Courtney McGrailDear Editor, It was interesting to read your front page story last week (‘Families need secure homes this Christmas – Archbishop’) in which Archbishop Eamon Martin called on the Government to do more to help indebted families who are dreading the financial pressures of Christmas.
There seems to be a Celtic Tiger sense of giddiness in the country this Christmas. Anyone visiting Dublin’s city centre for the past few weeks would have found parking spaces at a premium, queues at shop check-outs and packed to capacity cafes and bars. After some quiet years during the recession, the office Christmas party is back with a bang, not to mention the very annoying groups touring the bars for the ‘12 pubs of Christmas’.
At Christmas time we are often reminded of those who are not as lucky as us, as we prepare to open presents and sit down with our families to share a feast on Christmas day. Homeless charities run ads appealing for donations and charities working in the developing world ask us to give virtual gifts which support their work.
Let us hope that with the return of affluence to the country and the increase in spending and hedonistic celebrations, that the donations to charities and offers of volunteer hours also increase.
Not everyone is able to enjoy this new sense of recovery and I hope that as a country we have not completely forgotten the lessons of the bust as we enter another time of boom.
Yours etc.,
James Doherty,
Templeogue,
Dublin 6W