Thought for the Week
Rules in any game are important.
If you set off to play a board game and you make up the rules as you go along, things are sure to go awry; people you are playing with are sure to feel aggrieved, if it seems that the rules are being made up on the spot and to their advantage.
The Brexit debate has begun to feel like this. It feels as if the government is making up the rules as they go along. It also has the feel of people being rail-roaded into something that they are not really sure that they voted for, nor that the vote itself gave permission to advance. It looks also as if any serious doubts and misgivings people might have along the way are being batted back by the people calling the shots in the game.
It leaves you scratching your head and wondering whether you are playing against a player with a loaded dice or a rule book which only they can see. It leaves a bad taste – is this democracy in action or some other form of doing things that is completely alien to us in these islands?
There has to be rules and laws in any country – they underpin justice and fair-play. If someone makes up the rules as they suit them, that is a rocky road to take.
We don’t have much time, but there is still enough time for everyone to be happy that they are in the game and that it is a level playing field. There is still enough time to be sure that rules are fair, impartial and transparent.
It is not easy when it comes to rules, it can be a bit of a minefield. Even when it comes to God’s rules people have different views of them.
It helps in life when everyone knows and plays by the same rules in the first place and you are sure that someone, somewhere, is not pulling strings or calling the rules to be sure to get what they want. Father Paul Morton St Bride’s