ADDRESS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE ANNUAL JEWISH WOMEN’S LUNCH WEDNESDAY, 13 JUNE, 2001
ADDRESS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT THE ANNUAL JEWISH WOMEN’S LUNCH WEDNESDAY, 13 JUNE, 2001
Tá áthas mhór orm bheith anseo libh tráthnóna agus ba mhaith liom mo bhuíochas a chur in iúl díbh as an chuireadh agus as fáilte fíorchaoin.
I am delighted to have this opportunity to meet once again with the members of the Jewish Community in Ireland. A special word of thanks to Michael Coleman and Dorothy Mullins for their kind invitation to address the Annual Jewish Women’s Lunch, an occasion to acknowledge the achievements of an organisation that is continually working for the advancement of women and through their advancement, for the fulfilment of the true destiny of all humankind.
Events like this give us the space to examine important issues for women – issues that affect us worldwide and to learn from the problems, experiences and knowledge of others – and to recognise the significant contribution that the Women’s International Zionist Organisation has made among Israel’s minority communities. Today is a day when we pause to think and to empathise with those women who are less fortunate than ourselves and who bear the brunt of conflict and economic deprivation in the world today.
Like Ireland, Israel’s name has been synonymous for many years with sectarian violence, ethnic tensions, arguments over borders and an absence of peace. Within Israel and within its neighbouring countries there have mercifully been peacemakers who have committed themselves through heartrending and difficult times to the painstaking work of reconciliation and peace. No two conflicts are the same and no country’s solution is a simple template for others but our experience of the peace process in Northern Ireland allows us to say that peace is possible, that the intractable is soluble, that hearts hardened by hurt and bitterness, by distrust and fear, can be softened by meaningful dialogue, that the future can be better. Our experience of Northern Ireland also allows us to observe that the road to peace is inordinately frustrating and that sustaining the peace momentum calls for people of tenacity, vision, generosity and patience.
These qualities are not new to the Women’s International Zionist Organisation. You have championed the excluded, the weak, the oppressed, the frightened, the lonely, the newcomer in a societycoping with generations of recent and ongoing inward migration from many parts of the world. You have focussed on the human person at the heart of the story. As both a provider of services and as an international pressure group, the Women’s International Zionist Organisation lends a vital hand, willingly and selflessly giving time and energy, to meet the very real day to day needs of the many women and children who have turned to you over the years for help and guidance.
Since I took up Office, I have been honoured by the Jewish community of Ireland on a number of occasions when you very kindly invited me to participate in traditional Jewish celebrations. On those occasions I spoke about the common origins of Christianity and Judaism, of the common experience of exile known to the Jewish and the Irish peoples. These common threads create we hope, empathy, understanding and mutual respect. But we also know that our world has been morbidly obsessed by the fears engendered by difference rather than reassured by the existence of common ground, common humanity.
Here in Ireland Christians have hated Christians, enough to kill. In Israel, Arab and Jew have done the same. Every episode of hatred has demeaned us all humanly for part of us knows and knows deeply that the safest place to live, the happiest place to live, is where people live and let live, where there is acceptance of difference, where there is space for diversity, where children learn respect for all God’s creation and not just the bit that looks like, sounds like, thinks like, their mammies and daddies.
The Women’s International Zionist Organisation has a crucial role to play in spreading the uplifting, life-changing, message of understanding, in extending the hand of friendship to other faiths, in its work of caring for the welfare of the stranger and caring for the full inclusion, the full empowerment of women. Here in Ireland there is a good story to tell of a country whose fortunes were changed by the unleashing into the human energy grid of the creative genius and sheer working power of women these past two decades. There is a good story to tell of women who built bridges of care and tolerance bit by bit, who challenged the words of contempt and disdain and whose work helped quietly to seed-bed the peace process. In Ireland we are beginning to have revealed to us the kind of society that is possible when the barriers of discrimination come down and the impulse to full human empowerment is given its head. We are not there yet but these past few remarkable years have given us a taste of what we are capable of. They present us with challenges of welcoming migrants to our shores, of dealing equitably with the newly generated wealth, of drawing the marginalized into the mainstream, of strengthening the fabric of community so that people can go to bed at night content that they have lived this day and not fearful of tomorrow.
Your tireless work has helped people believe in human goodness, in kindness and decency. It has helped people believe in themselves, their value and their future. You have not just made a difference in lives but often you have made THE difference. That powerful message you send to women to strive “Hand in Hand, All Through Life” is paying off, the best is yet to come. May we live to see it. I commend everyone involved in WIZO and wish you continued success in that important and valuable work.
Thank you again for inviting me to be with you today.
Go raibh maith agaibh go léir.