单选题 Passage Four To claim supernatural powers and then be caught in dirty acts—sexually abusing children or, even worse, protecting the abusers—is not only a moral problem. It is a near fatal professional error. I wonder if the hierarchy knows how gravely the Roman Catholic Church, especially the American church, has been wounded. There's huge internal bleeding, a hemorrhage of credibility —yet, in the face of all that, a changing official attitude mixing pain and evasion. At least priest Jimmy Swaggart had the good grace to cry on television and beat his breast and otherwise oblige the audience with the acting of regret. Last week the Pilot, the newspaper of the archdiocese of Boston, did ask several questions that it admitted are "out there in the minds of Catholics"—an interesting phrase, by the way, that suggests some of the problems: A hierarchy that sees "the Catholic mind" as something "out there" and the defended priests as being "in here." Among the questions: 1) Should being alone continue to be "a normative condition for the diocesan priests"? 2) If being alone were of their own choice, would there be fewer errors of this nature in the priests? My answers would be: 1) No. 2) Yes. There's no cure-all, as the Pilot said. Catholics have to think though strong arguments for and against being alone—and for and against the appointment of women as priests. But the current failure will be compounded if the debate becomes a merely technical discussion of difficulties and ignores the overall danger to the church. A Catholic Church that is losing so much ground around the world and has such difficulty in employing new priests cannot afford the critical, firm pride of centuries past. Allowing priests to marry, and appointing women, would do an important thing: begin to change the culture of the priests—a culture that needs very considerable changing. It would help clean the sometimes dirty atmosphere of the religion. Sexual crimes against the most innocent lambs in the flock are a tragedy for the authority and moral structure of the church. Faith climbs on a vertical axis to God. The vertical is supported by a horizontal axis—trust, which is the everyday, stabilizing living church. If trust dissolves into doubt and dislike, if God's representatives on earth turn out to be, many of them, child abusers and protectors of child abusers, then who will ever see such men at their priestly work without suspicion and hating?

单选题 Money may not be flowing much in Thailand's capital these days, but something more unlikely is traffic. Motorists like to joke that it took the International Monetary Fund to unclog Bangkok's notoriously jammed thoroughfares. Before the economy crashed last summer, Bangkok was famous for its round-the-clock gridlock. Stories of how people coped became urban lore. Thais bought custom-made vans equipped with TVs and microwave ovens. On the endless trips home after school and work, parents would serve family dinners, then the kids would do their homework and change into pajamas before finally arriving. One company did a booming business in plastic disposable toilets. Consumers could get just about anything, from McDonald's hamburgers to prescription medicine, delivered via motorbike. The solution for easing congestion turned out to be simple: economic catastrophe. Rising fuel costs, coupled with lost jobs and declining incomes, mean people are making fewer trips. About 20,000 cars have been repossessed, while new-car buying has dwindled from about 900 a day a year ago to just 300 now. Bus rider ship is up; taxi trips are down. So many cabbies are having trouble making enough fares to cover gas and car rental that hundreds of taxis are sitting idle every day. Thinner wallets also mean people are spending less time in bars, restaurants, movie theaters and shopping malls. Instead, they're staying home. The government, much maligned in the past for botching up mass transit construction, deserves credit as well. New expressways have opened, and some of the construction that has blocked traffic lanes for years has been cleared. The good times may not last, however, at least for motorists. If traffic flow is in fact a reliable economic indicator, Thailand may be on the rebound. "The last few days," says taxi driver Boonlarb Srikam, "I've noticed the traffic getting busy again." Bring out those portable toilets.

单选题When George H. W. Bush graduated from Yale in 1948, most assumed he would {{U}}head to{{/U}} Wall Street. A. excel in B. make for C. compete against D. dispose of

单选题 At least since the Industrial Revolution, gender roles have been in a state of transition. As a result, cultural scripts about marriage have undergone change. One of the more obvious changes has occurred in the roles that women {{U}} {{U}} 1 {{/U}} {{/U}}. Women have moved into the world of work and have become adept at meeting expectations in that arena, while maintaining their family roles of nurturing and creating a (n) {{U}} {{U}} 2 {{/U}} {{/U}}that is a haven for all family members. {{U}} {{U}} 3 {{/U}} {{/U}}many women experience strain from trying to "do it all," they often enjoy the increased rewards that can result from playing multiple roles. As women's roles have changed, changing expectations about men's roles have become more {{U}} {{U}} 4 {{/U}} {{/U}}Many men are relinquishing their major responsibility {{U}} {{U}} 5 {{/U}} {{/U}}the family provider. Probably the most significant change in men's roles, however, is in the emotional {{U}} {{U}} 6 {{/U}} {{/U}}of family life. Men are increasingly expected to meet the emotional needs of their families, especially their wives. In fact, expectations about the emotional domain of marriage have become more significant for marriage in general. Research on {{U}} {{U}} 7 {{/U}} {{/U}}marriage has changed over recent decades points to the increasing importance of the emotional side of the relationships and the importance of sharing in the "emotion work" {{U}} {{U}} 8 {{/U}} {{/U}}to nourish marriages and other family relationships. Men and women want to experience marriages that are interdependent, {{U}} {{U}} 9 {{/U}} {{/U}}both partners nurture each other, attend and respond to each other, and encourage and promote each other. We are thus seeing marriages in which men's and women's roles are becoming increasingly more {{U}} {{U}} 10 {{/U}} {{/U}}

单选题Studies have proved that smart people tend to be smart across different kinds of realms. A. realities B. fields C. occupations D. courses

单选题The spacecraft touched down on schedule and the astronauts were helped out of it. A. launched B. operated C. landed D. crashed

单选题Winslow Homer captured the look and spirit of American life with {{U}}unparalleled{{/U}} eloquence. A. incredible B. inevitable C. unmatched D. unnoticed

单选题A．Hewasbeatenbyafellowworker.B．Hewaslaughedatbyafellowworker.C．Hewasfiredfromhiswork.D．Hewasreplacedbyhisco-worker.

