Sinead O’Connor calls for a new Catholic Church

Towngate, the colonists won the Revolutionary war, so we Americans have not been subjugated for more than two centuries. In dealing with conquerors, it's best to use their own weapons, of which language is the most effective. Of all the literature produced by Americans, the political essay is our native genre, originally inspired by British political philosophers and British oppression and exploitation. And how many international prizes for literature have the Irish, writing in English, won? Modern drama could hardly exist without the Anglo-Irish playwrights. Nice ironies there, especially considering the role that nationalist stories, song, poetry, and drama played in achieving the self-government of 26 counties. The defects of English (the sediment of the conquerors' history and value system) may help to restore the Irish language if people will just consider how much Irish cultural heritage is lost in English. Read Brian Friel's play "Translations" for more on that issue. At risk of becoming tendentious and boring (yawn!), I'll indulge in one more lit-crit comment in reply to your worry about my self-referential use of third person: don't you just hate it when a storyteller stops to explain why a line is laughable? If the reader does not know that I am female when he or she reads "Sister, how do I become a priest?" then the point is lost. Using "she" and "her" made it unnecessary to interject "because I was a girl!" in the story itself. It's called shift in point of view/narration in case you encounter it in the works of Joyce or other writers who break out of the usual constraints. Enough literary analysis lecture for now I hope.

Thanks for emptying a bit of your soul, eiriamach. There’s a nun working in the Philippine Islands whom the Roman Catholic Church, under Pope John Paul the First, recognises as a possible female catholic 'Popess'. Before you die, eiramach, look for her. She’d sort out Sinead O’Connor’s miseries, and all of our own, with her wisdom. I’ve heard her voice giving out her wisdom. Trust me on that.

Eiriamach: You are obviously under the illusion that the expression refers to having caused you pain ~ when the opposite is true. It is a term of sympathy ~ related to you having to use English...........I also have sympathy for you not understanding what Subjugation is as I accidentally typed a 'c' instead of a 'g'. However, as a fan of Non-Standard English, you should have worked it out! If you do have contempt for the 'language of conquest',yet agree to use it,you may consider yourself to be subjugated and therefore submissive. ......... Jacers: Great stuff on the use of English worldwide. The French Nation also lost out on the Meridian Line which they hoped would be through Paris instead of Greenwich,London. Just think if it had been moved 20 Minutes West, it might have run down O'Connell Street or even Stoneybatter! Slainte!

Jacers, I was doing research for myself and volunteer work in the archives and library. Irish monasteries have some of the finest libraries in the world! What a delight to work there and to be copying handwritten records from the founding of the abbey (one of my 19th century relatives was among the founders). To answer your more impertinent questions, only the computer techie monk with the determined stride and the swishy choir cape made me think in terms of anything other than work and meditation, but of course there's no story to tell about that. Average age of the monks was probably close to 70, and they are all interesting, mostly scholarly, holy men living contemplation, prayer, and work according to the 1000- year-old rule, and ministering to the locals, the travelers, and the retreatants. Great church and liturgy, beautiful grounds, fantastic peat-oven bread, legends of St. Patrick that you'd never find in books, and I miss the cooks and house staff still. You could spend a lifetime exploring the monastic midlands of Ireland, such a rich history, and conferences that draw people from all over Ireland and some of the rest of Europe. You'd think I'm trying to sell tour tickets! Seriously, in these times of trouble for the Church, I'd advise interested Catholics to gather at the monastery guesthouses for "retreat" time, for talks in the spirit of Sinead O' Connor: to discuss together what they can do to renew the religion. The future of the church will come from the kind of laypeople I met at the monastery.

On the question of English as a world conquering language – I think both Townie & eiramach have it wrong. Back in the earliest days of aircraft flights, both English-speaking and French-speaking pioneering pilots were to the fore. Eventually, it was realised that if pilots were going to be able to communicate with people on the ground (today’s equivalent of Air Traffic Controllers - and remember that the use of radio for communications was only in its infancy at the time too) then a common language would have to be chosen for pilots from different countries and for ground-based controllers in all countries to use. A meeting took place about this and it was decided that English would be the common language to use. Hence, all pilots & all air traffic controllers all over the world today – whether in Tokyo, Berlin, New York, Seoul or Dublin - use English to communicate with each other. It was the same for the earliest Christian priests – Latin was chosen as the common language, so when a priest or Cardinal from say, Ireland, meets with an African, or Bulgarian, or Russian or Sth American priest, they can chat in a common language. English as a world language has nothing to do with Britain’s attempts to conquer the world and everything to do with USA and UK pioneering pilots out-voting the French air pioneers at that momentous meeting. An Irish man invented the submarine boat; perhaps all submariners speak Garlic beneath the waves that Britannia claims to rule.

@eiriamach at 07.51pm Apr 30 – I guessed there was a nun’s story in you! Thanks for sharing it. So you’re a perennial renegade from authority? Tell us now... how much time have you spent in jails? Are you in or out of one of them at the moment? And you spent three months in an Irish monastery?? Did you masquerade as a young man in there, pretending to be a novice priest, just so’s you could prove your oul’ nun teacher wrong? Did you seduce one of the monks? Or all of them?? Do tell!

