Là Fhèill Brìghde 2015

This has been a busy Imbolc, so this will be brief. Here's our Là Fhèill Brìghde video. We made this last spring, so this is the first time we've had it for the festival day.


We've been continuing to work on the missing Manannán situation, and will have more materials out shortly.  For Imbolc proper, Annie got it together in the midst of it all to post Là Fhèill Brìghde links and stuff, as well as some lovely photos of Brigid's well and environs at her sanctuary in Kildare. Check 'em out, and we'll be back shortly.

Singing Manannán Home - New Video and Memes

The search for the Limavady Manannán statue continues. As Gaelic Polytheists, as people involved in cultural preservation, we are continuing to assist the effort, via networking and raising the alert via the Gaol Naofa and CAORANN pages on Facebook and Twitter (Gaol Naofa Twitter, CAORANN Twitter), and now with a new video and some more memes.


For this video we have compiled some of the many, astonishingly beautiful photos of the statue and land in Limavady, County Derry, Ireland (Léim an Mhadaidh, Co. Dhoire, Éire), plus a prayer we are using to call Manannán home. This video also has the Manx lyrics synched up with the corresponding verses in the song, to better facilitate learning.

We are calling Manannán from wherever he is, to show himself in the world, and to reveal the whereabouts of the statue. If the statue has been destroyed, we will support efforts to have it replaced. But it is up to the people of Limavady, and the sculptor, John Darren Sutton. The Limavady town council has expressed interest in replacing it themselves. After all, they originally commissioned the piece as part of their sculpture and heritage trail. If their budget will not adequately cover a replacement, we have also promised to help with any needed fundraising. While it's impressive to see the worldwide attention on this, those of us in the diaspora need to remember that any fundraising - if it is even necessary - needs to go through the local community in Ireland, specifically the Limavady community, and not through any individual from outside that community.

These amazing photos were largely collected via the Facebook group, Bring back Manannan Mac Lir the Sea God.  All the photographs in the video and memes are used with permission from, and gratitude to, the photographers (see the video credits for the full list of participants). Feel free to share them to keep the search for the stolen statue on the front burner.

The theft continues to get a great deal of press in Ireland and worldwide, and in specialized media like The Wild Hunt, who quote Annie and mention our work with Gaol Naofa:  Calling Manannan mac Lir Back Home.  

See the update on the Gaol Naofa site for full details: Where is Manannán?

Search for Stolen Manannán Statue Continues

Photo copyright © David Wright, used with permission. Song traditional Gaelg.
See our Midsummer video for the tune and pronunciation. Memeage by Kathryn NicDhàna

By land and sea and helicopter, by beaches, trails and roads, Irish people are searching for the stolen statue of Irish sea god Manannán mac Lir.

"Sea god Manannán mac Lir still missing after police search"

Locals in Limavady have issued a Missing Persons Alert:

DESCRIPTION - A well known six foot tall striking local male with an athletic build. He has shoulder length hair held back with a headband and has a beard. We have concerns for his health in this weather as he is bare chested with only a thin shawl held at the neck with a decorative clasp to keep his top half warm. Evidence at the scene suggests he has injuries to his feet!

He is a very striking fella so if you have seen him please let us know.

Last seen standing at Gortmore viewing point Binvenagh Mountain around the 21st January looking out to sea.

Locals have searched the area and have completed an overflight to check he was not dumped in the area.

And a local funeral director is offering a reward for the statue's return.

On the polytheist front, we are making offerings to him, and singing his traditional songs. We are asking Manannán to help the police and citizens who are searching, and to spur someone who has information and is feeling uneasy to do the right thing and come forward with the truth.

And a smaller version

While some are suggesting a co-ordinated, timed effort for the night of Jan 31 - Imbolc, this coming Saturday - we are not waiting for a particular night. We are on this right now.  Manannán is a guide and guardian of our Gaelic Polytheist and Gaol Naofa community, so we are singing to him every day and night. As we have been since this news broke and will continue to do until justice is done and he is brought home.

