Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

Maeve Binchy on God (video)

2»

Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 7,230 ✭✭✭Solair


    My gran (in her 80s) had an atheist / non-religious funeral. It went down quite well, lots of poetry readings and stuff.

    It was just amusing to hear some of her elderly relatives asking 'so was that an Atheist mass then?'

    Herself and her older brother (in his early 90s) have been out atheists since the 1940s. So, eh, there were always a few :D


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,373 ✭✭✭im invisible


    42 million books, that must have been hard not repeating herself,


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,753 ✭✭✭fitz0


    I read this letter in the Examiner with utter revulsion.
    From a Catholic perspective, it was most gratifying to observe that Maeve Binchy died with the great satisfaction of a Catholic requiem mass.
    Maeve frequently and enthusiastically, not least in her interviews with Gay Byrne, declared her lack of interest in religion, and Catholicism in particular.
    Indeed, perhaps the best known practitioner of a ‘double life’ was the anti-Catholic philosopher, Voltaire.
    While excoriating the Catholic Church in public, in private Voltaire sought the comfort of his pastor, and of the Catholic sacraments, with gusto.
    The good news is that a death-bed conversion is as good as any. So welcome home Maeve, and may you rest in peace.

    Eric Conway
    Navan
    Co Meath

    What a c*nt.


  • Registered Users Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    Weird how I had a pretty good idea who wrote that letter before seeing the name at the bottom. To reiterate something I said earlier in tread:
    Galvasean wrote: »
    bloody IndoExaminer Christians, why do they have to jizz on EVERYTHING?


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,809 ✭✭✭CerebralCortex


    fitz0 wrote: »
    I read this letter in the Examiner with utter revulsion....

    What an ugly thing to say? People sometimes defy belief. What a **** indeed!!


  • Advertisement
  • Closed Accounts Posts: 27,857 ✭✭✭✭Dave!


    People write scummy sh*t all the time, why on earth would a national newspaper publish it? He's a nasty piece of work anyway


  • Registered Users Posts: 8,824 ✭✭✭ShooterSF


    He seems to only spout such nonsense in national papers because having lived in Navan for 28 years I've never met the guy or anyone who knows him..


  • Registered Users Posts: 13 therattler


    Thanks for the vid Dave!

    Only recently joined boards.... so happy to come across like minded people. It really helps, especially in this country when you're in the minority.


  • Registered Users Posts: 11,813 ✭✭✭✭PopePalpatine


    ShooterSF wrote: »
    He seems to only spout such nonsense in national papers because having lived in Navan for 28 years I've never met the guy or anyone who knows him..

    I'm not sure whether or not I'll get a warning for suggesting he has some case of paranoid schizophrenia.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,373 ✭✭✭im invisible


    Oh but shur aren't we all 'delusional'...


  • Advertisement


  • ShooterSF wrote: »
    He seems to only spout such nonsense in national papers because having lived in Navan for 28 years I've never met the guy or anyone who knows him..


    I do, i used to work with him, he works in an accountancy firm in the town, and he is an absolute mouse when it comes to dealing with people face to face, he is afraid of strong people.

    He is a classic example of "small man syndrome" thank god (he'd love that i said that!) i dont have to interact with him anymore. Writing these letters with the hope of such reactions is the only power he has, sad really. His letters used to make me sick, but i just feel pity for him now


  • Registered Users Posts: 27 tdawg


    Dave! wrote: »
    I can't say I paid much attention to or took much of an interest in the writer during her life, but I've been lapping up as much as I can since hearing about her death a few days ago. Since her death there have been great interviews played, stories recounted by friends, and tributes paid, and she comes across as such a lovely, kind and generous person.

    Anyway, I just stumbled upon this interview she gave Gay Byrne on his 'Meaning of Life' show. I was shocked to hear it, but it turns out she was an unequivocal, unrepentant atheist! :eek:

    See the video here:
    http://www.rte.ie/player/#!v=10039611

    I found it particularly interesting listening to her describing how she told her father about it, and how he reacted, etc. Sounds like such a wonderfully warm home to grow up in, and her parents sound like incredibly understanding people.

    What a lovely woman she was

    edit

    They even talk about Dawkins at the end, and she endorses his worldview unambiguously! :eek:

    Mind. Blown.


