TIMES SQUARE: Many of you will have seen the letter the other day from a Mr T.J. Geraghty, in which he spoke of his unswerving lifelong commitment to the three national objectives (the unification of Ireland, the restoration of the language and the draining of the Shannon).
Mr Geraghty wrote most movingly of the many public meetings he had attended where the faithful, young and old, cheered and shed silent tears of joyful emotion whenever these objectives were mentioned. And he now feels that as they have come almost to fruition, a fourth should be added (the closure of Sellafield).
I am deeply impressed with Mr Geraghty's commitment over the years to the most cherished ambitions of our frail but resilient nation. Indeed, I suspect I may have met Mr Geraghty himself at one of those small but emotionally powerful meetings: does he perhaps recall a certain June Sunday in Cloonfad, Co Roscommon, 1953, the crowd gathered outside the old GAA changing rooms, a flurry of excitement when one Mícheál Macdara Ó Raghaillaigh rose to speak, and the passionate debate that followed afterwards in Síle Dubh's, ending only with the arrival of the gardaí at 3 a.m. and the inventive excuses of the "found-ons"?
I was a mere "gossoon" at the time, a raw youth, impatient with my culture and my people, loud and untutored in my criticisms, and eager only to depart what I believed to be a craven land. Many indeed were my foolish and rude interjections as the great Ó Raghaillaigh addressed us on the national objectives, kindly disregarding my ignorant remarks.
But that evening was to change my life. In Síle Dubh's, as I was savouring perhaps my fifth pint of Guinness, and boasting to my young comrades of my day's exploits, a kindly hand fell on my shoulder. I turned to face a man of perhaps middle height, with a noble brow, impressively red-rimmed eyes, a slightly worn tweed coat and a deceptively slow manner of speaking. He began to talk of the Shannon, the language and the unification of Ireland - but in a quietly convincing manner that was far from the bombastic hectoring to which I was normally subjected.
Instantly, I fell under his spell. Within hours, I came to see our beloved nation with new eyes. At times, hot bursts of shame threatened to consume me as I realised how foolish had been my mockery, and what I had stood to lose - indeed had been eager to lose: my patriotic pride, my moral fibre, my manhood, my very soul.
All this the stranger had given me back, and asked for nothing in return but a pint of Guinness at 20-minute intervals: a miserable price to pay for a new sense of self and, from that day on, an unshakeable belief in our tiny nation's great objectives.
Was our correspondent T.J. Geraghty in Cloonfad that fateful day? Does he recall the man in the tweed coat? Only he can tell us.
As well as being impressed by our correspondent's commitment to our national objectives, I am also impressed with his care in writing "come almost to fruition" where so many less particular people would have written "almost come to fruition". However, after agonised deliberations, and the feeling that I may be betraying someone who restored my whole inner being as an Irishman, I cannot agree with Mr Geraghty's suggestion that a fourth national objective should now be added.
To add such an objective to the sacred list would be to sully the trio already there for so long, to dilute their historic appeal, to deny their metaphysical nature.
Is T.J. Geraghty perhaps forgetting the central role of trinity in the Irish psyche? I do not of course refer to the profane Trinity (College), so rightly described by the basically Catholic James Joyce as being "set heavily in the city's centre like a dull stone in a cumbrous ring". No. That is not our trinity. We, proud nationalists to a man (and the mná have their place, too) pay homage instead to our Three Objectives. The three-leaved shamrock. The traditional Irish threesome (bride, groom, mother-in-law). The three lovely lassies from Bannion. The three blind mice. The three bears. All these hold hallowed positions in the Irish national pantheon.
If we are now to increase the number of objectives to four, with what do we align ourselves, apart of course from the four green fields? The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse? The four corners of the earth? The four-leaved clover? The Fourth Estate? No. It cannot be. We must, and we will, resist.
bglacken@irish-times.ie