APPENDIX 39
Memorandum submitted by the Most Rev Séan
Brady, Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland
INTRODUCTION
I welcome this opportunity to make a brief contribution
to the Inquiry on "Reconciliation: Ways of Dealing with Northern
Ireland's Past" being conducted by the Northern Ireland Select
Affairs Committee.
As the Inquiry itself notes, discussion on this
important and complex matter has intensified in recent months
following the Secretary of State's announcement in May 2004 that
he was embarking on a programme of discussions about how Northern
Ireland could find "ways of dealing with the past" which
"enable it to build a better future for the next generation."
This is a welcome objective and addresses a
theme that has been part of an ongoing conversation between representatives
of the various Christian traditions in Northern Ireland for some
time. My own comments and observations are informed by that conversation
and by the research and observations of the Northern Ireland Catholic
Commission on Social Affairs, the group which provides advice
and research to the Catholic Bishops of Northern Ireland on social
issues.
THE GOSPEL
OF RECONCILIATION
The point of departure for the Church's response
to the question of dealing with Northern Ireland's violent past,
is its belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus, the possibility
that God can heal and transform even the most violent and painful
of human events and bring out of their midst a new beginning,
a new creation. This healing and transformation was central to
the ministry of Jesus. He came to bring "liberty to the captives"
and "freedom to the oppressed" (Lk 4:16). This included
liberating people from the captivity of fear, regret, desire for
retribution and vengeance that are often part of the legacy of
violence and conflict. It was about restoring broken relationships,
breaking down barriers and opening up new horizons of both conversion
and forgiveness. It involved creating safe and understanding spaces
for those who are "weary and overburdened", including
the marginalised and the vulnerable. It was both personal and
collective, addressing the individual and the historical memory
of the community.
The Church continues this healing and transforming
ministry in many ways, from the sacramental and pastoral support
it provides to individuals and families who are experiencing trauma
and grief, to its development of and involvement in a wide variety
of local community initiatives which support the work of healing
and reconciliation in local communities, sometimes in partnership
with other community, voluntary or statutory agencies.
RECOGNISING EXISTING
INITIATIVES
This existing work of the Churches and of voluntary
and community groups at a local level, both within communities
and across traditional community boundaries, has had, and continues
to have, an important though often quiet and unpublicised impact
on the healing and reconciling of individuals, groups and communities
in some of the most difficult interface areas in Northern Ireland.
These local, sometimes informal processes have
the benefit of localised participation and ownership, familiarity
with the individual or groups concerned, as well as their history
and environment, and the durability to be able to ensure ongoing
support.
In considering "ways of dealing with the
past which recognises the pain, grief and anger associated with
it", it seems important and just that the existing work of
the Churches and faith communities, as well as other community
and voluntary groups, is recognised, supported and extended, in
addition to any more formal and public process which may emerge.
GENERAL PRINCIPLES
The experience of those working on such healing
and reconciliation projects at a local level would suggest a number
of general principles that are important in this kind of transformative
process:
(a) Respect for the uniqueness of the
experience of every individual, including the manner in which
they cope with and define their grief and pain
This suggests that there is no "one size
fits all" approach to the complex issue of dealing with past
in Northern Ireland. Some of the "pain, grief and anger"
associated with the past is personal, some of it is owned by communities,
some of it is recent, some of it is historical, some of it profound
in its scale and tragedy, some of it transient and relatively
superficial. This means that a comprehensive approach to dealing
with the past will inevitably be multi-layered, involving a range
of related strategies and approaches at both the macro-political
level, at the level of local communities and at the personal level.
It is likely therefore that different elements
of processes already undertaken across the world will be necessary
to address the complexity of the needs and expectations that exist
in Northern Ireland. There is no existing model which can be easily
translated to our particular circumstances. Some people will want
to participate, others will not. Some will benefit from telling
their story, having their pain heard and acknowledged, others
will want to uncover previously unknown aspects of the truth.
Some will want vengeance, retribution or imprisonment, others
will want exoneration and amnesty. Any macro process which is
proposed would have to address all of these needs and expectations.
It may be that some, rather than all of these
expectations can be met. It may be that some of these processes,
such as recording one's story or remembering painful events in
a formal and constructive way could happen in advance of or independently
from any larger scale process requiring political and legislative
support.