The many people who love this statue, be they polytheist, Christian, or any other religion or lack thereof, are sharing their photos on the Facebook page, Bring back Manannan Mac Lir the Sea God. While most are those who just love the statue as art and history, others are sharing altar photos as well.

This Manannán playlist has a video of sculptor John Darren Sutton creating the statue from the clay on up, along with local reactions to the theft (here on YouTube for those who can't get Northern Ireland TV news broadcasts) and more songs for him. For the tune and pronunciation of the Manx song in the meme above, see our Midsummer video in the same playlist. We will be adding more Manannán information and materials to the playlist as the situation develops.

Let's bring him home!

Ireland: Statue of Celtic Sea God Manannán Stolen

"Those who made off with the sea god left a wooden cross with the words 'You shall have no other gods before me' in its place." - Fiona Murray BBC News NI, Game of Thrones sculptor's sea god statue stolen from mountain.

This statue of the Celtic sea god, Manannán Mac Lir is a religious icon. People have been leaving offerings there, tourists make pilgrimage, photographers have spread his image worldwide, and local people still tell the stories of his protection of the land and relationship with the sea and local weather patterns.

photo via BBC Northern Ireland

Apparently, some people who pretend to be Christians don't like this.

Whether this was done by art thieves looking to lay a false trail, or by intolerant people who betray their supposed lord's message of tolerance and love, this is a hate crime.

Manannán is the guardian of the land on the Isle of Man and in other Gaelic areas. He is also one of the founding forces, guides, and guardians of the Celtic Reconstructionist and Gaelic Polytheist communities. For him to be out in Nature, high on a mountian, overlooking the sea, was profoundly moving, and those who have stolen him have desecrated something sacred.

If this was really done by those who claim to be Christians, this is a relgiously-motivated hate crime against a minority spirituality. For Irish people, even those who consider themselves Christian, or of another faith or no religious belief, Manannán is part of our history and culture, and this is a crime against all the Irish people who still respect history, culture, and the spirits of the land, sky and sea.

Our prayers are with the sculptor and all the people - local and worldwide - who are shocked and hurt by this crime. Our prayers are also with everyone investigating this and searching for the statue, that they quickly recover the statue and bring the criminals to justice.

So be it. Sláinte Mhaith.

If you have any information on this crime or the whereabouts of the stolen statue, please speak out. Talk to the members in your community, use social media, and let's take care of this. Feel free to reuse this meme if you like. This was a deliberate act of desecration, involving several physically strong people, a lot of noise, power tools, several hours at the statue, a truck or van, and planning. Someone who doesn't agree with this hate crime has to have seen or heard something. We pray they come forth now.

Sculpture by John Darren Sutton
Top photo courtesy the artist via his facebook page
Photos for "Missing" meme and Aurora Borealis copyright Neil Maroney, who I hope will understand re-use with credit, given the situation.

ETA: For more on Manannán, and a song to call him home, I am reposting our video about him that we released last summer.

If you're looking for the lyrics to sing along, the first part of the track is a traditional Manx song called "C'raad ta'n Ree?" which you can find a version of on the Gaol Naofa website: http://www.gaolnaofa.org/library/music/craad-tan-ree/

The second part is a song/prayer, which Breesha Maddrell notes is still popular with kids today: https://thesession.org/tunes/12899

Grianstad an Gheimhridh (Winter Solstice) and Hogmanay

Fàs is gnàths is toradh
growth, tradition, success 

On Hogmanay morn, we gather water from under the bridge, which became
"a dead and living ford" the first time we brought a deer carcass across,
and which has now witnessed the passage of several of our beloved dead. 
photo copyright ©2014 kpn

The winter snows have come, the nights are long and cold. We gather with our loved ones and hold each other close.

