Welcome to Sunday. The top 5 most-read stories of the week are displayed below. Below that are five editors’ selections we want to make sure you don’t miss.
You can also get the most-read stories in a magazine-style e-book.
This week our readers appreciated a story from Suresh Kuchipudi, a professor of emerging infectious diseases at Penn State. Kuchipudi explains to nonexperts – like me – how the omicron subvariant BA.5 uses “classic techniques” to became a master of disguise and what it means for the current COVID-19 surge.
In editors’ picks, historian Brenda J. Child writes about Pope Francis’ apology tour in Canada during which the leader of the Catholic Church visited boarding schools set up to assimilate Indigenous children. Child writes that Christianity is woven into the history of such Canadian schools – and, to a lesser extent, American ones – where Indigenous children often suffered neglect and abuse and were separated from their families, language and culture. Child is the granddaughter of school survivors and writes, “Many Indigenous people, me included, question whether the pope’s apology fell short in holding the church responsible.”
Also read Mississippi State professor of finance D. Brian Blank tackle the question: Is the U.S. in a recession?
Enjoy the rest of your weekend! Next week, we’ll bring you stories about the influence partisan election officials wield, food insecurity in Gen Z, and living with urban coyotes.
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Pro-Trump protesters and police clash on Jan. 6, 2021, at the U.S. Capitol.
Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images
Tim Bakken, United States Military Academy West Point
With the exception of a few states, dereliction of a duty is mostly used in military law and does not apply to citizens, including US presidents.
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Idan Ginsburg, Georgia State University
Astronomers have discovered the first dormant black hole outside of the Milky Way. These black holes are not absorbing matter from a nearby star, making them incredibly hard to find.
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George Michael, Westfield State University
The explicitly anti-democratic movement seems to have the ear of a major GOP donor – along with at least two GOP front-runners for the US Senate.
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Joshua Holzer, Westminster College
Created in Europe during a time of intercultural struggle and strife, Esperanto was meant as a communication tool to spread peace among the people of the world. Its speakers are still at it.
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Suresh V. Kuchipudi, Penn State
Face masks are still an effective way to help stop the spread of the BA.5 subvariant.
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Gilda Soosay, president of Our Lady of Seven Sorrows Parish Council in Maskwacis, Canada, where Pope Francis visited the site of a state school for Indigenous children.
Cole Burston/AFP via Getty Images
Brenda J. Child, University of Minnesota
A historian of the residential schools explains how religion played a key role in assimilationist systems for Indigenous children in Canada and the United States.
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D. Brian Blank, Mississippi State University
The US economy shrank for a second straight quarter. While some call that a recession or a strong sign of one, a financial economist explains why the term probably doesn’t yet apply.
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Nancy Berns, Drake University
An expert on grief says give people space and time to come to terms with loss and don’t expect them to need – or want – ‘closure.’
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Melanie Gall, Arizona State University; Christopher Emrich, University of Central Florida; Marie Aquilino, Arizona State University
Telling people they have a flood risk rating of 10 is less powerful than explaining how much they’re likely to pay to deal with flooding over the next five years.
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David Herzberg, University at Buffalo
Making them pay is important but it’s not going to stop drugmakers from endangering public health.
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