a study in character

Sitting with Dublin Gwen at the front of Newbridge Church.
An officious looking fellow, all beard and blue shirt, bustles by laden with parcels for the homeless.
He begins struggling with the door.
Then turning to me he snaps his fingers.
"You, hey you, get the door will you."
I continue to converse with Gwen.
We are discussing the reality of evil.
I kid you not.
Gwen claims she encountered an evil spirit in her home last night. Our exact discourse centres on the capacity of the son of the Hebrew God to cast out fear.
There is more finger snapping from stage left.
Faintly I hear: "You, hey you."
Gwen says in exquisite Dublinese: "Oi tink he wants ya to open deh door for him."
I rise and walk in the opposite direction towards the centre of the church.
The parish priest, a sort of generalissimo figure with a Shakespearian voice and deep liberal left wing convictions, who does not know me personally, hails me as if he knows me personally.
The PP says: "I think that man wants you to help him with the door."
I reply gently but firmly: "You help him Joe."
Then I bow to the real presence of God on the altar and exit the building.

top ten times i failed to join up the dots

1. Archbishop Diarmuid Martin some years ago nominated Fine Gael politician Alan Gillis to the Board of a Dublin hospital. I wonder what arcane conspiracy theory I could possibly have missed on that one.


2. Er that's it.

archie returns

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin's failed attempt two years ago to force a generation of Bishops from office simply by labelling them all concealers of child abuse, along with his additional failure shortly afterwards to stampede Pope Benedict into firing them, his failure in both these gambits I say, has not led to any long term alteration in Archie's overall strategic ambition to marxianise Christianity by usurping power and promoting himself as the putative leader of the Catholic Church in Ireland.
As before Archie's main allies in popular discourse are Independent Newspapers, interestingly enough the most anti Catholic media group in Europe.
The Irish Independent continues to give improbable prominence to twee reports suggesting Archie is a genuine Catholic.
Why do they like him so!
We've had slavish coverage of Archie's opportunistic defence of the family.
Photos of Archie leading interdenominational processions in the streets.
A Johnny Come Lately Archie calling for traditional values.
And a rather ridiculous comparison between Archie and a new Bishop called Kevin Donlon whom the Independent falsely claims is a "protégée" of Archie's.
Archie's protégée indeed.
Kevin Donlon is many things.
A protégée of Archie's he's not.
Let me explain
I happen to know Kevin Donlon well.
In fact he's my protégée.
I mean I corresponded with him briefly via email, oh for at least a full two days, while he was writing for the genuinely Christian newspaper Alive.
During this period (two days) I gave him extensive pointers.
Counselled him about where he was going wrong.
Favoured him with a bit of modestly sublime spiritual direction.
Advised him on international politics etc etc.
I also seem to remember accusing him of being too favourably disposed to Muslims in general and Palestinians in particular with regard to his writings on the State of Israel.
With fatherly concern, I suggested to him that the only reason the Jewish people are back in the Holy Land after two thousand years is because God wants them there.
He answered me robustly enough.
And now I hear he's being made a Bishop.
There ya go.
I never pick a wrong un.
Kevin Donlon's accession to the Bishopric is for me like that moment when a young unknown called Reggie McGroarity who made his stage debut in my Vampires Of Dublin play back in 1996, suddenly last year started appearing in television ads both sides of the Atlantic for Amstel larger.
I'm telling ya.
Neither Kevin Donlon the Bishie, nor Reggie McGroarity the professional inebriate, is conceivable without my formative input.
I made them and I can break them.
Well you know what I mean.
And you can imagine my chagrin gentle voyagers of the internet, now that Independent Newspapers is daring to declare that one of my protégées is actually a protégée of my old nemesis Archbishop Machiavelli Martin.
Fire in the disco, fire in the Taco Bell, as we do say in the trade.
Seriously folks.
Kevin Donlon is nothing like Archie.
Let me sum it up for you in one little revelation of the character of both of them.
All egomania to one side for a moment.
Here's the difference between Kevin Donlon and Archie.
A medical facility styled Saint Vincent's Hospital in Dublin recently announced that it would start murdering unborn babies through the provision of surgical abortions.
When that announcement was made Kevin Donlon immediately resigned from the Board of Saint Vincent's Hospital.
Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, Chairman of the Board of Saint Vincent's Hospital, stayed right where he was.
Kevin Donlon, who frankly disagrees with me about everything, is a genuine Christian.
Archbishop Diarmuid Martin is something else.
I have nothing further to add.

