Christmas

I am one of those people who love Christmas and have done so ever since I was knee-high to a grasshopper. I always feel an atmosphere in the air coming up to Christmas day, especially Christmas Eve. It seems a wondrous time to be alive and people genuinely seem to be more friendly and welcoming.

My earliest memories of Christmas are of my mother telling me (and probably my brother too, these memories encompass a few Christmases together) that it was time to write to Santa to tell him that most importantly I had been a good boy and secondly to inform him what I’d like as a Christmas present. Well, a comic book usually featured along with a toy Noah’s ark, or a fire brigade, or a cowboy gun and holster. Not in those days did we have the ridiculous “we mustn’t encourage violence in our child” crap. When did a gun and holster ever encourage a child to violence? Anyway, my mother sat down at the table with me and wrote the sacred letter. Then she carefully folded it and put it in an envelope which she let me lick and stick. The next step was to light a corner of the envelope in the fire and throw it up the chimney. This was how letters reached Santa Claus in the North Pole. I’m not exactly sure of the physics of it, but I guess the little flame at the corner of the envelope gave it a sort of rocket impetus which blasted it up the chimney on it’s long journey. Apparently it always reached it’s destination as I always got the present requested. Probably even more reliable than the internet!

Then there was the obligatory day in town. Mam (Dad, I guess was at work) took myself and my younger brother into town to visit Santa in Clery’s. We had to queue up outside as the excited line of kids and parents slowly made it’s way along the street and into the great shop. Then through the aisles amidst the hustle and bustle of shoppers and eventually we were able to catch our first delighted look at the magic man himself, sitting in great majesty in his red robes and long white beard.

“And what’s your name, young man?”

“Fergal,” I replied.

“Have you been a good boy for Mammy and Daddy?”

“Oh yes,” says I.

“And what would you like for Christmas?” beamed Santa.

“I’d like a book, and Noah’s ark,” I said, “And some sweets.”

“Ho, Ho,” replied Santa shaking with mirth, “And don’t forget to leave a carrot by the chimney for Rudolph and a small bottle of Guinness for me. It’s a thirsty trip from the North Pole to all the boys and girls in the whole world.”

“I won’t forget,” I promised as Santa put a small blue covered package in my hands.

“Happy Christmas” he said as I hurriedly returned to my mother clutching my little present in my hands.

When we returned to the street outside, it had grown quite dark and time to head off to McBirney’s across the quays to see the fabulous Christmas lights they put up outside their shop every year. We stood in awe on the far side of the Liffey taking in this majestic Christmas sight. There was Santa in his sleigh loaded down with presents, his beard flapping in the wind as he was pulled on his journey round the world by his trusty reindeer, led by the powerful Rudolph. The silent changing of the lights gave the impression of great movement as if we were watching the mystical voyage itself through the starry night.

Next we went to Grafton Street to see the lights there, hung across the street and sending great cheer to all the Christmas people, changing the landscape into a canvass of flashing colours. Finally we made our way to Switzer’s (or was it Brown Thomas’s) window display with scenes from some fairy story told with moving figures. After a tiring but happy day we returned home.

The weekend before Christmas day my father took us to get the Christmas tree. My brother and myself helped him to carry it home from the local shop (we didn’t have a car in those days). But this was part of the fun, carrying it up the street and to our house. Then as my father anchored the tree to the floor somehow, we busied ourselves getting out the decorations and generally giving a helping hand. To be honest my father would probably have done it all in half the time, but he was a patient man. And once the tree with all it’s lights was turned on, it was time to erect the crib. This was a beautiful open cabin which my father had built from plywood sometime in the past and had a door and windows cut in the back through which we could see the three wise men travelling across the land in search of the promised messiah. They were guided by a star in the sky and rode on camels. This was an old Christmas card we had received a few years before and which my father had used as a very effective backdrop to the main activity happening in the foreground. There was the infant Jesus surrounded by Mary and Joseph, a cow and an ass, a couple of shepherds and an angel kneeling for some reason in the back. This my father informed us was the real reason for Christmas.

And so the days hurried on and suddenly it was Christmas Eve. This was my favourite day and night of all. It brought all the hard work and preparations almost to a close. This was the moment of great anticipation for the wonderful day ahead. The only thing I found hard about it was the stink in the kitchen as my mother removed the turkey’s entrails before cleaning it, stuffing it and getting it ready for the oven. It took an hour for the stench to abate and I stayed well away until it was gone. Then the lovely smell of cooking turkey and ham, the plum pudding boiling away in it’s big pot, and the warmth of the kitchen which was quite unlike it’s warmth on normal days. This was like the kitchen knew it was a special event and wanted to join in. This was an extra happy kitchen.

Then sometime after tea Mr Dillon, the man who lodged in the flat above us, came down with a present for me. He was a nice man who I had befriended and often sat at his dinner table eating his discarded potato skins when he came in from work and strangely had his dinner when everybody else were having their tea. But every year he came down to our flat on Christmas Eve. He carried a box which he gave to me and with a shy smile wished me a Happy Christmas.

“What do you say?” prodded my father.

“Thank you, Mr Dillon,” I’d say, “And Happy Christmas”.

Inside the box, which I was always allowed to open when he had gone as it wasn’t a Santa present and so could be opened on Christmas Eve, was either a Mechano set or a Lego set. These were great presents and I was always pleased as punch to receive them.

My mother then got the tall Christmas candle and placed it firmly in a pot of clay. She opened the curtains a good foot or two and placed it on the window sill. Then she lit it telling me that it was to guide Our Lady and St Joseph on their way to Bethlehem where Jesus would be born in a stable. A lovely tradition.

At last bedtime came round and it was a night I was told I had to particularly make sure I went to sleep as soon as possible. I didn’t want to be awake when Santa pushed his way down the chimney and up to my bedroom to leave my presents at the end of the bed, have his little drink of Guinness and then depart as quietly as he came, taking Rudolph’s carrot with him. Funny he never left soot marks on the floor.

I hurriedly got into my pyjamas and got down on my knees by my bed to say my prayers. Then jumping between the covers, I snuggled down for sleep. My mother pinned a sock at the end of the bed for Santa to place some sweets in. Then my parents kissed me goodnight and urged me to sleep saying the Candyman would be along very shortly to sprinkle stardust in my eyes (as good old Roy Orbison sang).

I never had trouble sleeping at any time, but it especially came easy on Christmas Eve. However, it wouldn’t be long (at least to me, although it was somewhere in the middle of the night) before I’d awake with the thoughts of Santa rushing through my mind. Had he been yet? Only one way to find out as I sat up in bed and crawled towards where the sock was pinned. Would it be empty or full? It was always full and with a cry of delight, I’d leap up, turn on the light to find my presents on the floor at the end of my bed. Oh what a thrill as I tore off the wrapping to find exactly what I’d requested in that letter some weeks before which had winged it’s way to the North Pole. Then my brother and I would scramble to our parent’s bedroom to wake them with hollers of delight as we showed them both what Santa had left. Little did I know they knew full well what Santa had left and were only dying to get back to sleep. However, we were never aware of their urgency and it wasn’t long before we were both convinced to return to bed till the morning.

Then the second awakening as the dawn struggled to rise and we were free to get up and dress in preparation for the great day. First, before we could have any sweets or get down to any serious play with our new toys, we had to have breakfast (in later years it was a glass of water as we had to fast before Holy Communion) and head off to mass. During those days of Latin intonation and graveness the priest actually smiled and wished the whole congregation a Happy Christmas at the end of the mass.

Then we came home and were allowed full rein with our toys and sweets. As always my Uncle Raffles (his real name was Charles but everybody called him Raffles) arrived at our house in his car and always gave me a half crown for Christmas. He stayed for about an hour talking and joking and drinking his pre-warmed bottle of Guinness. I like Guinness today, but I couldn’t stand it warm. Ah well, different times, different folks!

Then at around four o’clock in the afternoon my mother summoned us in for dinner. It was the one day in the year I’d be truly starving at the lateness of the hour. We normally had dinner at dinner time (one o’clock) and tea at teatime (six o’clock). This was the normal way of the universe, in our house at any rate.

First we’d get the rich creamy soup. And then the main fare would arrive, the golden cooked turkey, the steaming ham, the brussels sprouts (a particular favourite of mine to this day) and the roast potatoes. My father always gave me a leg of the turkey as he told me this was what a man should eat, even though I’d have much preferred the breast. No matter, it was delicious. And as always we were too full to have any of the plum pudding, although it was duly brought to the table, sprinkled with whiskey and lit, it’s blue flame just discernable in the gathering dusk. Accordingly we left it till later in the evening. I didn’t particularly like the plum pudding itself, but I sure as hell liked the brandy butter. I remember one Christmas discovering the brandy butter already made a few days before and scoffing about half of it. I was very sick that day, I can tell you.

Over the years, Christmas changed little in our house. I grew older of course, and old friends like Santa and Mr Dillon left the scene and a little of the magic went with them. But then my own kids came along and reignited the old memories once again. I attempted to build a crib just like my father had done all those years ago, but not being gifted with my hands, it turned out a miserable failure. So I bought one instead. It was never like my father’s though. And of course Santa came back.

As we lived in one of those new fangled houses which didn’t have a fire place (this hot air central heating thing was all the rage) I had to come up with a new way of getting Santa’s letter to him. So I just got my kids to put it in the local letter box and let An Post worry about it. Fair play to them, they always got the letter to the North Pole on time. I often wonder what exactly they did with those letters as I know I wasn’t the only one posting them. Santa of course had to have a skeleton key which fitted every house which didn’t have a chimney. God, the lies we tell our children!

