Parish Newsletter

Masses Today

6.30: Séan Cooke, (Anniv)
12.00: Patrick Nyland, (Anniv)
6.30: Eileen Kelly, (Anniv)

AS I WAS SAYING.....

It has been a weird week, filled in turn with hope, with euphoria, and then with despair. in a number of ways. Our hope focused on the massive wave of protest, orchestrated brilliantly by a couple of wealthy pop stars, and directed against the greedy, selfish policies of the western world. They highlighted the unequal and unjust manner in which wealth is presently distributed. It concentrated particularly on the terrible sufferings of the African peoples. But more than that: they said clearly, "This NEED NOT BE SO. This is NOT the natural order of things. This is a MAN-MADE world order." These were the dreamers. They managed to move millions with their dream.

It was a brilliant campaign. All the aid agencies put together, be they Trócaire, Concern, CAFOD, Oxfam, Goal, or whatever, even the cumulative efforts of these outstanding organisations could never have hoped to motivate and mobilise such large numbers of people in such a short time behind such an unselfish, altruistic campaign. These were 'the Wristband Generation', wearing their consciences on their sleeves, literally. Many had long ago dismissed the Wristband Generation as politically apathetic and morally indifferent. Yet here they were, displaying a faith of a biblical quality that would 'move mountains', literally. Shane Hegarty, writing in The Irish Times, put this misunderstanding in perspective:

A generation presumed to have no interest in politics is, in fact, heavily politicised. It is just that their concerns, leaders and methods are different. They look to a stage rather than the Dáil; to rock stars rather than politicians. And it is about more than the ability to sum up a complex issue in a catchy bracelet slogan. From the anti-globalisation and Reclaim the Streets marches, to the anti-war demonstrations and now the Make Poverty History campaign, it has become a decade of activism. In following Bob Geldof and Bono, youthful idealism is being married with experience and influence.

They are citizens of a borderless world, so their concerns are chiefly global ones: war, poverty, climate change, globalisation. They are quiet on domestic issues perhaps because those that previously occupied youth - unemployment, emigration, contraception, civil rights - have been fought and, to an extent, won by previous generations. But then, like each one fuelled on idealism and hope, the Wristband Generation is only ever a press conference away from disappointment. The lead-up to Live8 has seen many older commentators adopting their default position of cynicism and it would be a shame to see it justified. But for this generation to truly make its mark beyond the money raised from wristband sales, it will need to achieve more than a decent concert.

Disappointment, however, didn't have to wait for a press conference, unfortunately. It came in the form of terrorist bombs on the London Underground, aimed at people going about their normal day's work. At the very moment when idealism seemed to be winning out, fanaticism once again raised its ugly head and blasted over 50 human beings (and optimism) to kingdom come. It was a dreadful ending to a great week. And we may not have seen the end of this.

-Dick Lyng.

By the way.......

Thought for the Day, 8 July 2005

'Dead silence, except for the occasional sirens.' That was how people were describing what it was like in London yesterday afternoon. Just as when we face a personal shock or loss, there comes a moment when we don't know what to say, or how we feel, or what can be done: dead silence.

Terrorist violence aims at just such a reaction and wants it to last. They want to silence human speech - not only by killing, but by paralysing us all. The terrorist's goal is a situation in which our fear of violence and our grief and pain over violence have become stronger than our positive hopes and commitments. For most of the last two weeks, the thoughts of millions of people have been focused on the G8 meeting: positive hopes and commitments were uppermost. People knew what they wanted - justice for the poor, firm promises to address the environmental crisis: they wanted to be able to be proud of themselves and their leaders, they wanted to be confident that this was a world where moral vision and power still worked. And then on Wednesday we had that great vote of confidence in London. Once again, hopes and commitments were in the air and people were being stirred by new possibilities.

So yesterday's atrocities could not have come at a crueller moment. In addition to the terrible fact of plain human loss and suffering, there's the sense of a kind of defiant insult being flung at all of this.

And just as there are insults that leave us as individuals feeling too sick and empty to respond, so there are moments when a whole society feels like that.

An Old Testament Prophet spoke these words: 'How doth the city sit solitary that was full of people'; he spoke them as he looked out over the ruins of his home and the bodies of his friends.

But that sick desolation is what the terrorist wants. If our passion for justice, renewal, reconciliation is silenced, the path is open for whatever distorted and inhuman agenda is ready to fill the gap. So we have to ask 'do we have the strength still to say no to this? Do we truly, commitedly, want what we wanted before this tragedy erupted?' We must take courage. We may not feel we have much strength, we may still feel partly paralysed. There's a passage in the New Testament where Paul says something like this: 'we don't know how to pray or what to hope for sometimes. But the spirit of God is working with us, and even our wordless cries and groans become part of the Spirit's action'.

There's another kind of silence, where we breathe deeply and 'gather' ourselves, anchor ourselves in what matters and what lasts. The only finally adequate response to terror and evil is to gather ourselves like this - to reach down into what feeds the roots of our spirit, trusting that justice, mercy and joy are never going to be silenced or paralysed. And when we know that, we're ready to begin again on the long road, the long task, of making humanity really human.

-The Most Rev. Rowan William

WALKING ON WATER

Perhaps God is not the shore
on which, like grounded boats, we end
our journeying;
perhaps God
is the ocean we step out on
through death, into our origins.

The sea surrounds us in the way, we hope,
God's care surrounds us;
out there, shark bodies
are long and lissom as a whip;
there is brill, black sole and the breadcrumb flesh of crabs
tasting of the essence of sea;

here ravens are riding the air above us, groaning;
and somewhere, circling offshore
there is a seal in mourning, its great love lost;

save me. O Lord, when the waters take my soul.

-John F. Deane.

MEMORABLE QUOTES