    Dare I ask why it matters so much that she was an atheist? I know of quite a few people from older generations (obviously more common and acceptable in younger generations) who would call themselves such, it's not exactly a major revelation.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,553 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    I don't see where Dave! has told of where it *mattered* so much. Just how he was surprised to see an elderly Irish female icon was a declared non-believer.


  • Registered Users Posts: 27 tdawg


    Dades wrote: »
    I don't see where Dave! has told of where it *mattered* so much. Just how he was surprised to see an elderly Irish female icon was a declared non-believer.

    It mattered enough to create a thread about it. My point is that she was a writer and that is what she will be remembered as. Personally when I die I'd rather be remembered for my achievements, not for my belief of whether there is or isn't a god.

    I almost find it disrespectful in the sense that I feel it comes across as if celebrating her for the fact she was a non-believer rather than for her work (I seem to remember a thread a bit-like that re:Steve Jobs). I am writing this as a 'non-believer' myself btw.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    tdawg wrote: »
    My point is that she was a writer and that is what she will be remembered as. Personally when I die I'd rather be remembered for my achievements, not for my belief of whether there is or isn't a god.
    tdawg wrote: »
    It mattered enough to create a thread about it.
    Well, in all fairness, the bar for opening a new thread isn't set all that high hereabouts. Here's a thread from yesterday in which a guy, with a peculiar login and now sadly departed, wondered about pork and blasphemy in Dubai.

    In any case, this forum is for the discussion of and about atheists and agnostics and things that interest them, so it's not unreasonable for this kind of topic to turn up in the first place. And anyhow, I wouldn't have thought that many forum regulars would be all that mad about Maeve Binchy's more mainstream output anyway.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 27,857 ✭✭✭✭Dave!


    tdawg wrote: »
    It mattered enough to create a thread about it. My point is that she was a writer and that is what she will be remembered as. Personally when I die I'd rather be remembered for my achievements, not for my belief of whether there is or isn't a god.

    I almost find it disrespectful in the sense that I feel it comes across as if celebrating her for the fact she was a non-believer rather than for her work (I seem to remember a thread a bit-like that re:Steve Jobs). I am writing this as a 'non-believer' myself btw.
    I think you're just looking for offense where none exists tbh. I may not have been familiar with her writing, but if you look in another forum, you'll see a thread I started where I say that Maeve Binchy's death has inspired me to try my hand at creative writing myself. And you'll see my first attempt too.

    I've also posted here and on Facebook, and spoke to various people I know, about what a wonderfully warm and lovely woman she seems to have been, and how highly everyone speaks of her.

    I may not celebrate her for her work, because I'm not familiar with it, but I celebrate her for her character, her philosophy on life, and her warm and loving nature.


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,650 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato
    Restaurant at the End of the Universe


    Dave! wrote: »
    I think you're just looking for offense where none exists tbh.

    If so, he/she is by no means alone... It's got to the stage where I just assume any new/low post count poster is a plant :(

    It took a while but I don't mind. How does my body look in this light?



  • Registered Users Posts: 27 tdawg


    ninja900 wrote: »
    If so, he/she is by no means alone... It's got to the stage where I just assume any new/low post count poster is a plant :(

    Cheers, this truly is a most welcoming place.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 25,553 Mod ✭✭✭✭Dades


    tdawg wrote: »
    Cheers, this truly is a most welcoming place.
    Ah, here now, your post received very clear replies none of which were anything but conversational (with the exception of the above, which is borne of recent frustrations, to be fair).

    Don't be like that. :)


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,650 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato
    Restaurant at the End of the Universe


    tdawg wrote: »
    Cheers, this truly is a most welcoming place.

    Sorry if you got the impression my post was aimed at you (it did say IF you were seeking offence you wouldn't be alone.) I had other posters in mind... There is a lot of disruption of threads going on, stupid circular arguments that have been debunked 100 times already, repeated 'I'll pray for you' posts, even someone who pretended to want religion banned to see if anyone would agree with them (who failed miserably to get a bite, btw :) )

    It took a while but I don't mind. How does my body look in this light?



  • Advertisement
Advertisement