In all our sanctuaries we sit at risk

Category: Europe

  • The Inn this Advent

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    Photograph by Robert Atanasoski/AFP/Getty Images. Expulsion I heard this song tonight from the desert the shelters below ground there and the wrecked homes and I heard it from the grey waters just south of Europe, with winter coming on and the boat leaking and from the guard posts and barbed frontiers that now cover a…

  • The Scottish Referendum : odd thoughts

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    The campaign has not just energised Scots and many more – it will surely have embittered many, too. How will Scotland fare once the decision is made and the “sides” stand back from the barricades, the losers looking at the winners in the eye ? Will they help each other put the barricades away ?…

  • Our present democracies will not rescue us from ourselves.

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    For the young, it will already seem a long time ago that the Soviet Communist bloc effectively closed down, its remarkable leader Mikhail Gorbachev introducing “Perestroika,” its various constituent states, including Russia itself, “giving way” to democracy in remarkably quick succession. A major symbol of that dramatic and joyful time was the destruction of the…

  • The Resignation of Denis MacShane

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    Denis MacShane was Minister for Europe under Tony Blair.  He brought a wider and more cultured vision and experience to that role than many politicians and activists  ever get near, at least in this country. For instance, he  translated into English a Brecht poem for “Poems on the Underground”.  He also responded positively to a…