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Would Pagans Occupy The Hill of Tara If It Was A Muslim Holy Site??

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    #62
    bellapip
    Registered Users Posts: 192 ✭✭bellapip


    And yet, regardless of Islam, Christianity, Tibetan Monks, or Janey mack gorillas, the NRA still ends up acting as the ultimate god and dictating to the Irish government what will happen with the motorway which jags like a scar through our heritage.
    Ferrovial/SIAC, still use the Garda Siochana like puppets as they demonstrated today while they issued orders for work to be carried out on a site which currently has a protection order on it, and all of this while they wave pieces of paper signed by the OPW around to beat the band.

    I think the question is not, would Islam or any other religion give a **** what other religious sect stood on THEIR hill, the question is more, why don't we give enough of a ****?


    https://www.indymedia.ie/article/86756

    B.


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    #63
    Hero Of College
    Closed Accounts Posts: 930 ✭✭✭Hero Of College


    Talliesin wrote: »
    An interesting thing about the Irish constitution is that while there is reference to particular belief systems it doesn't hinge upon them.

    While it is done in the name of "The Holy Trinity", the source of the constitution is "We, the people of Éire" who "Do hereby adopt, enact, and give to ourselves this Constitution".


    I have already alluded to the malleabilty of the Constitution- it can be moulded as seen fit to best reflect the feelings of the contemporary electorate. It so happens that the electorate are pretty happy being associated with The Holy Trinity thing, and given that {"the legend":rolleyes:} of St Patrick alludes specifically to the Holy Trinity and Patricks elucidation upon the subject matter, I felt entitled to draw a link between our Nation State today, and the arrival of Christianity into Ireland, via Patrick, at Tara.

    I do not think this was a shocking, triumphalist or sectarian link to make. But Sapien has gone off on a bender and tarred half the bleeding Island with the same brush. Apparently, we all have 2 motors, 3 teles and bear an uncanny resemblance to the Royle family.


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    #64
    Hero Of College
    Closed Accounts Posts: 930 ✭✭✭Hero Of College


    bellapip wrote: »
    And yet, regardless of Islam, Christianity, Tibetan Monks, or Janey mack gorillas, the NRA still ends up acting as the ultimate god and dictating to the Irish government what will happen with the motorway which jags like a scar through our heritage.
    Ferrovial/SIAC, still use the Garda Siochana like puppets as they demonstrated today while they issued orders for work to be carried out on a site which currently has a protection order on it, and all of this while they wave pieces of paper signed by the OPW around to beat the band.

    I think the question is not, would Islam or any other religion give a **** what other religious sect stood on THEIR hill, the question is more, why don't we give enough of a ****?


    https://www.indymedia.ie/article/86756

    B.

    I agree.....Guards are there to be used like poker chips. I'm no fan of the Police, or the NRA, or the OPW or ANY of these bureaucrats. In case it was lost on anyone...I don't like developers.


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    #65
    Talliesin
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,314 ✭✭✭Talliesin


    No. I don't think it was lost on anyone. Since you've so far got 84 posts of "why can't everyone else be great like me instead of sucking like everyone else" I don't think anyone was really expecting you to like to NRA, the OPW, or indeed anyone other than you.

    Okay. You're great. Have a Blue Peter badge. Now, anything on the topic of Paganism to say or ask?


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    #66
    twinQuins
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,199 ✭✭✭twinQuins


    Ever pause to consider that these people may have other motives besides seeing a pagan site preserved? Maybe they value their culture. The whole tunnel system they have may seem like a bad PR stunt but think about it: they're willing to risk their lives for that site. Think they'd take it upon themselves to do something like that lightly? They have as much a claim to defend it as you or any other Irish person. Don't try to muddy the waters.

    But you're not really interested in that, are you? You could have discussed this in a number of other fora but instead you dredged this up where you knew you'd get people wound up. Though I admit you seem to be somewhat...disorganised in what it is you're actually trying to say.

