Re-telling stories
Pictures of school life in former times brought thoughts of stories in such times. There were stories that every child seemed to have heard fables, fairy tales, classic children’s writers. Often the stories were unhappy, sometimes they were even horrid. It never seemed to occur to anyone that the option of changing the story was always there. Whether the story … [continue reading …]
Pitchforks and plantation
It is JB Keane time again in this week’s Leinster Express. The judge in the district court sitting in Portlaoise refused jurisdiction over a case, telling the defence solicitor that the matter was too serious to be handled by the district court and must be passed to the circuit court, where any sentence passed might be more severe than at district … [continue reading …]
Bungalow days
“What happens when you are old?” “I think you go in a bungalow.” The interviewee in Channel 4’s “Old People’s Home for 4 year Olds” will probably find her answer played and replayed in the years to come. It is the sort of thing that appears at wedding receptions, moments from childhood that might be thought humorous or embarrassing. The … [continue reading …]
The Star still rises
In the days before the Internet allowed one to verify or falsify almost anything, there was a tendency to believe what one was told. Unless there were reasonable grounds to distrust what a person said, their word would generally have been accepted. So, whether it was true or not, a lecturer at the LSE used to tell us that the … [continue reading …]
TELEGRAPHIC TRANSFER NOTICE ,
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Shotgun sentiments
Far from the Madding Crowd, the BBC adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s 1874 novel: Gabriel Oak is disturbed from his sleep by the barking of a dog and the frightened. bleating of a flock of sheep. There is one thing for which Oak instinctively reaches, the double barrelled shotgun that lay close at hand. For what else would he have reached? Shotguns were … [continue reading …]
Rector’s Letter – Summer 2017
The closing days of June were a difficult time in the North. Tensions within communities built up. Vulnerable people were intimidated by youths building bonfires. Policing, difficult at the best of times, became all but impossible. By the beginning of July, many people had left the Province, heading for Britain or the Continent, or crossing the border to Donegal or … [continue reading …]
Sermon for Sunday, August 20th 2017 (Trinity 10/Pentecost 11/
“It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” Matthew 15:26 Have you ever lost your temper and then regretted doing so? When we read Saint Matthew Chapter 15, it seems that might even have happened to Jesus; the Gospel reading offers us insights into his character and mind. Earlier in Chapter 15, Jesus … [continue reading …]
Is it all down to economics?
England declared their first innings closed on 514 runs for eight wickets. In response, West Indies were all out for 168 runs. There are those of us of a certain age who remember when it was otherwise, the West Indies touring teams of 1976, 1980 and 1984 swept aside the English opposition with the minimum of effort. It is the … [continue reading …]
Confused listener
Waking in a Devon guest house on a Sunday morning, BBC Radio 2 provided a companion to the ablutions. A “thought for the day” slot seemed to have a prominent place before the news. Perhaps it was the English air, but the religious sentiments seemed from a different sphere of reality. Going into the town, the noticeboard of the medieval … [continue reading …]
Wet weekday consistency
Somerset County Cricket Club have never won the county championship, the premier prize of county cricket. There have been times when they came very close, losing out in the last minutes of the last day of the competition in 2010 and 2016 (losing only by a statistical quirk in 2010), but the title has eluded them for more than one … [continue reading …]
I would love to live
It is twelve years since tracks from Dido’s album Life for Rent were filling airtime on Irish radio stations. Buying Life for Rent and James Blunt’s Back to Bedlam on 12th July that year (a date remembered because it was The Twelfth), there was no thought that the songstress’s lyrics would still be a haunting refrain a dozen years later. Dido … [continue reading …]
The Passenger
Reaching for his phone, he switched off the alarm. It surely could not be seven already. A friend’s birthday the previous day had meant a night out and a late return, maybe it had been after three. Those with Monday to Friday jobs could now sleep until lunchtime; he needed to be in work by half past eight. Going to … [continue reading …]