AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A STAMP 
Or, "Converted "by the Jesuits"   By Rev. Kenneth W. McCabe, S.J.
Few people would like to be born a Communist.  Being a stamp such was my fate.  One day a million of us were produced in a single morning.  My life had begun.  I quickly discovered that, though I was on an equal basis with my companions, I had no rights. My one value apparently was to symbolise the payment of a letter travelling from one place to another.  I was a mere insignificant cog in the huge network of the postal service.
However, I soon discovered that I had one chance to increase my value.  If I could manage to get myself sold on the first day of our issue, my companions told me, I would be very popular with dealers and collectors.  Imagine my disappointment when I didn't even leave the drawer on the first day of issue.  About a week later I was sold to a young man, immediately stuck on an envelope and I began what I thought to be my first and last journey.  I arrived, at a big office the following day and quickly found myself in the waste-paper basket.  Life for me seemed to be over.  Imagine my surprise when at the end of the day a nice young lady came to the basket and salvaged myself and some companions from oblivion.  She put us into a big box and left us guessing as to what our fate would be.
We hadn't long to wait.  The following day we were put into an even bigger box and before we realised what was happening we found ourselves in the Jesuit Stamp Bureau at Tullamoreo  For the first time in my life I found I had a purpose and a value in life. I was not a Communist anymore.  I was converted by the Jesuits.  You see the Jesuit Students run the Stamp Bureau for their missions in Hong Kong, Malaya and Northern Rhodesia.  Parcels of stamps are sent to them from all over Ireland and from England. Old stamps of every sort who thought their life was over find that they are welcome and badly needed in Tullamore.
The students used to work on us almost every day.  They sorted us and put us into large sacks which they sent to dealers all over the world.  Some of my companions were picked out and put into special packets.  They were more valuable because they were scarse or first-day issues.  I was not chosen specially but I did not mind.  I was doing my part for the Jesuits Missions in a very special way and I was happy in life.
To-day I am proudly displayed in the album of a nice little boy from Southern Africa. Old stamps may be sent to the Editor who will forward them to the Stamp Bureau.

[Shanganagh Valley News, Vol.1 No.5, November 1958, p.1]