by Jim Lawlor

Hastily prepared and quickly advertised, the Solemnity of St Joseph was like no other. Mass on March 19th was to be our last together indefinitely and turned out to be as busy as Sunday. The air was tense. Grandparents who hadn’t seen grandchildren for a week: people fragile with age or ‘underlying conditions’. As we took leave of one another, I wondered when – if – I would see these people again. We altered the chorus of the feast-day hymn to end that Mass. Not St Joseph, ‘teach us how to die’ – but rather – ‘Teach, O teach us how to live…’ Changing the language that morning has become emblematic of these months; the need to find new languages for a new time.