The Shepherds        The Magi      Mary      Herod       Simeon

Anna      John the Baptist       Andrew       The Woman at the Well       Matthew

Martha       Lazarus        Judas        Pilate        Peter

Claudia Procula       The Centurion       Joseph of Arimathea        Mary Magdalene       John

The monologues were recorded by Commission Christian Radio and broadcast on Downtown Radio in Northern Ireland.

Really, it wasn’t nice. It wasn’t nice at all.

I was just saying to Leonard, my husband, that it wasn’t nice. Leonard has just retired as an important civil servant and he knows about things. He agreed with me, “Not at all pleasant,” he said to me. “Not the sort of thing that decent people like ourselves should have to see”.

You’d think the Government would do something about it, wouldn’t you? I mean to say, if this sort of thing started happening everywhere, where would we be? The whole neighbourhood would be spoiled if we had people like them living among us. I can only say that I am relieved that the hotel turned them away. Can you imagine what would have been said if they had been allowed to stay?

Goodness knows what my friend Agatha will say when she hears about it. She always thought this a down at heel sort of place. She will snigger to herself when she tells her friends at the Bridge Club.

It wasn’t nice, not the sort of thing that a lady of any standing in the community should have to witness.

I mean to say, I only went to see if I might be of assistance. You can’t imagine the scene; worst of all, you simply cannot imagine the smell.

Leonard says I really shouldn’t repeat the details. “Not the sort of thing for polite ears”, he says.

And you should have seen the people there. Well, not quite the sort of clientele that you would expect at an important occasion. Farmers down from the hills, have you ever met one of them? Not the sort of men you would want your daughter to meet. Some of them looked as if they had never seen a bar of soap, and their clothes, their clothes were indescribable. They were simply the dirtiest people I have seen.

The most absurd thing was that this group of foul smelling rustics imagined that they had a right to be there. They insisted they had been told about it all happening. How silly can you get? What group of nobodies is ever going to hear of anything important before people of standing in the community? My husband Leonard says that if anything important were to happen, he would hear from his colleagues; important people always hear things first.

Oh dear, it wasn’t a gathering with any class at all. Apart from the hill farmers, there were strange people dressed in white. “Some sort of cult”, my Leonard says. I’m sure he’s right, Leonard is a man of the world, he knows about these things.

But do you know the worst thing of all? The young lady! A teenager! My Leonard has very firm views on teenage pregnancies and I’m telling you, if Leonard had been there he would have given the father a piece of his mind.

It wasn’t nice, no, not nice at all.

It was strange though. Despite the awful smell, and those horribly coarse farmers, and the funny fellows in their white costumes, there was a strange feeling there, a feeling that this dirty byre, with its unmentionable mess, held something special.

Of course, I’m not a religious sort of person, and if God, (that’s if he’s out there), if he decided to break into our world, he would never arrive like this. No-one would ever believe it . . .

Hello, Reggie?

Yes, it’s Angus here.

I’m keeping well, old chap. How about yourself?

And the good lady?

Splendid. You wanted what?

To hear about my strange encounter? My, news does travel fast.

Reggie, I tell you, it was an odd sort of episode. You know me; I take people as I find them. Too long in nasty places not to realize that there’s good and bad in every nation. I’ve met some tough fellows in my time, but these chaps were something else.

I don’t know where they were from. Took them to be Arabs – the long robes, etcetera. Word was that they were from further east, but you wouldn’t have asked them. You wouldn’t have asked them very much, they had the sort of faces that didn’t invite questions.

I’ll tell you something, they were hard men. Faces like leather and the chap I shook hands with in the city had skin like sandpaper. Kept themselves to themselves; alert all the time, constantly watching, missing nothing, always on guard. Wouldn’t have wanted to get on the wrong side of one of them on a dark night.

What were they doing?

That’s the odd thing, Reggie, that’s why news has reached even your ears. They were looking for a baby.

Why? I don’t know why. Something political – it’s hard to keep up with the intrigue here. It was their odd quest that made me curious.

They were hard to follow; they travelled at night mostly, taking their bearings from the stars. Even if I had got near, I wouldn’t have understood them; their language was unlike anything I’ve heard before.

