Old Latin Mass belongs in the past

The Thinking Anew column in The Irish Times today

Michael Commane 

I’m forever asking myself and others what is life about. Indeed, at this stage when people see me coming, they are waiting for my  question. 

In tomorrow’s Gospel John quotes Jesus: “I am the bread of life,  he who comes to me will never be hungry; he who believes in me will never thirst.” (John 6: 35).  

Here I am,  a Catholic priest, ordained in 1974 and I’m still asking myself what life is all about. But the older I get the more I realise my questioning may not at all be too far off the mark. Our journey of faith is a lifelong one and it makes no sense at all for anyone ever to think that they have captured God. That is idolatry.

Yes, I see the emptying churches. I hear the footsteps of people as they walk away from churches. I’m acutely aware of the growing divisions and tensions within the churches with specific reference to the Catholic Church, which has been my home all my life.

The Mass has been in the news over the last few weeks for different reasons. On the one hand Pope Francis has issued new rules on the celebration of the Old Latin or Tridentine Mass.

 

Personally I am delighted with Pope Francis’ brave announcement.

On the other hand there has rightly been great concern expressed about the appropriateness of conduct at funeral Masses in controversial circumstances.

The Eucharist is above all the Christian community in prayer with one another and Christ at the centre. 

It is that moment when people and God are communicating life in a most extraordinary manner. 

It is fitting that we do so in the language we use every day, just as God is present in our daily lives. 

The Mass is a central source of spiritual nourishment. And of course everything we say about the Eucharist presupposes our acceptance that we are a people of faith.  We should come away from Mass inspired and impressed by the presence of God in our world.

The deepest and most meaningful conversations I have with people are conducted through the medium of English because that is where I am most at home. I cannot fathom why people with a very limited knowledge of Latin celebrate the Tridentine Mass.

Is the Latin phenomenon some sort of attempt to escape into a past that is no more? Why choose to live in the past, adopting styles and vocabularies appropriate to long gone times? 

Shouldn’t we think more about the present? In 47 years of priesthood I don’t think I’ve ever been encouraged to attend any sort of workshop or seminar on how best to celebrate the Eucharist. None of us priests can put our hands on our hearts and say that we have perfected the way in which we celebrate Mass. 

Priests and bishops should, I suggest, make greater efforts to make the vernacular an inclusive celebration that makes those present know that they come face-to-face with Jesus, who is the bread of life. 

How often have people left church understanding that in believing in Jesus they will never thirst? Every day I meet young, old and sick people, good and decent women and men who have been alienated by church and churches. I find it most frustrating because I see how wholesome and good they are and how broken the institutional church is. 

The big question we must ask ourselves is why people have walked away. There are myriad reasons, but I keep saying to myself the institutional church does not do enough to pass on ownership to all baptised members. And people are wise and perspicacious enough to see all the shadow boxing that takes place.

But I am heartened by tomorrow’s Gospel when Jesus tells his followers that it is not Moses who gave them the bread from heaven, but rather his Father, who gives us the bread from heaven.

Our celebration of the Eucharist always has to be dynamic and real, a faith-filled experience that has clear meaning and availability for us. It has to be celebrated in such a manner that we will be enlivened with the Word of God and nourished by the body and blood of Christ, and subsequently be enthusiastic in living it out in our everyday lives. 

The life of a good man or woman nurtured by the bread of life leads to God.  For many Christians the Eucharist is that source of nourishment but why have so many walked away? 

The bread of God gives life to the world. Jesus Christ spoke to us in the everyday language of his homeland, and it is in our daily lives that his message of love and salvation, the bread of Heaven, belongs. 

Whom to believe? That surely is a big question

In the Weekend Review of last Saturday’s edition of The Irish Times Derek Scally wrote a review of the chancellorship of Angela Merkel.

It is a positive account of her 16 years as head of the German government and 31 years as a politician.

Scally says her maxim is simple: In calm lies power.

On one occasion she was asked what western Germans could learn from easterners like her, Merkel replied: ‘Patience’.

At her final summer press conference in Berlin last Thursday she said: “It’s up to others to draw a balance and they will do that.

“I’m at ease with myself, with my life and my biography. I think both gave me good opportunities to make a contribution to Germany’s political life."

