I was captivated by a small detail I read in a news article about the late singer Sinead O’Connor this past week.
In her obituary it said that the was born Sinead Marie Bernadette O’Connor on December 8, 1966 (Feast of the Immaculate conception) in the Cascia House Nursing Home in Dublin.
It also listed the rather odd detail that the delivering doctor was the son of the Irish revolutionary leader and first Taoiseach (president) Eamon de Valera. She was named in honor of the doctor’s mother Sinead and St. Bernadette of Lourdes.
As you might have guessed, it was the location that caught my eye.
Perhaps St. Rita is poking her head out again and reminding us that, with God, nothing is impossible.
So pray for the dead and pray for your own impossible causes.
If you’re too young to remember (I was 13 at the time) Sinead O’Connor was an Irish singer who shot to stardom with a song called Nothing Compares 2 U. The song was written singer who has gone to his judgment, Prince.
The song was indeed haunting, or rather Sinead’s voice was. She clearly had great talent.
But as quickly as she rose to fame, she also fell from Grace. Hard.
In October of 1992, the singer appeared on Saturday Night Live where she ended a performance of the Bob Marley song War by picking up a glossy photograph of Pope John Paul II, declaring “Fight the real enemy!” and then tearing the picture to shreds.
She was instantly banned from ever appearing on that show again. What’s more, she was roundly condemned. Look, when Madonna says you went too far, you’ve probably gone too far.
But I also remember a few years later when O’Connor found a renegade Catholic priest to “ordains her” to the priesthood. I believe she called herself Mother Bernadette or some nonsense.
Sinead claimed to have been abused by the Church. This is where it gets sad. Knowing what we know, she may very well have been abused. She claimed to be fighting for the true Catholic faith. She also appeared to be mentally unstable and easily manipulated. It seems to me that the Catholicism she was fighting for was straight out of the gates of hell, almost like an anti-church. Coupled with all her other problems, this talented women who otherwise could have had a bright career spiraled out of control and is now dead at 56.
Sinead isn’t even the point of this post though. And she wasn’t a “fierce activist” either. She was a manifest public sinner.
But what are we? Are any of us prepared for our judgment day? Hopefully none of us are tied up in drugs. But the question is valid. Barring mental illness and mind altering substances, how are we living? Are we prepared for the day when our lives are snatched away and we have to give an account of our wretched sins? When we die, did we think we had just one more day to pray for contrition and ask forgiveness for substance abuse, contraception, abortion, theft, blasphemy, to say nothing of the sacrilege of simulating a sacrament?
It comes quicker than you want and more final than you desire.
Seek the Truth.
He is a real Person.
In fact, He IS GOD Incarnate.
Cling to Him. Cling to His Church – the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church and make sure it’s not the false church presented to the world these days.
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“Now, let me be clear so that people can follow me. My religion outlaws sodomy and greatly shuns gay inclinations, gay relationships, and effeminate men. And if there are any such men in existence, then they need to be converted to normalcy. My religion says that God can be a jealous God, and that all other gods are demons, and that there is only one True Religion. All others are demonic lies. There is no such thing as divorce, and remarriage is adultery. We don’t live to be “greenpeace gardeners” of the Earth; we live to know and love God and one day meet Him in Heaven. And Christ didn’t resurrect to start up an NGO. He started a proselytizing organization on a mission during wartime to save humanity’s soul from the Devil. Also in my religion, the death penalty is one of the heaven-decreed penalties for a number of crimes. That is my religion.” - Laramie Hirsch (with permission)
Harvey Millican's Blog: Musings of a Trad Dad 