A man wandered up to the joint RC/CoI tent at the National Ploughing Championships today and came over to our table. He was warmly and loudly greeted by my colleague. If she had looked at him, she would have seen him respond by pointing to his ears and mouthing ‘deaf’. My colleague burbled on some more, louder this time, so he did it again.

I handed him a pen and a pad of post-its. He wrote: ‘the C of I does nothing for deaf people.’ I wrote: ‘Well, it should, I am pretty deaf myself, and am tired of people thinking it’s my job to listen harder, rather than theirs to speak more clearly.’ And so I am. I now work on the principle that if people can’t be bothered to speak clearly and with deliberate enunciation, it must be because in their heart of hearts they realize that they’ve nothing worth saying.

We had an interesting ‘conversation’. I’m inspired to learn sign language. It will do me no harm, and it might even do some good.

What else happened?

Well, I was accosted by a gentleman who told me that there will never be church unity, for any church that re-enacts the Lord’s passion on the altar, and indulges in paedophilia, was damned to hell-fire, and that only the blood of Christ can save the world. I thanked him for his kind words and he stomped off. Quite a few people commented on the Bishop-designate of Meath and Kildare, and one or two wondered how the horsey set and the masons would take to her.

It was striking to note how many young adults of both sexes wrote prayer requests. I had good chats with the parish priests of Myshall and Killeigh. I shook hands and exchanged blessings with countless visitors. And the new (RC) bishop of Kildare and Leighlin came over for a chat. It’s good to have another bishop to look up to, for like my bishop he is well over 6 feet tall. I suppose they must have stood for long periods in fertilizer when they were young.