In the Life&Arts supplement of the Guardian of the same date Guy Chazan reviews Robin Alexander’s book on Angela Merkel. He sees her in a different light as Derek Scally. 

Alexander argues that there was never so much government in Germany and never so much government failure.

He says she is now seen around the world by many as “the tired regent of a risk-averse, overly bureaucratic and technologically backward Germany".

Whom to believe Scally or Chazan/Alexander?

Interesting how people’s opinions vary and how at all can the reader draw conclusions?

Maybe there never are conclusions.

How Canon Law is actually applied

It often seems that Canon Law is applied to the foe,  interpreted for the friend.

Order 227

On this day, July 28, 1942 Soviet leader Joseph Stalin issued Order Number 227. 

In response to alarming German advances, all those who retreated or left their positions without orders were to be tried in a military court, with punishment ranging from duty in a penal battalion, imprisonment in a Gulag, or execution. 

The following month, on August 23, the Germans began the battle at Stalingrad. And it was there that Order 227 played a pivotal but cruel role.

No Russian was to cross the River Volga. There would be no further retreat eastwards. That was the final stop.

The following February a badly defeated German Army retreated from Stalingrad.

Zany Covid deniers and right-wing Christians

This week’s Mediahuis Irish regional newspapers’ column

Michael Commane

It was reported in the media in mid-July that both the chief medical officer Dr Tony Holohan and his assistant, Dr Ronan Glynn received abusive phone calls.

Across the world in Australia the New South Wales police fined far-right commentator Katie Hopkins before the Australian government deported her.

She had been invited to Australia to appear on  Seven Network’s Big Brother VIP.

Before filming took place Katie Hopkins released a video describing Covid19 as the greatest hoax in human history. She joked about her elaborate plans to break quarantine regulations, explaining how she planned to frighten security guards by answering her hotel room naked and maskless.

In Ireland we have had the spectacle of two well-known journalists taking the State to court, claiming that Covid is a conspiracy.

Another Irish media personality is constantly criticising the State for its strict Covid rules and he is also highly critical of how the church authorities have acquiesced  in State rules and regulations concerning liturgical celebrations.

One could easily get the impression that he believes the State is hellbent in closing down churches.

I am aware of a parish priest who has allowed choral singing to take place in church, something that has been strictly forbidden by the State and indeed the man’s own diocese.

And then there have been those who have refused to be vaccinated, citing spurious religious grounds.

I know a priest, who refused the vaccination, and subsequently fell victim to Covid. He lives in a community with a number of vulnerable people. To make it even worse there was hardly a word of apology from him to his colleagues.

What is it about the purveyors of this rabid right wing conspiracy that is simply running amok? They seem to have worrying links with churches.

Trump has discovered some sort of magic wand that appeals to large numbers of church-going people.

 

There is a significant underbelly of angry, disaffected people, who want to shape the world in their fanatical image. They are finding refuge and maybe even solace in the various Christian churches. And the Catholic Church is no exception.

I have to admit that I am scared. My experience is within the Catholic Church and I can’t help but feel there is a terrible swing to the right, indeed, a worrying trend. Maybe it is having such success because of the current weakness within church leadership.

From time to time Pope Francis hints at what is happening but then some days later his message is drowned out by off-the-wall right wing comments.

I’m often baffled and saddened how church leaders are so forthright in criticising any tendency that might show liberal or left wing tendencies, but when it comes to calling out far right-wing ideas, they are far more reticent.

On a personal note, I’m saddened by a conservatism that plays such a powerful role in the Catholic Church to which I belong. I’d love things to be different.

Söder tells Scholz that he is not the king of Germany

At a heated meeting in March of Germany’s 16 regional premiers discussing the coronavirus pandemic, the premier of Bavaria, Markus Söder said to the German finance minister Olaf Scholz:

You’re not the king of Germany, you know, nor the ruler of the world. So you can stop grinning like a Smurf.

Water water everywhere nor any drop to drink

Our heatwave may be coming to an end. A heatwave is declared in Ireland if there are five consecutive days of temperatures above 25 degrees Celsius. A drought is declared after 15 consecutive days with less than 0.2 millilitres of rain.

Irish Water collects, treats and pumps 1.7 billion litres of water every day. Forty per cent or 680,000 litres is lost through leakage.

