building jerusalem

Chatting with Farmer Jones.

"Where did you go when we went into the church?" quoth me.

"I didn't want to sit near you," answereth he.

"Why not?"

"To be honest, it's all that hand waving and Hallelujah-ing you do. You should stop that."

The noble Heelers found himself a bit nonplussed.

"Seriously?" sez me.

"I hope you don't mind me telling you," sez he.

"No, no, be frank."

"You're doing too much of it. It's drawing attention to yourself. It's like you're saying: Look at me everybody. What are you trying to prove? Do you think you're better than everyone else? Give it a rest. It's all too over the top. It's like you're putting on a production."

"Okay, you can stop being frank now."

Later that evening, in a state of some bemusement (Ireland), I betook myself to the house of Uncle Scutch.

I told him what the agricoleur had told me.

Uncle Scutch said: "He's right."

I was stunned.

Under the weight of a grand mal I exploded: "He's right?"

"Yes, he's right. What do you think you're doing?"

"Showing joy. The Catholic church is a joyful place. A house of worship. Our Father's house. It's where we celebrate. Or did Fine Gael pass a law? Is joy a crime now? Did some fembo declare that joy makes her feel inadequate? Heavens to Murgatroyd. I can't believe you'd be against praising God whatever way the Spirit led."

"You're the only one doing it."

"No I'm not. You want to see African Catholics. They go absolutely nuts."

"You're the only one doing it in Kilcullen."

"Our Protestant brothers and sisters do it."

"I've never seen a Protestant do it."

"I don't mean the ould hare baither abortionist Prods you'd be hanging out with. I mean ones that actually believe in God."

"And where do you see those?"

"Er, in America, on TV."

"We're not ready for it James."

"Not ready for joy? Not ready to pray with a full heart? Not ready to jejoice in the lamb?"

"Let me put it this way. You're a little bit ahead of us. A little bit too far ahead of us."

"But isn't our church dedicated to welcoming all God's family. Isn't that what the Catholic church is? Aren't we all a family? Expressive ones. Quiet ones. Soulful ones. Noisy ones. Silent ones. Young ones. Old ones. Single people. Families. Singers. Orators. Mystics. Lads who wave their hands and give plenty of welly to the Hosannahs."

"Not yet. It's too soon."

"But I've been doing it for years."

"I was hoping someone would tell you eventually."

Long after midnight I betook myself to a neighbour's house.

The neighbour is a bit of a sage.

I recounted the advice of the other two.

The sage scratched his head thoughtfully and said:

"Well I was with you in church a couple of weeks ago. And I did wonder. I'm not saying anything against what you did. But I was wondering."

"You were wondering what?"

"I was wondering: Are people going to think he's with me!"

As we chatted I flicked through the channels on the sexevision.

I alighted on a Christian preacher's channel.

The preacher was saying: "When my wife and I set up this channel, we were both in our early twenties. One of the most respected pastors in America came to visit us. And afterwards he told someone: There's no way those two kids will be able to run a television station. He was a holy man. A good man. And here we are decades later broadcasting around the world. I say to you: If you have a word from God, and even if holy men tell you not to do it, you keep listening to God. You hold on to that word."

bleak heart

a boy stands in a field above the town
he does not know what the years will bring
dark night touches him and the rain
his spirit leaps in his imagining

a man writes at table in the dark
he wonders of all things what we are
spirits creatures matter worse
pitched forth comets about a dying star

tell me if all time is one time
and what is was and will be
was the boy already corrupt as he looked upon the town
am i already dead as i write

obitcheries

The Irish sports commentator Jimmy Magee has died.
He was most famous for the television programme A Question Of Sport which he presented for many years with another commentator called Jorge Hamilton.
A Question Of Sport was built around the fellowship, conviviality, humour, affection, bonhomie and genuine warm heartedness of its presenters.
I always had the slightly unsettling feeling whenever I watched it, that they utterly despised each other.

no truth in the rumour

There's no truth in the rumour that sleazoid director Abel Ferrera is to make another in his Bad Lieutenant series of low rent porn and violence films to be entitled Bad Pope... No hang on...

the heelers diaries in italy

Wandering through Rome's Protestant Graveyard.
Still looking for the Keats grave.
Occasionally I stop to talk to the cemetary cats who recline on tomb stones here and there
A sign appeals for donations for the care of the cats.
A black kitten mews appreciatively as I donate 50 Lira.
I call her Bella Catta as I call them all.
One of the animal carers, a girl of teenage years, passes by smirking. She sports a tee shirt that states: "Sono troppo sexy per lavorare."
I am guessing this means: I'm too sexy to wash.
The thought amuses me mightily.
The cats are great though.
Ahead of me a man of hippy mien and his woman are searching through the underbrush.
"I think this is Keats," he says to her in American accented English, pushing back the fronds of some blue flowering plant to expose a slab.
The stone is near a secluded corner of the graveyard.
Its epitaph announces:
       "Francis Darcy Godolphin
                   Osborne
            KCMG, KSTJ, KCSG,
       12th and last Duke of Leeds
         Minister to the Holy See
           London 16/9/1884
            Rome 20/3/1964"
The hippy guy drops the skein of bramble back over the stone.
"It's not him," he exclaims.
He and his girl hurry away.
I drop to my knees and say a prayer for Francis Darcy Godolphin Osborne.

confucius he say

Those who are aborting the unborn, euthanising the elderly, assisting other age groups to suicide, murdering nascent human beings in test tubes in order to generate nascent human beings in test tubes (they kill ten for every one they create), and systemically violating life in genetic experiments, are not just atheists.
They are atheists and they are ahumanists.
They do not believe in God.
And they do not believe in humanity.

or the wongs

Coffee with farmer Jones.
"We had a saying back in the Revenue Commissioners," quoth I, "nemo me impune lacessit."
"What does it mean?" sez he.
"Nobody ----'s with the Revenue Commissioners," I replied.