Anyway, I tracked them for a few days. Was convinced they were lost, they suddenly stopped at a very ordinary house in the early morning and got very excitable. There was much shouting and unpacking. I thought that they had maybe lost something or something had been stolen, but no. They start sprucing themselves up, and then they get various things out of their baggage and they go into the house.

It was all very odd. They spent a while in the house and came out even more excited. Then they gather their pack train and go off in the opposite direction to the one they came, riding as fast as the poor animals can go. Didn’t know what to do, follow them or check out the house. The gammy leg decided for me, I couldn’t keep up with the pace they were setting, so turned back to the house.

This is the really odd bit, the house was nothing special, but there was this feeling, this sense that there was something there.

I watched the place for a couple of hours, the couple seemed agitated. They were packing to leave and then they set off westwards. It was strange; it was if there was a presence going with them. Couldn’t understand it, couldn’t understand it at all.

Course the religious ones here talk about a Messiah. ‘Don’t be daft’, I told them, ‘what sort of Messiah lives in a little house and gets visits from strange foreigners? No-one would believe in a Messiah like that.’

All the same, Reggie, there’s something going on.

Dear Lizzie,

It’s a long time since I heard any news from home. I hope all is well with you. I’m sure wee John is getting big now.

I wish I was back at home again. It’s strange here. The people are OK, but I don’t understand most of them. Joe says, from what he hears, we can come back soon.

Lizzie, don’t believe half those stories you have heard about what happened to us. There wasn’t much fun on the way, I’m telling you.

Sixty miles, it was. ‘It’s not so far’, says Joe, trying to cheer me up. Maybe not so far if you have transport, but we had to walk, and walking when you’re nine months pregnant is no joke, I’m telling you.

We get there and the place is packed with people, hardly a place to sit down let alone stay the night. Anyway, it was cold and dark and no-one would give us a bed, so we end up in this shack that they use for the animals at night time. It was very smelly, but we had to rest somewhere.

Doesn’t the baby go and arrive in the middle of it all. Not much of a place to be born, I’ll tell you. Joe coped OK, but it was no fun, Lizzie, don’t believe it was easy.

There were a few local fellas who heard about what had happened and called in with us, rough guys down from the hills, and there was a dazzling light for a while. It was a bit like a dream.

Anyway, I’m not feeling the best afterwards and Joe decides we might stay on in the town for a while. It being his family’s home, he knew people here and there. Once the crowd had gone we got a nice little place to stay in and Joe soon had plenty of work.

We would have stayed on, but things began to happen again. It must have been almost two years that we were there. We were getting used to the place and getting to know people and the child was running around the place, when these foreigners arrived one day.

They weren’t like anyone I had seen before, very exciting but also scary. The neighbours were very suspicious, you can’t be too careful these days. Course, it was the child they had come to see and they brought him beautiful presents, things the like of which I’d never seen before.

The foreigners were very jumpy and left very soon after they’d arrived. Then Joe said that we must leave too, for the child’s safety. So that’s how we come to be here. It’s a good place to be, but I’d like to be at home again amongst my own people.

There are times, Lizzie, when I wonder about all this. Of course, I don’t doubt, but I wonder. Born in a dirty shack miles from home, with only a few old farmers even knowing it happened; living in a strange town where only foreigners realize who he is; being chased from his own country because even as a toddler, he is considered a danger. Lizzie, who is there who will believe he is the Messiah?

I don’t know. I’m just looking forward to being at home again.

Your loving cousin

Mary

Good evening.

Thank you for coming.

This press conference has been called to give members of the press and the wider public the opportunity to be aware of the facts surrounding recent security operations.

No-one can fail to be aware of the ever present terrorist threat in our country and of the potential for small groups of extremists to destabilize our country. Any responsible administration must take measures to safeguard national security. Such measures will by their very nature be unpopular in some quarters, indeed their very unpopularity may be a mark of their effectiveness.

Religious elements within our society have behaved in a grossly irresponsible manner, suggesting that there would be sudden and unexpected changes and creating a mood of anticipation in the general population which quickly turned to a mood of discontent. The government has been conscious that there are those who would wish to subvert the present order and establish a rule very different from the nation with which we are familiar.