I think it was my firstborn’s second Christmas when he knew a little about Santa Claus and was able to inform me that he wanted a Space Hopper for Christmas. You remember those things, like a big solid rubber balloon with two ears which you could sit on and bounce around on. So I thought it would be a good idea to blow the thing up and leave it at the end of his bed. That Christmas morning when we awoke we found it strange to find there was not a sound from his bedroom. He should be up and about by now and coming in to tell us what Santa had left. Not a sign. So I had to go to his room and opened the door. There was the poor child, wide awake, sucking his thumb and looking in abject terror at this monster at the end of his bed. I didn’t make that mistake again.

So full blown Christmas was back in our house, Santa, tree, crib, decorations, fantasy and of course the real meaning. And now with grandchildren the whole cycle begins anew.

Have yourself a Very Happy Christmas this year and for all the years to come.

Ghosts

Ghosts! Now there’s a thing. Do you believe in them? I don’t but seeing the season that’s in it, I’m going to tell you my own ghost stories. These actually happened to me and I sometimes think about them. I’ll tell them exactly as they occurred with no additions or subtractions.

The first took place when I was about 10 years of age in a little fishing village in County Down called Ardglass. The very place that Van Morrison sang about in that song of his, Coney Island. I know all the places in that song as I went to Ardglass for a month every summer as a kid to my grandfather’s house. I had really great times there and great memories. I am always amused by the song because following it on a map, takes you all over the place and a most unlikely route to follow. I’m actually convinced Van told the orchestra to play some nice music and he just made it up on the spot. Anyway, I digress. The house backed onto the sea with a small stone yard and wall at the back beyond which were rocks which were covered at high tide. We had a massive bay window in the back of the house overlooking this yard where you had a clear view of the bay, the harbour and the long hilly region across the water called Ardtole. On a stormy day, I would sit at this window watching the waves crash over the little wall right into our yard where they spent their fury in a mess of lather and water. Fabulous.

Upstairs there was a landing which led to the back bedroom where I slept. I don’t know why, but we always slept with the doors open in that house which meant I could see across into my mother’s bedroom, just able to make out the end of her bed. I loved sleeping in that back bedroom because a short distance away across the bay was a lighthouse, whose powerful beam swept through my bedroom, lighting up the night momentarily and then plunging it into darkness again.

I awoke one night and lay quietly watching the room as the lighthouse beam kept it’s rhythm perfectly, illuminating and darkening the room. Nothing stirred, not wind nor sea nor being. The silence was palpable. After a while I looked in the direction of my mother’s bedroom across the landing. There she was, a tall dark figure at the end of her bed stretching out her hand to switch on her bedroom light. I turned away to get back to sleep assuming my mother was making a visit to the bathroom. But no expected light came on and suddenly the fear slammed into me. I was instantly drenched in terror and sweat. With a yell I jumped up in the bed at the same time turning towards the ghost. The bottom half of the woman was missing and slowly the rest of her vanished as well. The lighthouse beam lit up the room to reveal absolutely nothing. But now my real mother had appeared and this time the light did switch on. She came into me and asked what the matter was as I had screamed pretty loudly. I told her what had happened and she told me not to worry as it had been a bad dream. Didn’t feel like a dream to me but I accepted what she said and settled down to sleep again. For some reason I didn’t have much trouble doing just that.

The funny thing was that my mother told me years later that the house in Ardglass was haunted.

My second ghostly experience happened in my home in Raheny. A simple ordinary semi detached house in a Dublin suburb and certainly not old enough to be haunted. I can’t remember what age I was but I was around 12 or 13. I used to sleep in the same room as my brother, his bed was near the window while mine was near the door. Once again I awoke in the middle of the night, or so I assumed until I realised that there was a low level of light in the room. Naturally I thought it was the early dawn until I noticed that the light wasn’t coming in through the curtains, but from behind me. I sat up in my bed and turned around to see the wall which usually stood between my parent’s bedroom and mine was gone. In it’s place stood my father in his pyjamas and holding a rosary beads in his left hand. The light was coming from behind him and wasn’t defined. For some reason I didn’t feel any fear at all and calmly asked him who he was, even though I can see he was my dad. He made no reply and I picked up a flashlight I kept on my bedside table and turned it on. Everything reverted to normal. The wall was back where it should be and my father was gone. I don’t know why, but I felt a strange sort of calm, enough to be able to switch the light off and go back to sleep. When I told my brother in the morning what had happened he just said I was nuts.

I’m not sure how to categorise this following story but it was the most frightening of them all. Once again I awoke in the early hours and just lay in the dark thinking about one thing or another. Suddenly I felt this terrible presence in the room. It’s not easy to describe as I couldn’t place it in one area of the room, it just seemed to fill the space all around me. And it was incredibly evil. An almost tangible substance seemed to hover all around me. Now, don’t laugh (well, laugh if you want, I do now), but the only thing I could think to do was to put my head under the bed covers. In fact I think every other part of my being was paralysed with fear and it was the only thing I could actually do. Lying there under the covers I couldn’t think, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t cry out. The only thing between me and this diabolic malevolence outside was the sheet and blanket under which I hid. Hide? That’s a joke! The fiend knew exactly where I was and I had to get rid of it. I prayed. I thought “Jesus, please make this thing go away”. And with that, the fear suddenly left. I felt a rush of calm through my body and was able to stick my head out from under the covers. Whatever it was, it was gone. I can tell you, I never felt such relief in my life before. And because I was so strangely calm I was able to return to sleep.

And that’s my three ghosts for you. Of course, the last one was surely more than a ghost? I don’t believe in the devil, but that time I came close. And if it turns out that there is a living entity called Satan, well, I met him that night.

Other than the usual things one can amuse (or more correctly terrify) oneself with like conjuring up faces in the dark when alone, I have nothing else to tell except for my Ouija board experience which I relate below. I’ll add here that it is not a good idea to dabble with the unknown, not because there is anything there to jump out at you in the dark, but the mind can play tricks. So if you want to spend a night in a haunted house, bring a friend.

Finally to the Ouija board. Many years ago (in my early twenties) I was with a couple of friends in their house when one of them suggested we try calling up a couple of spirits (and not the bottle variety either). They had a Ouija board and got it out. I don’t know how these things work, some psychologists say your mind moves the planchette subconsciously, although I’d prefer to think one of the people controlling it actually do the moving. In this case I was with a very good friend who I trusted implicitly. She said she wasn’t moving it and I sure as hell wasn’t. I believe her, I think. Anyway, we didn’t have a proper planchette so we used an upside down glass. We both put two fingers each on the glass and began.

“Is there anybody there?” said my friend. I just smiled. Nothing. So she repeated the question.

To my surprise the glass started to move slowly towards the Yes word on the board.

“You’re moving the glass,” I accused her.

“I swear I’m not,” she replied.

So we asked the spook what it’s name was. I can’t remember if it actually told us, but it did say it was the soul of a little girl who had lived in this house at the turn of the century. She didn’t tell us much else about herself, but did appear to lose her temper once or twice as the glass fairly moved in circles around the board till we told her to stop. I can only recall today two things which stuck in my mind. Once was that I would marry a girl called Mary Stephenson and I would die in my early thirties. Well, she was wrong about my death as I’m now in my early sixties (and hopefully will reach more than my early nineties) and I actually married a girl called Mary Jameson. Wowee! Wowee! Ain’t that creepy!

So what do you think? Did I see any ghosts or not? Some people will say definitely, but personally I doubt it. But I find the experiences fascinating to look back on.

The woman in Ardglass had to be a dream. Or else my mind fooled me into thinking I saw a woman when it could easily have been a shadow, perhaps caused by the rotating lighthouse beam or car lights passing outside. Your mind, as I’ve mentioned above, can really play tricks on you. I remember once awaking one early summer morning with the daylight streaming into my bedroom. I was only about a year married and we didn’t have much money after purchasing a new home and we didn’t have any wardrobes, just a rail with clothes hanging on it. I recall lying in the bed looking at this clothes rail and in my half awakened state somewhere between sleep and fully awake I could see clearly that a guy from work was standing beside the rail. Because I knew I had just awoken and my eyes were still blurry, I knew nobody could be standing there. But there he was, as large as life. Naturally I had to solve this mystery and I lay still, watching him. As my eyes became less hazy from sleep, he gradually turned into a white shirt which was hanging from the rail. So easy for your mind to fool you.

The more intriguing ghost, however, is the one of my father. I was left sitting up in bed with a flashlight in my hand, so I was fully awake. Perhaps initially it started as a dream which caused me to wake and pick up the flashlight. The strange thing is how calm I remained during the aftermath, calm enough to turn the light off and go back to sleep.

But the most intriguing of all was the episode with the evil entity and me shivering in fear under the bedclothes. What had brought that terror on? And why when I thought to pray (and these in the days when I was a full blown atheist) the mind numbing terror lifted and was replaced by a heightened sense of peace? Ah, once again the believers will say I had a visit from the dark one while the sceptics will say it was all in my mind.

So there you have it, my small contribution to Halloween this year. The night when the gates of Hell are opened and all sorts of ghouls and demons prowl the highways and byways. Oh, I saw a few demons that night, but they were all drunk!

I’m a complete sceptic in these matters. There simply is no such thing as a ghost. And I’m always amused by people who swear this house or other is haunted, who suddenly tell you that you can’t visit it anymore as it was torn down when you ask where exactly it is. How convenient! Of course, we can thank the arrival of electric light to deal the whole ghost business a death blow. You see a spectre, you turn on a light, and bam! The spectre is gone!

