Isolation

louth | environment | event notice Friday December 16, 2005 19:34 by Sean Crudden - Cooley Environmental and Health Group sean at cooleyehg dot com Jenkinstown, Dundalk, Co Louth. 087 9739945

Winter Workshop

The sixth annual winter workshop organised by Cooley Environmental and Health Group is slated to take place in January.

John Maguire, Health Promotion (Mental Health), HSE North East Region; Dr Mary Grehan MCC; John Radican, Director, Irish Advocacy Network; Archbishop Michael Desmond Hynes OMA PhD; Kalichi; Sean Crudden BSc H Dip in Ed; William Jones (Engineer) and Leonard Hatrick TC will speak (among others) at the Cooley Environmental and Health Group’s winter workshop. The theme of the workshop is "isolation" and the workshop is scheduled to take place in The Strand Hotel, Omeath, on the afternoon of Saturday 28 January 2006 commencing at 2.00 p.m. Any member of the public wishing to speak at the workshop is more than welcome to do so and should contact 087 9739945 as soon as possible.

"I want to be alone." Everyone remembers the famous dictum of Greta Garbo (1905 - 1990) who was probably the most famous film-star of all time. Reading in St Luke’s Gospel we find in the account of the night in The Mount of Olives the sentence "Then he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, knelt down and prayed." So you don’t have to be ill or depressed or socially excluded or an inferior person to be isolated.

Of course what really interests us is malevolence. Does the bully isolate his (or her) victim? Does the Machiavellian politician circumscribe and isolate his (or her) political opponents? Does the unscrupulous business-man or employee isolate his competitors to increase profit or to win the race for the top job?

We have all heard of ghettoisation, marginalisation, exclusion (Groucho Marx once remarked "I would be ashamed to join a club that would have me as a member"). Basically these are unwanted forms of isolation. Most of us want recognition and love and we dread isolation and fear those who can engineer our exclusion in the community, in our clubs, in our families, in our jobs.

Worshippers in Our Lady of The Wayside Church in Jenkinstown have often heard the choir sing the lines:

"Don’t feel separated from everyone around
And don’t feel isolated
You’re on holy ground
You are in the presence of The Lord."

Undoubtedly there is a feeling of togetherness in the church especially at Christmas time. Are there other alternative, practical answers to the problem of isolation? Let’s hope the workshop on 28 January will provide a few.