REMARKS BY PRESIDENT MCALEESE AT THE XIII COLUMBANIAN FESTIVAL BANGOR, COUNTY DOWN
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT MCALEESE AT THE XIII COLUMBANIAN FESTIVAL BANGOR, COUNTY DOWN SATURDAY 26TH JUNE 2010
Good afternoon and thank you for the invitation to be here today. I am proud to join with you to honour the memory of Columbanus – a great Irish saint, a great European and a potent symbol of this Island’s links with continental Europe. I’d particularly like to thank Fr John Connolly for his invitation to the Festival and North Down Borough Council for the warm reception today.
The Ireland of Columbanus was known as the land of saints and scholars. On the periphery of Europe, classical learning in Ireland was nurtured in Irish monasteries and Columbanus received his impressive education all those years ago right here in the monastery in Bangor. It was here, to use Bryan McMahon’s great phrase that “the windows of wonder” were opened up to the young Columbanus. And it was through those windows of that great classical Christian education that Columbanus fixed his gaze towards the continent and determined to make a European journey of faith and in faith. He left these shores in the company of a few others, bound together by faith, solidarity, courage and of course joyful inquisitiveness about God’s creation. It was that sense of wonder and curiosity about the wider world that laid the foundations for his discernment and wisdom.
And though Columbanus lived in very different times to those that we are now experiencing, his story still has great relevance for today. The mountain tops he saw, we see today, the seascapes that took his breath all the way to infinity, inspire us too. The contours of this island were well known to him and he was at home in any part of it. Born into a Leinster family of high social status, it was in Ulster that he found his life’s mission, a mission that though it is a millennium and a half old has a distinctly modern ring to it - for he believed passionately in the critical importance of education and of Ireland’s committed active engagement with the rest of Europe.
Columbanus’s education here in Bangor lit a fire in his heart. He came to believe that each individual was capable of doing great things for humankind and it was with that conviction in the transformative power of committed and selfless people that he set out for Gaul with a small group of 12 companions. Their imprint is to be found all over the European mainland, their names and his in particular still spoken of, still revered, still resounding down through the many centuries since his days ended in Bobbio, he actively consolidated the intellectual and spiritual identity of old Europe and in so doing, profoundly shaped European society. Others followed in his footsteps leaving a legacy of Irish saints names on streets, cathedrals, churches and countries all over Europe.
Many of them experienced hardship and even martyrdom. Columbanus himself incurred the wrath and displeasure of established hierarchies, both religious and royal for he never shirked from condemning wrongdoing and his pursuit of freedom, truth and dignity became his most enduring legacy.
His insistence on respect for the personal integrity of each individual is aptly reflected in an inscription in the chapel dedicated to Columbanus in Saint Peter’s Basilica, Rome - “Si tollis libertatem tollis dignitatem” – if you take away man’s freedom you destroy his dignity. If those words seem familiar read the first Article of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union which proclaims that “Human dignity is inviolable!” It is a principle that far too many have had to die to defend. And from the worst bloodletting in human history which almost consumed early twentieth century Europe there came a new era of chastened but hope-filled partnership that we call the European Union – a development that would surely have made Columbanus proud for it set Europe on a new and shared pilgrim journey towards a common destination. It affirmed his view that we, none of us own this world but rather inhabit it as temporary visitors, whose lives could be and should be dedicated to leaving it better than we found it.
Similarly the peace which has been built on this island has set those of us who share it on a new and exciting trajectory. The process of transcending the legacy of sectarian and political hatreds which had divided our small intimate communities of not so neighbourly neighbours is one that Columbanus had long called us to do when he exhorted us to “clean the field of our heart…. Root out its vices and plant its virtues…” This generation more than any other has succeeded in turning a culture of conflict into a culture of consensus, a culture of hatred into a culture of love. As Columbanus said “love is no trouble, love is more pleasant, more healthy, more saving to the heart.”
Is it possible that this Ireland, our Ireland could become, like the Ireland of Columbanus a beacon of light in a world of darkness? As we struggle down the pilgrim path of peace and reconciliation, stumbling occasionally but, more often now than in the past, helping one another to move another inch, another yard closer to the light, do we have a powerful, transferable message to all those other parts of the world where neighbour holds neighbour in fear and contempt, where there is no peace on the streets or in the heart and where the absence of love brings nothing but trouble? One thing is sure it was those who walked courageously together in the footsteps of Columbanus who refused to be banished from each others friendship and neighbourliness by history’s vanities, who converted the multitudes to the way of peace and the way of love. Thanks to them we now see the future very differently and while the destination of full reconciliation is still some way off it is nearer today than ever before. There was never a better time for a Columbanus festival – a time to be grateful for the remarkable journey already travelled and to commit anew to continuing our pilgrim journey to an island renewed and reimagined by the continuing relentless action of its peacemakers.
The prize, the destination is a place arrived at not easily but worth the work and described so beautifully and realistically by Columbanus as a place where “Clouds melt away and the harsh tempest stills, effort tames all, great toil is conqueror.”
Go raibh míle maith agaibh.