单选题The speed of an object moving in a ______ direction is called the velocity. A. unique B. special C. particular D. strange

单选题Passage Two For years, France proudly resisted establishing domestic smoking bans. It held out longer than Britain, Spain and Italy, but on January 2, 2008, it finally forbid cigarettes in bars, cafés, restaurants and clubs. This was not a decision taken lightly. Magazines ran photo-spreads reminding us that French people look seriously cool with a cigar in their mouth. There were illustrations of Charles de Gaulle, the French president during World War Ⅱ, Brigitte Bardot, the 1950s famous fashionist, and the famous French philosopher and writer, Jean-Paul Sartre. Even the present President Nicolas Sarkozy, extremely image-conscious, posed for Paris Match magazine with a fat cigar. But now, France's traditional "café-clope" (morning coffee and cigarette) is only possible if people can bear the freezing temperatures outside. In the latter part of the 20th century, the health risks of second-hand tobacco smoke were made public. Then, in 1975, a modern wave of smoking bans started in Minnesota, the U.S.. Since then, many countries and regions have joined in the movement. Among them, the U.S. has been a pioneer, with California being the first in the world to ban indoor smoking at all public places, including bars and restaurants. Thus some French people call the non-smoking law issued on January 2 "a touch too American". However, studies before the ban showed that 70 percent of French people supported the enforcement. The public's positive response means that the smoking ban will be just one more U.S. trend accepted by French society. Even among strong smokers, no one wants to risk a fine. French barman Jean-Michel, dressed in a leather waistcoat and a cowboy-style shoelace tie, complained harshly about the ban. Was he anticipating a smokers' revolt? "No," he said calmly. "People will respect it. I'll do what I did at school. I'll smoke in the toilets." According to the non-smoking law, individuals who smoke in bars, cafés, restaurants or clubs can be fined up to 450 euros. The owners of these places can be fined up to 750 euros if they fail to stop customers from smoking.

单选题Finally she decided to do something ______ the thing she disliked ______ herself.

单选题A.Jenniferwasarealstand-out.B.Jenniferhadanimpracticalwish.C.Jenniferusedtolikeeatingpies.D.Jenniferrealizedherdreams.

单选题Geraldine Ferraro said that whoever {{U}}coined{{/U}} the term ObamaCare was brilliant. A. came upon B. broke down C. made up D. drew on

单选题The law is expected to improve the efficacy of {{U}}surveillance{{/U}} on HIV carriers. A. inspection B. investigation C. observation D. restriction

单选题If you don't know how to ______ your achievements, your parting from this world is going to be a nightmare. A. take hold of B. get rid of C. let go of D. make fun of

单选题 It's all Apple all the time these days: "astounding" earnings reports in the news on Jan. 25, lingering shots of Steve Jobs' widow Laurene sitting near the First Lady and, of course, ever since his death in October, universal references to Jobs himself in any writing or speech aimed at promoting creativity or ingenuity or an all-American, against-all-odds model of success. However, New York Times articles this week spoke of a darker reality behind the glowing Apple story: the "millions of human machines," as the Times" Charles Duhigg and David Barboza put it, in China who are now laboring 12 hours a day, six days a week to maintain the company's amazing rate of growth. They live in dormitories where they can be called to their jobs anytime and often work double shifts in highly unsafe conditions. They're willing to do all it takes. "It isn't just that workers are cheaper abroad," Duhigg wrote. "Rather, Apple's executives believe the vast scale of overseas factories as well as the flexibility, diligence and expertise of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts that 'Made in the U.S.A.' is no longer a viable option for most Apple products." The Times stories raised very serious questions about not only Apple or the many other companies that similarly rely on overseas labor to support their growth and flood the world with cheap products, but the human cost of the growth model itself that has allowed Apple to thrive. It's a model of growth, all too unquestioned in the U.S., that demands endless quality-of-life sacrifices in the service of productivity and profit. By quality of life, I mean good relationships with friends and family and having the time and the physical and emotional availability to invest in friends and family. Yet American workers have been headed in the opposite direction for decades. Working hours have expanded to the point where successful professionals now consider the traditional 40-hour workweek a "part-time" job. Vacation time has been shrinking. In the current downturn, the employed are too scared of losing work to take time off. The pressure to be superproductive, ever willing, and always available has never been greater. But we should call into question the direction we're headed and ask whether chasing the dream of growth has already turned into a nightmare. It's up to the rest of us now to decide what to make of Steve Jobs' legacy.

单选题The short story about the missing personnel during the civil war was adapted into a(n) ______ movie. A. winning-award B. award-winning C. won-award D. award-won

单选题We have come to realize the need to leave enough environmental space for our offspring. A. contemporaries B. ancestors C. descendants D. neighbors

单选题The Arab oil embargo and long gas lines ______ oil companies flocking back to Midland. A. compelled B. sent C. delivered D. committed

单选题Andrew had taught English in a couple of schools {{U}}prior to{{/U}} working in this academy. A. after B. during C. before D. by