Last night I had the privilege of being at an event in the Waterfront Studio which was part of the Belfast Festival, but unlike other events I usually go to in this and other festivals it wasn't primarily an artistic one. There was a short, superb set by the Féile Women's Choir at the beginning, but despite the fact that my wife sings with them, that wasn't my main reason for going, rather it was to hear Professor Phil Scraton, one of the members of the Hillsborough Independent Panel, speak about the work of that panel, the tragedy that unfolded on 15th April 1989 and its aftermath, under the title of "Hillsborough: Speaking Truth to Power." This was an event not just for Liverpool fans or football fans, but for anyone interested in politics, power and the dignity of people in the face of injustice. Whilst I was quite familiar with most of the material presented, to hear it all over the course of 90 minutes from a person intimately involved with the whole p
Dialogues, monologues, sketches, poems, rants, theological and liturgical bits and bobs and miscellaneous other verbal doodles...