Islam and me in the 21st Century

As I start to write down these thoughts, the year is 2015 AD and it is the 1st of March (St. David’s day), when the daffodils outside the door of my home in Ireland are normally in bloom. I love the way, how I love the way, they return each year just as I love the way the swallows return, up in the sky, a little later on. Right now an Irish spring is beginning at my Irish home and it is so unlike all the Arab and other “springs” that have burst onto the world stage in the last few years.

I have to say that I am less and less happy about being a member of what is commonly called the “human” race and what has prompted me to start this piece of writing today is the news that Raif Badawi, the Saudi Arabian blogger sentenced to 1,000 lashes and 10 years in prison, could now actually face the death penalty for alleged apostasy. This is mediaeval justice and I use the word mediaeval in the specific sense of it being the justice of men and not of god. The ‘dastardly’ crime of this thin, diabetic with high blood pressure was to organise an internet forum to allow some free expression by other people and so was charged with “insulting Islam through electronic channels” and with “violating Islamic values and propagating liberal thought”.

Now make note that this is being imposed by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (a state which has adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights even though it abstained on the vote in the UN in 1948 especially with regard to Article 18, which states that everyone has the right “to change his religion or belief”; and Article 16, on equal marriage rights) and not by a bunch of terrorist islamofascists attempting to coerce everyone to submit to their particular form of inhumanity and barbarism. This is crazy to anyone, such as myself, that subscribes to the simplest, hopefully self-evident and rational, aspect of loving one’s neighbour as oneself. To “love thy neighbour as thyself” is invoked not only in the New Testament (Mark 12:31) but also early in the Old Testament (Leviticus 19:18). Such an exhortation must thus be relevant to both Christians and Muslims.

The crowd that watched the first fifty lashes (the first installment of twenty such planned public floggings) were cheering incessantly with what is fast turning into an infamous phrase: “Allahu Akbar” (“God is great”). So what of submitting and allowing the one and only deity to decide who is guilty and how they should be punished. Man it seems knows better than his maker especially (and with the greatest irony) when it comes to matters of faith. All societies have civil laws and codes and this is always particularly the case with regard to such things as property, marriage and murder. But the punishment must also fit the crime. Deterrent punishments may have a different role but a punishment designed to deter others (rather than be simple justice for the perpetrator) has always seemed somehow suspect to me. Capital punishment itself never seems to be an effective deterrent for murder though it would probably stop people from parking illegally. This flogging and imprisonment of the Saudi Blogger can only be described as barbaric and not a judgement but a form of arbitrary revenge.

I don’t normally quote scripture because by “cherry picking” through the bible one can often find a passage to suit many points of view. Whether one takes its content literally or metaphorically doesn’t detract from the fact that it contains the collective wisdom of western society put together over millenia. It forms part of the canon of all three of the major semitic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam that had their origins in what can be loosely called the Caucasian peoples. It is in the best sense a “good book” and worth reading. I believe it is much better read than preached from so give thanks to the invention of the printing press that you can nowadays read it for yourself. We are no longer confined to hear it interpreted by a priest from the pulpit. I have already referred to the self-evident and logical statement of “love thy neighbour as yourself” and I will now add some of the words about judgement for everyone to ponder. Not only to the Saudi state (in respect of what started me to write these thoughts down) but to everyone. I believe the words have merit so please re-read them and reflect.

In the Old Testament (Jeremia 22:3) it is written “Execute judgment and righteousness, and deliver the plundered out of the hand of the oppressor. Do no wrong and do no violence to the stranger, the fatherless, or the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place” and in the New Testament (Matthew 7:2) it says “For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you.” So why is it that the barbarity of the literal “Eye for and eye and tooth for a tooth” seems to have centre stage under Shariah law and not the more temperate “Judge not that ye be not judged”. Man once again interpreting God’s will and not allowing God to be the judge.

Ever since the twin towers were toppled in New York I have been trying to get some inkling of what could be going-on in the minds of those assassins who flew airliners into those buildings. It was with the most grievous horror that I watched that tragedy unfold live on television. One of the most enduring memories is of a man at a window hundreds of feet in the air waving a white sheet or tablecloth in a hopeful but ultimately hopeless call for help. The two towers came tumbling down killing all and sundry in what was a unique moment of globally-watched horror. I read on the news next day that ordinary people in some places in the Middle East instead of lamenting or sympathising were cheering in the streets.

There also followed a deafening silence from the Islamic establishment as the identity and motives of the perpetrators became fully known. We are told that suicide is against the Islamic faith and yet this cult of mostly young male Muslims (for want of a better word) who kill themselves along with their perceived infidels seems not to lessen apace at all. A Muslim, I have learned from Wikipedia, translates as ‘one who submits’. But submission is passive and not active and there is a world of difference between the submissive actions of Gandhi and his followers and those of such “radicalised” members of Islam.

Time has moved on since I started writing these thoughts down and it is now November 2015 and a week after the terrible events in Paris on Friday 13th. In the last couple of days I watched a video of a minute’s silence in respect to all of those killed and injured, which was held before the start of a football match in Turkey against Greece. There was no respectful silence because a significant section of the Turkish fans booed and whistled and the infamous “Allahu Akbar” (“God is great”) could be heard from what I hope was a minority of the Turkish fans. It is the same term said by those beheading their kneeling victims with a knife, by those before blowing up a bomb in a crowded market and by those about to machine gun and kill over a hundred victims inside a hall as they watch a concert. Those who broke that minute’s silence were obviously not only emboldened enough to do so but should they also be numbered amongst the not-so-actually-moderate moderate side of Islam?

Over the past year or so there have been so many horror stories. The things that have been happening in the self-proclaimed Islamic State/Caliphate and similar areas occupied by such Islamic “fundamentalist” groups nearly defies my intuitive comprehension. I felt similar when wandering round Auschwitz and allowing the depths of depravity and evil perpetrated (and with the greatest cynicism possible) by Hitler’s fascism to fully invade my consciousness. My mind would have preferred to be able to suppress such horrors but it is important to acknowledge that humanity is really capable of such abominations and I am simply thankful that I was not around at the time. But what if I was? Could I have been coerced into that collective mindset? Could I have resisted not shaking hands when meeting someone in the traditional manner but giving instead the Nazi salute? Islamofascism is the best term I have come across to describe the “philosophy” of IS and Boko Haram and such-like groups. They, like all fascists, must force their ideals because there is no peaceful path to their ends.

