Ethos

20th May 2020

In my 3rd motu proprio at the end of March I asked if anyone had a favourite tree – and received a great and varied response – with many reasons for the relationship. If you thought that my question was strange then – try this one now: Do you have a Braveheart Tree ?! I…read article

13th May 2020

Last Friday, the well-leaked news that this year’s Leaving Cert. was to be cancelled made it a unique day in the annals of the DES – and in the life of Rhetoric’20. Amid all the media frenzy and the rumours – a final (?!) and definitive (?!) Plan C brought to an end the agony…read article

5th May 2020

It is just over 50 days since the anti-covid-19 strategy brought about the closure of places of gathering. After the initial shock, people began to improvise – and everywhere there was surprise at how well this was succeeding. There was joy at values, for so long forgotten [or taken for granted] – were now coming…read article

29th April 2020

One hears a lot these days about people, unable to put up with the current anti-covid lockdown – wanting to leave their “prison-space” and head away beyond the imposed 2 kms from home. There is a well-known story of two men fleeing their fear-imposed lockdown. It is told in last Sunday’s Gospel in  St Luke’s…read article

21st April 2020

They all lived together and shared everything in common ……. [Acts 2:44] The first reading of last Sunday’s Mass describes the first Christians – after the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost – living together and  sharing everything in common – and recognized as associates of Christ [Acts 4:13] Future generations reading that line…read article

14th April 2020

My Little Friend Anne Marie’s Alleluia! I first met little Anne Marie on this very Easter Monday – 8th April 1985. I was on my first of nearly 20 visits to Lourdes with the Irish Children’s Pilgrimage. She was about 10 or 11 – and, like others with Down’s Syndrome, she was affectionate, tactile, generous…read article

7th April 2020

The other day I saw in a newspaper a photograph of a very busy Grafton Street – it looked a scene from the shop-till-you-drop Christmas shopping madness.  There was a caption underneath with the following three questions: When can we expect normality to return ? When our freedom returns, will it be by degrees –…read article

1st April 2020

A strange question, perhaps – but I hope it may make you think back for a moment and see that special tree in your mind’s eye. I am lucky that – even in these times of lockdown – I don’t have to go very far to actually see mine! I pass it several times a…read article

27th March 2020

Some years ago I spent a few weeks helping out in a parish in the middle of Paris. One morning I switched on to Radio Notre-Dame the station run by the Archdiocese.  The speaker asked a question: “Why do we all love to go to a night club?” He had my attention right away. He…read article

24th March 2020

Rest – read – work/walk – show love – be at peace – pray!   I came across those ten words the other day – in a church notice in Normandy – in a parish on the WWII Landing Beaches. Lion s/mer was liberated by the Royal Ulster Rifles in June 1944 – which gives…read article