All of this suggests that an important starting
point in any such initiative is a comprehensive assessment of
both the demand for and the range of personal, emotional, therapeutic
and other needs which would be associated with any such process.
(b) The potential for politicisation
should be minimised
This, I would suggest, is critical. The need
for truth telling and reconciliation needs to be weighed against
the need to achieve and maintain wide spread political agreement
in Northern Ireland. Unless such agreement has been achieved and
the stability of agreed political arrangements has become sufficiently
robust, there is a real danger that dealing with the past in a
very public and formal way will destabilise the political environment
and further undermine the very possibility of achieving reconciliation.
This suggests that achieving political agreement
and allowing the political institutions which emerge from that
agreement sufficient time to stabilise is a prerequisite for any
comprehensive and formal approach to dealing with the past. It
is not clear that Northern Ireland has reached that point. It
also suggests that people need to have the certainty that what
they have experienced in the past will not occur again in the
future, that violence and the threat of violence, from whatever
quarter, has been clearly rejected as a means of achieving political
ends. Again, it is not clear that Northern Ireland has reached
that point.
The principle of respect for the uniqueness
of the experience of every individual also tends to favour a process
which emphasizes the private mediated, or small group type of
process rather than one which is very formal and public. A more
private process would minimise the possibility of such a process,
and the individuals who participate in it, being exploited for
political or other ends. Such politicisation would quickly undermine
the integrity and effectiveness of such a process, yet will be
hard to avoid unless the two Governments, the political parties
and the relevant paramilitary groups have expressed a level of
agreement about and public commitment to the process itself and
to the rules that will govern it. Achieving such consensus and
obtaining clarity about the extent to which each party to the
conflict in Northern Ireland will participate in the process,
and on what terms, would be an important part of assessing whether
such a process is possible at all.
In this regard it is interesting to note that
there have been over twenty "Truth and Reconciliation"
processes undertaken across the world in recent times, most of
which seem to have achieved significant but always limited success.
Each of them has encountered some form of difficulty along the
way, not least that of raising expectations that the process was
not always able to meet. It is also interesting to note that in
the South African TRC process almost ninety percent of the hearings
took place in private.
(c) Those who feel the need to be healed
from the consequences of the past, determine who they are, not
others
This touches on one of the most sensitive aspects
of any process of dealing with the past, the issue of who is a
victim and who is a perpetrator. In the context of a historical
conflict, this distinction can sometimes be very straightforward,
at other times very complex. Some people have clearly perpetrated
the most heinous crimes for which there is no conceivable justification,
others reacted violently out of their own experience of being
a victim, and most, including Churches and State based agencies,
were caught up to varying degrees in the competing ideologies
of the conflict. This means that any process of dealing effectively
with the past needs to be sufficiently flexible as to allow for
the complexity of the relationship between victim and perpetrator
in a historic conflict, between a divided community, to be accommodated.
This is not to suggest that there is moral equivalence
in terms of the culpability of all of those involved in such a
process. Indeed, one of the potential abuses of such a process
would be for those who bear responsibility for what by any standards
were morally unacceptable actions, to be allowed to use the process
as a means of minimising the moral significance of what they have
done. Rather, it is likely that, in the interests of establishing
the truth about what has happened and why, the issue of the relative
moral culpability of the participants will not be the primary
issue. While accepting responsibility is important, and needs
to be considered in terms of the legal parameters which will condition
and support such a process, the emphasis will be on moving beyond
retributive justice to the broader and deeper processes of healing,
restoration, truth telling and transformation.
Any such process also needs to be flexible enough
to accept that many of those who perpetrated atrocities in the
past, continue to be burdened by that past and wish to address
it in a constructive and transforming way. Such acknowledgement
and transformation, if undertaken sincerely and with the necessary
commitments to a peaceful and constructive participation in the
future, will clearly benefit the whole of our society.
OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Other complex but important considerations in
any such process would include:
— How such a process will relate to
existing or potential policing, judicial and public enquiries
which seek to address issues from the past? Over 1,800 killings
and an even higher number of violent incidents resulting in injury
and loss remain unsolved. The fact that there is never likely
to be sufficient policing or other resources to address all of
these aspects of the past is a strong argument in favour of a
process of voluntary disclosure rather than criminal investigation.
