The remarks posted as a BLOG (August 13) arose from reading Frank McNally’s IRISHMAN’S DIARY in the IRISH TIMES of August 6th. They are excerpts from a long and hurried email sent to Jude
“McNally is by far the best columnist writing in any daily newspaper in Ireland, if not the world. His columns are invariably informed and informative, and come from a good brain and a generous heart. They are unlikely to compete for favour with those Irish writers quoted in anti-Irish publications around the world.
Frank McNally remarks on the shock that a Catholic, or even an atheist, visiting St Patrick’s Church of Ireland (Protestant) Cathedral in Dublin ,might get on examining the monuments to British Imperial criminality – such as forcing opium on the
Chinese in 1840, the later seizure by force of Hong Kong from the Chinese, the seizure of Burma etc,
The Catholic Church’s commemoration of imperial violence appears limited to an event in 33 AD when their Founder was the victim.
McNally praises St Patrick’s Cathedral for its Guidebook which acknowledges the UNHOLY ORIGIN of its monuments and quotes authorities such as William Gladstone who condemned the evil as it was being perpetrated.
Frank McNally’s column may perhaps never be engraved in gold over the entrance of THE IRISH TIMES. But in these decadent times, in the dystopian state, which would honour imperial criminals and traduce the people who challenged them,,may yet stand as the finest writing in this Decade of Remembrance.
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