Having now read more about apostasy in Islam it is obvious that the penalties for this have nearly always been severe. To me this does not make the religion more so but rather less robust. Any belief that is only sustained by a climate of fear is likely to be as hollow as any denunciations that are obtained by torture. Those in fear will probably do or say anything that will end or prevent their torture. I have said it elsewhere and I repeat it here: “all evil only comes about by the imposition, the imposition, of one person’s will on another”. Religions and their foot-soldiers do not escape this and before anyone gets too carried away with the state of Islam today it bears remembering the atrocities carried out under Christ’s banner in the past. It is bad enough when a sadistic dictator is in power but it is probably worse when the perpetrators are the so-called spiritual leaders of a faith. Only their creed is OK and only their creed will bring eternal happiness. Pooh!

As a child, I (having been brought up as a Catholic in a Protestant home) remember being told the story of someone arriving in heaven and being taken down a corridor with doors in it and that there was one door in it for each religious group. As this new arrival was being walked along the corridor a huge noise could be heard behind one of the doors as if everyone inside was having a wonderful party. The guide turned and said “Oh don’t mind. That’s just the Roman Catholics – they think they are the only people up here!” I guess it must be just the same for all the branches of the Islamic faith today.

I digressed a bit maybe but the point was a serious one. Members of many faiths obviously believe that their way is best and some believe it is the only way to find salvation. This mindset is particularly often found in the mind of an “evangelical” – a person who has “seen the light” – and not only seen it but who must now convert all those perceived to be in the dark. I am increasingly sure that this pertains to most Muslims as well as to various branches of the Christian faith – particularly to the avowed evangelicals. I am no theologian but Judaism, the third of the three main Semitic religions, seems less concerned with converting Gentiles to their way of thinking. They themselves are the ‘chosen people’ and so there is not a lot they can do about those not so chosen I guess. Religious elitism of one sort or another unfortunately affects so many faiths.

It is time to reflect on the terrible events that have happened recently in Paris: first ‘Charlie Hebdo’ and more recently what happened on Friday 13th. Time to reflect in the cold light of day and try and find a better way forward. It is not a nice contemplation and knee-jerk reactions are unlikely to help. Terrorists (and by any definition that is what the agents of these atrocities were) have always been hard to beat by systematic conventional force. Terrorism may eventually implode from a lack of support. More often the terrorists eventually evolve into some other politically “acceptable” entity. Such a metamorphosis would seem very unlikely just now and it is just as hard to see that the current support (that is the support from within mainstream Islam) is going to suddenly vanish. And let me be clear that silence from the mainstream is not silence. It is a silent vocal support – loud and clear.

I am sure there are many “moderate” Muslims who probably do not agree with what is being done in the name of Islam. No more so than there were many Germans who did not like what Hitler was up to. No more so than a large proportion of the population of Irish Catholics who disagreed with the tactics of the IRA. Yet all these silent majorities are complicit in the actions of those acting “in their name”. All these three silent groups kept quiet for basically the same simple reason; from fear. It was John Hume who bravely “came out” and trumpeted exactly what the IRA were at that time; they were fascists. They were fascists because they created a climate of fear. They may not have gone to the extremes of the Nazis but moderate men and women all over Ireland did not “speak out” until the twin tragedies of Enniskillen and Tyrone made people begin to lose their fear. Or at least if they didn’t lose it they were no longer prepared to tolerate what was being done “in their name”. It was different in Germany because the Nazis (though terrorising in the most brutal, cynical and arbitrary manner) were part of a state machine that was eventually destroyed militarily.

I suppose there were many moderate Germans in Hitler’s Reich and I have met what at least appear to be moderate Muslims (notably a self professed Sufi woman in Brussels and a previous colleague in Cavan General Hospital) but I more and more question just how “moderate” they are for, behind it all, they not only believe that they are right and that everyone else should bow to their faith. This has to be coupled with the fact that to leave their faith is a capital offence. Yes it is frightening, when polled, just how many (moderate) British “Muslims” uphold that an apostate deserves to be killed.

So what of the Islamofascists (a good term I think) of today. The fear they produce is not random or ill thought out, it is deliberate and is focused to be as brutal and horrible as can be imagined. It also has a huge arbitrary element in that whether it is bombing an airliner, bombing a market place, shooting the occupants of a building or whatever, that they know there will not only be many innocents and children but even good members of their own faith killed.

I fear that moderate Islam will never rise up and maybe cannot rise up and thereby effect a change. At this point I want to mention Richard Dawkins. He himself doesn’t believe in God but that is not what I want to talk about. He has written some truly fantastic science and my only problem with his stance on religion is mostly one of style. He too quickly uses sarcasm, for example, and in doing this he belittles much of what he sets out to inform about. Having said that I find myself more and more agreeing that it is the moderate Muslim or “moderate Islam” that one needs to fear. Perhaps to fear most of all. If interested then read him for yourself. He has affected my thinking to now believe that what is instilled into the minds of the vast majority of children (in this context by their Muslim parents and pastors) remains deeply embedded within them for life. These fundamental ideas and beliefs instilled within them are the rich soil in which radicalisation can, oh so easily, be instilled. It was little different when Christendom was brutal. The concept is little different than the Jesuit motto: “Give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man”.

The reactions and statements and fatwas of some of Islam’s clerics, particularly in the relation to real or imagined blasphemy, is something I would love to be able to abolish. It strikes me just how fragile the basis of such a faith must be when the faithful have to be controlled by fear. It is not all that different (historically at least) from most of the Christian churches except that the punishments (at least for centuries) have not been capital ones. “God is great”, “God is omnipotent”, “God has the power to grant or reject salvation” but it is the priests, the clerics, the ayatollahs, the inquisitors and so forth that take it on themselves to judge and condemn individuals instead of simply leaving it to the almighty to do the work that he is perfectly capable of doing. For me this is a great and fundamental hypocrisy; an absolutely gigantic hypocrisy; a hypocrisy only designed to maintain the power and influence (and oh so often the treasure chests as well) of those that preach in such a way.

