Michael Hand talks… six principles of a happy life


I RECENTLY read a book called ‘The Science of Happiness’ by Brendan Kelly and in it he talks about the six key things that contribute to our happiness. Seeking balance and moderation in all things One expression I recall my Dad saying was “everything in moderation” and it is so true. To be happy we […]

COLUMN: ‘Sorry for your loss’ isn’t enough


I HAVE a friend who is English and he often says that he does not understand what he considers Irish people’s obsession with wakes and funerals. He thinks that we overdo the whole death thing and he is much more in favour of the low-key, private way that the English deal with death. He may […]

COLUMN: Michael Hand – The Swan Story


I NEVER expected to be on the dating scene in my fifties but after 22 years my marriage ended and I wasn’t cut out for being on my own. I have heard it said that women grieve and men replace, so after a short period of grief I went looking for love. Dances and pubs […]

COLUMN: A dark secret


THE first man I ever hugged was Tony Esposito. In a black-and-white world, he was an explosion of Technicolor. But he had a dark secret. I had been accepted by the Diocese of Youngstown to work as a deacon in my final summer before ordination. I was assigned to this rather backward parish called East Liverpool […]

COLUMN: An accidental meeting


I WAS responsible for him losing his eyelash and gaining a wife yet I only met the man once and I don’t even know his name. It all came about because my first car as a newly ordained priest was a clapped out ten-year-old Austin Allegro that was held together by rust. The reason I came […]

COLUMN: A reluctant celibate


THE start of my journey to become a priest was very shaky. I fell in love twice in my first three months. The first time was the week before I entered the Seminary. I had received an itemised list that was considered essential for a young man starting off on the road to priesthood. Most items […]

COLUMN: Is there anything after this?


IN THE 1980s when I worked as a priest in a town in Fermanagh, I lived next door to a couple who were rather traditional, conservative Catholics. I wouldn’t have thought of myself as their type of priest as I was a product of the post-Vatican 2 church which for a very brief period flirted with some […]

Time for a Helping Hand


BACK in the 1980’s any decent Catholic was expected to go to confessions at least once a month and weekly for the more devout, whether you had sinned or not. As a clerical student at Maynooth College, it was easy for me to confess as we were assigned a spiritual director whom I could visit whenever […]

Time for a helping hand


“HAND” said the booming voice of the middle-aged cleric who lay on my bed in Rhetoric House, Maynooth Seminary back in 1974. “Hand, McLáimh, I’m afraid that name does not have a good reputation in clerical circles. Your pedigree is not very good I’m sorry to say.” The man who uttered these words was the […]