    From what I've read so far you seem incensed that Pagans dare try and protect a site that has meaning to both Catholicism and Paganism. That, Catholicism has had more of an impact in shaping Ireland and it's culture.
    That it has had an impact I don't think is in question. You seem however reluctant to leave it at that.
    The constitution was written at a time when a large portion of the populace could be considered practicing Catholics. Even though it may be amended when a majority of the people will it, that its wording hasn't been leads you to believe that people still accept it as a document steeped in Christianity? Would that be correct?

    Sure, let's discount history up to the point Catholicism was introduced because surely that has no bearing on what the nation is now.

    Now, most interesting is that you felt the need to not only post this thread here, but the very same one in the Islam forum! My-oh-my!
    What, may I ask, happened? Things a little slow here?

    Let's cut the c**p shall we? You're intent is pretty damn clear.


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    #67
    Sapien
    Closed Accounts Posts: 997 ✭✭✭Sapien


    Thaed - yes, sorry, I consider my hand thoroughly slapped. This twisted debacle is bringing out the worst in me, and the recent offlining of politics.ie means I have a build-up of spleen that needs to be vented on something (which may explain why I'm still pursuing this).

    And so...
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    Shocking. Just shocking........its almost...well.....perverse. #1, very few countries have Constitutions, even fewer have written Constitutions.
    You seem to have a deep interest in this. How many developed countries have written constitutions, and what makes Ireland's demonstrably better?
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    If Christianity is such a tough sell then explain its position as a leading global religion? Explain its position as the predominating faith in this Country. For every Paedo Priest there is a Jihadist Muslim and a Crazed Loonie Hippy. They are all tough sells, at the end of the day.
    I'll settle for your admission of equivalence on this as a sufficient victory - though, of course, I maintain that Catholicism would be the far greater turn-off.
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    My argument goes that if Tara is beholden to Christians, and Christianity has helped make this Country what it is today {decent enuff place, I would argue} and if the Christians can take a back seat on Tara, then why not Pagans??
    What!? That is not an argument. It's a non sequitur teetering on top of two unsound premises. You continue to phrase your position in maddeningly obscure ways. What do you mean "Tara is beholden to Christianity"? Why should the attitude of Christians towards Tara dictate, or influence in any way, the attitude of non-Christians? Momentarily ignoring the ludicrous contention that Christianity (as opposed to, merely, Christians) is to thank for the formation of the state - even if that were true, what difference would it make?

