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The bleeding statue.

In the west Cork countryside, a local farmer died suddenly. It was due to natural causes. After the funeral, as his family was tiding up his house, a young boy noticed that the sacred heart statue was bleeding blood. Soon, word spread about this event. People gathered to see this alleged miracle. There were voices wondering if the old man was a saint? Was this bleeding statue a sign from heaven that this man was living a hidden holy life? Local businesses were delighted with the extra trade coming their way. Sincere devoted people felt comfort from visiting the house. The parish priest felt uncomfortable with what was happening. He didn’t want to alienate his parishioners. But he was sceptical about this alleged miracle. He shared his doubts with his bishop. His bishop shared his own doubts about this event. The Bishop decided an investigation was needed quickly in order to find out the truth about this event.

Professor Austin Mccarthy was an English born son of Irish parents. He was a professor of philosophy in Oxford. He specialised in the philosophy of science. His intellectual passion was in defending science and in debunking irrational claims. He is a Catholic himself, but he valued science, too. He was in Rome giving a lecture on science and religion. After the lecture, Austin was relaxing, drinking a glass of wine. A young priest who worked in the Vatican approached Austin about the events in West Cork. The priest wandered would Austin be interested in investigating this event? Austin was interested in what was happening in West Cork. He did read about these events. Austin agreed to accept the young priest’s request, and the next day, Austin Mccarthy booked a flight to Cork.

After meeting the bishop and the parish priest, Austin decided to visit the village himself. He decided to investigate the statue himself. He wanted to see what was actually going on with the statue. Austin decided to work with the local police, the guards, and the local church in his investigation of this case. The local Guard Gerry Devlin knew the area and the people very well. Gerry was a real help to Austin in his investigation. The guards sealed off the house, and the statue was investigated by a select group of scientists who were handpicked by the science department in UCC.

After what Austin discovered in relation to this case, he decided to contact Garda Gerry Devlin. A detective was sent from Dublin to handle this case.

X-rays showed that the statue was tampered with. The blood was enclosed within the statue. The blood was pumped out of the statue using a small hole in the statue. A timer pumped the blood at regular times. The only people who had access to the house when the old man died was his family. It was discovered that his son, who was an engineer, had tampered with the statue order to produce this so-called miracle. The motivation was discovered why the son did the tampering. The son’s bank account showed that he pocketed the money that believers gave to the shrine in the house. It was an opportunist crime, and the motivation for this crime was pure greed.

John O Brien.

You can support my writing by buying my first book, Christianity and social democracy. It can be bought in Kanturk Bookshop, Dicks Supervalu Charleville, Foleys Ballydeheen Mallow and O Mahoney Bookshop Limerick. You can buy a copy online on Thebookshop.ie or O Mahoney. You can can contact me directly to buy a copy.

Updates on my writing.

I have been busy with my writing lately. I am selling the last remaining copies of my first book, Christianity and social democracy. I am editing my second book on the creed, and I am writing a science fiction book. I have been so busy that I have neglected my blog. I do hope to get back to blogging as there are many issues that need to be dealt with in the world today.

You can support my writing by buying my first book, Christianity and social democracy. Dicks Supervalu in Charleville and Foleys near the credit union in Mallow sell my book. You can buy my book in O Mahoney Bookshop Limerick. You can buy my book online @TheBookshopIE and O Mahoney Bookshop website.

John O Brien.

Book launch of Joanna Foley book at 14.30pm Mallow Arts Festival. It will be at West End Arts Studio in Mallow.

https://mallowartsfestival.com/2024/07/03/book-launch-with-joanna-foley/?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR1_WHQyhz8bQMsr1nClsy1cMm362SRyhcHNGVGVSQHMKGVFeu0Dhie7Ok4_aem_nR3jIIk9sW89H0Td1V3eWg&sfnsn=mo

Town councils.

10 years ago we lost our town councils in Ireland. Mallow Town Council had the lowest business rates in the county of Cork. Local businesses saw a rise in their rates when the Town Council was abolished. What did we achieve by this measure? What did we gain by getting rid of town councils? Our local democracy is poor in Ireland, but not having town councils means that our local democracy is even poorer now. Our county councillors are expected to be full-time politicians on part-time wages. To enhance freedom, national democracy needs a robust local democracy as its foundation. The running of the councils is in the hands of appointed chief executives. Directly elected mayor’s isn’t the answer to this democratic deficit. Look at America and the mess of its politics. I don’t want that for local democracy. Parliamentary democracy is superior to presidential democracy. The mayor should be elected from the councillors and by the councillors. Nationally, the government is elected by the Dail. Enjoy the local and European elections, and remember to vote.

Everyone has a part to play in public policy.

Rule by elites undermines democracy. In feudal times, elite families were thought to have expert knowledge that allowed them to impose their views on others. But in modern times, we have new elites that think that they have expert knowledge. They think that their knowledge of reality gives them the ability to impose their views on other people. But everyone is an expert in certain aspects of life. Specialist knowledge in one area doesn’t mean that we know everything about life. Everyone has their own experience of life, this experience means that they have a contribution to the debates that a society has.

Rural people have their own views, and this is true of urban people, too. A scientist may know about the natural world, but they may not know much about the political world. If we accept that everyone is an expert, then we should allow all voices to the debate. By listening to each other, we can make our society more democratic. We can also develop a consensus and tackle the problems that we face as humans.

The rule by experts is just as elitist as rule by feudal lords. By viewing having all citizens involved in decision making, we make our democracy stronger. We also will begin to solve the social problems that we face as a nation.