However, if there turns out to be an afterlife, well then I’m going to come back and haunt all those sceptics like me. That’ll show ‘em!

Why No Revolution?

So after the Celtic Tiger the Irish economy has crashed. The government, the banks and the property tycoons have brought our country to it’s knees. Those out of work have reached nearly half a million. Thousands have been made redundant. Hundreds have lost their homes. And the government have the cheek to tell us the recession is over!

So what are the army doing? What has there been no revolution? Why have half the government ministers who led us into this mess, along with the bankers and property developers not been manacled and thrown into jail? Not to punish anybody but to make a clear statement for the future that people who wilfully cause catastrophes like this will not walk away free, pocketing the money they made (including massive handouts and pensions) and laughing at the rest of us.

I have quite happily chucked the idea into the mix that the government, bankers and property developers are the ones to blame. But are they? Some will say that the Western World was heading that way. The good times simply could not continue. But Canada for one doesn’t appear to be in the same mess and although I’m not sure why, it does appear that their financial regulation systems picked up on early troubles in the US markets and did something about similar potential threats in their own areas. It seems in Ireland we did not. What in hell was the financial regulator doing? He seems to have allowed the banks to lend 100% mortgages to people. The banks were allowed to loan massive amounts of money to single businessmen. One of these guys even moved his loans over to another financial institution while his own bank was being audited in order that the auditors would see nothing amiss. These guys are supposed to know what they are doing, but even the dogs in the streets could see that the bubble was just getting bigger and bigger and had to blow at some point. One result is that today when I hear a financial package being advertised with the usual blurb that it is regulated by the financial regulator, I just laugh. In fact, I’d venture the opinion that I don’t think economists really know what they are talking about. They seem to disagree with each other all the time and they sure as hell all can’t be right! We’ve seen the results.

Did the property developers not see that the market could not sustain the continual growth? Did they assume there would be buyers for all the property they were throwing up all over the place? They borrowed massive amounts from the banks who were all too willing to lend in the hope that the bust would never come or at best come only after they were long gone. What were they thinking?

But worst of all the government, who after all are where the buck is supposed to stop, never saw this coming. Or if they did, they buried their heads in the sand. So these guys who were voted in were not fit for purpose. I don’t mind a small mistake or two. After all we are only human. But this couldn’t be called a mistake. This was a catastrophic meltdown! For years the government mismanaged and misruled. They put their friends in positions of power. They regarded the ordinary man on the street as a fool. They paraded around as if they were kings ordained by God on high to rule.

And do you know the worst of it? They are still in power and they are still allowing the same old thing to happen time and time again. They are allowing semi-state bodies, such as FAS and the HSE to continue to mismanage and waste public money. The civil service is a crying disgrace. One hand simply doesn’t know what the other hand is doing. The inefficiency is palpable. It is scary. What else is going to crawl out of the woodwork?

But there’s also us. You and me. Can we be blamed for this mess? To a certain extent, I have to say yes. We seemed to lose the run of ourselves. Celtic Tiger roared and we all got rich (well, relatively speaking). There were few unemployed. Most had their own homes, cars, mod cons, you name it. Most went off on their sunshine holiday (no longer once a year, but twice!). Many even bought property abroad. Oh yes, it was a good time to be alive. Let the good times roll! Okay, I acknowledge, to our shame, there existed far too many poor people, but that’s another subject.

Then the whole edifice came crashing down around our feet. Many found that the house they called home and which was mortgaged up to the hilt, lost 30% or more of it’s value, plunging them into negative equity. Many lost their jobs and then because they couldn’t keep up their mortgage repayments lost their homes too. Those financial idiots who loaned massive amounts of money with a great big smile on their faces, now took the houses back and chucked people out on the street. Our own fault? Come on, if you offer a man 100% mortgages and get rich schemes (property abroad etc.), you can’t expect him to be a economist and see through the deadly candy he was lapping up. Not only did the lending institutions (regulated by the financial regulator, remember!) lend so much money, the government didn’t try to stop them. The same government voted in by the people to do a good job of governing and looking after the state. And that means making sure that people are behaving with a modicum of sense. After all, they are supposed to have all the experts anybody could ever need to advise them.

So I think we can safely lay the major blame for the mess at the feet of the government first and foremost. After that come the financial people and the property developers. I suspect after that would follow the semi-state agencies who squandered public money through inefficiency and bad management. At the bottom of the heap comes the rest of us.

But let’s take a brief diversion and consider the real cause of the problem. I think this can be summed up in one word: greed. What in hell does anybody want with a loan of around €100 million? And this was what one particular banker had. Bankers couldn’t earn enough money. Property developers couldn’t develop enough property. Government ministers couldn’t get enough power and all that goes with it.

The current government, Fianna Fáil, has been in power for the last 10 years non stop. In fact they have been in power since 1987 except for a gap of about 3 years. That is far too long for one party. They get lazy and corrupt. They get power crazy. They don’t keep their eye on the ball. And we can see that too. During the Celtic Tiger years when our economy was booming, why did the government not save for the rainy day? Surely they knew the boom years could not last or were they stupid enough to think that it would last till long after they were dead and gone, and even then, did they never think of their children and grandchildren who would be left to pick up the tab? And what about all their financial advisers? Were they not advising them? And if so, were they not listening? It was criminal the way these guys let the country run out of control. And of course it’s never they who will pay. No, it’s the ordinary guy on the street.

Can a change of government do the trick? Who do we have? The Greens are a joke. They are propping up an incompetent government in order to get their environmental policies through. This is a joke. The environment can’t be changed by us. The sun is causing the climate changes and there’s little we can do about it. So forget about them. Fianna Gael are a clone of Fianna Fáil and I can’t see them doing much better. So we’re left with Labour. Is a Labour government, if they got into office in the morning capable of doing any better than what we have. I for one definitely think so.

However, I’m not a cheer leader for Labour (or any other party) and I really think the best thing is to stop voting along party lines and vote for people (of whatever party) who look like they could do a decent and honest job. Then once your candidate gets elected, watch him or her and if they do well, vote them in again. If not, vote them out. Probably a bit of pie in the sky, but once politicians begin to realise the only reason they’ll earn votes is if they earn them, we might find a change of attitude and they will climb down from their ivory towers and began to treat the ordinary citizens of this country with a bit of respect. And realise that they are in power to do a specific job and not to pull the wool over everybody’s else’s eyes or to rip the rest of us off.

The government needs to stand up and take responsibility, and I haven’t seen many of them do that. They should take responsibility, admit they blew it and start to fix it. But not by taking away children’s allowance, attacking the pensioners again, taking money from easy targets. No, they need to get creative about this. What about asking the rich bond holders and corporate people who have the money to take the biggest hits? What about taking away some of the massive handouts all those bankers walked away with? What about removing that ridiculous tax free status for rich artists? What about clamping down on all those tax exiles? What about following Britain and removing children’s allowance from those who don’t really need it? And I’m sure there are plenty of other ways to fix this mess rather than the way they are currently going about it. The government have paid millions out to consultants to get advice, well it’s about time they paid consultants to give them some good advice for a change. I’m sure it’s there.

So, why has there been no revolution? I guess because it’s not the way to go. Revolution only puts in power probably worse people than we already have. And while I insist we badly need a change of government, let’s do it the democratic way. And if the Greens and Fianna Fáil really had the good of the country at heart, they would step aside and let the people decide. And for God’s sake, let’s make good decisions this time.

Do We Need Religion Today?

Take a brief look at the world around you today. Crime and vandalism are rife. Drunkenness abounds on the streets and fights are common. The young seem to have no respect for their elders and their parents appear to allow them to do what they like. Idiot driving pervades our roads and nothing is sacred. The drugs trade is flourishing and hardly a week goes by without somebody being shot through inter-gang warfare.

A very negative start to this article, but hey, that’s the way it is now. In the 1950s in Ireland murder was such a rare occurrence that when it did happen it was headline news for days. Do you remember the Indian medical student who strangled his Irish girlfriend, cut her body up and burnt it? Today murder is so common it is more often relegated to the inner pages.

In the 50s and 60s you could walk any street in Ireland (I’m talking about southern Ireland here) in relative safety. Nobody would harass you and certainly you were in no danger of getting kicked to death by a gang of yobs. Today there are places where most savvy citizens wouldn’t go, especially at night.

Okay, we can say there was institutionalised violence, children were not treated so kindly in many of the orphanages. The Magdalene Laundries cannot hold their heads high and of course the Catholic Church needs to hang it’s head in shame more because it refused to recognise that it had a problem and tried to cover it up. There are paedophiles in every walk of life but because these guys were ordained, it just didn’t do to expose them. While it may be easy for us today to point the finger at the bishops of the time, we cannot judge them on today’s standards. Most Irish Catholics would probably have done the same thing then.

So what has changed? Some point to the rise in violence on television, cinemas, and music. Others point to poverty, bad parenting, lack of discipline in school and the easy availability of drugs. Then the rush to riches during the so called Celtic tiger gave people a feeling that they could now afford whatever they wanted and pay later.

The problem probably lies in some or a combination of the above, however, I doubt television, cinema or music have much to do with it. When Elvis Presley first appeared on the scene, concerned parents and other pillars of society saw the devil in Presley’s music. I wonder what those same people would think if they heard some of the satanic heavy metal around today? Some years ago some parents sued the band Judas Priest because they said their sons had committed suicide while listening to the band’s music and because there were hidden messages in the songs. To complicate matters further some of these were so called back masked messages. In order to hear the message it was necessary to play the record backwards. Another message which was discernible in normal play was the words “Do it”. Of course the first question is do what? Ozzy Osbourne was also sued for his song “Suicide Solution”. However, these kids were long gone down the path of destruction before they even started listening to this music.

