 troops from America and its allies who died in Afghanistan before the West’s humiliating retreat this summer. And among those paying tribute, far from the Cenotaph in London or the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, were dusty Western soldiers in small garrisons across a swathe of Africa. With the formalities over, they resumed their posts among almost 9,000 European and American troops on the front line of what is now the West’s biggest offensive against jihadists, in the Sahel. It is not going well. How it will end depends in no small part on whether the West learns the right lessons from its failures in Afghanistan.

Some may argue that the main lesson is to avoid fighting insurgents in distant lands where no pressing national interests are at stake. But that is not the case in the Sahel, where jihadists aligned to al-Qaeda and Islamic State have taken aim at Western countries, bombing their embassies and kidnapping or killing their citizens. If the jihadists are given havens and time, they will surely launch attacks on European or American soil, too. “That is their goal and their determination and they’ve been open about it,” says a Western general.

Western governments see other interests at stake as well. The most afflicted countries of the Sahel (Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger) are among the poorest, have the world’s fastest-growing populations and are among those where climate change will do the greatest harm.

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The West should offer more than a purely military solution to the jihadist insurgencies in the Sahel and be realistic about what it can achieve. A start would be to respond to local grievances https://t.co/sKK5G1h6ZJ

— The Economist (@TheEconomist) November 21, 2021

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In a new poll, a growing number of people who don't already have children say they do not expect to have them. Experts worry that the declining U.S. birthrate may have long-term implications for the economy. https://t.co/hm7qNuaG8X

— The Seattle Times (@seattletimes) November 21, 2021

As the first human trial begins, David Cox meets the scientists who say prevention, not cure, may be the answer

At Brigham and Women’s hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, Tanuja Chitnis is preparing to begin a clinical trial later this month, which represents a landmark moment in the fight against Alzheimer’s disease.

Chitnis, a professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School, is leading the first ever investigation in human patients to test whether a vaccine can prevent the progression of Alzheimer’s, the most common form of dementia. It works by clearing toxic forms of a protein called beta-amyloid which accumulates in the brain over many years. These eventually form plaques which disrupt normal brain function and lead to memory loss and confusion.

This is not a vaccine in its most conventional sense. While influenza and Covid-19 vaccines aim to prevent individuals from getting infected in the first place, the Alzheimer’s vaccine looks to mobilise the brain’s immune cells, called microglia, against these forms of amyloid. It is hoped that by doing so in patients in the very early stages of the disease, before too much damage has been done, it can be stopped in its tracks.

“The term vaccine is broad, and generally means utilising the immune system to combat disease,” explains Chitnis. “Here, we are activating a population of immune cells to clear beta-amyloid plaques.”

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🧠 Alzheimer's Vaccine:

"The success of the trial – which will see 16 participants with early Alzheimer’s, aged between 60 and 85, receive two doses of the vaccine – will determine whether this approach offers a new frontier in treating the disease."https://t.co/UlrTuieuwn

— HumanProgress.org (@HumanProgress) November 23, 2021

Almighty God, who didst choose thy servant Clement of Rome to recall the Church in Corinth to obedience and stability: Grant that thy Church may be grounded and settled in thy truth by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and may evermore be kept blameless in thy service; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Today is the feast of St Clement of Rome. He was martyred by being tied to an anchor and thrown into the sea. Join with us in praying for the city and church of Rome, for all persecuted Christians, and for those who study Clement’s writings. Mass at 12 noon and 6.15 pm. pic.twitter.com/5ydhBdlH9p

— All Saints Margaret Street (@ASMSLondon) November 23, 2021

O God, so rule and govern our hearts and minds by thy Holy Spirit, that being ever mindful of the end of all things, and the day of thy just judgment, we may be stirred up to holiness of living here, and dwell with thee forever hereafter; through Jesus Christ, thy Son, our Lord.

Good Morning pic.twitter.com/wxE3Cps4Il

— philip jackson (@pajacksonartist) November 23, 2021

The Lord will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time forth and for evermore.

–Psalm 121:8

Colorful, chilly sunrise this morning! The colors are so vibrant in this cold air. #scwx #sunrise pic.twitter.com/8yPFOlMjm0

— Chrissy Kohler (@ChrissyKohler) November 23, 2021