You are a successful, upwardly-mobile, new-Ireland type of person, complete with the €100,000 job and the 99-D car. Life is good, and now that the European Union has finally agreed to give the Republic better weather, the future looks brighter still. But you have a guilty secret. Yes, you are a practising Catholic.
Long ago, when you were very young and surrounded by dozens of hedonist colleagues, you made a terrible mistake: You produced a set of rosary beads and tried to rattle off a quick decade before lunch. Oh, you can still hear the peals of cruel laughter ringing in your ears.
For months, office pagans and heathens played joke after infantile joke at your expense - sticking a giant picture of the Pope on the back of your coat, getting friends to ring up and ask for you to hear their confessions. Now, it has died down, and you are not about to do anything to remind anyone of your devotion. But you would love to be able to say a rosary every now and then. . .
Well, weep no more (Isaiah 30:19), for the Rosary of the Third Millennium is upon us! Approved by the Pope, any First Communion child could work his or her way along the little bumps representing each prayer. And the glory is, to the worshippers of mammon it looks as if you are fondling a gold credit card!
The Rosary of the Third Millennium, around £25 (€32 ), will soon be available from Irish jewellers and other retailers.
