Hell hath no fury like a former seminarian. From Hollywood superstars to adulterous dilettantes, several seminary dropouts have managed to find success in the secular world. But they’ve also strayed from the Christian path – whether it was for the teachings of L. Ron Hubbard or simply to reign terror over a Communist nation. Here’s a sampling of the finest in almost-clergy.

1. Tom Cruise (1962 – )

In 1976, a deeply religious child named Thomas Cruise Mapother IV enrolled in a Franciscan seminary in New Jersey. Within five years, he’d ditched the church, dropped the Mapother, and landed a part in Endless Love. And in spite of his diminutive height (5 feet 7 inches) the man who might have been a priest became one of Hollywood’s top leading men. Around 1986, though, he abandoned Catholicism altogether, embracing the Church of Scientology, which he once credited with helping him overcome dyslexia. Wildly popular with celebrities, Scientology is the path of choice to "clarity" for everyone from John Travolta to the guy who played Parker Lewis in Parker Lewis Can’t Lose. Incidentally, Scientology does have ministers – but while Cruise remains an active member and apologist for the group, he has yet to seek ordination.

2. Casanova (1725 – 1798)

Everyone’s favorite 18th-century libertine began his scandalous escapades at the seminary of St. Cyprion, from which he was expelled under cloudy circumstances (we’re guessing he slept with someone). And as you well know, his post seminary life was as ungodly as it gets. By the age of 30 he was sentenced to prison for engaging in "magic," but he escaped after only a year to Paris. There, he made a fortune by introducing the lottery to France. But before settling down to write his ribald, self-aggrandizing autobiography, Casanova was expelled from more European countries than most of us ever visit. Along the way, he slept with tons of women, dueled with many of their husbands, and generally sinned his was to the top of European culture, befriending such figures as Madame du Pompadour and Jean-Jacques Rousseau along the way.

3. Joseph Stalin (1879 – 1953)

Lasting longer than the vast majority of divinity school dropouts, noted mass murderer Joseph Stalin studied at the Georgian Orthodox seminary in Tiflis (now Tbilisi) for five years, between 1894 and 1899. He left the seminary either because of poor health (his mom’s story) or revolutionary activity (Stalin’s story). Either way, Stalin clearly didn’t take much of what he learned to heart (assuming he had one). After he became the Soviet leader in 1922, he was responsible for the deaths of thousands of religious leaders, and Stalin did more than any other premier to eliminate the role of Christianity in Soviet life. But his seminary wasn’t exactly a study in Christian love, either. Prior to Stalin’s arrival, a rector was murdered there – possibly by unruly seminarians.

4. Michael Moore (1954 – )

Controversial documentary filmmaker Michael Moore began studying at a seminary in his hometown of Flint, Michigan, as an eight grader in 1967. Brought up a devout Catholic, Moore aspired to a career as a priest, but he left the seminary the next year for thoroughly secular reasons. When the Detroit Tigers made it to the World Series in 1968, the seminary refused to let him watch the games – so he quit. Before his successful filmmaking career, in fact, Moore was something of a serial dropout. He dropped out of the University of Michigan because he arrived at the school one morning and couldn’t find a parking place, and he once got a job at an automobile factory in Flint – but called in sick on his first day and never returned.

5. Al Gore (1948 – )

Believe it or not, the winner of the popular vote in the U.S. presidential election of 2000 was actually a devoutly religious divinity school dropout. It’s true! Al Gore graduated from Harvard cum laude in 1969 (although he earned several Cs and a D during his time in Cambridge), but he’d always been interested in theology, so he decided to continue his studies. It’s no wonder, then that he enrolled in Vanderbilt’s prestigious divinity school, where, over the course of three semesters, he failed five of his eight classes! Gore’s allies claimed that the birth of his first child and his duties as a reporter at the Tennessean newspaper kept him from his studies. For the record, though, Gore also later dropped out of Vanderbilt’s law school (in 1976), but this time for a truly higher purpose – to run for Congress.

From mental_floss’ book Forbidden Knowledge: A Wickedly Smart Guide to History’s Naughtiest Bits, published in Neatorama with permission.

Be sure to visit mental_floss‘ extremely entertaining website and blog!

How do chimps cross the road? Carefully, it turns out:

Experts studying chimpanzees while investigating the evolution of human social behaviour have uncovered their ability to safely cross roads.

They said the discovery has shown chimps’ ability to cope with the risk of man-made situations.