Yes, we've made more Gaol Naofa videos :)  Annie took point on these, and we have her lovely photos from Newgrange and other sacred sites in Ireland and Scotland. For those of Scottish heritage who may not have known why secular/calendar New Year's Eve is a big deal in our families of origin, we have the answer: Hogmanay.

Hogmanay is a time for saining the house and welcoming in the New Year. While the dour Celtic mindset supports the idea of beginning the year at the falling darkness of Samhain, there is something about the Winter Solstice sunrise that lights a spark in my heart: The longest night of the year is broken by the rising sun, shining down the long passage at Brú na Bóinne, bringing light to the ancestors and announcing that now the days will grow longer, bit by bit, until warmth and green return to the land.

As a people who see time as a circle, and spirit as eternal while only matter rises and falls, dies and is born again, I'm not particularly interested in the debates about which day is "The Celtic New Year." Arguments can be made for pretty much any point in the cycle, depending on one's work, where one lives, and which deities and spirits are most important to us. 

The phrase  "Fàs is gnàths is toradh (Growth, custom, and fertility)" is traditionally said by the head of the household as they bring a twig from a local fruit-bearing tree inside to the breakfast feast. It is customary to sain one another and entire house at this time, with water from "a dead and living ford" (a watercourse over which both the living and dead pass), and to fill the house with so much juniper smoke that everyone begins to cough. This means that all your smoke alarms will also be going off. I consider it part of the festivities. But any of the alarms that are hooked into a security system will need to be turned off. Trust me, your local firefighters will appreciate being spared the false alarm. If you forget and they show up anyway, you can consider it a bizarre variation on first-footing. Make sure to offer them abundant hospitality.

As everyone is coughing and the alarms are blaring, it is time to fling open the doors and windows and welcome in the brisk, cold air of New Year's morning. We do a brief welcome and prayer in Gaelic at each door and window we fling open, welcoming the household's guardian spirits and the qualities we hope for in the coming year. It is customary at this time for the hearthkeeper of the household to offer everyone a nip of whisky. As a sober household, we use strong, alder-roasted or hazelnut coffee and espresso chocolate.

Then everyone sits down to a big breakfast, which symbolizes the abundance we hope for in the coming year.

Good Hogmanay to our Gaol Naofa family and extended community!
Fàs is gnàths is toradh!

For an abundance of lore and more suggestions for celebrations, see Annie's collection of links to her articles and research. 

 

Samhain

And we have... another video. This time on Samhain, with songs, poems, prayers and activities:



Annie did a good writeup about the videos, so I'll just send you her way. We also have some updates on the Gaol Naofa page.

 Blessed Samhain to you all!

Lá Fhéile Pádraig / "Saint" "Patrick's" Day, 2014

Tis the Season...

For those of us with Irish heritage in the diaspora, this is one of the most awkward and uncomfortable times of the year. While we are relieved at the lengthening days and warming weather, glad to have survived another harsh winter, we are also horrified at the debacle that is American and Canadian Saint Patrick's day.

As I write this, the riots have started. In one college town this weekend, thousands of students celebrated their idea of St. Patrick's day by drinking themselves sick, puking on their violent green t-shirts, assaulting one another and hurling bottles and rocks at the riot police that tried to stop them from harming other civilians. This behaviour is shameful, and as an Irish-American it makes me very sad and dismayed to see this happening yet again in the name of "Irish pride." Of course, I think only a minority of those rioters even have Irish heritage. And what heritage they have, they dishonour.

As I've written about before, to attend some of these awful festivities can put your safety in jeopardy. And the thing is, these drunken blowouts have nothing to do with being Irish.

In past years, we've done our best to avoid the whole thing, or to quietly educate via online discussion and memes.

This year, we've decided to get proactive.



We're pleased to present an article debunking some of the myths around St. Patrick's Day: Pagans, Polytheists, and St Patrick’s Day, as well as two videos on the topic.

Video one is a general introduction to the problems with the stereotypes, and video two is directed more specifically at the myths around Patrick himself, and the misinformation spread by both Pagans and Christians.