The latest threat to our country’s stability was the most serious and could not be ignored. Our country was infiltrated by foreign agents who unwittingly established contact with the government in their attempts to link up with those they sought. Intelligence sources were able to identify the location of the threat, but not the precise persons.

Faced with an undeniable challenge to the integrity of our country and to the fabric of our society, we were left with no choice but to employ military force in a precise, surgical strike against targets identified by our agents on the ground. Sadly, such operations always carry with them the risk of collateral damage and we do of course regret any unnecessary loss of life. However, it must be emphasized that such decisions are only taken when our nation is confronted with the gravest of threats.

I can confirm that this morning, in defence of the safety and stability of our nation, all males under the age of two years in the town of Bethlehem and its vicinity were liquidated by members of our defence forces. We hope that this operation will have secured the well-being of our country and our people for the foreseeable future and will be a warning to anyone making claims to power that belongs only in the hands of the lawful authorities.

This concludes the statement.

We will not be taking questions.

It has been a long time. Yes, a long, long time.

Waiting is not popular. I can see why. You wait so long that you begin to doubt yourself. Was I right? Perhaps I misheard. I tell you, when you get to my age, it’s easy to mishear things.

People come and people go. You wait so long that even your friends begin to die. That’s hard. Hard to see them go; men who were like brothers, men whom you knew from the younger days and suddenly they are gone, as though they never existed. Five minutes ago, you were all fourteen, and now? And now, indeed.

I never married, you know. Perhaps I was too serious. Don’t think I would have been much company. “You spend too much time at the studies”, my mother would say, “You’ll never find a nice young lady sitting there every night”.

She was right, of course. I spent a lot of time studying. But I enjoyed it. It was never a burden, never something I wanted to avoid. Perhaps that’s what’s made me the way I am. What would they call it, introspective? I like that. I like the word “introspective”, makes me sound serious, someone who is a deep thinker.

Of course, I think a lot, you haven’t much choice when you’re by yourself. But a deep thinker, I’m not sure. No, I wouldn’t be sure about that at all. Thinking worries me sometimes, I go through each day and sometimes I have to just put the head down and get on with things. Thinking can cause you problems. “Less thinking and more doing,” my mother would laugh. Aye.

Anyway, you have plenty to be doing without listening to the ramblings of an old man. It is not me that you’re wanting to hear about.

It was a long, long wait, longer than you can begin to imagine. Things were different, the only news you would get would be what people would tell you, and you know what people are like – half of what they tell you could mean something else and the other half mean nothing at all. People were always wanting to hear good news and sometimes the wanting to hear something good would take over their telling of a story. No matter.

What kept me going was the belief that whatever stories came and went, whatever hopes were raised, only to be dashed again, I would live long enough to see the day that we had been promised. Many’s a time I was called an old fool and many’s a time I believed I was, but when you’re promised something and you believe that person, well, you trust they’ll keep their word.

Do you know, when the day came, I could hardly believe it? You wait so long for something that when it arrives you wonder if you’re dreaming.

It wasn’t a grand occasion, nothing grand at all, just a couple with a wee child and I took that baby in my arms and knew the day had come.

I’m an old man who’s here far too long. It’s high time that I was with my friends again, and if I can read in heaven, I’ll be a happy man. But no moment could be happier than the moment that I saw that wee baby.

Lovely, he was; the most handsome boy in our village. The best catch any girl could possibly have hoped for. Tall and dark with deep brown eyes, my friends so envied me the day I was married.

Oh, we were so, so happy. It’s hard to imagine now that it was possible. Seven years of such happiness before he was taken from me. “A simple accident”, they said, “It could have happened to anyone.” Except it didn’t happy to anyone, did it? It happened to the best husband anyone could have ever wished for; it happened to the only husband I ever wanted.

Some said I wasn’t quite right in the head afterwards. Easy for them to say, with their husbands coming home each evening and their children running around their feet. I was right enough, right enough alright.

Then they started mocking me. “Annie’s become religious”, they would say. “There’s Annie, off to her prayers again”.

Maybe I was a troublesome sight, a young woman in her 20s amongst the elderly women who prayed every day. What else was I to do? I had no children to care for. My husband’s brother saw that I had no need for money. Mind you I wasn’t rich, but I certainly wasn’t poor. My prayers became my life.