When Monty Python’s “Life of Brian” was released it was rebuked by certain members of the establishment for being blasphemous. It, like much satire, may have been irreverent but it was not, from my standpoint, blasphemous. There was a renowned TV debate with the Bishop of Southwark and Malcolm Muggeridge on one side and John Cleese and Michael Palin on the other that I must revisit sometime. The po-faced establishment rather at a loss against the fun and health and healing power found in real humour is what I remember. Indeed it is so often the lack of humour, the inability to laugh from their hearts or their stomachs that seems to be part and parcel of the puritan, the reactionary and the foot soldiers of all forms of fascism.

The frailty of Islam in the face of any such humour is manifested by the outrageous actions that its adherents are invoked to do “in God’s name”. Whatever real harm did Salman Rushdie ever do or a cartoon of the prophet Mohammed do? The reply by the Nigerian journalist Isioma Daniel (in the context of a Miss World contest taking place controversially in Nigeria) when asked; “What would Mohammed think?” she replied, “In all honesty, he would probably have chosen a wife from one of them.” This was enough for a fatwa and so a death sentence was passed on her. Unbelievable.

It is worth stating that in the last five years or so there have actually been Fatwas against terrorism, Al-Qaeda and ISIS. They may be steps in the right direction by some in the Islamic world but for me it is not only too little too late but of dubious intent – other than that of self-preservation. At the moment ISIS and suchlike are on the upsurge and it seems pretty obvious that there will be more and more murderous incidents and thus more and more reaction to them. An emboldened far right will thus be able to garnish their ideologies and move onto the political stage with much greater success. I fear that happening and I am sure there are more and more adherents of Islam (in countries where they are now in a minority) that will feel increasingly fearful for themselves and their communities. These fatwas remind me a little of the so-called infallibility behind Papal bulls. The invincibility and conceit of certain mortal men over and above those of its faithful are abhorrent to me.

There is another question that I now ask myself : “How did Islam co-exist with its ‘neighbours’ for so very many years without the overt and pernicious way that its radicalised elements have evolved in recent years?” It seems too simple to blame the Taliban in Afghanistan , the Iraq war and its consequences and all the revolutions that have taken place around the Mediterranean but a deeper understanding of the nature of all of the divisions within Islam. No more so than with Christianity there have been divisions and schisms right from the start. And with every split comes the inevitability of “I’m right and you’re wrong” like little children unable to agree. Unfortunately however the consequences are severe – only too often deadly severe. In a way that is the hardest thing to understand about all these different monotheistic religions and their offshoots. They all believe in one almighty supreme being but, but, their own interpretation of things is the only one that can be correct.

At this point I will interject that I was born of a Roman Catholic father and an Anglican Catholic mother and educated as a Roman Catholic. I pursued that faith until one day I realised that I had been saying the creed, like a parrot, for years. What appalled me and what made me stop “blindly” following that faith was not that the words were right or wrong but that they had been instilled into me. I was saying “I believe” in things I had never ever considered for myself. This just seemed to be so wrong that it started my rejection of such a church as run by men. Over the years I have vacillated a bit and right now I am really not sure in what I believe. I am neither agnostic nor an atheist – I am simply perplexed. For me it shouldn’t matter whether there is a God or not as to the manner in which we should all lead our lives. I am a reluctant “muslim” only in the sense that I submit to my maker and to whatever unfolds in the future.

My maker whether a deity or not has not yet empowered me to understand what has always been an unanswerable paradox that centres on the nature of time and infinity. Did “stuff” always exist or was there a time when “stuff” came out of nothing. I don’t pretend an answer. I don’t understand the rather mystical “I am the alpha and I am the omega” nor do I understand the imagined singularity at the source of the Big Bang. In all probability it may be impossible for anything to understand its own existence let alone its own creation. I don’t want to waste time or lose any sleep on such “unanswerables”. Like others before me I simply wonder at the nature I have been blessed to live within and of the unbelievable sight of the night sky particularly when devoid of both the moon and artificial night: it can be literally overpowering to see the limits of the visible universe and it can make one feel very small indeed. Yet, small as I am, I am yet a part of that whole. That is what I believe in; that is the most part of my credo right now.

It is a creed supported scripturally by “Live and let live”; “Judge not that ye be not judged”; “Love thy neighbour as yourself”; Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those that trespass against us” and never forgetting that “Straight is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it”. If you are a professed Christian it will bear you well to fully comprehend and understand the last two of the above statements for to ignore or misunderstand them could be fatal for your soul. If you come from a different persuasion I think it will still be hard to better them as the tools for a good and productive life. So, just as the Irish comedian, Dave Allen, used to end his shows I will just say “Goodnight and may your God go with you”!

Lies, Truth and Courage

A lie can be defined in more than one way. I have found it useful to define a “real” lie simply as the intention to deceive. There are members of our species who can tell such lies with the greatest of ease and unfortunately they are far too often believed. We, as a species, seem to be particularly vulnerable, even naive, in this respect. Maybe that is because we concentrate too much on the meanings of words and have, unlike dogs, lost the innate ability to immediately see/feel deception when it is staring us in the face.

Neurologists have understood that there are a group of patients that cannot be lied to. They suffer from aphasia and so because they can no longer grasp your words so they can no longer be deceived by them. This dog-like behaviour is very well described in “The President’s Speech” a chapter in the strangely named but wonderful book “The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat” by the neurologist Oliver Sacks.

I try very hard never to lie and those that ever lie to me really do risk losing my friendship and respect. Trust flies away at the same moment and is unlikely ever to return. My reasons for avoiding lying do not stem from any high moral standpoint. They are far more functional than that.

In the first place, very few lies stand the test of time. The truth nearly always eventually comes out. I was once told of a Polish expression whence “a lie has short legs”. This provided me with an amusing vignette of a lie trying to escape detection but unable to do so because it couldn’t run fast enough.

In the second place, a lie once told has to be remembered or else the game is likely to be given away in the future. This involves unnecessary effort and usually it gets more and more complicated as subsequent lies have to be created to cover-up for earlier ones. The ability to remember what had been told in the past gets worse if  different lies get told to different people. If you prefer a simple life then avoid lies. Some “economy of the truth” may be necessary at times but even then be careful.

