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The first of many crises of religious faith to strike me happened on a Good Friday a long time ago. It came when I belatedly found out that the iconic western series The Virginian had been ousted from the television schedules and replaced with hymns, scripture readings and sacred music, in efforts to piously reflect sympathy with the Saviour’s suffering.
As Leo Varadkar stepped out, and Simon Harris steps in, this is the eighth time an internal leader switch has given us a new taoiseach. Here’s a summary of the previous seven “switcheroos” and a flavour of how the switches worked – and sometimes did not.
Ireland has voted to reject both government proposals to change the Constitution on Family and Care, but it is not the first time governments have found themselves on the losing side of constitutional reform in this country.
In the end it was a close-run thing played out to the background sounds of fierce street protests by farmers. The EU’s embattled plans to restore nature and wildlife in the coming decades just scraped the bar as they went over in a crucial European Parliament vote.
It’s reminiscent of one of those real old Irish questions, like what time is midnight mass? Not only does Seachtain na Gaeilge – A Week of Irish – go on for more than a fortnight, it actually starts on March 1, St David’s Day, celebrating the Welsh patron saint, only to then abruptly end on St Patrick’s Day, the Irish patron’s day.