Did I think about the future then? What was there to think about? A young woman whose husband has died, what future could I think about? I didn’t expect anything. I just lived from one day to the next.

I think there must have been times when my brother-in-law wondered what he had taken on, looking after me all these years. Making sure I kept my own house, and that I was decently clothed and that I never went hungry, it must have cost him. He was a good man, just like his brother, and he rests with his fathers. My husband’s nephew has kept me these past years.

I’m eighty-four now, over sixty years a widow. Sixty years! Can you imagine what it is like being on your own for over sixty years? It’s not that the family didn’t care for me, they were very good. No, it’s that I liked being on my own, I liked the quietness. I liked the time with my own thoughts.

Perhaps it was the quietness that started it, this feeling that I was being spoken to. My mother used to say I was a terrible daydreamer, “Phanuel,” she would say to my father, “I sometimes wonder where we got that girl. She has her head in the clouds all the time”.

The ones who used to mock me would say to you now, “What else would you expect? All those years on her own, all those years saying her prayers; sure, she would hardly know a real voice if it spoke to her”.

I am not worried by what people might think, after sixty years I have learned not to worry about what anyone thinks. I know what I hear.

There has been a point to it; there has been a point to these sixty years of loneliness, these sixty years of walking through the streets in the cold and the dark to be there for the prayers each morning.

When I saw that child, I knew the moment had come. In the arms of that young woman was our freedom. They can laugh at me now, they can say “Old Annie has lost her marbles”, but I tell you, I have seen our future.

What do people think of me? I don’t know. I never stopped to ask. I’m not here to be liked; I’m here to do a job.

Do I like it? Would you? Have you ever tried sleeping rough? I guess not.

Aye, there were times when I had doubts. I was an only child, but you would know that, anyway. I’m sure my parents would have wanted someone just a wee bit more conventional. You know what I mean. They had a long wait before I arrived and I’m sure in their hearts they would have liked someone who would have got married and had a nice home and had some children.

But that’s the way of things, that’s the way of things.

I didn’t choose to be the way I am. There are times out here when I think I would like to be back in the city. It would certainly be more comfortable and there would be a bit of company at night times.

It’s the nights that are the worst. People come out here and they look up at the sky and they see all the stars and they say it’s an amazing place to be, amazing. I invite them to stay out here for a while and they are quick with the excuses, “Oh, I would really like to, I really would, but things being the way things are, I’m afraid I can’t stop, perhaps next time”. Of course, most of them, I never see again.

Aye, I have friends, good friends, people who take risks by being seen with me, but there are others. Aye, there are others.

What do I mean about ‘others’? Work it out for yourself. There’s stuff I say that doesn’t go down too well with some people. Do you think the poor would be poor if everyone agreed with me? Do you think this country would be so rotten if everyone in our capital city thought the stuff I was saying was a good idea? Do you think they all go back saying, “Isn’t he a jolly chap and what wonderful things he suggests”?

I wouldn’t be on their dinner party list. You know what I am saying? They will talk about me, alright, but there’s not too many of them that would talk to me.

There’re times when I wouldn’t blame people for disliking me. It’s harsh stuff that they hear, harsh stuff, but that’s the problem with the truth, sometimes it’s not nice, sometimes it’s not welcome.

What about the future? Is that meant as a joke? What do you think is going to happen?

These people I’ve offended, do you think that they are just going to put up with what I say? We’re talking about powerful people. We’re talking about dangerous people. Do you know how they settle matters, or do I need to spell it out for you? They will get me. Sooner or later, they will get me.

But do you know something? I’m not even worried. My work is done. I’ve met the person I’ve been waiting for – all the eyes will be on him now.

You tell people, John was a happy man. Aye, John was indeed a happy man.

Ah, Andrew. Come in, come in. Do have a seat there. Another fine day; if a little too hot for me.

All well, I hope. How’s your mother-in-law?

Of course, it was your brother’s mother-in-law who was unwell. I remember now. Anyway, I trust she’s well?

Good. Good. Worrying about loved ones always affects our work.

Your brother’s well? Good.

Being honest, I would have preferred to see you and your brother together, but you know as well as I do that Peter is a bit hot-headed at times; a bit, shall we say, impetuous. I thought it might be easier for all of us if you and I had a quiet chat together. I’m sure we can get thing straightened out between us and avoid any unpleasantness.

