Despite the slide back to war in Northern Ireland, the Archbishop emeritus of Armagh sees a formula for peace. He calls on the British Government and Sinn Fein to keep in contact and keep talking. The article is an edited version of a speech delivered by Cardinal Daly in Dublin last week. There is much tension and great polarisation in many areas in Northern Ireland today. The situation in some respects resembles that which gripped Europe in the year before the declaration of war on 3 September 1939.

That period is powerfully described by Jean Paul Sartre in his novel, Le Sursis (Reprieve), which marvellously captures the mood in Europe at that time, as people nervously waited for the doom which seemed inescapable and yet kept hoping that something, anything, would happen which might, at the eleventh hour, avert catastrophe. Even after war against Nazi Germany was declared, the situation in 1939, particularly in France, following the brutal overrunning of Poland, was a strange one, with a state of war undeniably existing, yet large-scale military operations still seemingly suspended. It was a waiting period, filled with anxiety, tension, suspicion and fear. The French called it une dr?le de guerre, a funny war.

The phrase comes to my mind in relation to the present situation in Northern Ireland, when the IRA cessation has ceased and what the republican movement calls the war is back in place, yet, mercifully, large-scale paramilitary operations have not been completed and major loss of life has not been suffered.

It is by no means, however, a funny situation, and the IRA have themselves declared that it is not a phoney war. It is an understatement to say that the activities of the IRA at this time are recklessly and irresponsibly dangerous. The callous shooting dead of a young British soldier at a checkpoint in Bessbrook, with reckless risk to the lives of civilians in the vicinity, is a grim proof that the IRA have not gone away.

The negative consequences of the IRA?s decision to return to violence are so many and so obvious, even in terms of their own political strategy, that the decision seems completely irrational. It is certainly totally without moral justification and it is politically inept and counter-productive.

In the case of a movement which has for so long laboured and called for admission to substantive political talks, it is extraordinary to find them yet again engaged in a campaign which gives unionists further justification for refusing to admit them into the talks process, and which makes it politically and morally impossible for the British Government, the Irish Government, or the United States Administration to advocate or to support their admission to talks so long as their violent campaign continues.

This campaign increases suspicion on the part of many, particularly of unionists, that the 1994 cessation of violence was not genuine and was never intended to be a permanent turning away from violence to politics, but was only a variation on the old armalite-and-ballot-box policy. The renewed IRA campaign has been seen by almost all unionists as only a new strategy for bringing them under pan-nationalist domination and ultimately coercing them into the united Ireland which is their historic dread. The campaign has spread fear and anger amongst unionists and dismay and alarm among the broad nationalist community.

It has been seen by unionist leaders as a full vindication of their refusal of any dialogue with Sinn Fein. It has led both the Irish Government and the United States Administration to terminate official contacts with Sinn Fein. It has rendered immensely more difficult the admission of Sinn Fein to the political talks. It has dealt a massive blow to the entire peace process, which the republican movement itself has so patiently laboured over so many years to construct. It has brought some of our best and most courageous workers for peace to the verge of despair.

Perhaps the most dangerous immediate effect of the IRA?s renewal of hostilities has been to put the loyalist ceasefire at risk. Indeed, some would argue that the IRA wish to provoke the loyalist paramilitary organisations into renewing their campaign, so as to give credibility to the IRA?s claim to be defenders of the Catholic community. The IRA will resent and strongly deny this charge, but how can they not see that their campaign intensifies sectarian tension and carries high risks of new outbreaks of sectarian violence?

Only a Northern Ireland within which Irish nationalists can feel completely at home, with their rights fully respected and their identity and culture equally esteemed, can have a stable and peaceful future, to the mutual benefit of both its historic communities. Dialogue between the divided communities, always difficult in Northern Ireland, has been made immensely more difficult by the renewal of IRA violence, on the one hand, and by the events associated with the Orange marches at Drumcree and Garvaghy Road in July 1996 on the other. As could have been easily foreseen at the time, the consequences of Drumcree and its aftermath have been and continue to be disastrous. The ugly scenes continuing week after week in the Catholic church in Harryville, where every Saturday evening demonstrators harass Massgoers physically and verbally, constitute a most serious setback to all the work in inter-community relations which had been going on at so many levels over many years.

The Drumcree crisis was a shock to many people engaged in cross-community work and to many people in the Churches. It dispelled many comforting illusions. It shattered what now looks like our complacency. We in the Churches sincerely believed that an inter-community crisis of this kind, affecting almost every part of Northern Ireland, was scarcely possible after all the inter-Church dialogue and inter-community activity which had been going on for decades, and after the evidence we have had of the longing for peace in both Northern communities, manifested strikingly by President Clinton?s visit in November 1995.

