Is Ireland Going Down The Swanee?

Over the last few days the media has been reporting on the worsening economic situation here in Ireland.  Now the EU and IMF are urging our government to accept a bailout to help sort out the crisis, but our Taoiseach (Prime Minister) and Minister for Finance are resisting it.  Today, we are told, representatives from the EU and the IMF arrive in Dublin for "negotiations" with our government - economists and journalists see the writing on the wall - the IMF is about to take over and our government is in denial.  The British have told us that they are willing and ready to help us out - you imagine how that will be received by the Irish!

I am no economist, and to be honest when I listen to all the information which is being spilled out like blood in a abattoir, I get wheezy.  Are things that bad?   People are now saying that Ireland is about to lose her sovereignty, hard won back in the 1920's - although we have thrown a lot of it away with the various EU treaties we have signed up for.  But the big question is: is Ireland about to collapse?  We are being told that the future of the EU is at stake - we have heard that before too.  Is the Euro about to collapse too?   No harm, we never liked it anyway - Monopoly money which helped hike up the prices here. 

People are in a bad way here - I look around and see unemployment going up and despair rising with it.  Every time I go to Dublin now I see many more sleeping on the streets - not just the Roma who run an organised begging business, but others - ordinary Irish, sleeping in doorways - not dishevelled and dirty, but clean and respectable, now hiding behind cardboard.  Our suicide rate is rising, although there may be other factors there - the loss of faith tends to have a role to play there, but certainly many people feel like there is no way out of their troubles. 

But, you know, we have been travelling to this point for a long time, even when the economic boom made us one of the richest countries in the world.  Some have said that the Irish did not know how to handle wealth - and you know, I agree with that.  When we got wealthy we lost a lot of our humanity, and we lost our faith.  Someone once said to me about five years ago that the Irish had no civility - they had money now and they were bossy and ignorant, unmannerly - our wealth went to our heads and we thought we were "IT".   I have to agree with that.  Many Irish were insufferable.  As a priest I experienced many Irish looking down their noses at me and my faith - the superstitions of peasants, now they were rich they no longer had need for such childish occupations.  Perhaps we have ended up where we deserve to be - the pariah of Europe.  We need to learn humility.  A friend to mine once said that it takes a lot of humiliation to learn a little humility - is this the programme laid out for Ireland's return to faith?

Perhaps I am being too harsh.  There are those who do need to be taken down a peg or two, we leave them to God, but there are also those who are suffering, many of whom did not benefit from the Celtic Tiger in the first place - my heart goes out to them.   Our charities are under tremendous strain - the Society of St Vincent de Paul, which I have worked with for a number of years, is counting the pennies and relying on God's providence.   I can only hope that the Lord will look after them and keep the money rolling in.  Some cases the organisation have to deal with are shocking, crippling debts that cannot be sorted and whatever help the Society can give is a mere drop in the ocean. 

Well, I think now is the time for faith.  We have landed ourselves in pickle - an enormous, acidic pickle jammed in a jar, and I think it is bringing to us to have a good look at ourselves.   It is the old story over again - man messes up, God has to sort it out - such is our fallen humanity.  I pray something good will come out of all this, and I pray that that will be a return to our faith and a healthy distrust of the prestige wealth and status (and sophistication) bring.   I believe things will be sorted, but in the meantime we need to look after our new poor.  Time, perhaps, for new Catholic foundations to reach out to them.  Who knows, maybe all of this will help in the renewal of the Church in Ireland. God alone knows, so we must let him guide us.