Dublin uses a third of the State’s water. Every day the greater Dublin area consumes 572 million litres of water.

The average daily consumption of water used by every person in the State is approximately 133 litres.

Our water supply right now is hanging on a knife-edge.

Irish Water has just begun work on a new 100 million litre reservoir in Saggart

Proof that gambling is a mug’s game

In 2019 Revenue collected €51.9 million from traditional betting and €40.6 million from remote betting.

This was close to double the figure for the previous year, 2018.

Across the EU more than 44 per cent of all online betting is done from a smartphone or tablet rather than from desktop computers.

Last month President Michael D Higgins spoke of the importance of greater regulation of online gambling.

According to a report funded by Gambling Awareness there are  55,000 people in Ireland with a serious gambling disorder.

Last year Irish gamblers lost approximately €1.36 billion.

Proof that gambling is a mug’s game.

Miriam Lord’s wonderful piece on Dessie O'Malley

Miriam Lord has a lovely piece in The Irish Times yesterday on Dessie O’Malley and it’s certainly well worth a read.

At the end of her personal story she relates how Dessie loved his wife Pat.

“At her funeral Mass Dessie said: ‘The thing should have been the other way around. I, and most people, expected that I would be the first to go. It would have been better for everyone if that were so, but the better one went first.’

“Two weeks ago, still politically engaged, he voted for the last time in the Dublin Bay South by-election.

“Wonder who got his number one.”

What a fabulous piece of writing. And how it catches the man.

Elsewhere Lord tells of a conversation Dessie, his wife Pat, and John Hume had in a pub in Omagh in the aftermath of the 1998 bombing. Miriam Lord is present. 

John Hume gives them a lecture on how to spot a good French wine. Pat’s family owned a pub in Omagh.

As John held forth, Dessie, trying to stifle a smile said: ‘really’ with an expression that was priceless.

Lord explains how it was a bizarre moment in the midst of terrible tragedy.

RTÉ’s Emer Flood gives us the weather forecast for today

At 07.57 today RTÉ’s weather forecast was read by Emer Flood.

Another warm day ahead. 

A brave Pope Francis says no to old Latin Mass

The text below is from The Irish Times of Friday, July 16. The link is from Crux.

Has the provincial of the Irish Dominicans made any statement about Irish Dominican priests celebrating the old Latin Mass?

Pope Francis has cracked down on the spread of the old Latin Mass, reversing one of Benedict XVI’s signature decisions in a major challenge to traditionalist Catholics who immediately condemned it as an attack on them and the ancient liturgy.

Pope Francis reimposed restrictions on celebrating the Latin Mass that Benedict relaxed in 2007, and went further to limit its use.

The pontiff said he was taking action because Benedict’s reform had become a source of division in the church and been used by Catholics opposed to the Second Vatican Council, the 1960s meetings that modernised the Church and its liturgy.

Critics said they had never before witnessed a Pope so thoroughly reversing a predecessor’s policy. That the reversal concerned something so fundamental as the liturgy, while Benedict is still alive and living in the Vatican as a retired pontiff, only amplified the extraordinary nature of Pope Francis’s move, which is set to provoke more right-wing hostility.

Pope Francis (84) issued a new law requiring individual bishops to approve celebrations of the old Mass, also called the Tridentine Mass, and requiring newly ordained priests to receive explicit permission to celebrate it from their bishops in consultation with the Vatican.

Under the new law, bishops must also determine if current groups of faithful attached to the old Mass accept Vatican II, which allowed for Mass to be celebrated in the vernacular rather than Latin. These groups can no longer use regular parishes for their Masses, and bishops must find an alternative location for them.

In addition, Pope Francis said bishops are no longer allowed to authorise the formation of any new pro-Latin Mass groups in their dioceses.The pontiff said he was taking action to promote unity and heal divisions within the Church that had grown since Benedict’s 2007 document, Summorum Pontificum. 

 https://cruxnow.com/interviews/2021/07/popes-clampdown-on-latin-mass-praised-as-prophetic-ripped-as-cruel/ from Crux!

Kuenssberg’s captivating interview with Cummings

In a special BBC Two programme last evening Laura Kuenssberg interviewed Dominic Cummings.