Many of us in the Churches genuinely thought that sectarianism was lessening. We are dismayed to find how little real progress has been made at grassroots level, and how deeply ingrained sectarianism still is in Northern society. We perhaps overestimated the effects on public opinion at large of the cordial relations which have for so long and so visibly existed between church leaders and many of the clergy in all the Churches. We were perhaps guilty of a fault which is not uncommon among us, the higher clergy ? though by no means limited to us ? namely, that of believing that a problem can be solved and a situation transformed by the issuing of a document and the holding of a conference.

All this sounds very negative. Positive things have been happening also. Indeed, the good things shine out all the more brightly in areas where darkness is thickest. There have been the deplorable events at Harryville; but all the more luminous has been the courage of James Currie, Mayor of Ballymena, and perhaps even more strikingly the courage of the new Grand Master of the Orange Order himself, Robert Saulters.

There has been the remarkably courageous editorial in the unionist Belfast News Letter by the editor, Geoff Martin, calling for an apology from Britain for the appalling events of Bloody Sunday in Derry. There has been the equally courageous public support for that call from the unionist MP Ken Maginnis, who has also taken a brave and principled stand on Harryville, as has also the unionist Mayor of Derry, Richard Dallas. There has been the courageous condemnation by David Trimble, leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, of the latest parade in Harryville. There have been many enlightened statements from various Churches about parades and marches. In a time of heightened inter-community tension, and in a period of pre-election strain, these actions and utterances are all the more to be admired. They show that polarisation is not absolute and they give ground for hope.

The demeanour of Catholic worshippers at Harryville, in the face of frightening intimidation and disgraceful sectarian insults, has been exemplary. The work of constitutional nationalist politicians in exploring all avenues to a peaceful settlement and resolutely opposing all recourse to violence is admirable.

It is also a reason for hope that the loyalist ceasefires have held, and this reflects great credit on the loyalist leadership. Indeed, the political leadership of the so-called fringe loyalist parties has shown a maturity which surprised many and which is a good augury for the future in Northern Ireland.

It was a momentous moment in Irish republicanism, steeped as it is in the physical force tradition, when the IRA in August 1994 declared a cessation of their physical force campaign in order to begin, through political dialogue, the search for political rather than military solutions to overcome the causes of their conflict. It would be hard to exaggerate the significance of the evolution in republican thinking which brought them to that point. It represented an unprecedented opportunity for ending, once and for all, an armed conflict which had lasted for more than a quarter-century, and even for taking the gun finally out of Irish politics.

Tragically, that opportunity was frittered away. Many, especially Irish nationalists, feel that history will judge harshly the waste of that opportunity over the 17 months which intervened between the IRA cessation and the Canary Wharf bomb. Mutual recriminations and ascription of blame can, however, be self-righteous and self-indulgent. The Christian way is to leave judgement to God and to examine our own consciences as to whether we could and should, each of us, have done more to support and to promote the peace process; whether we, each of us, bear a responsibility, in what we said or did, or failed to say or do to save the peace.

Now it seems to be commonly, however reluctantly, accepted that any major new initiative before the British election is very unlikely. This creates a most dangerous vacuum. It is imperative that everything possible be done to reinstate the peace process, or, at the very least, to find alternative ways of preventing that vacuum from being filled with murder and destruction.

Some meagre consolation may be derived from the IRA?s latest statements, and some hope may be drawn from the latest statement from Sinn Fein. While grimly declaring that their ceasefire remains terminated, and that their resumed campaign of violence is real, the IRA nevertheless declare that they are still committed to the search for peace and still support the efforts of Sinn Fein in this direction.

It is easy to dismiss this as cynical and self-contradictory. I believe that it can be read more positively, particularly when set alongside the later statement from the president of Sinn Fein, Gerry Adams, reportedly suggesting that another IRA ceasefire is possible if British government officials sit down with Sinn Fein representatives to clarify what is required, from the British point of view, to bring this about.

Understandably, some have said that such a suggestion is rendered derisory by the massive bomb which almost simultaneously was being set up by the IRA in Strabane and then by that vicious bullet in Bessbrook. Significantly, however, the Sinn Fein president declared, on 8 February, that he was prepared to sign up to the Mitchell principles on non-violence. At the same time, he declared that he was prepared to continue, in association with John Hume, to work to bring about a peaceful environment in which political talks, to include Sinn Fein, could take place. So long as internal republican dialogue continues, and so long as the pros and cons of the armed struggle continue to be debated within the republican movement, there is still hope.