Our Gaol Naofa video channel has been in the works for a while now. Treasa made our first videos two years ago, then we stalled out a bit on getting more done. This year we've tried to use our anger and frustration around the whole St. Paddy's thing to motivate us to finish up some projects and counter the misinformation. Check out our playlists for other videos that should be of interest to Gaelic Polytheists, or anyone interested in Celtic Reconstructionism and Gaelic cultures in general. If you like what you see, feel free to subscribe, as more is in the works.

As we say in the videos, we welcome the spring, and celebrate the Hag who turns the seasons. She, and the Earth, are renewing themselves now, and we honour her.

We also honour our ancestors who worked so hard to survive oppression, famine and exile. The St. Paddy's parades in the diaspora initially began as cultural celebrations - a day for members of an oppressed ethnicity to gather together and celebrate their survival against the odds. It was only after our recent ancestors "became white" and rose to power in the police departments and mainstream politics that the marches became drunken bacchanals, with little to no connection to anything traditionally Irish.

We hope you enjoy these contributions, and find them useful in debunking the myths that surround this season. For more on our recent projects (such as our in-depth article, “Children and Family in Gaelic Polytheism”), see the Gaol Naofa site. Sláinte Mhaith.

Irish Fairy Beliefs: Interview with Folklorist Dr. Jenny Butler

Here is an excellent interview with Dr. Jenny Butler about the living traditions of the Creideamh Sí ("Fairy Faith"). She discusses those who have maintained these traditional ways of interacting with (or at least respecting) the spirits, along with some discussion of Irish polytheism in general.

At the end the interviewer also seems to know about those of us involved in the preservation, revival and reconstruction of the old Irish ways and asks about the modern communities. While I wish she would have made a bit more of a distinction between the various folks who either observe these ways now and those who are simply inspired by them, as that only came up in the last segment and was not the focus of the interview it's understandable there were only generalizations.

Definitely worth a watch, especially as an intro to the Creideamh Sí.

Go raibh maith agaibh, a Jenny (agus a Mhícheáil for posting this)!



A bit more detail about the Creideamh Sí:

The Creideamh Sí is the foundation of our spiritual work in Gaol Naofa. The Creideamh Sí, aka "the Fairy Faith" is a collection of customs and beliefs which make up the living Gaelic ways of interacting with the local spirits. Most of the people who have maintained these ways down into the present day consider themselves to be Christian. I think it is very important to respect the living traditions and not try to redefine these terms to fit modern, American pagan sensibilities. So, the Creideamh Sí is a part of most contemporary Gaelic Polytheist paths. But any attempt to redefine "Creideamh Sí" to only mean "Modern Gaelic Polytheism" kind of misses the point and is offensive to those in the living cultures, without whom we would have nothing.

Pretendian Racist Tries to Colonise Ireland - The attempted return of White Ego Fraud

Thoroughly non-Native Rachel Holzwarth is still calling herself "White Eagle Medicine Woman," even though she promised the real Native Americans who picketed her racist displays that she would stop doing so. She is still dressing in fake Plains NDN regalia, even though she promised NDNs she would stop. She lied. Then she lied some more.

Now she's looking for some place to sell her fake ceremonies and "prayerformances" (her word), and she's hoping she can find some place where there are no NDNs, and where no one cares about misappropriation. Her only performances and workshops in the US in the past five years have been in all-white, gated enclaves. She's gotten some confidence back by selling her pretendian schtick to Jews & tourists in the Middle East. Now, five years after her broken promises, she is once again looking to branch out. This is from her Facebook page (It looks like you will have to temporarily "like" the page to see the posts):


from Holzwarth's Facebook page
Holzwarth photoshopped a version of a spiral from a Christian manuscript into one of her bizarre publicity photos:
 

It's not even an image of the Newgrange spiral. Ripping off an unrelated image from an Irish manuscript gives her no more connection to Newgrange, or any other Irish sacred site, than does her hanging Australian eagle feathers off that death drum and claiming it gives her the right to represent Native Americans. Yet she has lied and claimed to be "Celtic" just as she has lied about being Seneca. She has never shown that she knows anything at all about Irish (or any other Celtic) culture. She just tried that old racist ploy of thinking "Celtic" can be used as shorthand for "white appropriator." When pressed, she has admitted she is Jewish. There is nothing wrong with being a Jew, but apparently Rachel seems to think so. It looks like she has tried to be lots of things.