He began by denying his current anti-Johnson campaign is revenge. And he said it didn’t matter if it was personal and went on to say that the country needs more difficult conversation.

Cummings said that Boris Johnson referred to his real boss as The Telegraph.

In many ways the hour-long interview may well have been the rantings of a mad man. On the other hand it may have been prophetic words spoken by a genius.

He was not afraid to say that the leadership of the Tory Party is useless and spoke about the political system allowing one bunch of clowns replacing another.

He openly and emphatically said that the sooner Boris Johnson goes the better.

Cummings passionately believes that Brexit is good for the UK but at one stage in the interview, he lumped some of the crazy MPs who were denying the dangers of Covid with Brexit MPs.

That sounded contradictory and indeed odd.

While one may profoundly disagree with him politically, he would have a lot to say around a table of Dominicans discussing where they are at, indeed, he’d make great sense talking at any gathering of church people wondering what next.

His comment about "the political system allowing one bunch of clowns replacing another” surely applies  across all society, within the churches too.

It was captivating television.

Those lines from John Dryden: “ Great wits are to madness near allied/And thin partitions doe their bounds divide."

Hidden beauty right in front of our noses

This week’s Mediahuis Irish regional newspapers’ column

Michael Commane

I can’t imagine the damage Covid has caused the airline travel, indeed the damage it has caused everywhere.

Maybe it is that I am growing old and the attraction of non-stop travel is no longer a great priority with me. 

Also, up to some years ago I did my fair share of travel. I was going backwards and forwards to Germany ever before Ryanair appeared on the scene and Aer Lingus may have only had two or three flights a week to Frankfurt-am-Main.

But these days listening to the uproar and almost pandemonium that is being caused because people can’t travel to far-off places, I’m wondering have we lost the run of ourselves.

Again, maybe it’s easy for me to scratch my head when I hear about people travelling to Berlin for a weekend. What can one see of Berlin in two, three days? 

I lived in the city before the Wall came down and know just a little about the enormity and complexity of the German capital. But back in the day, when I was there, it was a divided city, East Berlin being the capital of East Germany and West Berlin, an island city, that attracted all sorts of ‘Refuseniks’ alternatives and the likes of me, but that’s another story altogether.

At the weekend I did two lovely walks. On Saturday I walked along Dublin’s River Dodder from Donnybrook to where the river flows into the Liffey. 

It’s one fabulous walk. One minute you might well think you are deep in rural Ireland. Two kilometres further on you come to that spot where the Grand Canal and the Dodder flow into the Liffey. It really is a piece of engineering wonder.

And just before arriving at that junction my companion and I were discussing whether or not we liked the Aviva Stadium. Such a colossal building plonked right beside family homes. Neither of us is an architect but we both agreed and thought it works. We decided it is a piece of architectural genius.

Then on Sunday I walked around the reservoir at Beohernabreena, just beyond Tallaght. It’s a nine-kilometre walk.

The reservoir supplies water to approximately 35,000 households in the Rathgar Rathmines area of Dublin and was built in the 1880s.

Over the last few months I’ve been discovering places, roads, alleyways that I never knew existed.

There is a wealth of treasure right in front of our noses that we constantly seem to miss or ignore.

It’s only in recent years that I discovered where the sources of water are for the two Dublin canals. And when I was at Grand Canal Dock on Saturday I got talking to a couple. We were joking and laughing, and also talking about the wonder of the place. I asked her in true school teacher fashion where was the source of water for the Grand Canal. She nor her husband had no idea.

Why do we frenetically fly all over the world when there’s so much wonder right in front of our noses here at home?

In every nook and cranny of this island of ours there are extraordinary gems to discover.

These days I’m reminded so often of the old Irish seanfhocal, far away hills are green.

Priesthood

Is priesthood fit for purpose in July 2021?

Does one have to answer that, do they? 

Disaster gives youth a chance to show their greatness

So far 140 people, including four fire brigade personnel, are confirmed dead in Germany as a result of the flooding and that number will  rise. A large number of people are missing.

There has also been heavy flooding claiming the lives of  people in neighbouring France, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier visited one of the worst hit areas in North Rhine Westfalia yesterday. He stressed how impressed he was in how people have come together in support and help and promised that bureaucracy would not get in the way in the immediate rebuilding of houses, roads and rail lines.