Most of us know the oath taken by a juror: “To tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”. This may apply in court but in real life the whole truth can sometimes be too much. If a patient is diagnosed with cancer should one immediately explain this and all the ramifications or is it acceptable to use some euphemism and then wait to truthfully answer any follow-up questions? How explicit should one be when a child asks “where did I come from”? To say “the stork brought you” wont satisfy the child for long so some restraint in “telling all” whilst not saying anything untrue would seem sensible. There are no real guidelines in such cases because each case is unique and will benefit from good judgement. Good judgement is more likely if such dilemmas have been thought about and discussed with others in advance.

It is so, so easy (perhaps even natural or instinctive) to want to always be seen by others in a good light and to never be in error. So much so that a lie can so easily slip out. We all have a degree of innate pride that is necessary for our psychological well-being and yet our stature can (paradoxically or not) actually be increased by being able to openly acknowledge when one has been wrong. No one is always right. We are all fallible. Thank goodness for it.

For me, amongst the most destructive lies are the ones that one tells to oneself. It takes the sort of courage that DH Lawrence’s poem refers to in order to live with the greatest integrity. It reads: “What makes people unsatisfied is that they accept lies. If people had courage, and refused lies and found out what they really felt and really meant and acted on it, they would distil the essential oil out of every experience and like hazel-woods of Autumn, at last be sweet and sound. And the young among the old would be as in the hazel-woods of September nutting, gathering nuts of ripe experience. As it is, all that the old can offer is sour, bitter fruits, cankered by lies“.

The complexities of truth lie at the heart of Kurosawa’s film “Rashomon” in which at least four different characters relate different versions of the murder of a man and the rape of his wife. Other complexities of truth can be seen when police witnesses of the same event tell different tales. The point is that truth is easily distorted particularly when people intend to deceive but also because the mind can fill in or alter holes in its own memory to make everything “fit together”. So untruths can told without any intent. That is why an untruth differs from a lie. One is a mistaken fact the other pure deceit.

The word deception is a “false friend” between the English and the French. Deception in French means disappointment in English and deception in English becomes tromperie in French. So be neither deceived nor disappointed by such usage. False friend is a good description of such words that don’t translate literally but there is another sort of false friend and that is the sort that bears false witness. For me amongst the most invidious lies are those that involve false witness. The reasons for blackening someone else’s character are bad enough if true but disgusting when they are untrue. Such false witness may come from envy or to hide one’s own fault but when it comes from pure bigotry and prejudice (and especially from state institutions) the results for mankind can be devastating. If the world stands silent at such times it has to share in that culpability and share in the shadow that it creates in the unconsciousness of us all. The dark shadow in our collective, hidden, instinctive and inherited unconsciousness that we would love to deny but which we cannot escape from.

Caution too is needed when making any promise, for a broken promise very rapidly can become a lie that not only hurts the other but also damages one’s own integrity. To borrow and never to repay is a well known way to lose friendship, whether by intent or by simple default. Either way such a debt is often rationalised as being something the lender can afford to lose. If that is the mentality in place it denigrates both borrower and lender. The same is true of any broken promise be it by intent or not. Hurtful to everyone.

Lies can also be “told” by omission and these are no better than those that are explicit. My sister and I were half-siblings because of an affair my mother had with her dying father’s nurse. We were brought up believing my father to be our father until we were aged twenty or thereabouts. Once we knew the truth it became clear why there had been certain ambiguities in the past. Why, for example, there had been an awkward silence in the room when someone said to my sister “Oh Mary you are so like your father”. During our childhood my sister and I had seldom been really close but knowledge of this particular truth brought as much closer together. In the end she was almost certainly my best friend and a person whom I still love unreservedly.

The extent to which one can fool oneself can be exemplified by the human ability for self-denial. One of the grossest examples of this that I recall was a woman (she was in fact the wife of a GP) who presented in an out-patients’ clinic with such an advanced breast cancer that it had perforated through the skin and was purulent and ulcerated. “I only noticed it last week” she claimed. I, myself, carried-on smoking cigarettes until, one night, I had a heart attack having previously lived in a state of denial that nothing bad would ever happen to me.

There is another sort of invidious and often unrecognised deception when an individual (or group) manipulate or selectively collect data to “prove” their own ideas or concepts or, possibly worse, to disprove or denigrate opposition. I have seen specific examples of this in so-called scientific medical research. I remember a professor at university, who had an unconventional theory but instead of initiating proper research to prove it he spent an inordinate amount of time in the medical libraries searching for anything that he could quote in his favour but also, and crucially, disregarding those articles against his belief.

This is a growing problem on the internet, which can so rapidly disseminate deception and misinformation and which helps contribute not only to conspiracy theories but also to the promulgation of erroneous theories and frank deceit. The causal relationship between types of immunisation and autism should, by now, have been totally debunked. The chief perpetrator of this idea has not only been proved to be wrong but has also been removed from the medical register for falsifying his results. The sad thing is that too many still believe his findings and many children have suffered, got brain damage, gone blind or died as a result of not having protection from certain and preventable infectious diseases.

An attendant conspiracy theory runs that the advice from the WHO (regarding the benefits to certain groups from influenza vaccination) is simply a result of lobbying from the multinational manufacturers. It is then believed that therefore the advice must be wrong and should be ignored. Whether there be lobbying or not, it is the facts alone that need to be understood and circulated.

There are and always have been (right back to the serpent in the very first garden) false prophets. One of Christ’s warnings (and one that I wholeheartedly endorse) is: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits“. The whole of Islam nowadays rises up in anger if there is the slightest criticism of their prophet and incite their followers to riot. I merely say look at the current fruits of Islam and its associated Islamofascism and judge for yourself. Pretty rotten fruit right now I would say.

I am writing these thoughts down to help me reflect on my own integrity and maybe to cause any readers to contemplate some of these things for themselves. I do not deny that I have sometimes wanted to be other than I actually was. I had, as an example, and like many of the “Anglo-Irish”, a romantic attachment to Ireland for a long time and was appalled by the way the country had been treated by the British for centuries. The lie that there had been potato famines in the eighteenth century being just one of these. It was in fact a starvation because large quantities of grain were exported to Britain during these times as cash for the absentee landlords. It was I suppose because I wanted to identify and feel solidarity with the Irish than I became a bit more Irish than was my natural state. I even developed a sort of Irish accent so that the Irish mostly still thought me English but the English would take me as Irish. It was a sham, of course, but as I have grown in my own self-confidence I have managed to drop these illusions excepting for such times that it is simply for fun or entertainment.