So what about television and cinema? Some of today’s films are extremely violent, some just a horrific gore fest. Some of the most gruesome films show in close and excruciating detail every slash of the knife, every cut, enough to churn a hardy stomach. But seriously, do such films make one want to go out and copy the action? I seriously doubt it. It’s fantasy. Horrible maybe, but fantasy nevertheless.

What about poverty and bad parenting? Even in the 50s and 60s in Ireland we had a lot more poverty than today and bad parents too. But it didn’t product a brood of sullen, violent youths prepared to kill. And if anybody says that nobody goes out for a night on the town with the intention to kill another person, why do they bring knives with them?

Lack of discipline occurs in some schools but not all. I have always thought that teaching was a vocation and I believe a lot of teachers should never be allowed near a class of kids. Not for any sinister reasons, but for the simple fact that they cannot teach. I had my fair share of such nincompoops. They drilled poetry into you. They drilled Irish language into you. They drilled religion into you. But what they didn’t do was to teach you how to think for yourself. In my day discipline was relatively easy to keep as they were allowed to give you a few slaps with the leather and it didn’t hurt either. It was a bad decision to take this out of schools and a lot of wayward behaviour today could be stopped in it’s tracks by a good belt. I don’t mean a savage lashing as I witnessed in my day being handed out by a christian (small c on purpose because in this particular rage he was far from being a follower of Christ) brother to one of my schoolmates. He even made the poor guy kneel before him and kiss the ground while the rest of us looked on. Who was going to stand up to this particular thug? But that’s another story. So today we have the do-gooders tut-tutting and sticking all sort of labels on bold kids and then in some cases stuffing them up with drugs. I ask you, what planet are they on? So I guess the lack of discipline, not only in schools, but also in the home itself may be a contributor to our sorry society today. But I still don’t think it’s a major one.

Drugs are certainly one area of deep concern where people can be so coked up they hardly know what they’re doing. Drugs can change personality also. And they weren’t generally available in the 50s (although they were certainly coming on stream in the 60s).

However, I believe the lack of religion is a major cause of the breakdown in society today. Many may find that surprising, but consider the following: lack of spirituality often fosters lack of respect for others as well as oneself. When a person has no respect for others, there is no reason for him to consider the consequences of his actions in relation to other people. Some will point out that there are very good living atheists in society who have no need of religion, but I would contend that committed atheists are generally humanistic and in a sense have a faith in humanity. But when a person has no such faith in anything, he tends towards nihilism and self gratification to the exclusion of others. He has nothing to which to orient himself. No spiritual values, no humanistic values, all of which points towards no values whatsoever. This is a dangerous position for anybody to find themselves in.

Let’s take a brief look at the Jamie Bulger case in Liverpool where a 2 year old child was adducted, tortured and murdered by two 10-year old kids. This is horrendous by anybody’s standards. What made these two do something like this? It wasn’t simply a situation which got out of control and went horribly wrong. No, the violence was systematic and took it’s awful course to death. It appears that these two were brought up in very bad family situations and were basically left to their own devices with no guidance whatsoever. It may be that this is a rare occurrence and you will always get people like this who are totally out of control. After all, they were not the first child killers in Britain. Unfortunately statistics seem to indicate that this type of crime is on the increase.

Another type of crime which is also on the increase around the world is the lone gunman who kills as many people as possible and then turns the gun on himself (or even two gunmen as in the Columbine high school massacre). This is a cold, calculated act of evil. What is going through these guy’s heads as they contemplate such a thing?

I would put forward the opinion, that any child who had been raised in a religious household (with the important caveat that the particular religion was uplifting and not oppressive) or even in a household where the parents held a sincere humanistic view is much more unlikely to act in a manner as discussed above. There is always the exception which proves the rule, of course. But all things being equal, I would hazard the opinion that religion can be good for humanity and society. Naturally the parents need to be good at parenting. It’s no use being brought up in a spiritual environment if your parents ignore you.

Without religion or maybe I should talk about spirituality which is more open and less narrow, people seem to be foundering. Look at the Celtic tiger and what happened to people in Ireland when they suddenly thought they had a lot of money. Banks gave 100% mortgages. Loans were no problem to access. Credit cards seemed like a ticket to spend, spend, spend. One notable thing I noticed was in my day when people got married, they moved (if they were lucky) into an empty house. My house warming had no chairs for my guests to sit on. Over time we accumulated the necessary items. But today (or at least during the boom years) it seems to me, people weren’t content with that. Once they had their house it was full of furniture, televisions, digital players all purchased with a nice piece of plastic or on the never-never. People didn’t seem to know the value of money. They simply lost the run of themselves.

Capitalism continues to push it’s money grabbing ways and forgets about morality. I get sick of hearing managing directors of big companies blather on about how important their employees are to them, how cherished they are and then to make them redundant willy nilly when things get a little rough. Suddenly gone is the concern for their charges and they let them go irrespective of age, mortgage status, financial situation or family commitments. To be fair, there is the odd “good” company out there, but unfortunately few and far between. And how about these rip off merchants who advertise competitions on TV with their small hard to read text and not on the screen long enough? They want you to enter a competition for a trip to New York or some such place and then send stuff to your mobile phone taking a couple of euro every time and continue to do so until you text Stop to them. How many people, especially those not especially technology savvy are being taken to the cleaners by cowboys like these? Unfortunately legal, but highly immoral.

And then of course shops, hotels, among others appear to be able to charge what they want. I’ve seen vast differences between the price of petrol or beer depending where you go. Want to take your family to the cinema or theatre and see what they charge you for popcorn. Captive audience! And what do our flamboyant government ministers have to say about this? The same buys who allowed the banks and builders drive our economy into the ground? Nothing! Shop around! It’s nothing to do with my department! Like the state of our health service, they take no responsibility. And you can bet your bottom dollar that it’s not them or their buddies who will pay for the mess. It’s you and me.

Capitalism and consumerism are trashing traditional values. For example, look at the X-factor television show. Everybody now sings like an American. Different traditions and cultures are something to cherish, not to destroy. TV and the internet are making us all more Americanized with American values, not all bad perhaps but certainly not all good. And to give an idea of the power of TV, when the French stood up over the US going to war with Iraq over nonexistent nuclear weapons what do the American people do? They refuse to buy French products but they didn’t stop to examine their own consciences and ask were their leaders telling them the truth.

So, what do I mean by religion? In fact I would be better speaking about spirituality rather than religion which is just a structured form of spirituality. Some people need this structure while others do not. We don’t necessarily need religion, but we certainly need some sort of spirituality. Something as simple as getting carried away by the beauty of music and art. The ability to be able to sit and contemplate in a forest, on a mountain, by the sea. To look at the stars on a cloud free night and contemplate the majesty of infinity. To be able to sit quietly in a church and simply ponder the mystery of existence. To allow oneself to glimpse, no matter how fleetingly, a sense of something beyond humanity. Beyond our material world with all it’s shortcomings. And this spirituality is far from a claustrophobic, forbidding, oppressive Catholic religion which was particularly abundant in the 50s and 60s under the loveless and austere rule of Archbishop John Charles McQuaid and Taoiseach/President Eamon de Valera. This should be an uplifting of the spirit. It should be about the joy and freedom of being human. Whether or not you believe in a God doesn’t really matter. You can experience this spirituality if you try. Some of the hardliners try to explain it all away as a nasty side effect of evolution, but I would contend that they are wrong. Spirituality is something inherent in all of us. It is like the air we breathe, we need it to enhance our lives. How poor we would be if we could not experience some of the things mentioned above? Some prefer to take it further and allow God into the picture. That’s fair enough and there is plenty of room for him as well. But those God fearing folk should not try to force that view down those who have decided that for them God does not exist. Or are even in ignorance of his existence or otherwise.

And this gift of spirituality should be nurtured starting in the home. It should be encouraged by the school system. We don’t need the type of spirituality where you have wimpy priests or holier-than-thou laypeople going on about relating a football match to your life with Jesus. Or a tedious sermon about the love of God in our lives. What does that mean? No, we need a dynamic religion, one with hope, one with joy. Not a wagging finger saying everything is bad. We need the sort of encouragement which shows us how important it is to be human and especially to allow others to be human too. We have to learn to live in a society which has other people in it, who have rights exactly the same as our own. And we have to appreciate that right in others. If the universe is a cold, dark place, what hope can there be for a caring society? If the universe, on the other hand, has a sense of meaning, this can allow us to be so much more free and caring. A sense of meaning does not necessarily equate to an afterlife, after all many atheists live a full and meaningful life without God, but they mostly have their humanism to hang onto. This humanism which can give them a sense of something else, something greater than themselves. And after all, the mass of humanity is far greater than any one of us.

I hesitate to say that someone who does not experience some sort of inner peace from time to time is doomed to a cruel purposeless existence. Myself, as an agnostic, can look around and see hope in personal family and beyond to the great family all around me. At the end of the day, we are all on this earth together and we will sink or swim together. That in itself can give a great sense of freedom. Of something bigger than me. If there is a God, then so much the better.

I think encouraging this sort of approach to life in our children and in those around us can help make the world a better and more agreeable place to live in. A place where we can share our humanity, our troubles, our weaknesses and strengths and together help to enhance each other’s lives. No matter the colour of skin, race or religion. Go on, give it a try.

