I live in Northern Ireland. I was born here. I like it. Mostly. The glens, the coast, the potatoe bread. What's not to like?
Well, there's the mindset.
I've had a few conversations lately with people where the same theme, the same old moan, keeps cropping up: why is there no innovation coming from Northern Ireland? Where are the makers? The geeks? Why are our graduates coming out of university without the knowledge they need or the drive to find it for themselves? Why aren't we investing in the future? Or more importantly, why are we creating the future?
The same answers are wearily proffered. The same fingers pointed in the same directions. It's the universities' fault. They're not keeping up with new technologies required by the market. We're not doing a good enough job of marketing ourselves to the world. We're not investing enough in the creative industries.
Yada yada yada.
All that may be true, but I humbly offer another, more fundamental reason. Faith. Or more precisely, faith that believes in an after life. Minds in Northern Ireland are still strongly influenced by the notion of a life hereafter. Paradise. Heaven. A place we need to strive for. A notion that, whether we want it to or not, informs our view of this life. I believe that in Northern Ireland we are crippled with a fundamental, implicit, pervasive view that this life is of little value, relative to the life to come.
If we hold this view, consciously or, more likely, sub-consciously, why would you invest in this life? Surely, only the things you do that affect your eternal life have any *real* worth. As the old hymn triumphantly proclaims:
"Only one life, 'twill soon be past. Only what's done for Christ will last."
The irony for me, is that this thinking leads almost inevitably to a sort of nihilism itself. The thought flows from this notion that we're really only enduring this life until we get to the next. That *real* life waits for us. We're just "passing through". This view of life on earth as a test, a waiting room, a journey to the real life beyond will stop us from valuing what's around us. Here and now doesn't matter compared to there and then.
Northern Ireland will never be an innovator until we break free from the bondage of the Presbyterian long view. This life matters, whether you believe there's another one or not. I would argue that the belief in another life will always hold you back in this one, and in every aspect of it.
Not until we learn to value the preciousness of the life we have, the only life we're likely to have, will we see any need to invest in it.