hence wilt thou lift up olympus

The busy afternoon bustle of Clarkes Menswear Newbridge.
I like to put in an appearance there now and again to pretend I'm not embarrassed about owing the proprietor Vivian Clarke a sum of 240 Euros for some interminable debt or other.
Three jumpers, a brace of shirts and a few pairs of trewsers if you must know.
And lo!
Out of the corner of my eye I see Vivian Clarke himself approachething.
He calls to me across the store.
"Hey Heelers," quoth he merrily enough for a man I owe money to, "any truth in the rumour that you're putting on your Poets In Paradise play to raise money for Tony O'Reilly."
I turn with what grace I can.
"Actually I have some sympathy for Mr O'Reilly," I answer with calm dignity. "I don't like the way his former yes men have turned on him. And I don't like the sneers that are being heaped upon him by people who have never shown so much as a fractional millionth of his principle, his courage or his enterprise. And by the by, the new majority shareholder at Independent Newspapers Denis O'Brien is in my book a far worse crook than O'Reilly anyway. Denis O'Brien made his money by bribing government Minister Michael Lowry to give him mobile phone licences for a million dollars that should have cost him a billion. Denis O'Brien robbed all of us and subverted parliament and is now subverting newspapers and media in a twisted vendetta against his betters. I gotta tell ya Clarkey, if it's a choice between Tony O'Reilly and Denis O'Brien, I stand with the O'Reillys."
"Lordy," said the proprietor in a shocked voice, "they're really in trouble now."

piranha

Today's edition of the Irish Independent newspaper features seven pages excoriating the newspaper's former owner Tony O'Reilly who has been declared bankrupt.
All the toadies and cravens who formerly worshipped at his left tit, are now vieing with each other to be the ones who twist the knife.
Sigh.
If this keeps up, I'm going to have to start defending him.

farty towels

Curtain up.
Snodgrass Crowley, Chief Executive Officer of Allied Irish Banks, played by John Cleese, is sitting behind his desk. Tony O'Reilly looking very like Lord Melbury from the confidence trickster episode of Fawlty Towers enters stage left.


John Cleese: Ah Lord Melbury. How lovely to see you.


Tony: Ah  Fawlty. I'm heading into town tonight. I wonder could ya give me ten million dollars just to tide me over.


John Cleese: (a little nonplussed) Oh of course Lord Melbury of course. Nothing would be simpler. Will ten million be enough? Eleven perhaps? Twelve, twelve and a half?


Tony: Hmmm. Well it is the weekend. And I'm meeting the Duke of Beucleuch. Oh and then there's the theatre. Fifty. Fifty million alright?


John Cleese: (taken aback but anxious to impress) Oh, oh, of course. Fifty. Ha ha. It's nothing. Fifty million. Oh I'm so happy. Are you sure that's enough My Lord?


Tony: Well you never can be sure what's going to come up when you're out and about in the city. Tell you what. Make it the round 200 million and I'll pay you Monday when the banks open.


John Cleese: (muttering) This is a bank.


Tony: (sharpish) What's that?


John Cleese: Oh nothing Your Lordship. Nothing at all. Two hundred million dollars will be perfectly fine.


Tony: Oh and better add a thousand million to that for my newspaper group. Separate unsecured loan you understand. I've been paying myself dividends out of the newspaper group's borrowings and the damned bum wipe scandal sheets haven't made a profit at all during our forty year attempt to eradicate Christianity from Ireland.


John Cleese: Ulp. Oh. Er. A thousand million. That's a billion. Right. I'll just have Manuel run down to the Irish taxpayer to obtain the money because we're going to go bust lending to you as you know.


Tony: And oh, I might have a punt on the gee gees. Feel like buying Waterford Wedgewood and setting up a few oil exploration companies, and asset stripping them as I go by paying myself dividends even though like my newspapers these companies will never make a red cent. Better make it the round two billion. Two and a half billion to be sure. Plus the two hundred million personal loan to me for the weekend expenses.


John Cleese: Yes My Lord. At once.


Tony: Fine. Get a move on. You know there's a member of the faux high society Crowley family on the board of this bank. And his brother's on the board of my newspaper group. And his other brother is on the board of the other bank I've bankrupted. Get on with it man.


John Cleese: Yes Lord Melbury I know that. I myself am the faux high society Crowley who runs this bank, being portrayed today in inimitable style by John Cleese.


Tony: Well hurry up Crowley. Get me my two and a half billion unsecured dollars and in addition that other two hundred million unsecured dollars we mentioned for my petty cash. Oh and make me a cup of tea.


John Cleese: Of course Lord Melbury. And might I say what a pleasure it is to have someone with real class bankrupting Ireland. Not like the usual riff raff we get around here from the exponentially overpaid trade union movement or the corrupt psychotic police force, or the Mafioso judiciary, or the drug dealing people trafficking Muslim terrorists, or Russian and Triad crime gangs, or whatever.


Tony: Thanks a million.


John Cleese: That should be thanks two and a half billion plus a separate two hundred million in petty cash, Your Worship.


Tony: It's good to be the king.