The death drum contains human remains and human blood. It is evil, like the racist pretendian fraud who bangs on it, the one who has openly espoused the racist theories of Steiner - suggesting that all the NDNs need to die so the white people can inherit their medicine. Anyone of any spiritual sensitivity who has been near that thing can feel that it is bad, bad ju ju. Anyone with basic human compassion for oppressed people must stand up to this crass exploitation.

She's also putting out feelers in England:


from Holzwarth's Facebook page
Heads up, Irish and English folks, and anyone else in the Isles. Don't let this woman exploit you the way she's tried to exploit Indigenous people everywhere she's gone. Don't let her come to your land, don't let her present there, don't buy her lies.

Don't let her rip us off the way she's ripped off Native Americans. Don't let her steal our ancestors or sell a mangled misrepresentation of us to the capitalist newagers. Don't let her use us to promote her racist agenda.

Go raibh maith agaibh! 

---

Windigo Disease collage courtesy of When White People Go Bad.

Cultural Cringe 2012

It's that time of the year again.

Before you wish us "Happy" "Saint" "Patrick"'s day (or even better, "St.Patty's") you might want to check out this year's roundup of links:

Gorm sums it up well with, Leprechaun Vomit... or why I hate St. Patty's:

So when a day is supposed to be about celebrating a culture, about celebrating an identity, and that identity is then popularly portrayed as being the worst stereotype of that culture, the meaning and significance is completely lost in a sea of four leaved shamrocks, leprechauns and an alcoholic haze. It isn't an appropriation of Irish culture, because you would need some actual Irish culture to be appropriating. No, its bizzarely just a sophmoric misrepresentation, which is then celebrated as being authentically Irish; cultural misappropriation, perhaps?

The harm, of course, is completely lost on such folks because their closest contact with actual Irish culture or tradition is the bowl of Lucky Charms they had for breakfast. It is an argument from ignorance because they do not understand the significance, and so are indifferent to the point of arguing that people who do get upset or irritated by such portryals, "just need to lighten up."

More...

Seren weighs in with, The inevitable Paddy post:

Then again, one could argue that faulty interpretations of history (and culture) are what St Patrick's Day is all about now. Some years ago, Ben and Jerry's ice cream released a special edition flavour to "celebrate Irish culture." They had the brilliant idea of calling it "Black and Tan," which oh no, couldn't possibly be offensive at all - it's a drink, right?

Umm. No. Not just a drink, anyway.

After the outcry, they pulled the ice cream and apologised profusely. So it's quite perplexing that Nike have now decided to "celebrate" in a similar way with their Guinness and Black and Tan trainers. Awww. Bless 'em. I like how "celebrating" is unashamedly synonymous with "cashing in on" and "being totally unaware of history."

More...

And one from the vaults: Five years ago I weighed in on the the Irish-American dilemmas of this blessed day, and don't have more to add that the others haven't already covered: Anciente Oirish Family Wisdomme:

So, my Anciente Family tradition I'd like to share on this day? Stay home.

Or, if you're lucky to live somewhere (as I do now) where people only use the holiday as an excuse to schedule Gaelic music and arts performances, and there's no more drinking than usual, and no one dyes anything green (except maybe their hair), go out and support real Irish culture. Go to a language class or seisiún, support an Irish-language (Gaeilge) musician or arts group. Make offerings to the deities, spirits and ancestors who roamed the land before anyone ever heard of St. Patrick. Remember what lives below the surface, what sustained us long before anyone commercialized and exploited a few, distorted elements of the culture. These things can, and do, sustain us still. So, if you want to be "Irish for a day," find out what Irish really is, because, for the most part, it's not what you'll see in the streets this weekend.