To be Honest, You have to be Agnostic!

There are really only three positions one can take when considering the existence of God. Faith, atheism or agnosticism. Of these the one which gets the most bad press is agnosticism. But to me this is the most honest of the three. Faith says that you believe in God whatever you perceive him to be. On the other hand atheism takes the same position except it denies the existence of God. Agnostics sit on the fence.

So what is wrong with sitting on the fence? Many say you have to make up your mind and take a decision. But how can I take a decision on something for which there is no evidence either way. But the atheists say there is a 99.9% chance of there being no God. Evolution has put paid to all that superstition. At the beginning of the last century some highly respected physicists said everything that was to be known about the universe was now known, all that remained was the crossing of a few t’s and the dotting of a few i’s. Then relativity and quantum physics came along and blew that idea right out of the water. So how certain is certain? Remember that old joke about bleach killing 99.9% of all known germs? As one comedian so aptly put it, it’s not the 99.9% I’m worried about, what about the 0.1%? Those are the bastards to worry about.

On the other hand those of faith say that they know Jesus. They go further and say that they have met him, have spoken with him. Well fair enough, but they can’t prove this to me. Without meaning to be disrespectful, I could equally say I have met and spoken with the fairies at the end of my garden. I might even believe it, but I reckon I’d have a hell of a job trying to convince you of that. You can ask me to show you the fairies, but I’d tell you that they are invisible. Then you can ask me to show you something that the fairies have done and I’d say they have given me my health. Eventually after detailed questioning I’d get frustrated and tell you that you just don’t have any faith.

None of the above means that there is a God or that there isn’t a God. Neither side can prove it either way. So if somebody wants to say they don’t believe in God, that’s fair enough. They can lead just as moral and good a life as anybody else. You don’t have to be a religious person to be a good person. Similarly if someone says they believe in God, that’s fair enough too. However, they should be strong enough to at least admit there is a chance, no matter how small, that they may be mistaken.

So I sit on the fence, not in judgement of anybody, but because I simply don’t know whether or not there is a God. Which is why I think it is the only honest position for me to take. That does not mean that I’m right or that everybody should have that opinion. After all, I could be mistaken.

Today’s atheists are a militant bunch. Many of them don’t seem content to quietly get on with their lives, content in their disbelief. They have to proselytize and try to get everybody to see their point of view. Some even put advertisements on buses telling the world there probably is no God. I wonder why they included the word probably? However, it seems to me that many of their arguments ring a little hollow. They like to set up straw dogs so that they can easily knock them down. They argue with fundamentalists who are just like themselves, head to head, neither side giving an inch. They like to quote the bible extensively telling us what a bad old egg the old testament God was. Getting his chosen people to kill other peoples so that they could have their land. The promised land. Yes, I agree this particular God was a vengeful, blood thirsty fellow, but surely the atheists don’t believe that this is a realistic God to debate? Where is the God of compassion and love? The God of Francis of Assisi? The God of the poor? The God of the sermon on the mount?

Many of the bible stories were written by humankind to try to make sense of the world they found themselves in. On one hand many of the stories like the killing of heathens etc were a history of the Jewish people who were just as blood thirsty as any other race. On the other hand many of the stories were allegories or parables which tried to teach wisdom. For example, many point to the terrible story of Abraham being asked to kill his son, Isaac and even worse Abraham agreeing to go along with the command without question until an angel stays his hand at the last minute and suggests sacrificing a ram (conveniently entangled in a nearby bush) instead. What sort of a God is that who would try and test his loyal subject in such a way? But this was not a story about loyalty or obedience. In those days people did sacrifice their children to their God. The story was trying to teach the people that child sacrifice was not what God demanded. In fact I don’t believe he even demanded sacrifice, but in those days people believed that he did. So let them sacrifice an animal instead. So the atheists should be a little more thoughtful before condemning the bible stories out of hand.

Many of today’s believers are also a militant bunch. Especially those of a fundamentalist and literalist frame of mind. Take the creationists for example. They will tell you if anything in the bible contradicts hard scientific fact, then the bible takes precedence. It’s not that these guys are stupid, many of them have advanced degrees in their fields. It’s just that they are convinced of the literal truth of every word in the bible. It appears similar in the world of Islam where fundamentalist Muslims believe that their Koran is also literally the word of God. Not all Muslims are like that, of course, there are many moderate Muslims as there are many moderate Christians, Jews, etc. But they can’t all be right. Also take the so called Christians who bomb abortion clinics (killing some) in the USA on one hand and then the fanatical Muslims who carried out the 9/11 attacks. But these are extremists.

Most atheists and believers, however, are not so extreme and are willing to debate their beliefs sensibly and with benefit to both sides of the argument. Similarly with agnostics except they don’t tend to hold extreme views. After all how can a committed agnostic argue with passion on the existence or non existence of God when he has already taken the position of not knowing in the first place? This is not to say agnostics are better people. Many of them simply don’t care either way.

So, I am an agnostic. To be honest, I’d prefer that there is an afterlife and a good God, but maybe that is just because I don’t want to die to nothing. I would rather like there to be a purpose to the universe rather than it just coming into existence and blinking out again. I would like there to be meaning to my life, although many atheists say that there is meaning to life without God or purpose. Just grasp what we have and do the best with it as all we’ll leave behind are our footprints and our children. It is not a bad philosophy, but me being me would prefer more. Maybe that says a lot about me and as the old song says you don’t always get what you want!

The idea of God is crazy! This super being who always existed decided to make a universe with people in it and there it is. Let there be light! And then one day it will all end and we’ll all go to heaven or oblivion (I can’t believe in such a ridiculous place as hell) and that will be it for eternity. Eternity! That’s a concept that nobody can fathom. Try to imagine it. Existing for ever. Surely there has to be an end?

But then again, the idea of a universe popping into existence is also crazy. Whether there was this vacuum of seething particles or absolutely nothing, somehow this universe pops up with all it’s incredible and complex laws eventually leading to humans who are capable of contemplating it. Think about it. What happened before the Big Bang? Was there a previous Big Bang stretching back to when? What started the whole thing off? And then again, why should there be just nothing? Nothing is about as hard to understand as something. Can you imagine nothing? I mean really nothing, not even something for nothing to be in. The mind boggles.

There are those (who we generally refer to as mystics) who after years of contemplation begin to glimpse the reality behind the universe. They suddenly have a flash of understanding which quickly vanishes again. So where does this experience come from? Maybe something deep down in the human psyche? Or maybe something else. In fact, in my opinion assuming that God does exist, the only way we mortals can access him in this life is through deep contemplation (denied probably to most of us).

Which brings me to the “God of the Gaps”. Sufficiently advanced technology will appear as magic to those less technologically advanced. For example imagine showing a caveman electric light. Suddenly you stand up in his cave and click something on the wall, and an electric bulb flashes on in the ceiling above. What else would he think but that it was magic. Or something from the gods. This is similar to ourselves were we to come across a highly advanced technological civilisation hailing from interstellar space. If they have achieved the technology to cross light years of space, they sure as hell won’t be wasting time buzzing aircraft or abducting humans. In fact if they didn’t want us to see them, then you can rest assured that there’s no way we’d see them. In ancient times (and perhaps not so ancient) our ancestors saw gods behind every tree, in every stream, with every gust of wind or downpour of rain, with every crop failure and success. But now we have grown up (or like to think we have) and have a much better explanation for weather and crop failures. So we remove God from those. But then what about the miracles? Like Lourdes for example. Well, these are probably mostly psychological (a strong faith can produce wonders). I often think of the sceptic who said he was surprised that no artificial limbs were to be found among all the crutches left by supposedly healed individuals.

Then the bible takes a bashing. Galileo and others firmly put the sun in the centre of the solar system which many said directly contradicted the good book (for there it says that the sun was stopped in the heavens implying that it revolved around the earth). Probably the most devastating blow was the theory of evolution which said that we didn’t even need God to create us. We evolved from the biochemistry of the earth, which was created from the aftermath of the sun’s formation. Now the scientists tell us that the whole universe was created in the event known as the Big Bang. No need for God at all. And as sciences progresses it gradually pushes out the “God of the Gaps” leaving no room for God to hide.

All of which brings us back to the point I made above that it is just as crazy to think that God created the Universe as it is to think that the Universe created itself. But, you may object, God didn’t create himself. He was always there? Okay, so the universe was always there. Again no proof and the agnostic accepts this. It all boils down to what you personally believe. So if you think that Jesus, or Jehovah, or Allah is the God you worship, that’s fine. I won’t argue with you. But you must also respect my agnosticism and let’s be honest: admit that you ultimately don’t know.

Let’s consider some other crazy ideas. To some the stories religion teach us, for example Adam and Even in the Garden of Eden, the changing of bread and wine to the body and blood of God, are nuts. The idea that God, supposedly omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, would create two people and put them in a garden, and then tell them not to eat of a certain tree is contradictory. God must have known what would happen. If he didn’t he is not omniscient. And then when this pair do exactly what God knew they were going to do anyway, he punishes them. It is like me giving sweets to my kids and telling them not to eat them. What sort of parent would I be if I then punished my kids for doing what I knew they would do.

Now consider the changing of bread and wine to the body and blood of Christ. We are told that after the transformation (or transubstantiation, as it’s more properly known) the bread still looks, feels, and tastes like bread as does the wine still feel, look and taste like wine. But to the believer they are totally transformed into the precious body and blood of their lord and saviour Jesus Christ. Nutty or what?

