Among the policy issues being debated and discussed this election year, the economy leads in importance to Americans. Nearly half of U.S. registered voters, 49%, say the economy will be extremely important to their vote for Congress. But abortion and crime are nearly as prominent; 42% and 40% of voters, respectively, say each of these is extremely important.

Gun policy and immigration constitute third-tier election issues, rated extremely important by 38% and 37% of voters, respectively.

Fewer, 31%, say relations with Russia is extremely important to their vote, while the 26% focused on climate change makes it the least influential issue tested in the Oct. 3-20 Gallup poll.

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Voters rate the economy most influential to their vote this year, but abortion and crime aren’t far behind. https://t.co/JBypPUlXzs

— GallupNews (@GallupNews) October 31, 2022

A £1.29 million grant from the Archbishops’ Council will fund work led by Youthscape to help parishes connect with young people and recruit and train church volunteers for youth work.

The Launchpad scheme, run by Youthscape, has already been successfully piloted in the Dioceses of Blackburn, London and St Albans. So far, the scheme has helped 140 Church of England priests to formulate plans to work with young people in their parishes.

Under the new funding arrangements, the scheme will be expanded to 450 churches across 18 dioceses over the next three years with the potential to engage with up to 4,000 young people.

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Excited to share this partnership to support local churches in reaching young people. https://t.co/Q9sOEwMQo5 via @churchofengland

— Debbie Clinton (@debsaclinton) October 31, 2022

Melding faith and work is nothing new, of course. Victorian Britain, for instance, produced many high-profile business leaders with a strong religious bent: men such as William Lever of Unilever fame (Congregationalist), the tourism entrepreneur Thomas Cook (Baptist) and the “chemist to the nation” Jesse Boot (Methodist).

Nor is it a solely Christian phenomenon. Strong faith positions inspire a host of business ventures around the world, from providers of Islamic finance and Buddhist healthcare to purveyors of Kosher foods and Ayurvedic medicine.

Yet the rise of the modern “profit for purpose” movement, to use Murray’s phrase, is inspiring a new generation of religious believers to connect the dots between their spiritual and professional lives.

There is a logical confluence between the two, says Rachael Saunders, deputy director at the Institute of Business Ethics, a UK charity that promotes high standards of corporate behaviour. Founders of companies or people appointed to senior roles “naturally reflect” on the difference they want to make, she adds.

“People for whom faith is important are likely to immediately see that contributing to society can be part of that, either because of their faith teaching or because they’ve seen their faith community play that role of service,” she says.

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Faith at work: “As well as a powerful sense of purpose and internal harmony, some faith-driven entrepreneurs report finding a remarkable coherence between their religious tenets and the principles of sustainable business” https://t.co/QKJE6nxoOx

— john williams (@wi_john) October 31, 2022

Robert Crawford: Though I do understand why people often see—and hear—“The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” as inventing modern poetry in English, I think The Waste Land does so more comprehensively. It’s as if this poem can give anything—a cry, a list of place-names, a snatch of conversation, a Sanskrit word, a nursery rhyme, an echo—an almost infinite and carrying resonance that brings with it unforgettable intensity. Ezra Pound who, prior to editing The Waste Land,  had just been editing an English translation of an avant-garde collage-style French poem by Jean Cocteau, helped give the poem its intensity; but the words were Eliot’s.

As I’ve argued in Young Eliot, Pound’s editing was highly ethical in that he did not add or substitute words of his own; he just honed what Eliot had written. Eliot had learned from Pound’s bricolage style, but where Pound went on to go on and on and on, Eliot (with Pound’s editorial help) learned as a young poet just when to stop. That’s a great gift. So the poem exemplifies at once the way in which poetry can incorporate all kinds of diverse materials; yet it also constitutes a supreme example of poetic intensity. It’s quite a combination—and one from which innumerable poets (from Auden to Xu Zhimo and from MacDiarmid to Okigbo and beyond) have learned.

David Barnes: Basil Bunting famously compared Ezra Pound’s Cantos to the Alps: a poet ‘would have to go a long way around’ if they wanted to avoid them. I don’t know if The Waste Land is quite like that. Certainly, poetry was not the same after The Waste Land; at the same time, it’s perhaps more difficult to trace the influence of the poem than it is with Pound’s experimentations. In some ways, it’s quite difficult to go forward after The Waste Land, as it’s a poem that seems to have said it all. I sometimes wonder if The Waste Land hasn’t had more of an influence on the modern novel.

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“The poem is such a key landmark that all modern poets know it, whether they swerve around it, crash into it, or attempt to assimilate it.”
https://t.co/Q0rBR0MeSh

— Literary Hub (@lithub) October 29, 2022

Elizabeth’s brother Tim’s daughter Elena got married in Mobile, Alabama, over the weekend–KSH.

Good Morning Mobile, Alabama! Today it will be Partly Cloudy today! With a high of 77F and a low of 55F. It's currently Clear with a temp of 60 . Sunrise on October 31, 2022 at 07:06AM and sunset on October 31, 2022 at 06:04PM . pic.twitter.com/9yPayU2rYn

— Southern Weather (@TravelWeather1) October 31, 2022

O Lord God of time and eternity, who makest us creatures of time that, when time is over, we may attain thy blessed eternity: With time, thy gift, give us also wisdom to redeem the time, lest our day of grace be lost; for our Lord Jesus’ sake.

'How beautifully the leaves grow old. How full of light and colour are their last days.'
John Burroughs 🍁@StormHour @ThePhotoHour #October pic.twitter.com/vrZFei6DH7

— Kaumal Baig (@kbaig93) October 31, 2022

When I am afraid, I put my trust in thee. In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust without a fear. What can flesh do to me?

–Psalm 56:3-4

"I'm walking on sunshine"
A fabulous sunrise this morning #sunrise #Sunrisephotography @ThePhotoHour @StormHour pic.twitter.com/BnnuTSiDMW

— Mystic Mel (@Melshenny1) October 31, 2022