Let me find your file. Yes, here it is. Now, where are the latest figures? Ah, I have them here.

Yes. I’m afraid to say that we have become rather concerned at your cashflow situation. Now, there might be very good reasons for it, perhaps you have a large amount that you have not had an opportunity to deposit? Something to reduce this rather large overdraft?

You haven’t?

Ah, I see. You see we were rather counting on you being able to show that you were solvent. We have been dealing with you for sometime and we just assumed that this was just a temporary oversight. Your business has been very regular up until now and we have never had any cause for concern until recently.

Tell me. Are there problems with the fishing at the moment? All industries go up and down, good times and bad times. Perhaps we can see our way to extending your overdraft if we feel that things will come right again.

There are no problems with the fishing. I see.

Andrew, you are not being very helpful. We have been doing business with your family for years, your father was one of my first clients, never in all that time has there been a problem. Then one of my clerks comes to me and says that your account has had no lodgment for months. You must admit, it is very odd. A pair of hard working men and no money coming in, there must be some explanation.

You have no money because you have stopped work. Oh, are you unwell?

You’re fine. You’re fine and you have stopped work. You have just stopped fishing. I don’t understand it, don’t understand it at all.

Andrew, I have known you since you were a boy, since you took over the boat, what are you doing? How are you spending your time?

You’re following Jesus of Nazareth. Well, that’s very nice for you, but what about the bills, what about this overdraft?

You will sell your property. Fine. and what happens when that money runs out?

God will provide?

Oh dear, oh dear. This will not do. Andrew, as your professional adviser, as someone with your best interests at heart, I must say this is a wrong decision. You will never make any money. No, I’m telling you, you follow Jesus of Nazareth and you will end up poor.

I really don’t see it as something to smile about, I’m telling you, no good will come of all this, you will be a poor man!

Hannah, would you put the kettle on?

My feet are killing me. Such a day as I’ve had. You wouldn’t believe it, you wouldn’t believe it if told you.

You would believe anything if it concerned me? Ah, Hannah, that’s not fair, I’m not that bad; am I?

I am? Well, I love you too.

Now, where was I? Did you put the kettle on? You did. What time is it?

Good, we’ve a while yet before I’ve to get that man of mine his supper, I can tell you about the day I’ve had.

He knew about that man of mine.

Who did?

He did, of course, this man I met. He knew all about him.

Hannah, I’m not talking in riddles. I met this man.

I know, I know. I’ve met lots of men – and it was my misfortune to marry five of them.

OK. OK. I know, I know, I thought they were all great at the time, but this man is different.

No, no, no, this is not a new man to replace the present one – this is a different man.

Hannah, would you listen to me! I’m not talking about having two men at the same time, that’s what I’m saying to you, this man is different. He’s different, he’s not someone to marry; he’s someone who knows stuff about you, lots of stuff.

Did that kettle never boil?

Right, you pour while I take these shoes off.

That’s better.

I met this man who told me everything about myself, a man I’d never seen before in my life, a Jewish man.

I know we don’t talk to the Jews. Didn’t I grow up with my mother telling me, “Don’t talk to them, they’re Jewish”? I could never understand why playing with the girl down the street was such a crime; don’t we all look the same? We couldn’t go anywhere when we were kids without being told to keep ourselves to ourselves. They were just as bad, used to call us names and tell their own kids not to speak to us. Sad, really; us living side by side and hating each other.

Anyway, that’s the point, he was Jewish, and he knew I wasn’t, and he stood and talked to me, treated me like a human being, treated me better than a whole lot of our own ones treat me.

He talked sense, said that none of us had got things right and that there were different times coming.

He was talking to the right person, I’ve spent my life getting things wrong, and he knew that. He even told me how many times I had been married and that I wasn’t married now.

You don’t expect things like that; you don’t expect to be going about your ordinary everyday business and to meet someone like him. It’s unnerving, Hannah, to think that all those years where I was doing stuff that I shouldn’t have been doing, I was being watched all the time.

Anyway, I must go and get ready. I’ve told everyone about him and they are saying he’s coming here.

You’ll see changes here, Hannah, I’m telling you; the place will never be the same again.