My surname comes from West Cork, specifically the Baltimore area:
I’m not going to tell you what it is, but it’s quite a common Cork name. One interesting story about Baltimore is that it was once raided by Algerian pirates, who kidnapped a bunch of people and brought them to a life of slavery in Algiers. The sad thing is that this sort of thing still happens in other regions of the world, albeit using different methods. Only recently, I heard a sad story about Myanmar’s scam centres. That’s probably just one example. The show that I listened to, on BBC radio, featured a young girl from Sri Lanka who thought that she was getting a proper job. And when she got there, she found that it was a scam center, and she pretty much became a slave. It felt like hell on earth. Thankfully, it looks like the issue is being addressed. Sometimes when I wonder why God created hell, I think of what I would like to do to people behind such activities. If I’m appalled at such evil, consider how a holy God views evil. And we all sin at times, though they are plainly degrees on sin, and there will be degrees of punishment for sin. And there’s a Saviour, but to be saved you need to repent and believe.
Back in 1981, I remember reading a Christian leaflet that compared the gospel to Star Wars. The writer mustn’t have seen The Empire Strikes Back because he likened Darth Vader to the devil. But, (spoiler alert) Darth Vader repented and abandoned the dark side. Everyone in heaven will have been a sinner once, but a sinner that repented.
Anyway, my first name, as it happens, is Paul. I don’t know why my parents named me Paul, but I do like the name. I did wonder if it might have been after Pope Paul VI, but Pope John XXIII was still alive when I was born.
The name Paul goes way back to Roman times. I think that it means, small or humble. It would have been Paulus in Roman times.
And my hero, the Apostle Paul is the most famous person with that name. He was a conservative Jew from Tarsus in modern-day Turkey. He lived in Jerusalem when the early church was launched, and he initially saw the church as a threat and persecuted anyone who became a Christian. To the early church, he must have seemed like Darth Vader or worse.
But then, the Lord Jesus Christ appeared to him on the road to Damascus.
Acts 9:1-6
9 Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest 2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. 3 As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. 4 He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
5 “Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked.
“I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. 6 “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
He is known as the apostle to the gentiles, but he also had a great love for Jews, his own people. And we mustn’t forget that the early church largely consisted of Jewish people. And Jesus himself was Jewish. It’s so tragic that “supposed Christians” persecuted Jewish people in later centuries.
I never knew much about Paul as a child. I was familiar with Jesus and the gospels. I do remember hearing the priest in mass say, “This is the epistle of Saint Paul the Apostle”, but I never really concentrated on the readings at mass. Then, when I became an evangelical Christian back in 1980, I explored the rest of the New Testament, that is, the book of Acts and the epistles of Paul and others. And I began to see the significance of Paul. The gospels feel very much like the concluding part of the Old Testament, but it’s only after Pentecost that you see what the New Testament church was like and how they understood and implemented the teaching of Jesus. And Jesus left the writing of the New Testament in the hands of the apostles, guided by the Holy Spirit. And of course, the Book of Acts covers a good part of the life of Paul. The New Testament says nothing about his final days, but it’s believed that he was executed in Rome at the time of Nero.
And he has had a huge impact on general culture. Think of St Paul’s Cathedral in London, São Paulo in Brazil and so many other districts around the world named after Paul. I’m pretty sure that these are named after the apostle Paul rather than after me 😀.
And of course, I’m not the only Paul in modern times 😀. Here are some examples, with some variants in other languages:
- Paul McCartney (Beatle)
- Paul Hewson (U2’s Bono’s real name)
- Paul Newman (Actor)
- Paul McGrath, much loved Irish soccer player perhaps remembered mostly from the 1990 world cup
- Paul Weller (Rock star)
- Paul Simon (Rock star)
- Paul Gascoigne: English former professional footballer and manager, known as “Gazza.”
- Pablo Picasso – Revolutionary Spanish painter and sculptor
- Paolo Nutini – Scottish singer-songwriter with Italian roots
- Pavel Durov – Russian technology entrepreneur and founder of Telegram and VK
I always like to end with a couple of hymns or songs. The first is related to the Apostle Paul, but I’m not familiar with it. It uses the Scottish Gaelic tune that Morning Has Broken uses.
I’m more familiar with Magnificent, a U2 song that does have a spiritual theme, though it wouldn’t be sung in church 😀. But to me it sounds like it’s somewhat inspired by Paul’s writings. Many U2 songs have cryptic references to Christianity and for many, that works better than the “happy clappy” modern Christian music 😀.
I was born, I was born to sing for you
I didn't have a choice but to lift you up
And sing whatever song you wanted me to
I give you back my voice from the womb
My first cry, it was a joyful noise, oh, oh
You do get plenty of hymns about the name of Jesus. Here are a few examples:
Hibernia Gospel 