    Are you saying that because Christians largely don't care about the threats to Tara, pagans shouldn't either? If so, why? Why, why, why? For gods' sake, why?
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    I already retracted on the "defiling". I never condemned them
    You implied - indeed the very title of the thread implies - that the actions of the pagans are somehow predicated on disrespect to Christianity. That, coming from a Christian, is a condemnation. Now, I would be satisfied if you would simply say that you do not, upon further thought, believe that, and that your implications were rash and ill-considered, or the result of clumsy expression.
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    Thats a good question. I guess attracting support has two sides, one is you go out and recruit it, the other is that you attract it with your own actions, leading by example, for want of a better phrase.
    The actions were of those who turned up. The fault for non-involvement lies with those who failed to involve themselves. These pagans never adopted the role of demagogues, but as individual activists, organised amongst themselves. And they have at no point done anything to prevent others, indeed Christians, from standing alongside them. Have they?
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    I admit i was simplistic:- I don't think this islands spirituality believed at the flick of a switch. But to deny St Patricks legacy would be equally pig-headed about the whole thing. By the way, do Mass-Attending Christian Poles give a damn about Tara? Probably not. Do they attend Mass? Yes. Do they seek suffrage under the Constitution and the Common Law?Yes. Explain that.
    Explain what? What are you talking about? I'm not going to get into this Constitution nonsense again unless it has something to do with Tara. I'm glad you realise that the process of conversion is complicated and protracted. That the idea that it was wholly effected by some dramatics at Tara is preposterous. That, as nice a story as Patrick at Tara might be, it is of limited real significance in terms of the Irish conversion to Christianity, and to the history of Tara itself.
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    That doesn't mean a damned thing. There are no statues at the top of Mount Everest...I guess Hillary never made it to the top so.:confused::confused:
    That would be an apt analogy if I were disputing that Patrick visited Tara. I am not (at the moment). I was simply establishing that Tara was only ever used by pagans, or pre-Christians, in their political and religious affairs, and that its significance in our heritage arises from that. In fact, it is because of that significance that the Patrick story is set there. Whether the story was made up and set in Tara, whether it happened somewhere else and was fictitiously relocated to Tara, or whether Patrick actually did decide to perform his stunt at Tara - it all comes down to the same reason. That reason is the significance that Tara had, long before Patrick ever came to Ireland. And it is that significance that makes Tara important today. Even the Patrick story is merely a consequence and reflection of a much older significance. And so people today revering Tara may very well do so with little or no regard for the Patrick story. Do you understand? And so it is wrong to say that Tara is a Christian site. That is a poor use of language. It is a site that is of some significance to Christians (Christians who see religious merit in folk tales), but it is not a Chrisitian site.
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    And they say its me who needs anger management classes. Come on...I'm male, single, 25 yoa, no political affiliations, no mortgage, no kids....no car...no TV.....you seem to have a gripe with good old comfortable middle-class Ireland. Jesus, even I was trying to keep it an issue of Pagan/Christian. You're off on a tangent altogether.
    Then you fail to understand what realities lie behind your own dissatisfaction with the status quo (if indeed you have any - I'm still not clear). I have no particular beef with the middle classes. You, however, seem either to be mystified by their actions (or inaction), intent on blaming their inaction on pagans, or content to tout their inaction as a signal that no action is necessary.
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    I don't have a cultural conscience in the same way you do. Not to the same degree, and not about the same things. And I acknowledge that dissent and civil disobedience have their purposes. Just don't show me pictures of a tunnel system collapsing a road and tell me I should be impressed.
    You forfeit the right to criticise a course of action when you sit on you rump in your sitting room and spectate over the airwaves. If the cause is important to you, do something about it. You and all your Christian friends. If you don't care, stop whining.
    Hero Of College wrote: »
    My side may have let me down, possibly so- but it is my side that are keeping you UP. Remember that the next time you take out trade union membership, remember that the next time you attend your subsidised GP- remember that the next time you seek to defend your good name, or your life or property. The Constitution, based on...
    *slumps off his Ikea bucket seat into an irreversible coma*


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    #68
    Nevyn
    Closed Accounts Posts: 43,045 ✭✭✭✭Nevyn


    Hero Of College has been given a time out from this forum for a month.


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    #69
    bauderline
    Registered Users Posts: 898 ✭✭✭bauderline


    I have posted this elsewhere, but just to put the final nail in the coffin for this thread, its all over bar the shouting....
    NRA restarts work
    - claiming M3 protesters broke truce

    By - Tim O'Brien and Adam Harvey at Rath Lugh.

    THE NATIONAL Roads Authority (NRA) has withdrawn its commitment to refrain from work on the M3 near Rath Lugh in Co. Meath, after what it said was continual "violent protests", and damage to fencing and equipment.

    Instead the NRA yesterday instructed contractor Eurolink to bring forward work on a "box cut" - an outline for a future road - within the construction zone at Rath Lugh.

    The authority said the outline would demonstrate that the M3 would not encroach on the national monument or the protection zone around it.

    Protesters reacted with dismay at the move, saying they had been trying to stop work on the Rath Lugh "esker" - a glacial ridge - since last September, on the grounds that it is an integral part of the 2,000-year-old fort.

    Gardaí moved on to the site yesterday to allow workers to build a two-metre tall spiked steel fence to separate the construction site from a protest encampment.

    At the same time, gardaí searched tents in the protest encampment.