Okay, now let’s see what the physicists are asking us to believe. The moon is not there when nobody is looking at it. This is seriously considered as reality by some physicists (including Nobel prize winners). Quantum physics exploded onto the world in the early twentieth century and is still the most complete theory of reality we have. We even refer to it as the standard model of physics although it still has it’s problems which remain to be sorted out. Two famous physicists fought over the interpretation of quantum mechanics for years: Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr. Unfortunately Niels won (at least for now) and so the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum theory is with us to this day and many physicists have concluded that human observation of a microscopic event changes the reality of the event. In other words, if nobody is looking at the moon, it could be anywhere!

There are billions and billions of copies of us in the universe. Again coming from quantum theory, in order to account for certain experimental results the many worlds theory was suggested and surprisingly many scientists today would favour that interpretation of reality. This basically says that every time a particle or atom has a choice on what to do next or where to go, it chooses every eventuality. Therefore if a particle has a choice to go in one of two directions, it chooses both, splitting the universe at that point. So now we have two copies of our universe, one in which the particle went one way, the other in which it went a different way. So now we have two universes with two copies of every sun, star, planet, particle in each universe. Two copies of every person! And as every particle has normally many more choices of which direction to go and there are billions of particles in our universe, we now have billions of copies of our universe all slightly different. Nutty or what?

We have taken two examples from religion and science and both are as nutty as each other and it actually seems that the religious ideas are easier to swallow. So what is this all about? I think it is really man trying to find an explanation for his existence. Why he is here. He did it in biblical times with stories just as physicists do today with stories/theories. The more we think we know, the more we know that we know very little.

I would now like to discuss the problem of evil. For me this is the greatest obstacle to belief in God. If God is supposedly infinitely good, then why does he allow evil to exist? If he can’t prevent it, then he is not all powerful; if he can prevent it, he is not all good. The idea that he has to allow evil in order that we can have free will doesn’t wash. At least not with me. You can argue that he also gave us intelligence to see what is good or evil. Surely intelligence shows that fighting and killing each other is not the way to go? But our intelligence doesn’t go far enough as apparently many don’t see the stupidity of not working together. We are too greedy. Too power mad. Too into looking after ourselves to the detriment of others. Whatever you may think of Jesus Christ, he certainly left us some incredibly great lessons in how to deal with each other for the better. We may learn that in time, but why does it take so long?

In fact, some people do not even have a conscience so how can they make a rational choice between evil and good? A sadist who kills feels it is good for him. He likes it, enjoys it and therefore why shouldn’t he? He just doesn’t care or have any empathy with other human beings. So why didn’t God give him a conscience?

Then there is the problem of suffering. As far as I’m concerned suffering is an abomination which is one reason so many scientists and doctors are working towards it’s elimination. I do not believe that God so designed a world that he has to punish every single individual in it just because the first people he put in it disobeyed him. Come on! It’s like me punishing all my kids (I have only two, by the way) just because of what one of them did. Just doesn’t make sense. This whole atonement thing where the son of God arrives on earth and is horribly tortured and put to death so that he can repent for our sins makes no sense. And after that, down through the centuries, the church has decreed that suffering is a good thing. A good thing! If Christ is God and he did come to earth, it was surely to show us that there are better ways to live our lives than the ways we were going about it. His message of love and forgiveness is so powerful that the redemption thing pales beside it. He said the kingdom of god was within us. In order words, get off our lazy asses and seriously begin to work for a better world. Of course a man with a message like that in the Roman occupied Jerusalem of the time was asking for trouble and he was crucified by the Romans. But that was not his message. If anything his message was one of hope. His message was the resurrection. But no, the church had to concentrate on the death bit.

And now they have been shown up in a very bad light. For years they held us in the grip of fear. Even the constitution of Ireland was half written by the church. One couldn’t look sideways but the church heard about it and steps were taken. If you didn’t go to mass, you were hell bound. If you ate meat on Fridays, you were hell bound. The fear they engendered eventually went too far and it is no wonder that young people of my generation rebelled. And now where are they? The churches are empty. The only reason most go to church today is for weddings and funerals.

Also, it was not the evil of child abuse which was the greatest sin, but the cover up. These priests who stood in the pulpit and told us that bad thoughts were sinful, covered up and hid the greatest sin of all. They shunted paedophile priests to different parishes in the hope nobody would find out and realise that priests were human after all and not some kind of higher life form. Instead of being good decent human beings, standing up, admitting what was going on and doing something positive about it, they hid it. And the really sad thing is the thousands of good priests who have been deeply affected by this shame not of their own making.

And still the church can’t see and refuses to change. I think they would continue the cover up if they could. As far as the church is concerned women are second class citizens as are gay people. When are they going to give their priests the option of marriage and stop making marriage a poor second class to celibacy? Why won’t they kill the nonsensical doctrines of hell and purgatory as they did Limbo some years back? Why don’t they get rid of infallibility? The pope underneath all his glitter and power is human and as prone to error as the best of us. Why don’t they scotch Humanae Vitae? Why don’t they open the church to full collegiality, the power of the church should not be held in the hands of one man, the bishops and laity must share in it too.

Sometimes I think that perhaps the Jewish religion is a better one. This was what Jesus was, all his life, he never was a Christian!

So true to my agnosticism, I brought up my own children without forcing religion down their throats like it was mine. I tried to answer their questions as honestly as I could giving both sides of the argument. Now they are free to choose their own religion or none as they see fit. After all, if God is really there, then people find him sooner or later. Further, and maybe more importantly, they are at least free of the fear of hell (something which was drummed into me and I hasten to add, not by my parents). Nuns and Christian Brothers seemed to have a real connection to Satan and hell. What? Did they take tea with him? They sure seemed to know an awful lot about him. The stories we were told in school: people coming back to their loved ones to tell them they were in hell and how they should give up their immoral lifestyle if they wanted to avoid the same fate. Children being shown hell and it’s tortures by apparitions of the virgin Mary. What sort of a twisted mind is that? Hell has no place in the domain of a truly good God. If he has cooked up such a place, then I can tell ya, we’re all in trouble.

Ultimately, if God exists, he is surely so different to us that we cannot even begin to imagine what he may be like. Even the mystics have said they have only ever got glimpses of God, flashes in a great darkness. Of course there are those who say the mystics are deluded.

Finally, if God gave us intelligence, let’s use it and not be led astray by blind faith. If God doesn’t exist, let’s use our intelligence anyway. Maybe it’s all we have to rely on at the end of the day.

Free Will

Something, it seems to me, that everybody takes for granted is the assumption that we have free will. I take it for granted myself, unless I start seriously thinking about it, like now. I can choose to do many different things right now. I can stop writing this article and go and have a cup of coffee. I can go for a walk, or read a book, or even take a nap. Of course, taking a nap implies that I am tired in the first place, otherwise the chances of my deciding to take a nap are minimal. Okay, in a bid to convince myself that I have free will in the matter, I could decide to take a nap even though I am not tired. But that doesn't prove much, does it?

The problem is that all these areas are of no great importance in life. They are not the big issues. They are not the life changing issues which might make a meaningful difference. Look at it this way. I didn't choose most of the major things in my life, where I was born, colour of my skin, parents, siblings, sexual orientation. I didn't even make the choice to be born! I happened to be born in Dublin to catholic parents, hence I am white, Irish, heterosexual and originally catholic. Now there's a thing. I was born catholic and eventually changed to something else, at present agnostic. So here is a good example of free will. Or is it? I'll discuss this further below.

What about a life changing experience such as choosing a partner? Is that a free choice? Many will say yes, definitely, but think about it. What about all those girls or guys you fancied but who didn't fancy you? No choice there! The girl you choose had to like you as well. You can't make her like you. So you fancy somebody and ask them out. They have the choice to say yes or no. If no, that's it. You didn't have much of a choice there. If they say yes, you go out together, but don't get on. Not much choice there either. So you continue making choices and eventually find somebody who does like you and does want to marry you (or these days simply become your partner) and maybe have children etc. Then your marriage goes west! So, really not a lot of free choice here at all.

Now let's get on to religion. Initially you have no choice in the matter. You are what your parents decide they want you to be, usually what they themselves are. So you start life being a Christian, Jew, Moslem, Hindu, Buddhist or even Atheist. Some of us begin to think for ourselves, maybe in our teenage years, maybe later and decide to switch our religion. Usually it's from a religious faith to none or even agnostic. Sometimes it's the other way round. But again, I ask what choice is there in that? What about those who don't change. Did they choose not to change or did they even think about it? And what about those who do change? Do they exercise a really free choice or was it just their way of thinking which made them sit up and change? Our education system is so bad, that most people aren't thought to think for themselves. They are just thought things by rote and are told that's the way it is, learn up or else. They probably never get to question. And those of us who do question things, what's there within us that makes us do that? We didn't decide one day by free will, I'd better start to ask questions. So I don't really see much choice there either.

Consider your likes and dislikes. Do you have a say in this? For example, if you like sport, did you decide to like it or did you always like it? And take something you are not interested in, say history. Did you decide not to like it? Go into a library and take down a book on history and try to make yourself like it. You probably won't succeed, and if you do, well maybe you did like history in the first place but didn't know it. You'll notice that your likes change over time. For example, if somebody told me twenty years ago that I'd read books on church history, I'd have laughed at them. What a boring subject. Yet today I devour them and I can confirm there was never a time when I decided I was going to enjoy such books. Gradually I got interested in the subject, but there was never a "decision". So again, I ask, where's the free will?