Chancellor Angela Merkel retuned from Washington today and travelled directly to one of the stricken areas.

CDU chancellor candidate for the September election and current premier of North Rhine Westfalia Armin Laschet has also stressed the importance of all agencies working together to rebuild.

Laschet was caught on camera laughing and joking  as Steinmeier was speaking. He subsequently apologised for his behaviour.

Yesterday there was concern that the dam at Steinbachtal would break its banks. 

The television pictures of the devastated areas are truly horrific. 

Houses ruined, water flowing through villages and motorways turned into raging rivers.

One television clip showed a Bundeswehr tank pulling a large truck out of raging waters on a motorway.

But what is impressive is the solidarity of the people and especially the willingness of young people to roll up their sleeves and help.

Learning to trust the people

The 'Thinking Anew' column in The Irish Times today.

Michael Commane

On July 1, the People’s Republic of China placed a full-page advertisement in this newspaper. The text was written by the Chinese Ambassador to Ireland, He Xiangdong, to mark  the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China.

The publication attracted criticism as there were those who felt it was wrong for a country with a reputation such as China’s to be given a prominent space in a national newspaper. Opinions on this differ but I prefer to think that when the ambassador of a country with which we have diplomatic relations speaks to us, we are mature enough to make up our own minds to accept or reject what is said.

  

Early in his message the ambassador suggests that the Chinese government has the solid support of the Chinese people.

 

The word people plays a central role in the vocabulary of all politicians. Politicians like to show that they are representing the people. Whether in democracies or in tyrannies, that word people is writ large. 

In tomorrow’s Gospel, St Mark tells the reader how Jesus takes pity on the large crowds “because they were like sheep without a shepherd, and he set himself to teach them at some length”. (Mark 6: 34).

Indeed, in the first reading in tomorrow’s liturgy the prophet Jeremiah quotes the Lord, the God of Israel, as saying: “Doom for the shepherds who allow the flock of my pasture to be destroyed and scattered.” (Jeremiah 23: 1)

There we have it again, the importance of caring for people.

In the current issue of ‘Reality', a magazine published by the Irish Redemptorists, the editorial is titled ‘God’s silence and the death of vocations’. The author, Fr Gerard Moloney, writes  about vocations to the priesthood and religious life.

In conclusion he writes: “We need to imagine a radical new way of being church in the 21st century. 

Even though it may seem like we are peering through a glass darkly, we need to trust that God will show us a way forward.”

I find it an inspiring piece of writing, which is very welcome, cutting as it does through much of the tired ‘pieties’ I have come to expect from so much of the religious press.

Fr Moloney suggests we trust in God. I suggest we should also trust far more in people. What has happened to the impetus of the Second Vatican Council, that threw open the doors and windows to make the church an open and inclusive community, where the voices of more and more people could be heard and indeed respected too?

Many Christian churches are in meltdown and instead of listening and respecting the views of all those who have been hurt and alienated there is this constant pull to return to old ways that have no contemporary meaning for so many good and noble people.

Any time I pick up the New Testament I am struck with the recurring  theme of how Jesus interacts with people. It’s his mission to serve and heal the people, and that involves listening  to them too. It’s perfectly clear that he respects and cherishes them. He is a true servant of the people. Jesus is the servant of the people because he is primarily the servant of God. It was his commitment to God that drove him to be the servant of the people.

What have we done? We have turned our faith upside down by  placing far too much importance on those who serve. There is too much reverence shown to office holders, be they political, titled or ecclesiastical. In the past we doffed the hat to the church leaders, but who are we genuflecting in front of today?

Now, as never before, there is  a serious need for a root and branch change in a church that has for far too long given an impression of being driven by rank and entitlement. This  has to go. Because if it doesn’t the church will become totally irrelevant to the people it claims to serve.

Boris Johnson’s battery made buses

British prime minister Boris Johnson was in Coventry yesterday where he was giving a talk on ‘levelling up’.

At one stage in his ramblings he spoke about the great new green buses made by batteries.

Has anyone seen a battery made bus?

Covid is a blip compared to sufferings of earlier generations

People are objecting to how Covid regulations are keeping pubs and restaurants closed. There are priests too, who are objecting to Covid regulations, restricting liturgical celebrations. Indeed, there are priests who flagrantly break the rules of the State and of their diocese.