Freedom of religion and freedom from religion

You can support my writing by buying my book Christianity and social democracy. You can buy a copy in Kanturk bookshop, O Mahoneys Limerick, Dicks Supervalu Charleville Foleys Ballydaheen Mallow. You can buy my book online, Thebookshop.ie.

Real societies don’t think with one mind. It is made up of people who have different religions and moral beliefs. Debate in this context is natural, and debate on these issues enables us to grow in knowledge of the truth. But when a state imposes its views on society, oppression is increased, and the real economic issues are downplayed and ignored.

A theocratic state is a state that justifies its power over the individual and society by an appeal to God or the gods. Iran is a prime example of this type of state. But there are other states that rule in this way. These states transform religious leaders into politicians. These states oppress minorities. But believers in the majority religion who believe that their religion is not faithful to its core teaching are alienated from the theocratic state, too. It allows the rulers to be corrupt in many ways and justify their corruption by an appeal to their religious authority.

Atheists and agnostics would reject theocratic states because they are oppressed by this state. Religious minorities would feel the same way as the atheists and the agnostics about a theocratic state. But members of the majority religion in a theocratic state should join others in rejecting a theocratic state. These states corrupt the religious leaders. They also create unnecessary conflicts and introduce force instead of freedom in relation to religious faith and practice. In Ireland, the Catholic Church in the past had too much control over the state. Bishops became politicians. Church teaching in areas like its social teaching was downplayed. In the past, we had people who conform to church practice while their own views were hidden.

To ensure freedom and equality of all citizens, faith should be a personal matter. The state should be secular and neutral in matters of religion. People of faith and people who don’t have faith could then in freedom develop their views without religious imposed beliefs forced on them. Theocratic states do distort beliefs to suit ruling elites.

People should be free to believe or not believe in any religion. The state should be secular and neutral in regard to religion. Then, we might focus on real economic material issues instead of other issues.

Writing updates, Christ or Caesar, public services in crisis.

I have 2 chapters left to type in my second book. Then, I will need to edit the book many times before it is ready for the reading public. I will put Galway on hold for now, but I want to have a book launch of my first book, Christianity and social democracy in Galway in the future. For now, you can support my writing by buying my first book, Christianity and social democracy. You can buy a copy in O Mahoneys Limerick, Dicks Supervalu Charleville, Foleys Ballydaheen Mallow and online through Thebookshop.ie. Copies of my book are selling, so get a copy before they are all gone.

Christian leaders can rule like Caesar in the name of Christ. This type of leadership does great harm in preaching the Gospel. Caesar is the type of ruler that seeks to have power over us. We may feel terror at displeasing the secular ruler, or we may believe that only the ruler can help us when we need help. But following Christ rejects this type of leadership. Christ came to serve and not be served by people. Christ was poor and powerless, who died a rebel, and he died helpless on the cross. The power of Christ is the power of love that liberates us humans. A servant helps people they don’t overpower them. Christian leadership should model itself on Christ. It should be a service to others. The fact that we have examples where this type of service leadership isn’t always practised shouldn’t be an excuse to abandon this ideal.

Our public services in Ireland are under-resourced. From the breakdown of public order to health care being in crisis to a housing crisis, our experience of public services in Ireland is poor. It is assumed that we are a rich country. If we are a rich country, then why do we have these problems? If that statement is true, then the government doesn’t care for its citizens. If the country isn’t as rich as the experts say that it is, then that would mean that the money isn’t there to fund our public services. But the public services are in a bad shape. The government is doing a bad job of running the country, it doesn’t have the money or it cares more for the rich and it does for ordinary people. Maybe instead of arguing about minor issues, we should focus on the issue of public services.

My writing it is tough being a thinking, compassionate Catholic, housing in Ireland.

Christianity and social democracy and other projects. Copies of my book are selling well. There are still copies of my book for sale in O Mahoneys Limerick, Dicks Supervalu Charleville and Foleys Ballydaheen Mallow. You can buy my book online through Thebookshop.ie. I am actually writing 2 new books, a book on the creed, and a science fiction book called Journey to Utopia. I decided to write a book on the creed because I think that a basic knowledge of the Christian faith is lacking. My first book sums up years of reflection on my political theology. This new book will be a part 2 of my first book. I want to focus on storytelling in the area of science fiction. It is an area of storytelling that I love, but I find some stories to be depressing. I want my stories to give hope to people. Yes, we do need hope at this time of bad news.

In general, living my faith with love can be a challenge. We should remember that no one has all the answers to the questions of life. We should be open to having our views challenged all the time. Church history is instructive where the church had to revise its views on issues. We have the revelation from God in the Church, but our knowledge of the natural world has to be worked out using our human reason alone. As an example, our knowledge of biology has changed because we have new knowledge that has been discovered by scientists. The Galileo case should make us pause as a church when we try to understand certain aspects of our faith in the light of the natural science. This is a plea for humility in the Church today. We do need to realise that we don’t have all the answers and we need to approach our situation in life with love.

Local and EU election campaigns are underway. We will have a general election sometime in the future. A major issue in Irish politics is the housing crisis. To resolve this crisis, we need to understand the economy today in Ireland. Housing is too dear for many people, and money that could be spent in the local economy is instead spent on rent. There are deep issues involved, but as a start, we should learn from the past. The building of local authority housing on public land should be the starting point in tackling our crisis. Allow ordinary working people to be housed. Income limits are too low. In the past, the Dail was recalled in the summer to save a beef company. But our government doesn’t have the same feeling of crisis when it comes to housing. The private market isn’t meant to solve the housing crisis. Money that could be invested in the productive economy is instead tied up in the housing market. We as a people can do better.

You can support my writing by buying my book Christianity and social democracy. You can contact me X @irishfabian Facebook John O Brien Irish author and Instagram Johnobrienirishauthor.