One small step…
If it is true that many people sentimentalise life before the Troubles, it is also true that for many, the difference between war and peace was a matter of hours. See Northern Visions seminal A Million Bricks if you don’t beleive me. The road to normality has still some way to go, but yesterday saw one small step in the right direction. Ian Paisley and Archbishop Sean Brady were clearly pleased with their meeting, though as some in Ballymena asked the Irish News the other day, what took them so long?!
What took them so long?
Well, once upon a time there was this guy in what we now know as Germany called Martin Luther. Now he was a bit cheesed off with the priest so he bought a half-pound bag of nails and wrote out a list, and got the hammer from the shed and….
… then, there was this king of England with a bit of a problem producing an heir with an aging wife…
Neah, it was all predestined.
And then there was Bishop Casey and his ‘american ‘ family and your man in Ferns and Frs Cleary etc etc etc . Not to mention the Irish taxpayer having to pay out for the hundreds/thousands ? of crimes committed over a generation by members of sexually repressed priesthood . And then there was the Kincora affair and the DUP politicians and the gay massage parlour . And now we read of the pair of Florida Fr Teds absconding with 8.5 million dollars monies which are no longer resting in their accounts but appear to have been pissed away on good times in Las Vegas not to mention financial ‘investments in Ireland .
Not to worry faithful .It’s all just good clean Christian fun . The ‘lads ‘ practicing what they don’t preach as always .
As for the 40 years ?
Well the way I see it as long as the Free P’s and the RC Church and other Churches /religions had an ‘iron grip’ on the faithful /gullible they did not need to ‘talk ‘ to each other . But now in an increasingly ‘secular’ Ireland our Father Teds are being marginalised and the weekly take from the pews is drying up and recruits for the priesthood almost zero the future looks bleak .
smcgiff: .. then, there was this king of England with a bit of a problem producing an heir with an aging wife…
Well, you can hardly blame Henry for the Free Ps, or even the Real Ps.
Would the Presbyterians flourished to such an extent if England remained Catholic? Suppose it could still have taken off in its stronghold in Scotland.
Besides, not that I’d necessarily let facts get in the way of a joke!