Mid-west Humanists – An Irish Atheist Community

Hi all,

Apologies to my fellow bloggers and meeting goers for being so absent as of late! Anywho, I was wandering around Limerick with a German friend a week or two ago, and I came across this:

As you can see from the photo above, the plaque/memorial etc… I found speaks about the loss of a loved one. Now, to be fair, this is from the middle of the 19th Century (hence the title of this post) and it was found on the grounds of St. Mary’s Cathedral (you know the big noisy protestant one?) so this kind of religious rubbish is to be expected.

What I find interesting are two things. First of all, the phrasing of this memorial is ridiculously fawning. All of the attributes of the woman being mourned, virtue and amiability etc…, are viewed from the point of view of how well she fits into (their) God’s idea of good, upstanding traits. Her “departed worth” clearly wouldn’t be worth much if she had been one of Limerick’s poor at the time of her death, regardless of how good a parent she was, or how beloved and affectionate she was.
The other thing I find highly interesting, is that, despite the fact that this memorial plaque is clearly over 150 years old, it could quite easily have been written this year by any single devout religious believer who has a talent with flowery words. Am I the only one who is bothered by that…?

Interesting to think that most religious people in Limerick are still living in the world that existed at least 7 years before our beloved, amiable Charles Darwin published his ground-breaking work and turned the international scientific community away from the hokum of the ages. Also very pathetic…

Peace, my friends, and remember, don’t fall asleep in Jesus! You might never wake up again! 😉

Filed under: atheism, religion, science |