In fact a lot of things change about you over time. Not only do certain cells in your body get replaced, a lot of the body you have today is no longer the one you were born with. However, more importantly for our purposes, your ideas and outlook change over time. A lot of these mental changes depend on the environment you live in, the friends and acquaintences you keep, the books and newspapers you read, the films and television you watch. Each of these has an influence on you whether you like it or not and you may find that your ideas begin to change almost imperceptibly over time, sometimes influenced by the above. But seldom do your ideas change overnight. It happens subtly over time. So exactly where or when can you say you made a free decision to change one of your ideas? For example, you might believe passionately in a particular idea or you might follow a particular football team. If you think about it you'll most likely find that something you were passionate about years ago, you are no longer so. When did the change occur? I'll bet you that you can't really say. But more importantly you can't say that you ever sat down and made a decision to change in this area.

So where exactly does free will or choice come in? Take something as simple as deciding to have a cup of coffee or tea. If you consider the situation carefully, you'll find that you don't really make a choice. You either feel like a cup of coffee now or a cup of tea. Then again, you can sit down and say you're going to give this free will stuff a whirl. I'll make a firm decision. Even though I feel like having a cup of coffee at this point, I'll exercise my free will and have a cup of tea instead. Very good, but you're actually taking an idea and deciding to defy it. Or are you? Are you really deciding to decide to defy it? Or are you just in the mood to do an experiment.

Some scientific experiments appear to show that we do not have free will. For example a famous experiment some years back has shown that approximately 10 seconds before a person made a conscious decision to do something, the brain had already taken the decision. Of course, these experiments were only dealing with very simple decisions, for example whether to press a button on the right or on the left. A lot too depends on how the MRI imaging which was used is interpreted so the issue is far from closed.

Of course, if we don't actually have free will, this leads to the troubling question as to what, if any, responsibility must we take for our actions? For example if a serial killer has no conscience, no remorse and simply enjoys killing, is he responsible for his actions as he has absolutely no choice in the matter? I'm not defending him and believe he should be locked up for life (in fact he deserves the death penalty, I'm not a namby-pamby do-gooder). But if he had no other choice, what can we do? Well, I suppose lock him up and tough! He can't be allowed to be free if he threatens others in this way.

So if we don't have free will, do we give up? Throw our hats at it? No free will, what's the point? Another interesting experiment was carried out a year or so ago which tried to find out a little more about the effects on society if free will does not in fact exist. A number of participants were given passages from a book to read. Half of the participants got a section of the book to read which stated that there was no such thing as free will, our choices have already been predetermined and we can't change them. The other participants got a section which concentrated on the importance of studying consciousness and didn't mention free will at all. After reading the passages all the volunteers in the study were asked to complete a survey on their belief in free will. Then they were asked to complete 20 arithmetic problems which would appear on a computer screen. But they were also told that when the question appeared they needed to press the space bar otherwise a glitch in the computer software would make the answer appear on the screen. They were told that nobody would know whether they pressed the space bar or not, but they were asked not to cheat. The results showed that those who read the text which stated that there was no such thing as free will cheated more often. The researchers also found that the amount somebody cheated correlated with the extend to which they had rejected free will in their survey. Doesn't bode well for us if we don't have free will!

Which leads me to believe there must be some choice somewhere, but I've no idea where.

Now, what made me write this blog?...I guess I just couldn't help myself!

Help, I'm a rock!

It'll Never Last

I don't know when I first took an interest in music, but my first memories are of my parents listening to the radio. This was in the 1950s and the radio and the gramophone were the only sources of music in our house. My folks were lovers of the classical genre of music, the heavier the better. Music like Wagner (have you heard the screeching sirens bellowing their way through arias in his operas?), Beethoven (much nicer), Tchaikovsky (even nicer) and Bach to name a few. I neither liked or disliked this music, but certain items in my father's record collection were more interesting. After wading through the heavy stuff, I came across gems such as Sparky's Magic Piano, Eamonn Andrews telling the story of the Giant's Causeway, Danny Kaye telling the musical tale of Tubby the Tuba, and a particular favourite of mine, Life Get's Tedious. I don't know who sang/recited this little ditty, but it had some wonderful lyrics which I can recall to this day: "Old hound dog, he's so forlorn; Laziest dog that ever was born; He's howlin' 'cos he's sittin' on a thorn; he's just too tired to move over". My father, however, forbade me to listen to Don't Mention Wives to the Sultan which of course I did, but couldn't understand then why I shouldn't listen to it.

We used to go every year for our holidays to a little fishing village called Ardglass in Co Down, to a house my grandfather owned. I loved this place which was a child's paradise, beach beside the house, the sea just over the backwall (on a stormy day, the waves would crash into the backyard) and of course no school. One time my cousin Tim and myself were in Charlie's shop which had a jukebox. Tim put some money in and we choose Elvis Presley singing Jailhouse Rock. Don't know why we choose that particular number, but the effect was electrifying. I had not realised there was such pounding, uplifting, exciting and mad music. "Play it again, Tim," I cried when it ended. He did and we must have listened to it till most of his money was gone. Naturally I got the blame for spending all Tim's holiday money when I got home, but I didn't care. I had discovered Elvis Presley. Roll over Beethoven, my musical education was beginning.

My father wasn't exactly over the moon when I told him about what I had found although to be fair my mother didn't seem to mind so much. "It'll never last," he said emphatically and that was that. I didn't know what he meant by that remark. Not till years later when I realised he was right, although not about Elvis. He has lasted and why?...because he is one of the greatest rock singers of the last century. So called cultured musicians like to sneer and say Presley was rubbish and I should listen to the original Hound Dog recording by Willie May Thornton. I have and I have to say, it's crap. I can genuinely say there is no better version that the Elvis Presley recording.

But other than the jukebox down the road, where else could I hear this music? Apparently nowhere. I was 9 when I heard Jailhouse Rock and didn't know of any other radio stations other than the BBC and Radio Eireann and they sure as hell didn't play this sort of music. So I was stuck for a year or so until one day I found Radio Luxembourg. Here I found a program with a guy called Jimmy Savile who played nothing but Elvis. So I was introduced to a whole wealth of this singer's music. Now the next step was to get my hands on an album by Presley and managed to convince my mother to get Rock 'n' Roll No 2 as a Christmas present. Magic to this day!

The next great step was finding Radio Caroline. By this time I was 16. As we didn't have a television set, I was forced to go to friend's houses to see BBC which had a program called Top of the Pops. Around the same time the Beatles exploded on the scene. I didn't like them at all, but they were quickly followed by the Rolling Stones who were so much better. In later years the Stones went downhill while the Beatles improved immensely. However, it wasn't long till a new phenomenon began to emerge. I first became aware of this when I noticed an intriguing album cover a colleague had tucked under his arm and I asked him who it was. Cream he said, a blues band with Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker. I'd never heard of the blues let alone a band who played them. I don't know what prompted me (maybe it was the album cover and I've bought other albums based on their covers alone, some with great results and others disastrous) but I went out and purchased the album. It was like hearing Jailhouse Rock all over again with new ears. Tracks like N.S.U. and I'm So Glad simply burst from the record player. Sublime, ethereal and grounded. Shortly after I found John Mayall and his Bluesbreakers. While both these bands were blues based they were the beginning of the progressive music scene. Artists like Pink Floyd, Santana, It's A Beautiful Day, The Doors began to appear. Others who weren't bagged in the progressive genre were Bob Dylan and the Greenwich Village folk scene with artists like Peter, Paul & Mary, Tom Paxton and Joan Baez. I'd like to mention Joni Mitchell also, but I don't think she was part of the Greenwich Village scene.

Then one day I picked up the New Musical Express, or was it Melody Maker (a doubt crosses my mind), the premier weekly music papers from the UK. They had a review of the first album, Freak out, released by The Mothers of Invention which was Frank Zappa's band. I wish I could remember the name of the guy who did the review but it was the worst review I had ever read. He basically said the music was worse than awful and named some of the song titles: Who are the Brain Police?, Hungry Freaks Daddy, Help, I'm a Rock, Return of the Son of Monster Magnet. Well, of course, I was so intrigued I had to hear this album. In those days, the only place to get your hands on records was the record shops (even Richard Branson's Virgin mail order wasn't around). So I traipsed through all the record stores in Dublin. Nobody had heard of this obscure American group. Even the International Record Store (at least I think that's what it was called) in Tara Street had never heard of it. So I had to give up or maybe take a plane to London and try there (very expensive then, Michael O'Leary was still in short pants). However, about a year later I happened to be in the record shop in Tara Street, and there was Zappa's second album, Absolutely Free. Naturally I snapped it up and once again this music of sheer genius (at least to me) exploded into existence: Plastic People, Call Any Vegetable, and Uncle Bernie's Farm. One track, Invocation and Ritual Dance of the Young Pumpkin had a blistering guitar solo backed up by flute which clocked in at 7 minutes and raised the music above anything else I had ever heard. There is simply nothing produced by our modern musicians which can equal it. Really, I'm not joking.