More...

And... Sing it loud, sing it proud...



ETA: And Treasa weighs in with: "The Luck of the Irish" and a Link Round-Up

Anciente Oirish Family Wisdomme

Having spent much of my formative years in Chicago and Boston, here is my old, "Traditional Irish," family wisdom: Stay off the streets on St. Paddy's Day.

As a kid I was embarrassed to be Irish-American. The sight of shamrocks, green fucking beer, the Gods-damned green RIVER and, for many years, the color green itself, all nauseated me. Let alone the roaming packs of drunken boys looking for a fight or worse.

I was a weird kid, and didn't fit neatly into the mold of what a traditional Irish-American girl should be. Even before I became explicitly polytheist, I didn't identify as either Catholic or Protestant (my family has a heritage of both, and my parents are mostly agnostic. I had to figure out the religion thing on my own). The packs of Irish-American disaffected male youth roaming the streets of Dorchester didn't give a damn about our shared ancestry - I was a dykey freak who dressed like a glam-rock boy and a punk rocker, and whom they'd never seen at mass. Therefore, I was a potential target.

Some of the other young white women in our collective household were scared to be living in what was in some ways a "Black" neighborhood. The thing is, Dorchester was mostly Irish Catholic then, with many of the Irish folks being right off the boat. The African-Americans and Haitians were more recent arrivals, and there was significant tension in the neighborhood between the old guard and the new folks. Our household was also mixed-race, and sometimes those tensions were internal, as well. So how ironic is it that Irish-American, white girl me, was never once hassled by Black folks, but was almost gay-bashed, multiple times, by those packs of boys who looked just like me (well, minus the punk haircut and weird clothes. And btw, you don't have to be gay to get gay-bashed. But a woman alone who isn't dressing femmey will often have "dyke" screamed at her by the assailants). I am lucky I got out of that rough neighborhood alive. But wouldn't you know, to this day, whenever I mention that I used to live in Dorchester, people always get it completely backwards as to exactly who it was who made it dangerous.

Now, I've come to terms with the violence in Irish culture. It is true many of us can be a quarrelsome lot, and the alcohol doesn't help. This is why I feel it's important to have spiritual/religious traditions that focus on peace, compassion, and mutual respect. When we have to use violence, we have to know where and how to direct it for positive change rather than community destruction. It also helps to be sober. Now I know why I come from a non-drinking family. Because genetically, it seems for many of my people the choice is either sobriety or alcoholic hell. After experimenting with the other, I choose sobriety.

When I first began exploring pre-Christian, polytheistic and earth-based religions, I actually avoided Irish traditions for the first few years because they just weren't exotic enough for teenage me. At that point in my life, I really didn't appreciate or understand the good parts of my heritage, and the bad points were enough to make me go be a Hindu for a few years.

I eventually came around, and now appreciate my heritage - largely because as I learned more about the older, less-popularized aspects of Irish culture I realized all the things in my family that I knew as "just how we do things," were because we are the product of Irish and Scottish culture (and Welsh, to a much lesser extent). I also discovered that some of the customs we kept, that I thought were just idiosyncratic to my family and some of the neighborhoods I'd lived in, were actually survivals of older spiritual practices.

But the parts of my heritage which I appreciate - the values, the stories, the spirituality, the love of nature, the value of poetry and music - are certainly not all that horrible Plastic Paddy drunkenness, aggression, stupidity and twee. I still can't stand that stuff, and once again feel nauseated (and furious) when people assume that shit has anything to do with Irish (or Celtic) culture. As another blogger put it, it's "greenface".