The University of Stirling research was carried out with a small chimp community in West Africa.

It found the dominant adult males took up protective positions in the group when it was tasked with crossing roads.

Link

From the website:

On July 17 Landall Proctor climbed on his bicycle in Richmond Virginia and embarked on a solo journey around the Unites States to support the Meals on Wheels program. He will pedal more than 10,000 miles through 27 States in 100 days and you can follow his progress daily from this site. Most importantly, you can contribute to his effort to bring meals and companionship to the elderly and homebound.

Way to go, Landall! Link – Thanks Crystal!

Photo: Rafael Estefania, BBC Mundo

BBC Mundo has a neat photo journal of the San Pedro prison, the biggest prison in Bolivia’s main city La Paz:

Once you pass the thick walls and the security gates, any resemblance to a normal jail disappears: there are children playing, market stalls, restaurants, hairdressers and even a hotel. It looks more like the streets of El Alto, Bolivia’s poorest neighbourhood that sprawls on the outskirts of La Paz, than a prison.

There are no guards, no uniforms or metal bars on the cell windows. This relative freedom comes at a price: inmates have to pay for their cells, so most of them have to work inside the jail, selling groceries or working in the food stalls.

"If you have money you can live like a king," an inmate told me. Money can buy you accommodation in the "posh" sections of the prison – one of the best is Los Pinos. Here, cells are spacious and have private bathrooms, kitchen and cable TV. Outside, they have billiard tables, kiosks selling fresh juice, and food stalls. Cells cost between $1,000 and $1,500 and are bought for the duration of an inmate’s sentence.

In the poor areas of the prison, inmates have to share small cells.

Link (Escape from New York [wiki], anyone?)

From the website:

A member of the stinkhorn family of fungi, Aseroe rubra is commonly known as the starfish fungus or sea anemone fungus (for obvious reasons, I hope). Tim Geho of MushroomExpert.com writes that it is not only widespread throughout the south Pacific, it is also the most common stinkhorn in Hawaii. …

Some interesting factoids are also available on this summary from a radio or television show in Australia with Tim Entwistle of the Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney. Two of my favourite tidbits are: 1) it was the first fungus ever collected in Australia by Western explorers; and 2) its name literally means “disgusting red”.

Link

Probably the proof that you can take recycling to extremes:

Creative Paper Wales has produced greetings cards and gifts made from the by-products of its woolly neighbours.

Its Sheep Poo Paper products have won a £20,000 Millennium Award for "social entrepeneurship".

After the sheep droppings are collected, they are sterilised, washed and mixed with other recycled paper.

This is then turned into the finished paper and cardboard while the washing water is distributed to local growers as concentrated fertiliser.

Link

Being a new Dad, I can totally appreciate Wry Baby’s witty notepads "for the parentally distracted." Or for those with bald babies (nope, not mine: she was born with a full head of hair), here’s the hairdo maker:

Link (don’t miss the Flash Game) – Thanks Dave Sopp!

From the website:

Since the 911 incident, many countries have stepped up their defense against terrorism. For instance, Beijing’s Zhongguan Village square has come up with an innovative product: a bulletproof public toilet! Costing about US$100,000, this special toilet’s exterior remains intact even if ordinary TNT is detonated within.

Initially, the instructions were all written in English and French and hence locals were afraid of entering or using it. However, on August 25th, the instructions were converted to Chinese but the public toilet still remains unpopular.

Link | Original Website [Google translation] – Thanks Spluch!

Between November 2004 and February 2005, John Ralston drew the entire 1925 senior class from the Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Link [flickr] – via BibliOddysey – Thanks PM Morte!

Neatorama reader Scott made a neat little door hanger that warns would be visitors of your mood using emoticons!

You can download the printable PDF at his blog: Link – Thanks Scott!

From the website:

Artist Kevin O’Callaghan, a Manhattan School of Visual Arts professor, saw something of beauty in the car that the public has turned its back on. He bought 39 rusty Yugos and asked his students to make objects of functional art from them.

What was remnants of a failed automotive venture became a very popular exhibit drawing crowds to auto shows across the country. Twelve of these recycled Yugos were displayed at the ’97 auto show hosted by the St. Louis auto dealers association.

"What do you do when a Yugo don’t go? It’s about taking a useless product and giving it a new life," said O’Callaghan, also the exhibit’s curator. "I was blown away by the concepts. That’s the beauty of this, the imagination."

Yes, it’s quite old (1997), but still very interesting: Link