Thus I am wholly fallible in many ways but if I have learned anything in my life to date it is to, at least, attempt to never be afraid of being myself. In important interviews I have twice answered truthfully even though my replies were unconventional and would normally have been viewed badly. On both occasions I got the job – probably because truth is nearly always simple and more easily seen for what it is. I try not to wear any masks and in the end this is important to me in the following “spiritual” sense. If I get to stand on my maker’s threshold I want to be still recognisable as the me that was created; was created naive, naked and wearing no mask or disguise at all. If I am not recognisable what hope for my future thereafter.

That was going to be the punchline of this epistle but in recent months I have been reflecting on many things and that includes the nature and importance of “self belief” because it is real self-belief and not pride; it is real self-love and not vanity; it is real self-confidence and not ones fragile ego; it is real self-truth and not simple belief that can help one sleep well at night and make life on this planet more worthwhile and less nonsensical.

Such self-confidence and self-conviction can achieve much against the odds but to do so may take a lot of effort and a lot of pain. I recently saw the film about “Eddie the Eagle” (the only British Ski Jumper to participate in the Olympics and against all sorts of opposition). But he had great self-belief and although he came last in the competition his personal achievement was simply fantastic. Some people are lucky enough to have various talents. Usually having talent is not enough on its own but if worked-at it can bring huge rewards – materially, physically and psychologically. To deny such development to oneself is a sort of lie if it happens because of laziness or apathy or by being side-lined to other things of little real importance. Few achieve much in life without good work, study and practice.

I believe that to achieve a state of true self-reliance and self-belief one must eschew deceit and question most things that one is ever told in order that they become truly one’s own. Such freethinking is too often decried by the established order whether from a state or from a religion. Without the freethinkers of the enlightenment; without the self belief of such as Saint Joan; without the so-called nihilism of philosophers like Nietzsche and Sartre; without the evidence of “our eyes” and the doors opened by the real science behind Copernicus, Galileo Galilei, Darwin and others I believe that the collective unconsciousness of the “West” would be in a much worse place. Those that fear the Islam of today would do well to reflect on the days when Christendom was extremely brutal. It appears that Islam needs some free thinkers more than ever before.

So the world may yet have to suffer much at the hands of the new Russian “Czar” or to the Caliphates of revolutionary Islam or from the effects of global warming and exponential population growth but there is still hope and no need yet for despair. It is individuals who have been the main catalysts for change and not the masses or the results of ‘consensus groups’ or, by definition, the reactionary stance of most of the world’s religions. I believe that there is much truth and eloquence in the statement that: “Individuals are sometimes guided by reason. Crowds never“. It will take much time, maybe too much time, for the world to evolve into a better state of harmony and détente but for it to do so will require that we see more individuals of stature with real courage and not the grey mess being expounded by most of the political and religious institutions of today.

So stay alert, don’t be afraid to be a sceptic and bear in mind Alexander Pope’s words; “Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man“.

Postscript 30/3/20

Mendacity derived from the Latin mendax simply means untruthfulness or lying. It is embodied in the 8th Commandment “Thou shalt not bear false witness against your neighbour” and so it runs fundamentally counter to all of the three semitic religions (Christianity, Islam and Judaism). That there are those who seem able to turn it into an art form does not give it one iota of respectability.

George Washington’s “I cannot tell a lie” is a myth. A very different president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, said somewhere that “repetition does not transform a lie into a truth” and more eloquently, at the beginning of his inaugural address at another very hard time in 1932, said “This is pre-eminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. One might also contrast how Roosevelt, crippled by polio managed to largely conceal this, whilst Trump’s heel spurs saved him from Vietnam though not from the golf course.

What a contrast with today’s incumbent. The gross irony when Donald Trump repeatedly cries “Fake News” should not numb our senses nor our consciences. It is incredible just how so many have succumbed to his denigration of truth and of the press in particular. We must all up the ante of learning how to discern what is fact and what is fiction, what is true and what is false and indeed what is right and what is wrong.


Hard Arteries & Soft Bones

There is a known paradox that as the body ages there is a tendency for minerals to disappear from bone (osteoporosis) whilst, at the same time, increasing calcification is seen in blood vessels (atherosclerosis). However, in the absence of disease, the blood calcium levels remain remarkably constant despite wide variations in the amount of calcium ingested in both food and drink.

It is vital that the body maintains the concentration of calcium in the blood and ECF (extracellular fluid) within very narrow limits and it is very good at doing this. It has to be good at doing this because vital physiological actions (such as normal nerve conduction and all forms of muscle contraction) depend on the levels being very accurately set. Even quite small changes in blood calcium levels can have serious consequences for the whole nervous system and for the heart.

This finely tuned calcium homeostasis is achieved long-term by an ability to store excess in bone and also to excrete it in urine and faeces. When too little is ingested  the opposite happens – excretion is slowed  down and the blood level can be restored from the huge quantities stored in bone. Up until about the age of 25 the total amount stored in bone keeps rising. Thereafter this large store gradually falls, particularly in women after the menopause.

Other reasons than simply looking at calcium intake need to be found to explain the “calcium-out-of-bone and calcium-into-blood-vessel paradox”. Some yet unknown linking factor may yet come to light but for now these two contradictory effects would seem to be unrelated and not a paradox at all.

I need to say that I am not a specialist in the highly complex field of mineral metabolism though I used to be a specialist in Intensive Care and had to deal with the clinical consequences when such metabolism goes astray. It must be pointed out that soft tissues, other than blood vessels, can become calcified and that this can happen in both the young and the old. Leaving aside the formation of stones in urine, which can be understood by straightforward chemistry, there are numerous other examples of where calcification occurs in tumours, in bacterial nodules and other areas subject to chronic inflammation or irritation.

It is a straightforward postulate that the actual reason for “hardening of the arteries” is the chronic deposition therein of cholesterol-related plaques damaging the lining of the blood vessels and thence attracting calcification by attachment to adjacent Ca++ ions present in blood and the ECF of the the endothelium (the cellular lining) of the vessels. Also, and somewhat critically, that this will occur regardless of the blood calcium level. Such calcification in soft tissues is almost entirely a one way process with little or no reversal possible – unlike the active processes going on in bone formation and resorption.

