The word “death” is a word many Chinese friends tell me I should not say aloud. They advise me to avoid the word because only speaking of it may bring ill fortune. I deeply believe, however, that to know how to live, we must also know how to die. The problem is how we talk about death.      
Like everyone in Taiwan this week, I have had “Tomb Sweeping Day”. I am proud to be part of a people whose culture sends millions of families to cemeteries on this special day to share memories and endless love.
Today, eight days after the death of Pope John Paul II, millions of people of all backgrounds still grieve(悲痛) his passing away. He was a deeply human person who knew how to laugh and show emotions, a writer with a gift for words a leader who appealed to us by the sheer light of his love for life.
On the same day and only hours before the Holy Father left us, a friend of mine named Veronica McBride died of cancer in a small Wisconsin city. My friend Veronica was 52 years old. She was an attractive, humorous young woman who, as the saying goes, “never married”. She published several humor books with her mother, Mary McBride. She enjoyed traveling, and for years sent Christmas card photos of herself standing beside monuments or odd animals. She fought cancer for five years. She joked about her treatment keeping her pretty because it kept her thin, and told me she didn’t mind losing her hair because of chemo therapy. “I get to wear nice wigs!”
The last time I saw Veronica was when I visited her family on a sunny day in August in 2003. When she burst into the front door later and saw me in the living room, she ignored me completely in her hurry to hug her newest baby nephew, leaving me shaking my head in laughter at her.
As we look to the significance of the Holy Father and his life, surely we must also keep our eyes open to see the wonder and goodness in ordinary people who show us how to live and how to die.
【小题1】The purpose of the article is ___________.

Stephen Hawking believes that the earth is unlikely to be the only planet _______ life has developed gradually.

完形填空（共20小题；每小题1分。满分20分）
This was an unforgettable and wonderful experience. It happened about three years ago and it has had a  26 effect on me. I would like to show respect here for the two men I do not know 27  but whose actions gave a new 28  to the words—kind and generous.
I was walking down a busy street on a cold, windy day in early  29  . A homeless man, probably about 60 and without wearing any shoes, was 30 for change on a street corner.
A BMW car  31  on the other side of the street and an executive（主管）who was perfectly dressed stepped out of the car. He was probably about  32 years old. He was wearing a blue business suit with a deep red silk tie. He walked 33  across the street and over to the homeless man. Without saying anything, he first gave him a lot of 34  and then he sat down and took off his gloves（手套）, beautiful black leather shoes and his black dress socks. Then he  35  them to the homeless man. The homeless man took them and stared with a/an  36  mouth.
As he drove off, I couldn’t  37 thinking that it was probably the first time he had  38  the pedal（踏板）of that top-brand BMW car with a 39 foot!  I stood there and the looks of  40    appeared on my face and the homeless man’s.
Two men of about the same age,   41 very different lives had met and the one who was 42 in materials had offered  43 than his shoes. He had left his BMW car and  44 down from his high position. He lifted up the other man when he offered respect,  45 and real generosity.