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After the dogs and the trots on the pub's TV have been silenced, the musicians arrange themselves around the table. Martin Kelly closes his eyes, plucks his guitar and sings a ballad written at the time when the potato famine was laying waste to Ireland.
John Deane grew up in Catholic Ireland, which has now seen the Church questioned and rejected. But unlike those who have walked away, Deane goes to poetry to help pick up the pieces of a broken religion.
Sometimes we need to look elsewhere to realise what is happening in our own backyard. Ireland is not Australia, but both countries have become prosperous at a time when many other developed nations are in the midst of an economic downturn.
History shows how Irish people have relied on the Church in coping with adversity. The 'official' church may now choose to follow where the people have led, into an Ireland that is more diverse, urban and secular than before.
Real peace is likely to come to Northern Ireland only when a new generation sets aside the long-dead icons of 1916 and 1922.
Hardliners remain at daggers drawn, but their relevance is fading as Ireland embraces globalisation.
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