Eighty years ago Germany invaded Mother Russia. Between 1941 and 1943 Soviet battlefield deaths numbered perhaps 10 million. Of the 5.7 million Soviet soldiers taken into captivity, 3.3 million died of starvation, disease, or in the case of at least 140,000 individuals, at the point of an executioner’s gun.

Fifteen million Soviet civilians died as a direct result of Germany's attempt to obliterate the Soviet Union.

It is embarrassing and annoying to  listen to people, including priests, moan, groan and break rules and regulations that have been put in place to protect us all.

In July 1941  Red Army soldier Dmitry Tkachenko wrote to his daughters Vita and Lyusya: “I am so far from you. Perhaps you have already begun to forget your daddy.

“Girls, so many children are here living in fear of air raids .... Please, I want you to help your mammy and look after her. Don’t be lazy. Anything can happen to me. Maybe I’ll never see you again. Perhaps you will be left just with mammy..

“I would love so much to be with you just for one day. To look at you and play with you. Please make sure the house is always clean, both the rooms and the kitchen.

Hugs and kisses, Your Daddy.

He was killed on October 30, 1941, four months and eight days after the Germans invaded the Soviet Union.

But the Red Army would turn the tables and rout the German aggressor.

RTÉ highlights scams perpetrated by county councillors

RTÉ’s Prime Time last evening aired a programme on how county councillors can easily abuse the system for their own financial benefit.

It included accounts of councillors claiming for expenses for attending two meetings taking place at the same time in different parts of Europe.

Councillors are allowed claim for expenses that are not vouched.

The programme highlighted the expense sheets of a number of councillors, which clearly show how they entered conflicting and contradictory claims.

A lot of public money swirling around in a large trough.

Ireland has an opportunity to speak for the voiceless

This week’s Mediahuis Irish regional newspapers’ column

Michael Commane

I put on a new summer shirt on Sunday and while unwrapping it I checked the collar to see where it was made. Bangladesh. I trust and pray that the people who made it are paid some sort of decent wage. 

But I suppose I looked at country of origin half expecting to see those five letters China on it. So much of what we buy these days is made in China.

 

On Thursday, July 1, ‘The Irish Times’ carried a full-page advertisement from the Chinese government. It caught my eye. I read all 1,500 words on the page. My first reaction was one of surprise, indeed, I was so surprised, that I commented on it the next day on my blog.

The text was written by He Xiangdong, the Chinese ambassador to Ireland. The ad marks the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party. 

The ambassador draws similarities between Ireland and China and writes in glowing terms of the current relationship between our two countries. He stresses the Chinese Communist Party is solidly supported by the Chinese people.

That same day on the lunchtime RTE Radio news I heard a report on comments made by the Chinese leader Xi Jinping, celebrating the milestone event. He said: ‘Anyone who tries to bully China will have their heads bashed bloody against the great wall of steel forged by more than 1.4 million Chinese people.’ 

That put a chill down my spine. And it certainly didn’t seem to gel with the soft words that his ambassador was writing in ‘The Irish Times’. They were indeed words similar to what Josef Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Mao Zedong might have spoken.

 

The following weekend ‘The Sunday Times’ was most critical of the Chinese ad that appeared in ‘The Irish Times’. It ran a story on the subject and columnist David Quinn was critical of the paper running the ad. I carefully read both pieces in ‘The Sunday Times’ and they made some valid points but why did I keep saying to myself ‘The Sunday Times’ is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp and naturally he would be strongly opposed to the philosophy and behaviour of the Chinese Communist Party?

I was reminded of author Jung Chang’s ‘Wild Swans’, which is a powerful account of the brutality the Chinese Communist Party under Mao Zedong unleashed on the Chinese people.

Currently I’m reading stories of how China is incarcerating large numbers of Uighurs, Chinese Muslims, in the northwest of the country. The Chinese leadership is sabre rattling about Taiwan and have used tough versions of the jackboot in Hong Kong.

China is powerful. Ireland has a relationship of dependency with the country. How can I find out the truth? Who tells the truth? Dare I ask, what is truth? But people who suffer at the hands of dictatorships can quickly and clearly tell us what dictators really do.