Townie – nah, I was just taking de piss (aka TDP, meaning having fun) w/ me wild guesses on posters. I really didn’t think you are Teashock Noddy. Thanks for giving me a chance to have a bit o’ fun.

Towngate, if you're feeling pain, it's in your delusion of having inflicted pain, and no need for you to worry that using a language of conquerors has made me submissive-- quite the contrary. But "subjucation"? I can't argue with that because--though I haven't bothered to look--I don't expect to find it in the dictionary.

Eerieamock: I feel your pain! Every breath you take leading to an utterance in the conquerors tongue and further securing your submission and subjucation. Btw: To refer to yourself in the 'third person' @07.51,is worrying ~ and a sure sign of your down-trodden status.

I often completely disagree with sirpeter's church politics, but he is sharp and bold enough to call a bullying p**** a p****. I appreciate that trait. He does not always bother with "Standard" English, and why should anyone? I have some contempt for this language of conquerors myself (along with Latin, another language of conquest). I also appreciate the way mamaginnty works a little Irish into her sentences. She's a lively one! I wonder whether she lives in a Gaeltacht or maybe has a B&B.

Jacers! Hilarious! I have never laughed out loud so much at anything on here since slurpeter said he had studied Irish history! ~~ So lets invite everyone; especially the 'Usual Suspects' you mentioned, to react to your 'image' of them, and correct them, if they want to. ~ I am truly amazed that you should imagine I am anything other than a humble Member of this wonderful website being invited to pass Comments on the Articles Posted by staff writers and reporters. Especially to be mistaken for An Taoiseach Niall O'Dowd himself, has probably come as a bit of a shock to both of us! Good Lord! ~ Who'da thunk it! Thanks again, Jakers, for the hoot and I'd love to know why you came to that (sorry,incorrect) conclusion when you are so sharp with all the others!

Jacersagain, Eiriamach has known from an early age that obedience just isn't her cup of tea and, besides, she is a perennial renegade from authority. There's never been any nun material in that combination. Where'd you get such a weird idea? 'Reminds me of a first-grade story of my own. The nun was telling us how wonderful it was to be a priest, that it was the most blessed calling of all, that priests had the highest place in heaven, right next to God himself. Now, I knew very little about priests, but at the age of 6, I'd already learned the great American virtue of competitiveness, and of course I wanted to be the best, so I raised my hand and asked, "Sister, how do I become a priest?" Well, the other children in the class were all giggling and mocking me because I didn't know the first thing, obviously, about priests, and it was a Catholic school. But I paid them no attention because my eyes were riveted on the face of that nun. It took her a few moments to recover her wits when she realized what she had done. Then she said ever so gently, "My dear, you can't be a priest--but you CAN be a nun! Nuns are close to God too! I could not have put my thoughts into words at that age, but I knew then . . . second place is just fine if that's where you end up, but you don't spend a lifetime working for second place. So, Jacers, there was never any chance of my entering a convent. I did, however, once spend three months in an Irish monastery, but that's another story for another time. I wonder did you get any of your guesses right?

Oh! Pardonnez moi, maw is shay do hullay! Gearoid4 is a true gentleman, the kind I'd build a monument to if I knew how to.

Townie – oddly enough I’ve never tried to imagine what IC posters might be like! But hmmm... since you ask, let the fun begin! – eiriamach is an ‘equality-frustrated’ nun or ex-nun, I love her posts, always a great read; mamaginnty is a lovely old dear, looking after her man and still-at-home grown up family, run off her feet and tired all the time, which explains her angry posts; barneyjo is a middle-aged lady, kind and concerned, I love her intelligent sensible posts; FatherVol is a nice Catholic everyday parish priest but one who probably roars from the pulpit every Sunday; BishopSean is a Protestant bishop who gets out of bed for his daily glasses of sherry and occasionally dresses up in a purple ‘frock’ when he has to actually go and do some ‘work’; Portia777 is a divorced or separated South Dublin ex-hippy middle-aged lady still with flowers in her hair who now practices druidism and probably smokes pot; antoman thinks he’s God’s gift to comedy (woeful); sirpeter is a Republican in Cork, possibly a middle-aged, unemployed ex-IRA man, who can’t form proper sentences or spell properly and likes to think he’s a professor of history (Gawd help his ‘students’!!!); George Dillon... hmmm, I like the old goat, speaks his mind truthfully if disparagingly – I’d probably enjoy a pint with him; murphy66 is a bitter, sarcastic bollix, wouldn’t have a pint with him ever; Sinead O’Connor might be a poster here on ICentral, appearing under various nom-de-plumes given her schizophrenic behaviours and career confusion but what a great singer, what a beautiful looking woman; Searlit is an enigma – probably a very nice mature woman, the kind you’d want to put in your back pocket and run away and live happily ever after with; and I think Towngate might be an ICentral journalist/editor, masquerading under a bold veil of anonymity whose real name is Niall O’Dowd. Those are my off the cuff wild ‘image’ guesses. Your turn... :-)))

Excuse typos - out=our!