To say Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta – otherwise known as Lady Gaga – is a well-known pop-singer is an understatement.

The young Barney Casey thought he might have a vocation but poverty meant he had to go to work to support his family. He took jobs as a lumberjack, a hospital orderly, a prison guard and a tram operator.

“The violent are taking it by storm”. We have become too familiar with violence and blood. Before the recent horrors in Mali, Paris, Beirut and Baghdad there were many others.

On Melbourne Cup Day we had a staff party in my archdiocesan offices so we could all watch the race together. To be honest I don’t know much about horses.

“Hope. Hope is the only thing stronger than fear. A little hope is effective. A lot of hope is dangerous. A spark is fine, as long as it’s contained.”

Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde was one of the wittiest ever exponents of the English language. He lived a rather colourful and controversial existence in the second half of the nineteenth century.

These days words can pop into the English lexicon before our eyes. So, for example, the proper noun ‘Google’ has become a verb: ‘to google’ something means to search for it on the internet.

They were people just like us, doing the most innocent and human of things: eating with family at a restaurant, working in a pizzeria, cheering at a football friendly, having a drink with friends in a bar, singing and dancing at a rock concert.