Calcification takes place in the inner layer of arteries in the process known as atherosclerosis. The process begins with the  production of atheroma. This process, perhaps  surprisingly, begins in everyone in childhood and progresses at different rates in different individuals. Low density lipoproteins enter the inner endothelial layer of arteries and so do monocyte cells which then turn into macrophages. These phagocytic cells ingest these lipids. Some of the lipids can be exported to the liver by high density lipoproteins but the phagocytes eventually die and break apart leaving lipids and cell debris behind them. This is thus an inflammatory process and new macrophages then gobble up the mess and the process is repeated. Sequential calcification of these atheromatous plaques completes the process eventually leaving the vessels hard, inflexible, the lumen reduced in diameter and the whole vessel weakened both on the inside and on the outside. Sacs known as aneurysms (which can burst) may form on the outside and internal tears release substances which promote the formation of blood clots or thrombi. It is these thrombi that are the commonest cause of heart attacks and strokes.

Uncrystallised/dissolved calcium in the body fluids exists in two forms. As free chemically active calcium ions (Ca++) and also in another bound form where these cations (positively charged ions) are attached to corresponding (negatively charged) anions. Many of these bound anions will be chloride ions (Cl-) but the majority of bound calcium is tied to plasma proteins such as albumin. These proteins bind to Ca++ ions where they have negatively charged electrons available on their surface. These electronegative spots can also bind to any other available cations such as hydrogen (H+) and magnesium (Mg++) ions, all of which constantly compete with each other to pair up with any available electrons (e-).

It is most important to understand that it is the concentration of the unbound, free, ionised Ca++ ions that plays the critical role in the physiological reactions involving calcium in an organism. Any sudden change in the acid-base status, for example, is just one way of altering the bound to unbound ratio of the Ca++ ions since hydrogen (H+) ions constantly compete for their share of any available electrons. Thus if the blood becomes less acid (fewer H+ ions) some are then freed-up from where they had been bound to proteins in order to compensate for the induced alkalosis. The thus liberated  electronegative spots on the proteins can then be occupied by Ca++ ions causing a temporary fall in the free ionised levels of calcium. The resulting lowered ionised calcium levels (clinical hypocalcaemia) can rapidly cause symptoms such as tetany (muscle spasms) despite the fact that the body has enormous stores of calcium, in reserve, in its bone.

There is another closely related element, magnesium, that also plays a vital role in mineral metabolism. In like manner to calcium it dissociates into Mg++ ions and it too contributes to the large store of minerals in bone. Calcium and magnesium play intimately related roles, despite the fact that their clinical and physiological effects are often completely opposite to one another. It may seem surprising that atoms of calcium and magnesium (which are so similar both chemically and in size) can have such different effects. For now a simple approach is to say that when and where calcium levels cause excitement to nerves and muscles, magnesium tends to damp these effects down. Calcium does not exist in high concentrations inside cells, whereas magnesium is found there in significant amounts.

When a lot of people think of bone they imagine a hard, inflexible, dry and rather inert material. Nothing could be further from the truth. Living bone is a dynamic, flexible and metabolic tissue with a large blood supply. The fracture of a just a couple of large bones can lead to the need for a blood transfusion. In its marrow lie cells that are important in the formation of blood and for support of the immune system. When bones are broken they can, with certain limitations, rejoin and remould themselves. Bones are in fact constantly being dissolved and rebuilt. This is brought about respectively by osteoclasts and osteoblasts – two sets of very different specialised cells under hormonal control, which are capable of releasing and fixing calcium. Dissolving bone fairly obviously raises free calcium and rebuilding bone lowers it.

A very simple and classical overview of the hormonal control of calcium metabolism is that parathyroid hormone (PTH) corrects low levels and calcitonin (made in the thyroid) corrects high levels. These effects are mostly mediated by the control of osteoclast and osteoblast activity and by regulating renal excretion and reabsorption.

Vitamin D (or calciferol) in a number of forms plays an important ancillary role particularly where it can promote the absorption of calcium from the gut. Sub-optimal levels of vitamin D are particularly prevalent in the elderly and in northern latitudes or in those not exposed to enough sun. This can lead to a degree of secondary hyperparathyroidism (the release of PTH in response to lowered calcium levels) which in turn accentuates the demineralisation of bone so that blood levels of calcium are restored. A small daily intake of 400 to 800 IU is a straightforward, safe and inexpensive way to minimise this effect, particularly in the elderly. In postmenopausal women and in other conditions where there may be lower than normal levels of oestrogen (or testosterone in men) supplements of vitamin D will have little effect if the body’s levels are already OK but can help offset demineralisation if taken in conjunction with adequate calcium intake.

The complete picture of mineral metabolism is much, much more complicated than outlined so far. The relevant hormones and their co-factors interact in a complex manner. The interplay between calcium, magnesium, the acid-base status and other dissolved particles is equally complex. Low secretion of PTH, as just one example, can have the reverse effect of higher secretion. The fine control of the blood levels of these vital minerals and the mechanisms by which they affect their target cells (both directly and through various channels and gates in the cell membrane) is a very interesting subject but too big to consider right now. Newer research and understanding about this whole area may yet determine important roles for some of the vitamin K groups and a variety of other compounds such as the interleukins (which are involved in the production and control of osteoclasts).

A general overview of the body’s calcium stores is that, in youth and while the skeleton is still developing, a maximal store of calcium phosphate is created and laid down in bone in the form of the mineral hydroxyapatite (a type of calcium phosphate). Those that had a healthy youth and who have a big body frame get off to the best start. Thereafter there is gradual demineralisation of bone in just about everybody. One other noteworthy effect is that bones stay stronger when they bear weight. Being bedridden or being suspended in outer space or having one’s limbs immobilised in plaster are all examples that have detrimental effects on bone density. It is one area where a degree of obesity can actually be beneficial – perhaps this is because of the extra weight-bearing involved.

Suffice it to say that in the absence of disease and in the presence of a “normal” diet one is most unlikely to ever suffer the bad consequences of too much calcium or magnesium in the system. Eating and drinking adequate amounts of calcium and magnesium would actually seem to be sensible and not controversial. Taking small supplements of vitamin D (particularly for those not exposed to much sunlight or who are otherwise at risk of developing osteoporosis) has merit. There is increasing evidence that many (if not most) people do not consume enough magnesium and so perhaps, without overdoing it, regular supplements could have beneficial effects on maintaining not only an improved calcium status but also to give a bit of protection from some of the cardiovascular diseases that plague humanity now at the beginning of the third millennium.

