Letter: If we want peace and reconciliation in the world we must first of all make peace among ourselves
A letter from Gerald Morgan:
I write in reference to the piece by Ruth Dudley Edwards – Britain must stop the self-pity and realise how great it really is (January 1).
Your correspondent Ruth Dudley Edwards writes with the experience and wisdom of living in England among the English for many years.
I write with the experience if not the wisdom of living in Dublin among the Irish since 1968.
At the time, I was appointed – at the age of 26 - to a junior lectureship in English Language and Literature at Trinity College Dublin, the great university of all-Ireland.
In 1968 there were few if any Roman Catholics in Trinity contrary to our own traditions.
They had been banned by Archbishop McQuaid in February 1944.
It was a tragic error of judgment and in 1969 we were heading deep into the Troubles.
Nevertheless I have found the Irish to be a welcoming and compassionate people.
Perhaps the Troubles have helped to make them so.
But we have surely learnt by now not to be complacent. If we want peace and reconciliation in the world we must first of all make peace among ourselves here in Ireland.
Gerald Morgan, Dublin 4