Right now Ireland has a seat at the UN Security Council. I hope we are using it to the advantage of all the world’s citizens, especially those who are downtrodden and maltreated.

Irish save money and sell whiskey while Finance looks on

During the last 18 months of the Covid pandemic Irish households added €21 billion to their savings.

In 2020 137 million bottles of Irish whiskey were sold worldwide.

Two facts that surely must give some ideas to Department of Finance.

Jonathan Dimbleby’s epic account of Operation Barbarossa

Jonathan Dimbleby’s ‘Barbararossa - How Hitler Lost the War’, published this year, has to be considered one of the finest pieces of writing on the failed German invasion of Russia.

Martin Sixsmith writes of the book: ‘Jonathan Dimbleby’s epic account captures all the drama and magnitude of an event that determined not just the outcome of the war, but the future of the world.’

In November/Decemebr 1941 as the Red Army was beginning to turn the tide as the German attack on Moscow began to fail Alexey Surkov’s  popular prose poem ‘A Soldier’s Oath' captured the mood:

Mine eyes have beheld thousands of dead bodies of women and children, lying along the railways and the highways.

They were killed by German vultures .... The tears of women and children are boiling in my heart.

Hitler the murderer and his hordes shall pay for these tears with their wolfish blood; for the avenger’s hatred knows no mercy. (Page 457/458)

Surkov’s words are a warning to those who do gratuitous vile deeds to other people.

It seems clear that God is not listening

The editorial of the July/August issue of Reality, published by the Irish Redemptorists, carries an interesting editorial on the death of vocations to priesthood and religious life.

In the last paragraph acting editor Gerard Moloney writes:

Meanwhile, religious leaders continue to ask for prayers for vocations, even though it seems clear by now that God is not listening.

Perhaps God’s silence is sending a message.

The old clerical modal of church is dying.

Priesthood and religious life as we knew it are coming to an end. We need to imagine a radical new way of being church in the 21st century. 

Even though it may seem like we are peering through a glass darkly, we need to trust that God will show us a way forward.

Twenty per cent of the population did not attend Mass

Derek Scally in his book, 'The Best Catholics in the World’ points out that approximately 80 per cent of the Catholic population did not attend Sunday Mass in the 18th century; yet Sunday Mass attendance later became one of the main criteria for judging people’s practice of the faith.

Derek Scally is The Irish Times correspondent in Berlin.

From never knowing why to job satisfaction

A link to ‘A `word in Edgeways’ aired on RTE Radio 1 yesterday at 06.15. 

https://www.rte.ie/radio/radio1/clips/21978750/

A word on former Dominican, the late Joe Bergin

This is a post received on Monday and sent by Joyce2. It was posted on the obituary blogpost on Joe Bergin.

Again thank you for continuing to "own", by recalling them with affection and respect, those of the Dominican Order who chose to get married. 

It is tragic that the church authorities continue to impose celibacy on those who have a vocation to priesthood and a vocation to marriage. 

I am saddened to hear of Joe's death, but he lived with courage and love, that will not die. I hope his memories are published. 

It is consoling to know through your blog that priests who married continued to have a profound positive influence on others, continued to bring them closer to Christ. God bless you.

By-election posters provoke a wry smile

This week’s Mediahuis Irish regional newspapers’ column

Michael Commane

There is a by-election in Dublin Bay South this Thursday.

St Luke’s Hospital in Rathgar, where I work, is in the constituency and I live just a few footsteps outside the constituency.

This is a traditional Fine Gael seat. The former housing minister Eoghan Murphy is leaving politics and retiring as the constituency TD, hence Thursday’s election.

There are 15 candidates putting their names in the ring.

It means over the last few weeks I have been passing pole after pole festooned with election posters of the candidates.

On Saturday I went for a seven kilometre walk, which took me through a leafy part of the constituency, Palmerston Park, Ranelagh and Dartry.

What did I learn from the posters I saw? Certainly I learned zilch about their political philosophy. Why the posters? The marketing people talk about name recognition.

I think I’m fairly neutral, which gave me some chance of being objective about the posters I saw. It also allowed me to see the funny side to it all.

Labour’s candidate is Senator Ivana Bacik. Her poster caught my attention. I know it’s only a poster, and graphics of their nature must allow for a certain poetic licence. 

