Coronavirus: Bishops join calls to reopen NI cemeteries

Calls have been growing in recent days for the coronavirus lockdown restrictions to be eased so people can visit their loved ones’ resting places.

DUP leader Arlene Foster believes cemeteries should be reopened on a controlled basis, while Sinn Fein’s Michelle O’Neill has indicated the time had not yet come to consider easing restrictions.

And on Tuesday, DUP MP Sir Jeffrey Donaldson said a pensioner had impaled himself on cemetery railings while trying to climb in to visit his wife’s grave.

Now, the Church of Ireland Bishop of Derry and Raphoe, Rt Rev Andrew Forster, has launched an appeal alongside his Catholic counterpart Bishop Donal McKeown for a relaxation of the rules.

Bishop Forster has pointed to what he called “the mixed signals” in the emergency legislation passed last month which allows public parks to remain open but forces cemeteries to close.

“We’re literally ‘standing on holy ground’ when we’re talking about this issue,” Bishop Forster said.

“Cemeteries are a place of memory, they’re a place of grief, they’re also a place of hope and resolution as well.”

Bishop McKeown, speaking to BBC Radio Foyle on Wednesday morning, said: “I appreciate the politicians are struggling to get things right here, but we really would like to get some sense of logic from them as to their motivation for having this particular legislation.”

Bishop McKeown said the governments had worked very hard to cover the whole area of the economy and health, but huge weight had also to be given to the emotional and spiritual needs of people, particularly at a time of bereavement, and especially in the current circumstances.

Meanwhile, a woman who led a protest outside the city cemetery in Londonderry has said she will continue to hold a vigil at the cemetery gates until they are reopened.

Etta d’Arcy, who was married to Hugh for 46 years until he died in August last year, has visited his grave every day since his passing.

“Hugh is there and it is where I go to talk to him,” she said.

“It was my comfort and not being able to visit makes me deeply, deeply sad – the deepest sadness you could imagine.”

And a woman whose parents died of Covid-19 within hours of each other has also called for the ban on visiting cemeteries to be eased.

Fiona Vallely, whose mother and father Isobel and Arty Vallely from west Belfast died at the Mater Hospital at the end of March, told BBC Radio Ulster: “I can’t understand why the cemeteries are not reopening.

“Parks and other public places are still open, why not cemeteries? It’s been just heart breaking for me and my family.”