Category Archives: Europe

Requiem for a Dream

Posted on December 9, 2024 by Gerry Lynch

The EU is is dying as people mostly die, slowly and little by little, a cancelled election, an exiting member, some reimposed border controls… Continue reading →

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Must We Ban Russia Today?

Posted on November 21, 2022 by Gerry Lynch

UK and EU bans on RT are a betrayal of British and European values on free speech Continue reading →

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Northern Ireland is too Divided to Function

Posted on November 1, 2022 by Gerry Lynch

Given the obvious risk of political paralysis in N Ireland, why did the UK govt have no Plan B? Continue reading →

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Strange outbreaks of positivity over Northern Ireland

Posted on October 7, 2022 by Gerry Lynch

I was published in Unherd over the strange emergence of good vibes about breaking the EU-UK bad blood over the Northern Ireland Protocol. “After nearly two years of ugly in-fighting over the Northern Ireland Protocol, there has been a sudden … Continue reading →

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Orbán, Trianon, and the Rebirth of Nationalism

Posted on June 7, 2020 by Gerry Lynch

It is well worth reading Viktor Orbán’s speech on the 100th anniversary of the Treaty of Trianon, which was last Thursday and I didn’t even notice until it passed. Let’s start with this passage towards the end, which needs little … Continue reading →

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The Mosque of Bohoniki

Posted on June 17, 2019 by Gerry Lynch

The mosque at Bohoniki is one of the last places of worship of the Lipka Tatar community which still survives as it has since the late 14th Century in what are now the borderlands Poland, Lithuania, and Belarus. The mosque … Continue reading →

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St Pancratius, ‘s-Heerenberg, and the ‘Gestapo Window’

Posted on July 19, 2018 by Gerry Lynch

St Pancratius (de Pancratiuskerk) in the little Dutch market town of ‘s-Heerenberg (population 8,000) and literally a ten minute stroll from the German border. At first blush – another pretty, ornate, but unexceptional post-Vatican I church in the south eastern … Continue reading →

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St Nicolai, Kalkar

Posted on June 7, 2018 by Gerry Lynch

St Nicolai’s Church in the town of Kalkar (115km north of Cologne, 150km SE of Amsterdam) on the German Lower Rhine – a wonderland of woodcarving from the late 15th and 16th Centuries, where a remarkable cast of woodcarvers found … Continue reading →

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A Tallinn Memorial from the Days before Nationalism

Posted on June 7, 2018 by Gerry Lynch

Our past was at times profoundly different from our present in ways we little appreciate; this memorial in an Estonian church survives from a time when nationalism was not a given, not too long ago. Continue reading →

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Mariken van Nieumeghen aka Little Mary of Nijmegen

Posted on June 3, 2018 by Gerry Lynch

This bronze statue has been on Nijmegen’s Grote Markt, by the entrance to the Stevenskerk, since 1956 and was executed by Vera Tummers-Van Hasselt. It represents Mariken van Nieumeghen (Little Mary of Nijmegen) one of the symbols of the city … Continue reading →

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