It’s time to have a new rising to reclaim our sense of the sacred

I call on you all to consider joining me in a much needed revolution.

Each one of you, Old Irish or New, regardless of colour, religion or orientation, I call on each of you, you who love this island, I ask for your urgent attention.

Ireland needs you. If we act now, and together, we may save this beautiful country.

Ireland is in great peril.

In fact, I am speaking of a greater enemy than any invader so far.

It’s an oppressor that will rob our children of their future. It’s as serious a threat as the Famine, but starves the spirit, rather than the body. It tricks us with the allure of wealth.

All the while it thrives on our citizens not having a place they can call home, nor do many of them have meaningful work.

This enemy is gaining a hold on us, and dragging us towards darkness. We have lost a sense of the sacred. We put little meas on silence. Silence is awkward, to be quickly filled. We have forgotten that silence is essential for mental health. It is balm for the soul.

We boast 455 FB friends, and struggle to find three, who we can totally rely on. Addiction, in various forms, is enslaving many of our citizens. The cynical greedy few get fat on their sickness. Suicide is a growing, and even still, often a hidden problem.

It’s time for action.

It’s Easter. It’s the centenary year. Ireland is losing its soul. It’s time for the Spiritual Revolution. Let’s use our arms.

I grew up in West Belfast. I signed up for the peace process, but enough is enough. It will soon be too late.

My friends, let’s use our arms to embrace all the difference, and diversity, that is our new gold. Let’s link our arms in gentle, but unbreakable, solidarity to stand beside those who have been sidelined. The voiceless. The powerless. Let this year be their year.

For the children who died in the Rising. For the women, often forgotten, who were crucial to the Rising.

For the men of the Rising, whom we know and love, yes for all these and more.

Maybe the most important aspect of the more, is our children, and their children.

For all these, let’s awake from this sapping fog, and reignite the fire in our belly. Come on, together let’s reclaim mystery, and silence and the sacred, and passionate defence of the voiceless.

My friends if we don’t, we Irish will lose our very soul. Arise!

Joe McDonald

St Matthew’s

Ballyfermot

Dublin 10