In 1970 came the album which probably defined a generation, Fill your Head with Rock, with the eponymous cover of the demonic looking violin player from the band Flock. This was a sampler of various New World artists, introducing us to the likes of Leonard Cohen, Johnny Winter, Chicago, and Blood, Sweat & Tears. So with such a wealth of music to choose from, I, being young and foolish, began to feel the vibes from my friends who had also adopted this music and soon Rolling Stone magazine was telling us who it was cool or uncool to follow. Poor old Zappa didn't get a word in and Presley was decidedly uncool. I don't know how long afterwards that I read somewhere about Bob Dylan paying a visit to Sun Studios in Memphis (the home of Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison to name a few). He reportedly knelt down and kissed the floor with the words "This is where it all started". Now whether that story is true or not, I suddenly realised he was right and it wasn't up to the hip types to tell me or anybody else who I could and couldn't like. I followed my own preferences and found that Presley and Zappa sat very well together, thank you. I liked them both and you could argue as to who was the better, and even if Zappa was the better musician and Presley the better singer/showman, it didn't matter. They both spoke to me and their music moved me in different ways.

So, who will last and who won't? In this piece I'm ignoring the modern classical world as I know nothing about it. Obviously the old classical music has lasted and I expect it will last for many more generations to come. I also haven't mentioned the world of jazz, much of which will last and much of which won't. Other than ethnic music I concentrate on what we can loosely call pop music (which includes rock, country, metal, progressive (a snotty term really) and all their offshoots). Any of the boy bands will not last. Nothing they have done can stand against the sheer might of the far superior music of the sixties and seventies. Even the great U2 (except for their classic album The Joshua Tree) won't last much longer. In fact I can't think of any new artist who has come along in the last 30 years who will last much beyond the next 30 years. But the really great will last: Elvis Presley, the Beatles, Frank Zappa, Bob Dylan. Elvis had a magic voice, charisma, charm and he could really sing, a showman who could hold his audience in the palm of his hand. The Beatles in the persons of John Lennon and Paul McCartney were songwriters of the highest calibre. Frank Zappa was pure genius even though he had a ridiculous and childish side (his dirty lyrics were funny but ultimately boring). Bob Dylan whose lyrics were unrivalled and had a unique way of singing them (at least on record, some of his concerts have been disasters, no showman he!). Others mentioned above, like the Rolling Stones and Leonard Cohen will last a bit longer but not much more than the already mentioned 30 years. Some greats have even now gone. Where is Chicago and Blood, Sweat & Tears, two powerhouse bands?

You may have noticed that I haven't mentioned Jimi Hendrix. This is because, in my opinion, even though he was great in his day, he was not as good a guitarist as many seem to think. Clapton for one was better. I think he still lasts today through some diehards. Fair enough, I guess.

The one thing however that sort of bothers me about writing this article is the fear that I'm totally forgetting about somebody who deserves to be listed among the greats and he or she hasn't sprung to mind. Ah well!

So what is the future for some potential megastars who might be around today or tomorrow? I greatly fear that they won't get much of a chance as long as the music industry is being run by the businessmen who wouldn't know an A minor chord from a G string! Seriously, does anybody think that Simon Cowell would have put Bob Dylan through to the next round? Not on your nelly! As Zappa said many years ago, "no commercial potential". I think the rot started in the seventies when disco came pounding through our headphones. Punk was a non-music, most couldn't even play their instruments properly. Rave, rap and such are plain awful. The only people playing today who don't mime on stage are metal. So the future does not look bright. But I just hope there is some promoter still around who won't be afraid to take a chance on some new real talent. They are there, just hiding!

Should We Avoid Talking to the Aliens?

Recently the well known astrophysicist Stephen Hawking has warned that, while aliens almost certainly exist, we should make every attempt to avoid them. Why?

Basically he says that if aliens visit us, it might be to raid Earth for resources and then move on. If aliens visit us, the outcome could be compared to when Columbus arrived in America and the decimation the white man left after him on the Native Americans.

He continued that we only have to take a look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might change into something we wouldn’t want to meet and therefore we should do everything possible to avoid contact with extraterrestrials.

Naturally I don’t agree with him and set out some of my reasons below.

Astronomers are pretty much agreed having analysed the types of stars and star systems, it’s unlikely that there would be intelligent aliens anywhere within 90 light years of us. There probably is life but it could be microbial, or at a different stage of evolution than us. An astronomer called Frank Drake came up with an equation in the 1960s called the Drake equation. He was the guy who started Project Ozma which listened for signs of intelligent radio signals coming from a number of different star systems. Nothing was found. However, the answer to the Drake equation was the number of civilisations in our galaxy with whom communication might be possible. This took into account the average rate of star formation, the fraction of those stars which have planets, the fraction of those planets which actually produce life, the fraction of those life forms which develop intelligence and the faction of those which actually develop radio communication and finally the length of time such civilisations continue to exist. Multiplying these fractions together gives the number of civilisations. Depending on the value given to these unknown fractions has resulted in answers ranging from 1 civilisation per galaxy to millions.

It obviously can’t be millions as that leads to the famous question as to where are they. Some people believe that they are in fact already here and some go further and say they are in fact, dangerous. Alien abduction, mutilation of cattle are frequently cited. Sure there are lots of reports of UFOs in the skies but mostly from people who are untrained in looking at the sky. Most of the sightings are of Venus when low in the evening sky (a beautiful sight), weather balloons, even the common airplane. And surely a lot of the Nevada sightings are of the stealth aircraft being put through their paces before they were even announced to the American public. And frankly, I think anybody who believes they have been abducted are deluded. Think about it. An advanced civilisation crosses space and perhaps time to reach Earth and what do they do? Buzz aircraft, abduct people and mutilate cattle? Besides if there are so many aliens around, how come there is not one single incident where a piece of alien technology has been found? Roswell, among others, may be cited but no evidence has been forthcoming. Besides, the pieces of debris found at Roswell were from a weather balloon.

It is possible that we are actually unique and are the only form of intelligent life in the universe or even in our own galaxy. I believe this is highly unlikely and as the heroine in the film Contact said, if this is true it seems like an awful waste of space out there. And looking at the Drake equation again, we have already discovered in excess of 300 planets orbiting stars other than our own which implies a fairly decent rate of planet formation which is one factor increasing the odds in favour of life elsewhere. Also on our own planet we have found life existing in the most inhospitable places where we never expected to find it. For example, microbes living miles underground, some frozen in ice which revive when heated up, life existing without light or heat in the very deepest places in the oceans.

Now that it’s beginning to look like ET surely exists somewhere, let’s consider the question of whether they could reach us if they wanted to?

In order for a civilisation to cross the vastness of space they would have to be incredibly advanced technologically. And not only that, I believe that such advancement in technology also comes with advancement in their understanding of themselves and other creatures, so much so that they would surely have long ago realised the senselessness of violence and killing. At our present level of technology our fastest spacecraft could probably cover the distance to the nearest star in about 80,000 years. So an incredible leap in technological sophistication is required to overcome that daunting timeframe. If Einstein is right about the speed of light being a limiting factor, then we may never meet another alien race face to face. However, I’m convinced that there must be ways around this problem but these advances are not going to come anytime soon. However things turn out, only an incredibly advanced race will be capable of making such journeys. Aggression or violence would be a thing of the past with such a race. Certainly if they haven’t learned to control such behaviour then it is unlikely that they would have survived for so long. Besides, what could we have that they would possibly need?

So now that we know ET is not here yet and unlikely to be for some considerable time to come, our best option to talk with them is by radio or optical communication, or maybe by some other method we haven’t discovered yet. On Earth we have been communicating by radio for the last 90 odd years and as radio waves travel at the speed of light, this means that our signals have already traversed space out to 90 light years. So if there are intelligent aliens with radio capabilities within that range, they know we’re here already.

Now going into the digital age and away from normal radio communication analogue technology, some say that digital signals would look like noise to aliens. I don’t understand this. It’s nonsense! A signal is a signal and it just needs deciphering. Maybe they mean that digital signals from earth are weaker and more earth directed and so eventually when our technology has advanced sufficiently our signals won’t leak into space at all. Advanced aliens will probably use similar technology which is another reason we don’t spot them in our radio searches. The chances of finding a civilisation at the exact same point of evolution as ourselves is about the same changes of winning the lotto. Fairly low. So most civilisations out there are probably far superior to us and there’s no chance of our finding them (unless they want to be found) or far inferior to us in which case there won’t be much in the line of signal to find them.

I mentioned above that during Project Ozma nothing was found. Well, during a later SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence) search in the mid seventies, one signal was found and they called it the Wow! signal. This bore all the hallmarks of artificial origin (any hint of it being manmade was ruled out), unfortunately it was never seen again. To this day some still insist it was of extraterrestrial and intelligent origin.

Frank Drake sent a message from the Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico (the largest in the world) in 1974. Because this telescope can only point in one direction as the Earth rotates, the message was sent towards a dense group of stars called Messier 13. Messier 13 is the name given to a particular globular cluster which lies along with many other similar clusters on the outskirts of our galaxy. Unfortunately it will take about 25000 years to reach it’s destination, so we won’t be getting a reply anytime soon. But, what the hell, it was a first shot and maybe an alien spacecraft will pick it up first.

So why bother listening or trying to make contact? In my opinion, the importance of communicating with them is that we would have so much to learn from them. But maybe they don’t want to share? If that’s the case, it’s a pity, but I would think they would want to share. The more a civilisation advances intelligence wise, the more understanding they would have of the universe and all that’s in it. The more they might want to reach out and help struggling civilisations to come to grips with everything. Even looking at ourselves, many people want desperately to reach out and help others. Otherwise there wouldn’t be the outpouring of humanity when disaster strikes as seen recently in Haiti, for example.

So rather than trying to hide away, let’s announce our presence to the rest of the universe. And let’s keep listening to try and find a signal from them. One way or the other it would surely be the most significant discovery we have ever made to find out that we are not alone in the universe. Or equally that we are alone.