Seek the Fair Land
 Walter
Macken’s book Seek the Fair Land came to mind when I chose the cover
text to go with the picture of the Sikh man dancing in the St. Patrick’s
Day Parade in Dublin.
Macken’s novel centers around Oliver Cromwell’s brutal “ethnic
cleansing” of Irish Catholics, who were either killed, or banished
“to Hell or to Connaught” (to the barren lands of the West
of Ireland or to Barbados as slaves).
It was a terrible time in Irish history, and in sharp contrast to the
Ireland of today. Ireland for centuries was a place
of emigration, but has become something of a Promised Land for other nationalities
fleeing those very same horrors of poverty and religious persecution that
was our story for so long.
Cromwell ultimately failed, thank God, “because the human back is
stronger than the oppressor’s whip,” Macken said. The Catholic
church triumphed in Ireland, and became a force for education in the United
States, moving the Irish immigrants up the first rungs of the ladder of
integration and success. But in today’s Ireland the church has gone
into decline, its once almighty power done in, some would say, by the
thriving economy. There is hope of its resuscitation, however. Ireland’s
newest immigrants, the devoutly Catholic Poles and Latvians, have thrown
it a lifeline. (“They are like we were in the ’50s,”
a visitor from Ireland informed me).
While the Poles are the largest source of inward immigration (over 150,000),
followed by immigrants from Lithuania, the Czech Republic and Latvia,
it is not just the Central Europeans who are changing the religious and
cultural landscape of Ireland.
Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, and Nigerian Pentecostals are also making their
homes now in Ireland. In this issue, we bring you their stories in a special
report by
Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.
Naturally, there is much debate as to impact all this inward migration,
and problems to be overcome. The “mighty warrior” Sikhs, for
instance, are excluded from joining the police force because of a ban
on turbans. And, as Sharon Ní Chonchúir writes, asylum seekers
living in a former holiday camp in County Meath, have up to a five-year
wait for processing; yet, there are signs of hope. The Supreme Court recently
ruled that a Nigerian couple could stay in Ireland with their two Irish-born
children (unlike the U.S., being born in Ireland does not guarantee you
citizenship.)
And there are also some signs of integration. Rotimi Adebaria, a Christian
who was forced to leave Nigeria because of religious persecution, became
the mayor of the town of Portlaoise in 2007.
All this change is hard to grasp. And especially hard for those of us
who left – who are delighted to see the country doing so well, yet
miss the Irish bartenders and shop assistants.
But we can expect that Ireland, as a place that has undergone so many
demographic shifts since the Vikings first landed in 795, will absorb
all this inward migration in a generation or two. As the great American
writer John Steinbeck, who identified with his Irish ancestry, wrote,
“I’m half Irish, the rest of my blood being watered down with
German and Massachusetts English. But Irish blood doesn’t water
down very well; the strain must be very strong.”
Meantime, a charming story of Ireland and its immigrants is captured in
the Irish movie Once – a love story between two musicians, one Irish,
one an immigrant from the Czech Republic.
Made for under $150,000, Once went on to win an Oscar for Best Original
Song 2008.
In her acceptance speech Markéta Irglová, the Czech co-star,
speaking in a marked Irish accent, said: “The fact that we are standing
here tonight – the fact that we can hold this [Oscar] – is
proof that no matter how far out your dreams are it’s possible.
. . . This song was written from the perspective of hope and hope at the
end of the day connects us all no matter how different we are. And so
thank you so much to those who helped us along the way.”
Mortas Cine. |