Diet is one thing and it is so often regarded as the first port of call when things in one’s system seem to not be going to plan. For those truly interested in their health I would simply ask that, rather than concentrating on their diets, they concentrated on their whole lifestyle. Both smoking and excessive alcohol intake have a negative effect on bone mineralisation. Smoking puts people at a real risk of heart attack or stroke and a sedentary life will only exacerbate all these problems. I will not lecture others on what they should or should not do so, in return, please don’t lecture me.

I intend to write about my views on “diets” elsewhere but let me also say that I am not a health saint. I have always drunk a certain amount of alcohol and I smoked pretty heavily between the ages of 28 and 55. I was not overweight, not diabetic, my total cholesterol was normal, my blood pressure was normal, I was active on my farm and unstressed mentally and then one night I had a heart attack. I can certainly say that it was a shock and that I was very lucky that it was small and posterior (at the back of the heart) and very rapidly treated with “clot-busters” and a stent. As I lay in the Mater Hospital in Dublin, watching the radiologist doing the angiography and admiring his skill, I was able to see where a plaque of cholesterol had torn the lining of the artery. At that moment I also realised that about the only known risk factor in my life was that I was a smoker. So I determined, there and then, that I would never smoke again. I never did and I was never even tempted to begin.

Others can fool themselves if they want to and (just as I had done many times before) make periodic attempts to stop smoking or simply not care at all. With hindsight I know these two things. The first is to never even be tempted to start smoking – it is as easy (or easier) to become addicted to cigarettes as to heroin and for this the manufacturers and suppliers have to bear a share of the blame. The second point is that when I had tried to stop smoking, on a number of occasions, it was always in a rather “hopeful” way but that when I did finally stop it was because I had made a definite decision to do so. So you can do it if you want to but I believe you will be unlikely to succeed unless you make it your own conscious and definitive decision. A decision no one can take away from you.

I know I have already digressed away from mineral metabolism but while it is still in my mind I would like to add that the reason I started smoking tobacco was actually because I was tempted to try that “harmless” drug marijuana when at university in the 70s. I never became a regular user of the stuff and for me it was never (and was never likely to become) a “gateway” drug to heroin, cocaine, etc but it did lead me very quickly to an addiction to cigarettes. Be warned.

“A Portrait of the Artist”, Evil and Institutional Evil

Lying on its battered side, a 1960 edition of James Joyce’s autobiographical “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man” came into view. One or two penciled notes inside indicated that it must have been mine for ‘O’ level GCE. I don’t know how much I really appreciated it then but as I thumbed through it, towards the end, I found just one place where I had marked something in ink: “… and if Jesus suffered the children to come why does the church send them all to hell if they die unbaptized? Why is that?

Anyway that helped me to decide to re-read it and in doing so it has re-awakened issues related to my own upbringing as a Roman Catholic brought up in an Anglo-Irish Protestant environment.

Before I relate how the book was evocative of my own education at the hands of the Benedictine monks at Ealing Abbey, I will just tuck to one side the deeply divisive effect created within Joyce’s own family (and elsewhere) by the descent into “disgrace” of that political colossus of the nineteenth century, Charles Stewart Parnell. His monument today stands proudly at the north end of O’Connell Street in Dublin. Another monument in O’Connell Street used to be Nelson’s Pillar, which was blown up in 1966 by the IRA, and at the other end stands the emancipator Daniel O’Connell. There was always a certain irony that Ireland had these three adulterers standing up on high pedestals in view of one another in the main street of “catholic” Ireland’s capital city.

The Liberal leader H. H. Asquith called Parnell one of the three or four greatest men of the 19th century, while Lord Haldane described him as the strongest man the House of Commons had seen in 150 years. The thing that destroyed this Irish political colossus (for Land Reform and for Irish Home Rule) was because of a long-standing relationship with Kitty O’Shea with whom he had fallen in love at first sight and fathered three children. Quite cynically her husband Captain William O’Shea would not grant a divorce because his wife had expectations of coming into a legacy but eventually he changed his mind after Parnell and he clashed over a by-election in Galway and after the rich aunt of his wife died but left her money in trust. Once the affair became public Parnell was ‘shot to pieces’ by the Church and every like-minded sanctimonious individual and institution. It truly was the beginning of the end for him and even two of his own children were placed in the custody of Captain O’Shea!

The news of Parnell’s death in Joyce’s own home is recaptured in the following scene. “At the door Dante turned round violently and shouted down the room, her cheeks flushed and quivering with rage: – Devil out of hell! We won! We crushed him to death! Fiend! – The door slammed behind her. Mr Casey, freeing his arms from his holders, suddenly bowed his head on his hands with a sob of pain. – Poor Parnell! he cried loudly. My dead king! – He sobbed loudly and bitterly. Stephen, raising his terror-stricken face, saw that his father’s eyes were full of tears.

At that time, of course, and for many years afterwards the “church” wielded enormous influence in Ireland but how things have changed now following the overt hypocrisy that lay behind the ‘adulterous affair’ (for want of a better term for a prolonged sexual relationship between a proclaimed celibate and a divorcée) of Bishop Casey of Galway and later-on the cover-up of paedophile priests right up to Ireland’s most senior Catholic cleric Cardinal Sean Brady. One thing that particularly blackened Bishop Casey in many peoples’ eyes was that he had a son that at first he wished to be adopted and then later, when the whole business became public, he was reluctant to even acknowledge. The French are right to keep Church and State as separate as possible. Both can do harm, of course, but the almost boundless harm done when they can act in unison is perhaps now best seen in those Islamic States that aim to keep the Mosque and the State (or Caliphate) as one.

Adultery at that time was enough to finish a man (or woman) and of course it remains, in many parts of the Muslim world, a capital offense. Not only is it a capital offense that can be carried out by stoning but to increase the penalty they may use small stones to make the death even slower. Barbaric and cynical are the words that come to mind. I hope that Islam can move as far as Ireland has in the last century, though it would seem to be unlikely that they could move as far as to become a country that could legalise same-sex marriage. Such an act could only realistically happen in a country that can make a distinction between church and state and very many people around the world were astonished when “catholic” Ireland became the first county to do this by a popular mandate in a referendum.