A new IRA cessation before the election seems dubious; but, significantly, a new cessation after the election is not ruled out. Those persons, clergy, politicians and others, who have kept in contact with the republican movement should keep up their contacts. The persistence and patience with which some have continued to do so, in spite of sustained and bitter and unjust criticism, are admirable. These persons have been doing a service to the whole community; they should be given respect and not criticism for continuing to do so.

The conditions for a new IRA cessation seem now to be clear. As defined by Sinn Fein, they are: that they be admitted to the political talks without delays or preconditions; specifically, that decommissioning of weapons be not made a precondition for the discussion of the substantive matters at issue and be not invoked to exclude or defer discussion of other issues; that the talks be genuine discussions about the substantive issues which divide the communities; and that there be confidence-building measures, specifically regarding prisoners.

From the point of view of the British and Irish Governments, there seems to be tacit agreement on two conditions. First, the IRA must declare an unequivocal ceasefire, in deeds and not simply in words. Secondly, Sinn Fein must formally subscribe to the Mitchell principles and thereby declare their commitment to the use of exclusively non-violent methods and to the principles of democratic politics.

There seems, therefore, to be a basis for broad agreement between the two governments on the terms on which, even now, Sinn Fein could be admitted to political talks; and that in itself is surely progress. There seems also to be some beginning of convergence between the governments and Sinn Fein in this regard. The gap separating them on this issue seems to be admitted by Mr Adams to be not unbridgeable. I believe that the British Government should seriously consider, even in the present politically difficult pre-election situation, making new efforts to engage with Sinn Fein in some kind of communication.

It would, in my view, be singularly appropriate that the Prime Minister, John Major, in spite of all present political difficulties and risks, should undertake such an initiative. He has shown a greater and more sustained commitment to achieving peace in Ireland than any of his predecessors. No one is more deserving than he of winning the final crown of achieving permanent peace through an agreed political settlement in Northern Ireland. I believe that, in spite of all the indications to the contrary, it is still possible that he might do so. That certainly is my hope and my prayer. If the situation is allowed to drift further, this will be seen, and not only in Ireland, as one more missed opportunity in British-Irish relations; and what is worse, will be seen by many as yet another time when the needs of Ireland were sacrificed to British party-political interests.

Meanwhile, there are specific things which can be tackled now by each of the parties concerned, with a view to creating a favourable atmosphere for the rebuilding of the peace process. These apply to Sinn Fein and the IRA, to the loyalists, to unionists and to the nationalists, to the Irish Government and to the British Government.

Sinn Fein has repeatedly called for confidence-building measures. But these are not a one-way street. The IRA could begin the building of confidence by putting an end to punishment beatings. These bring disgrace to any movement, they discredit any cause. They are quite simply barbaric. Having seen in various hospitals the results of some of these beatings and shootings, I know at first hand how barbarous they are. Anyone who wishes the name republican to be held in honour must take steps to see that they are stopped forthwith.

Sinn Fein and the IRA should reflect on their need to realise the harm and the hurt, the grief and the heartbreak, the fear and the loathing, which their campaign has inflicted and continues to inflict upon the unionist community. It seems almost absurd to speak of confidence-building between the republican movement and the unionist community; and yet this must be attempted. The greatest contribution which the republican movement could make in this regard would be a reinstatement of their ceasefire.

In other ways also they must try to reassure unionists by credibly declaring their recognition of unionists? democratic and civil rights and their respect for the unionist tradition.

Irish nationalists and the Irish Government must persist with their efforts to convince unionists of their respect for unionist rights and their unequivocal adherence to the principles of non-coercion and of consent, as stated in the whole series of joint statements of the two governments from the Anglo-Irish Agreement onwards.

The British Government for its part could, even in present circumstances, act on a number of prisoners? issues, where long-standing Sinn Fein grievances could be further attenuated. In particular, the case of Roisin McAliskey, because of its special circumstances, calls on compassionate grounds for very sensitive treatment.

I also believe that the steadily diminishing period of time remaining before the new marching season is upon us calls urgently for a more resolute and pro-active response from the British Government to the North Commission Report 1 than has so far been evident.

Finally, an unqualified apology on behalf of the British Government for the lamentable events of Bloody Sunday in Derry is called for, together with an unconditional admission of the complete innocence of the victims. An impartial investigation of the new evidence recently brought to light is essential if the additional hurt caused by the Widgery Report, on top of the appalling shootings themselves, is to be redressed.

I believe in the power of prayer to change hearts and to change situations, to overcome evil with good. I not only believe this as a Christian, I know it from experience of meeting many of the bereaved and the maimed of our Northern conflict, particularly over the years of my ministry in Down and Connor and in Armagh.

Lent can be a time for reflection, for repentance, for unremitting prayer and untiring work to bring about lasting peace and agreed settlement in Ireland.

1: See Analysis, p.271.

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