Sunday Newsletter

Masses Today

6.30: (Vigil): Nora & Patrick Cunningham, (Anniv).
11.00: Johnny Buckley, (Anniv).
6.30: John Walsh, (Anniv).

As I Was Saying...

It is hard to believe that, in this age of universal recession, there are enclaves of this world still plagued by inflation. On Monday last, Real Madrid paid AC Milan €56 million for Brazilian star Kaka. This was the second highest transfer fee of all time, behind the €73m paid by Madrid for Zinedine Zidane in 2001. Later in the week, Manchester United announced that an opening offer of €80 million had been made by Real Madrid for the Portuguese star, Cristiano Ronaldo. United have agreed to give Real Madrid permission to talk to the player! You bet they have! Sports commentators are convinced that the final fee for the player will be in the region of €94 million.

Tommy Doherty, one time manager of Manchester United, stated later that he believed George Best was a far superior and more effective footballer than Ronaldo. Yet Ronaldo's earnings for one year far surpasses Best's earning for his entire career! (Ronaldo will earn €9.4 million a year or €181,000 a week after tax with Real Madrid). Football has lost all touch with reality, said Doherty with good reason.

How much is a person worth? Galway-based gold recycling company, ForgottenGold.com, has worked out that Ronaldo is actually 57 times dearer in person than his weight in gold. At last Friday's market price for 24-carat gold on the London Market, 11.8-stone Ronaldo would fetch a mere €1.638m! The very act of calculation is obscene itself!

However, in the context of the income that football generates, even these fees may not seem excessive. Indeed it is considerably less than the £100 million sterling that Manchester City were prepared to pay for Kaka.

However in other contexts, such fees are outrageous.

They will seem bizarre to those whose self worth has been undermined in recent months as they have been made redundant or had to suffer pay cuts. They raise the difficult ethical question of whether any one person is worth such money in a world where so many live in poverty.

Yet, alongside this, much is expected from those who attract such large fees. Not only by the club and the crowd but also by the sports people themselves. And, relatively speaking, they have very short careers. Most football careers are finished by 33 years of age (Ryan Giggs excepted). Then their real challenge begins. What was their value if no-one was prepared to pay for their talent or fame?

Kaka himself is an ostentatious, evangelical Christian. In the midst of his celebration in the 2007 Champions' League victory, he revealed a vest with the message 'I belong to Jesus'. He claims that this faith enables him to resist the excesses often associated with football's lifestyle, and motivates him as an Ambassador Against Hunger for the UN. Such faith doesn't take away the moral difficulties of one person being paid so much. But it does say that to those who are given much, much is expected, not least towards all other human beings who are equally special.

-Dick Lyng

Eileen Carr, R.I.P.

Eileen Carr believed deeply that she was destined for God. She believed that death was a bridge over which all must cross on the way to God. She often wondered aloud why it was taking her so long to reach that bridge. Yet she approached it with some apprehension.

Her attitude to death was similar to that of the actor, Michael MacLiammoir. When asked at the end what he thought of death, the old actor replied: "While I have myself grown tired of life, death itself holds no attraction." Eileen approached that final bridge, driven on by her strong faith, but burdened with the residual hesitation that belongs to every human being.

She was our oldest parishioner. She died peacefully on Wednesday last, in her 102nd year. She enjoyed good health up to recent weeks. Her major complaint, health-wise, was her hearing. She found the resulting 'social isolation' rather frustrating at times. Now, having said that, she didn't miss much!

She was born Eileen Flynn near Ballintubber Abbey on April 5th, 1908. It is difficult to comprehend the enormous span she has lived. On the day she was born, Henry Asquith became our Prime Minister for the first time. In the month of her birth, the 4th Olympic Games of modern times opened in London.

At the age of 20, Eileen Flynn came south from Ballintubber to Galway in the year 1928. She landed her first job in a a pub in Woodquay, then owned by a family called Cosgrove. McSwiggan's Pub stands on that spot today.

Having secured work, she went in search of love, or, more accurately, love came searching for Eileen. She began a relationship with Roddy Carr whose family owned the paint shop on Cross Street, now Supermacs. The happy couple married in Dublin in 1933. 'We tried to have a quiet wedding but we didn't succeed' she once told me without disappointment!

Her life revolved around this church. In fact, 5 years ago, when we were beginning our restoration of the Church here, she was part of the delegation that went to the bishop seeking permission for the use of St. Nicholas' Protestant Church. She had been next door neighbour of the bishop when he was a baby. Let us say that, in subsequent discussions, the bishop was at a certain disadvantage! He conceded, of course.

Her church life extended out into her social life. After 11.00 Mass each day, she retired to a restaurant; a place was reserved with her small band of friends for coffee. Eileen Murphy, Maribel McNeill, Sadie Copeland, Carmel Howard and Maura Moloney met daily to chat and trade news and stories. These same women met in their houses every Sunday afternoon for bridge. Eileen's body may have faded and worn. But her mind remained sharp to the end.

Her husband Roderick Carr died 45 years ago. Obviously, Eileen was familiar with loneliness. But she was a very independent, feisty woman, not given to self-pity or complaining. She enjoyed great health throughout her life. She had a pacemaker inserted five years ago, and cataracts removed from her eyes sometime later. She made light of these procedures by remarking that she was held together by strings and patches.

The people of this parish will miss her greatly. May she now enjoy the rest she so richly deserves.

-Dick Lyng.

SUMMER FESTIVAL, 2009

VISITING CHOIR

We welcome to our Church this morning the Eskilstuna Oratorio Choir from Sweden. They will sing at the 11.00 Mass here. We are privileged to have these talented singers with us. Their leader is Jorgen Lindstrom.

They have sung in Catholic and Lutheran churches throughout Europe, including St Peter's, Rome. We are delighted to have you, and we hope you really have a great time in Galway.

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