    By early afternoon excavators and trucks had removed the portion of the hillside that had stood in the motorway's path. The esker was the last obstacle in the path of the motorway through the Gabhra Valley, which runs close to the Hill of Tara.

    Three protesters were arrested at the site yesterday, said Insp. Pat Gannon from Navan Garda station. He said gardaí had searched the protesters' tents to look for weapons. None were found.

    In a separate move yesterday, Minister for the Environment John Gormley visited the national monument and inspected maps and plans for the new road before declaring himself satisfied that the NRA proposals, if implemented as proposed, would result in the protection of the monument.

    A spokesman for the NRA acknowledged that it had made a commitment on Saturday last to protester Lisa Feeney to have a one-month moratorium on construction work near Rath Lugh in order to persuade Ms. Feeney to leave the tunnel she had occupied for more than 60 hours.

    However, the authority said it understood that in return the protesters would not interfere with a "haulage road" and fence being constructed to allow the contractor to move plant and equipment past Rath Lugh.

    The NRA said matters worsened last Tuesday when the contractor "sought to erect fencing on the project boundary line, which is outside the area covered by the national monument preservation order".

    "In addition the contractor sought to commence the construction of the haul road that had been clarified with the tunnel protester on Saturday evening. In both areas violent protests ensued and the contractor ceased work due to safety concerns for his operatives and the protesters".

    The NRA also said contractor's equipment had been daubed with excrement and urine, something which was later confirmed by the Garda press office, which added that such daubing had been going on for the last week.

    However, Ms. Feeney said yesterday she had no knowledge of violent demonstrations and said her fellow protesters were engaged in a peaceful protest. She said she had heard nothing about vehicles being interfered with in any way.

    Ms. Feeney also maintained that the creation of a fence was never agreed with the NRA. The only contact protesters had with the fence that she had been aware of was in relation to people crawling under it, she said.

    Ms. Feeney said she could not see why the NRA had reneged on its commitment to a moratorium on construction work "as I have kept my side of the bargain, I came out of the tunnel".

    Dr. Muireann Ní Bhrolcháin of the Save Tara Campaign also said she have not heard anything about such incidents, adding that she sincerely hoped they had not happened.

    Paddy O'Kearney, a spokesman for the Rath Lugh Direct Action group, said it was very upset that its efforts had failed.

    "There isn't anything we can do," he said, gesturing towards dozens of gardaí lining the newly-built fence.

    Of the claims that protesters threw excrement, or damaged construction fencing, he said: "It's absolutely not true".

    A few protesters tried to run on to the construction site yesterday afternoon but were held back by workers and gardaí.

    Others stood in a circle as a robed "druid" conducted a memorial service for the esker.

    ... that last line sure sounds like pagan practice to me !


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    #70
    Doctor DooM
    Moderators, Music Moderators Posts: 25,868 Mod ✭✭✭✭Doctor DooM


    bauderline wrote: »
    I have posted this elsewhere, but just to put the final nail in the coffin for this thread, its all over bar the shouting....



    ... that last line sure sounds like pagan practice to me !

    Ok. There were pagans there. The point was that doesn't make it a "pagan protest." I am sure there's a few Christians there saying prayers too, but thats not really news worthy. :)


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    #71
    lostexpectation
    Closed Accounts Posts: 9,082 ✭✭✭lostexpectation


    i say there were christian bron people there i doubt any were saying prayers


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    #72
    Riamfada
    Registered Users Posts: 10,246 ✭✭✭✭Riamfada


    I just want to throw something into the fray.

    St Patrick made no mention of his encounter at Tara in his own Confessio. Mirchiu wrote the encounter at Tara using a fictitious Kings name (escapes me atm) that was a play on the ruling O'Neill classes . So in all probability Patrick never went to Tara.


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    #73
    Lou.m
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,532 ✭✭✭Lou.m


    (response to whole of thread)

    OOKKAAAAAAY!!

    Backs slowly out of the thread:o

    Phew!!


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