This is turn raises the complex question of incentive, what can
and should be offered to those who volunteer to disclose incriminating
information in the course of such a process? On the other hand,
if the perception of such a process is that it becomes a means
of obfuscating or postponing other more rigorous and effective
means of arriving at the truth, then it is unlikely to receive
widespread support.
— Closely related to this is the issue
of confidence in the willingness of individuals and organisations,
including paramilitary groups and state-based agencies, to participate
fully in such a process and to disclose accurately and as fully
as possible all the information they have available. On the one
hand, this may require the use of strong incentives to encourage
individuals to participate, incentives which may cause further
offence and pain to the victims of their actions. On the other
hand, the experience of participation in public inquiries in Northern
Ireland to date has been very mixed. It seems fair to suggest
that there is a general lack of confidence that all those who
need to participate fully and frankly in such a process are likely
to do so. In this context the question which needs to be considered
is whether even partial disclosure of the truth and an imperfect
process is better than no process at all?
— Political commitment to providing
the resources required to sustain such a process is also important.
If it is to be effective it will inevitably require the application
of a wide range of specialised administrative, legal, therapeutic
and other resources over a considerable period of time. This has
to be weighed against the realistic outcomes of such a process,
in as far as these can be anticipated. While disclosure of the
truth is a high priority and no price can be put on its discovery,
in real terms resources are rarely unlimited and often compete
with other important demands. In this context, while finance should
not in any sense be the primary consideration, the shape, form
and limits of such a process might be determined to a degree by
the implications for resources. It may be important to cost certain
approaches and make these costs known to the general public in
advance of a final decision being taken about the model to be
followed.
— It is unclear what, if any, remedies
such a process could produce. Would it include, for example, compensation,
a declaration of rights infringed, a recommendation for future
statutory reform and safeguards, referencing for counselling and
therapy and so on? Who will decide is to decide on the range of
remedies to be offered and who will provide them? What are the
legal implications, notably in terms of human rights legislation
in favour of the right to an "effective remedy" (European
Convention on Human Rights & Fundamental Freedoms, 1950, Art
13).
THE ROLE
OF CHURCHES
AND FAITH
COMMUNITIES
Churches and faith communities clearly have
a role to play in helping Northern Ireland deal constructively
with its past. As mentioned at the beginning, much of the work
of the Churches at local level is already directed towards this
end. Those who minister in Churches and faith communities also
have considerable pastoral experience of journeying with people
through the pain of loss and grief. Churches can create safe and
constructive spaces for people to tell their story and receive
spiritual and emotional support. They can provide prayer and ritual
for both individuals and communities, for collective, constructive
and transformative remembering. They can support the process of
healing with the vocabulary and experience of the Gospel in terms
of forgiveness, reconciliation, love of enemy and going the extra
mile. They can offer prayer for discernment, wisdom and guidance
about dealing with the personal and collective dimensions of the
past, for letting go of the anger and pain which can hold us captive.
In the context of a stable political arrangement and the absence
of the threat of violence, it may be that the Churches and faith
communities could contribute to dealing with the past by organising
prayerful and transformative memorial events such as those currently
associated with the holocaust or other tragic historic events.
The media also have an important role in this
regard. Carefully constructed programmes which provide opportunities
for people to tell their story and have it acknowledged publicly,
such as the Legacy series recently on the BBC, can have a significant
healing impact.
CONCLUSION: AN
INDEPENDENT INTERNATIONAL
COMMISSION
By far the most consistent view expressed by
those I have consulted on this matter, was the need to hand over
the whole process of assessing the desire for dealing with the
past in Northern Ireland and making recommendations for the structure
and form of such a process, to an independent commission with
expertise across a range of related disciplines and a mix of local
and international membership, at the earliest possible stage.
While current initiatives and consultation are important and welcome,
a process which does not have this level of independence and broad
political agreement between the two governments and the main political
parties in Northern Ireland, is unlikely to receive widespread
support and is therefore unlikely to be effective.
While not intended to be exhaustive, I hope
these comments have been of some assistance in this timely and
important inquiry being undertaken by the Northern Ireland Select
Committee has undertaken and for which I offer my continued best
wishes and support.
December 2004
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