The British Virgin Islands (BVI), officially the Virgin Islands, are a British Overseas Territory in the Caribbean, to the east of Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands and north-west of Anguilla. The islands are geographically part of the Virgin Islands archipelago and are located in the Leeward Islands of the Lesser Antilles and part of the West Indies.
The economy of the British Virgin Islands is one of the most prosperous in the Caribbean. Although tiny in absolute terms, because of the very small population of the British Virgin Islands, in 2010 the Territory had the 19th highest GDP per capita in the world according to the CIA World factbook. In global terms the size of the Territory's GDP measured in terms of purchasing power is ranked as 215th out of a total of 229 countries. The economy of the Territory is based upon the "twin pillars" of financial services, which generates approximately 60% of government revenues, and tourism, which generates nearly all of the rest.
The United States Virgin Islands, officially the Virgin Islands of the United States, are a group of Caribbean islands and an unincorporated and organized territory of the United States. The islands are geographically part of the Virgin Islands archipelago and are located in the Leeward Islands of the Lesser Antilles.
Charlotte Amalie, located on St. Thomas, is the capital and the largest city of the United States Virgin Islands. It was founded in 1666 as Taphus. In 1691, the town was renamed to Charlotte Amalie after the Danish queen Charlotte Amalie of Hesse-Kassel (1650–1714). It has a deep-water harbor that was once a haven for pirates and is now one of the busiest ports of call for cruise ships in the Caribbean, with about 1.5 million-plus cruise ship passengers landing there annually. Protected by Hassel Island, the harbor has docking and fueling facilities, machine shops, and shipyards and was a U.S. submarine base until 1966. The Town has been inhabited for centuries. When Christopher Columbus arrived in 1493, the area was inhabited by Caribs, Arawaks, Ciboney and Taíno native peoples. It is on the southern shore at the head of Saint Thomas Harbor. In 2010 the city had a population of 18,481, which makes it the largest city in the Virgin Islands Archipelago. Hundreds of ferries and yachts pass by the Town each week.
Sir Richard Charles Nicholas Branson is an English business magnate. In the 1970s, he co-founded the Virgin Group, which today controls more than 400 companies in various fields.
According to apocrypha, as well as Christian and Islamic tradition, Saint Anne was the mother of Mary, the wife of Joachim and the maternal grandmother of Jesus. Mary's mother is not named in the Bible's canonical gospels. In writing, Anne's name and that of her husband Joachim come only from New Testament apocrypha, of which the Gospel of James seems to be the earliest that mentions them. The mother of Mary is mentioned but not named in the Quran.
The calendar of saints is the traditional Christian method of organizing a liturgical year by associating each day with one or more saints and referring to the day as the feast day or feast of said saint. The word "feast" in this context does not mean "a large meal, typically a celebratory one", but instead "an annual religious celebration, a day dedicated to a particular saint".
The Assumption of Mary is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Pope Pius XII defined it on 1 November 1950 in his apostolic constitution Munificentissimus Deus as follows:
We pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever-Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.
The flag of the United States Virgin Islands was adopted on May 17, 1921. It consists of a simplified version of the coat of arms of the United States between the letters V and I. The yellow-colored eagle holds a sprig of laurel in one talon, which symbolizes victory, and three blue arrows in the other, which represent the three major islands that make up the U.S. Virgin Islands: Saint Croix, Saint Thomas, and Saint John. When the Virgin Islands were owned by Denmark, the flag was a blue ensign with the Danish flag, or Dannebrog, in the canton.
Mount Herzl, also Har ha-Zikaron, is the site of Israel's national cemetery and other memorial and educational facilities, found on the west side of Jerusalem beside the Jerusalem Forest.
The British Virgin Islands national football team is the national team of the British Virgin Islands and is controlled by the British Virgin Islands Football Association.
The Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Nativity of Mary, Marymas or the Birth of the Virgin Mary, refers to a Christian feast day celebrating the birth of Mary, mother of Jesus.
Dead Chest Island is an island located half a mile north east of Deadman's Bay on Peter Island, British Virgin Islands. It is uninhabited, has no fresh water or trees and only sparse vegetation. It was formerly used as a firing range by the Royal Virgin Islands Police, but the opening of the nearby hotel on Peter Island coincided with the decision to build a proper firing range on the island of Tortola. The island is now an uninhabited National Park, with several popular scuba diving and snorkeling sites.
Gihon Spring or Fountain of the Virgin, also known as Saint Mary's Pool, is a spring in the Kidron Valley. It was the main source of water for the Pool of Siloam in Jebus and the later City of David, the original site of Jerusalem.
Bethlehemites, or Bethlemites, is the name of five Catholic religious orders. Two of them were restored to existence in the 20th century. The other three are extinct.
Broken Jerusalem Island is an uninhabited series of islets between Fallen Jerusalem Island and Round Rock in the British Virgin Islands in the Caribbean.
Round Rock is an uninhabited island in the British Virgin Islands, to the south of Virgin Gorda, east of Ginger Island and close to Fallen Jerusalem Island.
The Averoldi Polyptych, also known as the Averoldi Altarpiece, is a painting by the Italian Renaissance painter Titian, dating to 1520–1522, in the basilica church of Santi Nazaro e Celso in Brescia, northern Italy.
The Monastic Family of Bethlehem, of the Assumption of the Virgin and of Saint Bruno – or simply known as Monastic Brothers of Bethlehem and Monastic Sisters of Bethlehem – is a Roman Catholic institute of consecrated life that practices the Carthusian spirituality and was founded through the inspiration of a small group of French pilgrims on November 1, 1950, at St. Peter's Square, following the promulgation of the dogma of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven. The Monastic Sisters were founded in France, soon after, and the Monastic Brothers in 1976.
The Holy and Ancient Archdiocese of Jerusalem, All Palestine, and All the Near East or the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate in Jerusalem, is a Metropolitan Archdiocese of the Coptic Orthodox Church, which is part of the wider communion of the Oriental Orthodox Church. It is headed by the Coptic Orthodox Metropolitan Archbishop of Jerusalem, the incumbent being Metropolitan Archbishop Antonious of Jerusalem since 2016. Its jurisdiction covers those Coptic Orthodox Christians living in the Near East; with churches and monasteries in the State of Israel, State of Palestine, the State of Kuwait, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, the Lebanese Republic, the Syrian Arab Republic, and the Republic of Iraq. The adherents are largely of Coptic Egyptian descent, mainland Coptic migrants and their descendants. The archdiocese is based at St Anthony's Monastery, in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, beside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