But Ivana’s poster did bring a wry smile to my face. It’s obviously attempting to be artistic. But really does it work? It’s a graphic of a young woman with a scarf around her neck, wheeling a bicycle. 

But it’s the weirdest bicycle I have ever seen. It has no brakes, no chain, no mudguards but it does have a basket. And why in heaven’s name is the young woman wearing a scarf. After all, the election is in mid-summer. 

Then there’s the poster of the Fine Gael candidate James Geoghegan. It’s just a mugshot of the man. The moment I saw it, the immediate word that came to mind was smarmy. Yes, that's the impression I got from the picture. 

I don’t know the first thing about the man. No, not completely true. I have a vague memory of hearing something some weeks ago about the house he lives in and something to do with the mortgage. Nothing else.

The next poster was that of Social Democrats Sarah Durcan. Again it was a mugshot and all I can remember from the poster are her unusual-looking glasses and her lipstick.

I saw a poster of the Aontù candidate Mairéad Tóibín. Nothing special about her picture and when I saw the name I thought of Niall Tóibín and was wondering might she be related to the late actor.

My last poster on my seven kilometre walk was that of the Fianna Fáil candidate, Deirdre Conroy. 

Nothing special or unusual about her picture. But I was reminded about how she was in the news some weeks ago for not being too kind to someone who was cooking in her kitchen And at the time there was some sort of hullabaloo about it all.

I was walking with a friend and we had a discussion about the posters. I came home and began to think about election posters and democracy.

I’m growing more and more confused about democracy as we currently operate it.

Maybe I’m missing something.

Dates worth noting in Britain, Ireland and Germany

On this day in 1954 the BBC broadcasted its first television news bulletin.

We have come a long way in 67 years.

On December 31, 1961 RTÉ Television began broadcasting.

ZDF, one of Germany’s two public broadcasting television companies, announced on Friday the appointment a new director. 

The man’s name is Norbert Himmler. And his father was a police chief. An unfortunate name surely and then the poor man’s father's occupation.

Norbert Himmler will take up his new job next March.

Phone scamming is costing people dearly

According to US research for phone company TrueCaller, 59 million Americans lost money to phone scams last year. One in five admitted that they had been fooled more than once.

The average loss was approximately €420 per person.

The business to the fraudsters was worth approximately $30 billion.

In Australia people were defrauded of €538 million.

There are no figures available for such scams in Ireland. 

The moral of the story is never ever give personal information to a cold caller. Never engage them in any conversation. 

Bertie Ahern on a border poll

In my view the time for a border pole is not opportune until we reach a situation where nationalists and republicans and also a sizeable amount of unionists and loyalists are in favour of such a poll on the basis of consent. That is still some years away.

- former taoiseach Bertie Ahern

What China says in Ireland and in Tiananmen Square

The Irish Times yesterday carried a page advertisement from the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China.

The author is He Xiangdong, who is the current Ambassador of China to Ireland.

The ad begins explaining how the Communist Party of China was established 100 years ago this month.

The ambassador points out how China, like Ireland, remaind poor and backward and was struggling against foreign oppression and exploitation.

He goes on to say that over the last 100 years the Chinese Communist Party have been rallying the Chinese people, leading them in revolution and nation-building, and putting an end to semi-colonial, semi-feudal society of the old China.

Today, he tells the reader, that China is the world’s second largest economy, its largest manufacturing country, and the largest commodity trading nation.

The ambassador believes this is a good time to strengthen further China Ireland cooperation.

Meanwhile at celebrations in Tiananmen Square  yesterday Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged that China would not accept “sanctimonious preaching” by others, and it would not be “bullied, oppressed, or subjugated”. Anyone who tries “will find them on a collision course with a steel wall forged by 1.4 billion people.”

There are always two sides to stories.

The altar boy from Schönau who won the World Cup

"One win more, one defeat more. There are other important things: family, friendship, values." 

Joachim Löw has retired as manager of the German national football team after 15 years and 198 games.

Among the team’s many victories under his stewardship was the World Cup in Brazil in 2014.

Hansi Flick is the new German manager.

I was ordained a priest the day West Germany beat Netherlands in the World Cup in Munich on July 7, 1974.

Löw, born in Schönau in the Black Forest, was an altar boy in the parish church of his childhood.