Peter CostelloHold Your Head Up High: Conversations about Controversies in a Catholic Parish
by Fr Patrick Delargy
(Shanway Press, £10.00; contact john@shanway.com)
The author, Fr Patrick Delargy, is the parish priest at Ballymena in Co. Antrim. It is another book which the author has had to publish himself.
So many books these days on religious, theological and philosophical ideas are self-published that one begins to wonder if there is a crisis in religious publishing in Ireland.
Fr Delargy sees his book as an educational discussion resource. It consists of some 18 stories which are inspired by his experiences in parish chaplaincy work. They are all self-contained units to help the discussions.
The theme is faith and practice in the parish, with the focus on current controversies, often the very topics which are frequently avoided.
Facing a parish which has changed beyond belief from what it once was, the author says that the aim of his narratives “is not to alarm but to alert the reader to sources of inspiration and to promote understanding of the new realities surrounding birth and death, care of children and the disadvantaged, the search for truth and integrity, the missionary church at home and elsewhere in the world, and prayer and belief in the afterlife”.
This is quite an agenda, but the author explores his topics in a very readable way. I was reminded of the parables in the Gospels which draw their impact from everyday situations.
Stories
In the stories, readers will find echoes, or often replications, of discussions they have had themselves, about abortion, medical ethics and other issues.
The opening narrative here, of a woman dying of cancer who becomes reconciled to Christ and his suffering, is very moving.
There is another very striking section, a discussion of the religious beliefs of Seamus Heaney. This has many excellent things to say and represents the doubts and the difficulties that many have had with the late poet’s stances on so many things from the IRA to the afterlife.
In his lifetime people and critics expected him to make plain prose statements about many issues.
But that (it seems to me) is not the role of the poet – his role is to explore through the ambiguities of words the ambiguity of life and death.
However, the English teacher at the end reminds the priest of an important point: “Well, then, father, do you not agree that Heaney, albeit unintentionally, may have been right in reminding everyone that, in practice, it is hard to believe?”
An excellent though unpretentious little book, which ought to have readers far beyond the parish circles that the author seems to envisages.
It will be very well worth getting hold of.