Blog

A Real British Cock-up                 Word on the Week                       6th April 2024. It came to be known as Mr Bates v The Post Office and involved over 900 sub-postmasters (operating as franchisees) who were accused of stealing. The shortages were revealed by the new computer system which was compulsorily introduced in the 90ies.  The ‘Horizon’ […]

Risen and Reigning                   Word on the Week          30th March 2024. Of all the expressions of Easter my least favourite would be the cartoon which adorned the front page of one of our national newspapers.    It portrayed the common man surveying a litany of disasters appearing in a news sheet and exclaiming loudly ‘Jesus Christ’. Recognising […]

To Be or Not to Be              Word on the Week                 23rd March 2024. On 20 March 2024, the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Assisted Dying recommended the introduction of legalisation regulating assisted suicide and euthanasia in its majority report.   The spirit of our age, so fond of death, commended we follow Holland, Belgium and Canada on […]

St Patrick                         Word on the Week                     16th March 2024. It’s tomorrow that St Patrick kisses the stone!   His kiss transforms the land from its winter hibernation to the green fertility that makes Ireland the Emerald Isle.   After this Winter’s deluges of rain, he may need to blow his warm breath over it to dry up […]

From the River to the Sea         Word on the Week          9th March 2024. It’s the slogan, chanted by Palestine/Hamas supporters, seeking the total destruction of Israel who inhabit the land from the river Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea.   It is matched by the Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s intent to annihilate Hamas!   The conquest of […]

Counterfeit Relief            Word on the Week                     2nd March 2024. Life in this life can be hard.   It can offend our desire for fairness.  Things happen that should never have been allowed.   The apparent randomness of illness and accidents.    Then, in some cases, the premature-ness of death. To combat these thoughts many turn to the drug […]

To God be the Glory            Word on the Week                24th February 2024. Seeing God’s hand on a work is not always apparent until time filters out the incidental from the important.   So it has been with Jon and Sandra Blackwell’s search for God’s mission field for them.   The initial decisions came slowly.  First the […]

Alexei Navalny                      Word on the Week               17th February 2024. Alexei Navalny died this week.   He is the most recent and perhaps the best known of Putin’s political enemies.   He loved Russia and held to a vision of a future time when his beloved Russia would be free.    The 47-year-old blogger had survived poisoning attempts […]

New Life                           Word on the Week                     10th February 2024. One of the joys that light up our spinney is the bursting forth of the snowdrop. They have to penetrate a mat of ground ivy to reach the light of day.  These plants which the poet Thomas Tickell, who lived in Glasnevin, Dublin, (on land which […]