Trees | Freedom | First Dáil

TREESI want to recommend that you make friends with a tree. Any tree. Pick one in your local park or glen or up on a mountain. Get up close and friendly with it. Or admire the very welcome trees now being planted along our urban roads and streets. Make friends with one of them. And you don’t have to be monogamous. You can love lots of trees. In lots of places.They come in all shapes and sizes. All produce seeds. Some have berries, bright and attractive.  Most of them are older than us. In the Irish tradition some trees are sacred. They ward of evil spirits. Or bring good luck. They provide shelter. Some are ancient. They have wisdom. They are holy.THERE IS NOTHING GREATER THAN FREEDOMMartin Luther King’s birthday is on 15 January. Each year since 1986 the USA has celebrated the life and legacy of King with a national public holiday.In 2001 I had the good fortune to visit Atlanta in Georgia where Martin Luther King was born and where he spent much of his life preaching. Atlanta was at the heart of the Civil Rights struggle and I had the opportunity to sit quietly in Ebenezer Baptist Church where he preached his first sermon at the age of 17.The Democratic Programme of the First Dáil21 January 1919 was a day of firsts. It was the day the first shots were fired in the Tan War at Soloheadbeg. It was the first day those TDs elected in the December 1918 election met in the Mansion House as the first Dáil Éireann. And it was also the first ever democratically elected Parliament in Ireland. Lá stairiúil a bhí ann.The First Dáil was the moment the Irish people democratically asserted our desire for sovereignty from the British Empire. Just over a century later of the three texts presented to the Dáil that day the Democratic Programme is as relevant today as it was then.