I have a Roman Catholic background for sure and there have been times, for one reason or another, that I have flirted with the idea of re-establishing better contact. On the last two occasions that I was tempted to go spontaneously to mass on my own, the priest from the pulpit turned me away again. On the first occasion the congregation were admonished for not singing properly ‘as they do in Protestant churches’, etc, etc, and the second occasion was just before the same-sex marriage referendum and I leave it to your imagination just what the oratory was like.

It interests me that Pope Francis is a Jesuit. James Joyce was educated by Jesuits. First at Clongowes and later at Belvedere. Re-reading his memories was just so, so, so, evocative of my own experiences at the hands of the Benedictines. He and I both experienced the corporal punishment that was prevalent in such a system. He and I both experienced the terror, the humiliation and the pain of its execution. He and I both experienced the additional hurt of it being inflicted in an arbitrary way and when no offense had actually been committed. At the age of 13, I simply walked out of the school and would not return. There was never any apology of course. He, at about the same age and at a boarding school, had the guts to go the “head” (the rector) to complain but the rector simply made some measly excuse and didn’t have the guts or the inclination to correct things. It is so often easier to do nothing than to correct a wrong but such inaction is also very wrong.

Another Irish literary giant, George Bernard Shaw, in typical hyperbolic style, made the point that: “If you strike a child, take care that you strike it in anger, even at the risk of maiming it for life. A blow in cold blood neither can nor should be forgiven.

I don’t intend to speak in any depth about my own faith at this moment-in-time though the establishment would, I am sure, consider me a “lapsed catholic”. What I will say is that my drift away from the mainstream kick-started when I suddenly realised that I had been saying the creed (verbatim and without any thought) for far too many years. What appalled me at that moment was that I had been so indoctrinated as to say something (about belief of all things) that I had never, at any time, been encouraged to think about myself and thereby make my own. The words had just been slipped into my mind; a sleight of hand; a neat conjuring trick.

The next rather extended, but still evocative, passage from “A Portrait” was all to do with an “Easter retreat” peppered with its associated hell-fire sermons, confession and absolution. Oh! such relief and purity that could be engendered now that one had been made acceptable to God. The grim reaper could now come to call.

Everything about such a system is brutal and lacks humanity, humility and even wisdom. I would go as far as to say that it is actually wicked and probably evil. Just as evil as the indoctrination going on with the modern ‘islamofascist’ movements and particularly the mind-games and rote-learning that is forced into those children’s minds.

Of course that begs the question: “What is evil?” I have thought about this a lot and so, keeping semantics out of it, I think that a simple, self-evident approach has merit. I think the majority of people know what is and what is not evil. People and institutions may of course become implicated in evil and attempt to justify what they are doing. The Nazis, when the war was lost, rushed to try to hide what they had been up to and notable members committed suicide. They knew very well and had realised for sure that what had been going-on was pure evil. No rationalisation could help them now they were to be exposed.

I have come to the conclusion that although a cast-iron definition of evil may be impossible I do however think that all evil only comes about when people attempt to coerce others to do their will. Let me be clear that I do not think that all acts of coercion are evil but I do think that one should always take a step back and think carefully when one desires others to do as one would have them do. If there is any concept of the goodness of God versus the evil of the Devil that helps embellish this, it is the concept of the gift of Free Will on the one hand and the coercive and intentional seduction that things must be done “my way” on the other.

Traveling in a car once with my Uncle Wynne, I raised this topic with him. He agreed with me but he made his point that it was even more evil when evil was institutionalised. It was a good point because often individuals can hide within their club or their party or their tribe or their religion or their employer or their whatever and somehow thus justify their own complicity – however blinkered they had become.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer is described as a Christian martyr. He was indeed a remarkable man, though I personally do not warm to him or anyone who is imbued with evangelical zeal. Where he was a giant was that he continued to speak out against evil – and in particular the evil of Hitler’s rise to power – and this despite deprivation and imprisonment and then leading finally to his murder just before the end of the war. That he did this as an individual is particularly worthy of note.

There were “institutions” and “states” that were unbelievably silent during those terrible times and in that respect much of humanity must share some of the culpability for not having been much more outspoken. Certainly it was known in many high circles that such acts of evil were being perpetrated. The clichéd expression of uncertain origin runs: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing“. Bonhoeffer put it much more strongly: “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.” To say that “not to speak is to speak” must, I think be tempered by the situation. It takes one sort of courage for an individual to speak out against wrong-doing in the face of violent opposition and another for an organisation to stay silent when it has very little to lose by speaking out.

Many others than the Jews were persecuted in the “Holocaust” but unfortunately the roots of antisemitism go down deep and no institution is more culpable of this than the Catholic Church. The roots of empire are also very long and its own chauvinism has often played its part in the more rotten affairs of mankind.

In the end, evil involves brutality of one sort or another and results in both physical and mental pain. There is an additional aspect of brutality that needs careful thought. The brutalised tend to become brutalisers themselves. I believe that the evidence shows that the abused are the most likely to become abusers. Paedophiles so often were victims of their own (commonly incestuous) childhood rape; the bullied learn to become bullies, when it’s their turn; the beaten foe wants revenge and not to turn the other cheek. That seems to be the way of the world far too often and it is a circle or cycle of violence that tends to perpetuate itself. The old testament book of Esther has much in it about the futility of revenge. I have a recurrent dream, where a black-garbed Benedictine monk turns into a spider, whose legs I pull off one by one. I will never forget that school, which all but finished my proper formal education, and the revenge I desire is to see is that the system itself is turned into legless and impotent dust.

Spare the rod and spoil the child was once a common catchphrase but I believe that the free use of the rod did far more harm than good. Thank goodness there has at last been a reformation, a modern enlightenment, of education in “the West”. Youth always did have and always will have “problems” but I believe there is more hope for us all when the brutality and evil of coercive education is minimised or abolished. I also believe there is more hope for humanity when the clerics learn more to lead by example and not by their rhetoric from the pulpit or the minaret.

Joyce, I salute you. I salute your unique style and intellect. Finnegan’s wake still largely alludes me but everything else you wrote is full of perception, observation and wit that I do understand. Your self-exile from Ireland is a sad fact yet it was laudable and the literary world is much enriched by those who persevered to see your work published against the wishes of many of the establishment. Any evil was in their attempted coercion to silence you and not in the way you lived, observed and worked.