As disillusionment with the war sets in, the characters change. Olivia offered strong textual support demonstrating the change in both Dr. Rinaldi and the priest. With respect to Rinaldi ,we examined the metaphorical significance of his contracting a STD, and the cause of his existential crisis leading him to comment that "it all amounts to nothing". Likewise , as Olivia pointed out ,the priest has become inured to the war . Hemingway's writing submerges emotions to facts ,and Olivia perceptively commented on the farewell scene between the main characters as abrupt ,and unemotional. Again, I mentioned that stylistically Hemingway offers the reader the sensory experience of what is seen and heard relying on the reader to infer the submerged emotional content. We last discussed Lt. Henry's comments on war,victory,and defeat as illustrative of Hemingway's binary philosophy leaving no middle ground. Man either rises against the outside world or is vanquished. For homework ,I assigned reading through chapter 31.

I demonstrated for Olivia how she could convert angles greater than 90 degrees into angles whose trigonometric functions could be calculated based on their reference angles. We analyzed angles in all four quadrants in addition to angles on the axes and angles larger than 360 degrees. There was no assignment.

Having completed our study of the "Establishment " clause ,we today discussed the 'free exercise clause. " Olivia provided a good definition of the scope and meaning of the clause and from there we discussed the clause's application to specific situations such as the right of the Amish to refuse to send their children to public school, the right of atheists not to salute the flag and recite the pledge, and last the right of a religious employer to refuse to provide birth control pills to employees who wish them notwithstanding the dictates of the Affordable Care Act. This last instance involves the facts of Burwell v Hobby Lobby which Olivia reviewed and discussed. We reviewed how the court determined that for profit corporations are treated as "persons" for the purpose of the "free exercise " clause and the Court therefore , in a narrow 5-4 vote, held that corporations can not be forced to violate their religious beliefs if their owners equate birth control pills with promoting abortion. According to the Court, the beliefs of the employees who are deprived of the law's benefits are not material. We discussed this controversial decision in terms of fairness to employees and in the context of whether the decision appears to encourage a religious belief in contravention of the Establishment Clause. For homework, I assigned reading about the Supreme Court case appearing to uphold the right of a bakery to refuse to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple based on the bakery's owner's religious beliefs.

In this section of the novel, external forces begin to intensify the novel's conflicts. Accordingly we addressed Hemingway's terse dialogues in terms of literary naturalism. We first analogized the "fixed " horse racing chapter to Hemingway's view of life as a race that one can not win. We discussed fatalism and pessimism as a characteristic of naturalism but not necessarily a characteristic of the related genre of realism. Olivia further discussed the recurring symbolism of rain . Last, we analyzed Hemingway's philosophy on bravery and courage as manifested in the protagonist's speech paraphrasing Julius Caesar's comment in the Shakespeare play that cowards die many times before their death. For Hemingway, experiencing fear is a sign of intelligence . Hemingway's heroes must ,however, exhibit bravery and grace in the face of death .

I instructed Olivia to find what quadrant was represented by the positive or negative values of various trigonometric functions. We then used the values of some other trigonometric functions along with the Pythagorean Theorem to solve for various trigonometric solutions. There was no assignment.

Continuing our examination of the "Establishment Clause", we discussed whether various actions of government , such as school vouchers, and holiday displays, violated the Constitution. Olivia discussed the distinction between permitted public displays of generic holiday themes such as snowflakes and reindeer, and prohibited displays, such as a crèche with no other accompanying religious displays. I discussed local responses to this issue from allowing all forms and types of religious displays, even satanic worship, to outright banning all holiday displays ,mostly to avoid all of the surrounding controversy . For homework ,I assigned reading a summary of the Hobby Lobby case dealing with the "free exercise"clause.

Olivia was absent today.

I continued working with Olivia on problems constructing the six trigonometric functions of angles given the coordinates of their terminal point. I explained how to use the distance formula in order to find the radius from the origin to the point. With the x, y, and r values, I told her how to use the definitions of the trigonometric functions to find their values for any given angle. We did several problems until Olivia mastered the concept and the technique. There was no assignment.

The second clause of The First Amendment prohibits the "establishment" of a state sponsored religion as well as prohibiting the "free exercise" thereof. We examined and discussed what these words mean. Olivia defined "secular" and then talked about Jefferson's comment that the First Amendment created " a wall of separation between church and state." We examined various fact patterns that constitute a prohibited "establishment " of religion such as prayer in public schools, and prayer at pubic school football games, and contrasted them to permitted state actions such as funding secular activities at parochial schools such as providing bus transportation or , purchasing computer equipment. We then noted the sanctioned ceremonial references to God on our money and in the pledge of allegiance. Olivia offered interesting views and analyses on which activities she considered an infringement of the establishment clause. We then began a review of the free exercise clause by discussing the hypothetical where a Muslim woman refuses to remove her head scarf for a picture at the Dept. Of Motor Vehicles in connection with securing a license. For homework, I assigned reading pages 455-457 and answering study guide questions. 4-7. We will shortly complete this unit and then begin reviewing for the final exam which will be given next week.

As we approach year-end, we compared the literary genres of Romanticism, Realism, and Naturalism. I discussed the relationship between Naturalism, fatalism, and Darwinism, and Olivia discussed some distinctions between Hawthorne's Romanticism, and Hemingway's Naturalism. We then explored the developing love relationship between the protagonist, and Catherine Barkley ,as depicted in Hemingway's sparse dialogue. Olivia provided good insights into the rapidly developing emotional and erotic love between the characters influenced by their environment -a war. We then analyzed how Hemingway's naturalism is illustrated in the relationship in that the characters are controlled by external forces, the war, and societal expectations of marriage, notwithstanding their commitment to forging their own fate free of these external forces. This conflict becomes more acute as the novel progresses. For homework,I assigned reading through chapter 22. The final exam will be next week and will be an essay on the novel as well as some grammar exercises.