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Monks Live Longer: What a 16,600-Person Study Reveals About the Neuroscience of Monastic Life
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Monks Live Longer: What a 16,600-Person Study Reveals About the Neuroscience of Monastic Life

The German-Austrian Monastery Study, tracking 9,569 nuns and 7,022 monks from 16 monasteries across more than a century of data, found that men in religious life live substantially longer than men in the general population — and that the sex-based longevity gap of 4.45 years nearly disappears inside the cloister. The neurological mechanisms behind that outcome, and what they mean for lay Catholic Christian life, are the subject of this article.

Jul 16, 2026 · 5 min read

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The Vein They Could Not Find: Tennessee's Botched Execution and the Limits of Democratic Law

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What the Padua Program Actually Proved — and What Therapists Can Draw From It

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Anglican Euthanasia Liturgies and the Abdication of Accompaniment

The Anglican Church of Canada has published official pastoral liturgies for clergy accompanying those who choose medically assisted death. The document frames this as compassionate presence, but producing ritual forms for a death a minister could have worked to prevent raises a harder question: is this accompaniment, or its surrender?