A Different View
Crayons in the Cathedral add colour for the kids
A Different View with Dave O’Connell
There was an old rule of thumb much loved and adhered to by adults that suggested children should be seen and not heard – few, it should be said, took that more to heart than the Catholic Church.
The only noise you could make during Mass was to respond to the priest in the way clearly laid out in the booklet.
For those who might have taken a more freestyle approach to proceedings, there were special rooms – still are in most churches – into which those likely to make noise during Mass were corralled.
Some foolhardy parents were brave enough to take a chance on their little treasures maintaining a Job-like silence during ceremonies.
But they then ran the risk of having to take the ultimate walk of shame down the aisle with a screaming child wriggling from their grasp while the preacher, incandescent with rage, stopped proceedings entirely just to heighten the tension.
Talking during Mass was up there with stealing the altar wine in terms of mortal sin – but, it seems, no more.
Galway Cathedral, for one, now makes a point of telling the congregation that there are crayons and sheets of paper in front of the altar in case any of the younger participants need diversion.
Apparently the Cathedral isn’t on its own in this more liberal approach to children – other Churches have been doing this for even longer – and not alone is nobody annoyed at the rise in background noise, they appear to welcome it.
The sheets of paper – it must be said – have a religious theme to them, but little people just want to colour inside and outside the lines; they wouldn’t know God from Goosey Goosey Gander, and they’re as likely to give him a purple face as a flesh-coloured one.
The irony here is that purple used to be the colour the priest’s face went if anyone so much as budged at the wrong time in years gone by.
Nobody really minds the odd yelp out of a little person during Mass – at least outside of the consecration – and bringing the kids with you is the only way that young parents can get to go in the first place.
Equally, if you’re going to Mass, what’s the point in then enclosing yourself in a soundproof room away from the main body of the Church?
You might as well stay at home and tune into some Mass on the radio.
So getting out the crayons is a great idea – once the little people stick to colouring in the pages rather than parts of the Cathedral itself.
There nothing wrong with a little bit of noise during Mass anyway; we weren’t meant to sit like automatons, speaking only when spoken to – and certainly two year olds were never put on this earth to stay quiet.
It’s the same in libraries these days…gone is the era when you’d be afraid to as much as whisper in the presence of a librarian, even if you were trying to find a particular book.
There would be more noise in the Dail during the summer recess than you’d find in a library 20 years ago – but that’s all over now as well.
These days, there are readings, computer classes, children’s workshops, mothers’ mornings…everything that makes up a vibrant place where interaction is encouraged instead of frowned upon.
Because like the Church, a library should be a living thing, not an austere building where the emphasis is on stick more than carrot.
I didn’t see any rush to the crayons corner in the Cathedral, but it wasn’t so much the art option that mattered – it was the fact that the priest acknowledged that children might need diversion, and that if they did, they were still welcome.
Small steps for sure, but ones in the right direction – and maybe the next generation will turn Mass attendance into an art form.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
A Different View with Dave O’Connell
The only time in your life that you should ever utter the words: “Do you know who I am?” are if you’ve just had a bang on the head or you are unfortunately suffering from dementia.
Because, otherwise, the phrase ‘do you know who I am’ only serves to make things a whole lot worse.
Normally, the phrase is unleashed towards late night door staff on a wave of alcohol – and never once in the history of time has it produced the result the utterer had intended.
The doorman may well know who you are which is often the very reason you’re not getting into the place in the first instance – or if he doesn’t know who you are, he won’t be unduly influenced when he does, unless you’re a famous movie star or his long-lost cousin.
‘Do you know where I am?’ might often be closer to the phrase you’re looking for, because that would serve you well when you’re looking for a taxi.
‘Do you know who I am?’ is a threatening phrase that in truth wouldn’t frighten the cat. But if you’re anxious to dig the hole a few shovels deeper, you should follow up with ‘I’d like to speak to your manager.’
Managers can be elusive at the best of times, but they’re normally rarer than hen’s teeth when it comes to the small hours of the morning – and even if they’re there, they are most likely watching proceedings on CCTV…just so they know who you are, in case you yourself can’t remember.
‘I’d like to speak to your manager’ suggests that you and he or she are from the one social sphere which is several strata north of the one occupied by door staff.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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A Different View with Dave O’Connell
As it turned out, we were much closer to a Eurovision win than we could ever have imagined – not Ireland, of course, because we’ve now mastered the art of just sending cannon fodder to be blown out in the semi-final.
No, this was just two of us – myself and our eldest – who were lucky enough to be at Anfield for the Reds’ recent win over Brentford, where positioned in the seat right in front of us were four happy lads from Finland.
One of them, we now know, was Käärijä, the singer of the catchiest song at Eurovision, Cha Cha Cha.
But just a week before 7,000 people sung his catchphrase at the Eurovision Arena, he and two his mates – accompanied by an older bloke who had to be either his dad or from the national broadcaster – sat anonymously in the same corner of the lower level of Anfield’s Main Stand.
He was utterly unknown to us as well of course, and the only thing that saw him stand out was his green nail varnish. Live and let live, of course, but it still ensures that you make an impression even if it looks like you were just very late for St Patrick’s Day.
Käärijä may well be Liverpool’s greatest Scandinavian fan, although the bar for that is set fairly high, given that they invade the city in greater numbers every two weeks than the Vikings did just once during the first millennium.
Equally, he may not be a football fan at all – although, as the rest of the week proved, he sure loves a crowd.
Positioned as we were in the corner of the Main Stand, the next section to us, around the corner in the Anfield Road Stand – currently adding a top layer – was occupied by the visiting Brentford supporters.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
A Different View with Dave O’Connell
Contactless payments reached a record €17.9 billion in Ireland last year – up by 31 per cent on 2021, as people came out from under their Covid shell and appear to have left their cash behind them.
Figures from the Banking & Payments Federation found that – despite the cost-of-living increases – the Irish public made three million contactless payments a day, worth an average of €53 million in the final quarter of 2022.
Given that there are 3.8 million people in Ireland over the age of 18, that means that almost every single one of us tapped the card every day last year.
And again, on the presumption that there are a few who still prefer peeling a fifty off a wad of notes, the true figure may be even higher, as we eschew actual money every time we go into a restaurant, bar or shop.
Then comes the monthly morning of reckoning when you open your statement – electronic of course because, like paper money, banks don’t deal in paper statements anymore either – and your guilty secrets unfurl like a rap sheet before your very eyes.
Five taps of a Friday night in the local, followed by a five-ounce burger meal on the way home.
And just why did you need a family-pack of crisps when a small bag would have done? Was all that beer and wine really for a party, or a night in just for one?
Cash provided plenty of dark corners to ignore your profligacy, but there are no hiding places in the contactless world.
Worse still, until that morning of reckoning arrives, you’ve no clue how much you’ve spent, and handing over the card doesn’t hurt half as much as parting with hard cash.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
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