END OF SUMMER PARTY

- Irish Network Seattle's annual End of Summer party is this coming Saturday, September 8, 6-10 pm, at 1177 Fairview Ave N, Seattle, a unique outdoor venue overlooking South Lake Union. This is a social event to network over heavy appetizers, drinks (wine/beer) and great views - all included in your ticket, but space is limited. The sun will be setting at approx. 8 pm , so be sure to dress appropriately. Tickets and more details at eventbrite.com.

BUSINESS LEADERSHIP  - 

TOUGH VISIT - Last month, Ireland hosted a two day visit from Pope Francis for a festival celebrating the spirituality of family and community - two fabrics of Catholic Ireland's tapestry that has frayed at the seams in recent years. His trip was dominated by the topic of sexual and institutional abuse within the Catholic Church in Ireland and the US, yet thousands came out to see him in Dublin and at Knock Shrine, Co. Mayo. The numbers at the Dublin Mass were fewer than anticipated although the wind and heavy rain that morning undoubtedly dissuaded many from attending.

 

TAOISEACH'S SPEECH - From the speech of Taoiseach Leo Varadkar to Pope Francis: Holy Father, I believe that the time has now come for us to build a new relationship between church and State in Ireland - a new covenant for the 21st Century. It is my hope that your visit marks the opening of a new chapter in the relationship between Ireland and the Catholic Church. Building on our intertwined history, and learning from our shared mistakes, it can be one in which religion is no longer at the center of our society, but in which it still has an important place. One with greater diversity and choice when it comes to the patronage of our schools - and where publicly funded hospitals are imbued with a civic and scientific ethos.

 

NEWS REPORTS - A New York Times article was headlined: "In Ireland, Pope Francis Finds a Country Transformed and a Church in Tatters" . The BBC outlined all the events of the visit and quoted parts of the Pope's speech where he asked for forgiveness. Al Jazeera said that the visit came amid "declining religious observance in the traditionally Catholic country and anger over the Catholic Church's record on tackling sexual abuse by priests".

 

TUAM BABIES  - Ireland's Minister for Children Katherine Zappone met for several minutes with Pope Francis and told him that she believes the Catholic Church should "contribute substantially to the cost" of reparations involving the former mother and baby home in Tuam, Co Galway, where the bodies of over 700 infants were buried. The remains were discovered at the site of the former church-run home for unwed mothers. Zappone, who grew up in Seattle, gave the Pope a memo outlining her concerns. The Pope referred to the memo in one of his speeches and told journalists on the plane back to Rome "It touched my heart, that is why I wanted to repeat it during my speech [at Dublin Castle]."

NOT 1979 - Washington Post: Pope John Paul II's arrival in 1979 came at a fraught time for Ireland. ... Around a month before the pope landed, the Irish Republican Army bombed Lord Louis Mountbatten's boat, killing him and one of his grandsons. He was Queen Elizabeth II's cousin, and that same day, a separate IRA bombing killed 18 British troops in Warrenpoint, Northern Ireland. ... Ireland is still largely Catholic, though far fewer people attend Mass than once did. Too much has happened, and too much has changed. a wave of secularization accelerated by anger and a sense of betrayal on the part of the church. About 78 percent of the people are still nominally Catholic, and the church plays a central role in health care and primary education.

 

MAYO CURSE -  Co. Mayo Gaelic Football fans are hoping that their team's curse will finally be lifted by getting the pope to sign a Mayo football jersey! The story of the curse haunting the team dates to the county's last All-Ireland football final victory in 1951.  The story is that the team was traveling home with the winning trophy when they met a funeral and didn't stop to pay their respects to the deceased. Since then, Mayo have played in nine All-Ireland finals but won none of them.

BLOOMBERG: In the Brexit referendum campaign two years ago, Britain paid little attention to how exiting the European Union might affect the Irish border. Now, it's the single biggest issue in negotiations...

TODAY'S GUARDIAN:  Angela Merkel has warned her country's business leaders that the Brexit negotiations are in danger of collapse.

NFL PROTESTS - A story in Sports Illustrated compares the NFL player protests during the National Anthem to a protest held in Ireland 100 years ago. In July 1918, British authorities in Ireland issued a proclamation prohibiting all 'meetings, assemblies, or processions in public places' without police authorization. The Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) refused to comply and threatened to suspend any GAA member or club that did. On 'Gaelic Sunday', August 4, 1918, every GAA club throughout Ireland organized Gaelic games of hurling or football or camogie 'in the greatest single act of defiance outside the purely political sphere between 1916 and 1922', as the GAA's official historian put it. That day, a bout 54,000 people played 1,800 games in front of 100,000 spectators. There was no police interference and no trouble, although 'Dublin's Croke Park, the heart of the GAA, was closed by the authorities, but the local women honored the day by closing Jones Road outside the park and playing a wild game of camogie in the street.' LUSITANIA DECK-CHAIR - Almost 1,200 people died on May 7, 1915 when the Lusitania was torpedoed by a German U-Boat eight miles off the Old Head of Kinsale in Co. Cork. Shortly afterwards, flotsam from the vessel, including a deck chair, was salvaged by Blasket islanders. The deck chair was used as a fireside armchair until the Great Blasket Island was abandoned in 1953, and the chair has since then been stored in an old shed on the island. Now the chair has been restored and will be displayed either in the Blasket Centre in Dún Chaoin or on the island's recently restored home of The Islandman author, Tomás Ó Criomhthain.