So, my Anciente Family tradition I'd like to share on this day? Stay home.

Or, if you're lucky to live somewhere (as I do now) where people only use the holiday as an excuse to schedule Gaelic music and arts performances, and there's no more drinking than usual, and no one dyes anything green (except maybe their hair), go out and support real Irish culture. Go to a language class or seisiún, support an Irish-language (Gaeilge) musician or arts group. Make offerings to the deities, spirits and ancestors who roamed the land before anyone ever heard of St. Patrick. Remember what lives below the surface, what sustained us long before anyone commercialized and exploited a few, distorted elements of the culture. These things can, and do, sustain us still. So, if you want to be "Irish for a day," find out what Irish really is, because, for the most part, it's not what you'll see in the streets this weekend.

Slán

"IRA Propagandist" - Moi?

On May 5 it will be twenty-five years since the death of IRA hunger striker Bobby Sands. This prompted me to pull out some old writings and papers, and take a stumble down memory lane (or the cobblestones of Beacon Hill, to be more precise).

Twenty-Five years ago I was a teenager living in Boston. It was my first year away from home, and I was working as the editor of an underground newspaper. I was also the main writer, photographer, typist, and production staff, but that's how these oh-so-glamorous jobs went. Our office was in the cramped, damp basement of a stately old building that happened to be within a block or two of the British Embassy. And, of course, this being the spring and summer of 1981, there were protests happening.

Though I grew up in a largely Irish/Scottish family in the Midwest, I don't recall much discussion of the struggles in the North when I was a small child. People in my family were more concerned about Viet Nam, actually, as no one in the family was being drafted to go fight in Ireland. There was some mention of The Troubles, of course, but no deep analysis in my earshot, and no horrible fights like in some families. Unlike my mother's generation, or some of my friends, I wasn't forbidden from wearing orange, hit for saying the wrong thing, nor had I (yet) been stopped in the street and quizzed about my religious affiliations.

But Boston was different. There was Gaeilge (Irish Gaelic) grafitti in the subways, and packs of surly Irish youths wandering the streets of our Dorchester neighborhood. Many people were fresh off the boat, and support for both Sinn Féin and the IRA was strong. Though New York has a higher total number of Irish, Boston has a higher percentage of the population, and this is especially apparent in the South Boston neighborhoods where we lived. And, of course, there were the protests.

I became friends with a guy who was very active in Irish politics, and attended some Sinn Féin actions with him. He wrote some articles for the newspaper I edited - coverage of the hunger strikes, the blanketmen, and basic history of the conflict for an American audience that was largely ignorant of the struggle. Reading them now, they seem so basic, so neutral. True, they are mainly from the perspective of Irish children and youths, describing the terror of having their neighborhoods attacked by British soldiers, and vivid descriptions of what the men and women in the prisons and internment camps were facing, but the overwhelming plea throughout is for peace and justice. After publishing these stories I was accused by some liberals of spreading "IRA Propaganda."

I have to admit I am just as puzzled by this accusation now as I was then. I think, like bringing up Israeli military actions at the Seder table, it's just one of those issues that provokes fights whenever it arises. Maybe not so much now, but certainly then.

I think most of what I did during that time was pretty benign, and what most leftists, let alone Irish-American leftists, were doing to support a variety of struggles worldwide. In looking back on those days, I find my thoughts turning more to the changes in our communities here than the changes in the North of Ireland. Well, this is where I live now. Since moving back to the country, I feel very out of touch with the Irish political scene. I keep up with things online, but it's really not the same as working with people in person. I have my opinions on the peace process, and the changes in the movement and organizations, but it seems less urgent now to state them publicly. Perhaps this is what it means to have twenty-five years distance on anything, really. And what it means to be a forty-something instead of a passionate teenager, ready to take on the world, with every moment a life or death battle.

Love,

Your Friendly Neighborhood Propagandist
(apparently semi-retired)
(but willing to be brought out of retirement for a good scuffle)