McDowell Is Dangerous

Irish Justice Minister Michael McDowell should be ashamed of himself in carrying out what respected retired Justice Feargus Flood termed a “drumhead court martial” against investigative journalist Frank Connolly.

It can be extremely dangerous to use Parliament to make serious allegations against an individual, as the tragic case of Pat Finucane showed.

British Minister Douglas Hogg used the House of Commons to make unsubstantiated allegations against the human rights solicitor Finucane. Weeks later Finucane was shot dead as he ate dinner with his family.

Hogg claimed he based his allegations on “security sources,” but Sir John Stevens later found that elements of the security forces were involved in the murder.

McDowell also claims that his allegations were based on security sources. But these same sources continued for 30 years to tell the family of Seamus Ludlow that he was killed by the IRA when they knew that he had been shot by a Loyalist gang with British security connections!

McDowell should learn from his allegations against a new national newspaper before it was even published. Since he said that Daily Ireland was like a Nazi hate-sheet, that paper has receives six visits from the Northern Ireland police to tell its workers that they are under threat from Loyalist paramilitaries.

Dr. Sean Marlow, Dublin, Ireland

Lewis’ Scottish Idol

Sean O’Driscoll, the writer of “The Lion, the Witch, the Windfall” in last week’s issue, missed an opportunity to identify the 19th century Scottish minister about whom C.S. Lewis often expressed his profound indebtedness.

That minister, George MacDonald (1824-1905), wrote sermons, poetry, novels, fantasies, short stories, literary criticism, drama and fairy tales. His children’s story, At the Back of the North Wind, has been in print ever since its first publication in 1871.

Lewis wrote, “I have never concealed the fact that I regarded him (MacDonald) as my master; indeed I fancy I have never written a book in which I did not quote from him. But it has not seemed to me that those who have received my books kindly take even now sufficient notice of the affiliation. Honesty drives me to emphasize it.”

Elsewhere Lewis wrote, “I know of hardly any other writer who seems to be closer, or more continually close, to the spirit of Christ Himself.”

In his conversion from agnosticism to Christianity, Lewis considered MacDonald his mentor.

It’s likely that the seeds for The Chronicles of Narnia were planted more than 175 years ago in the Scottish Highlands.

James V. Dolson, Springfield, Virginia

Irish Never Changed

I would like to bring to the attention of Irish Voice readers that a new book has just been published under the title of How the Irish Became White by Noel Ignotiev.

The book was reviewed last Sunday in Ireland’s Sunday Business Post by one David McWilliams, who says it explains “how we eventually changed color in the eyes of the Anglo Saxon establishment.”

I would urge all readers of the Irish Voice to make known their objections to this title and implied content by writing to the publishers Routledge at www.routledge.com.

The Irish never changed color in the eyes of any nation; they progressed from enslavement and starvation at the hands of the so-called Anglo Saxon establishment, whose British brothers almost eradicated the race in what can only be regarded as genocide under brutal rule and by force of arms.

Rory McCarthy, Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Sinead Is a Heroine

It absolutely stuns me that the Irish Voice treats one of Ireland’s greatest and most influential artists with such back-handed disdain.

I am speaking of Sinead O’Connor, and in particular of Sean O’Driscoll’s account in last week’s issue (“Sinead Discovers Rasta Rhythm”) of her triumphant U.S. tour in support of her new album Throw Down Your Arms.

This kind of treatment has become a grotesque and transparently dysfunctional corollary of poor journalism. Let’s cut to the proverbial chase.

Were many Irish Americans, for example, confounded and dumbstruck by O’Connor’s papal protest on Saturday Night Live back in 1992? Of course.

How many of those same Irish Americans looked beyond the tabloid frenzy and bothered to wonder about the source of her protest at the time? Few.

Sinead made it clear that, in 1992, she was protesting the institutional abuse of children by the Roman Catholic hierarchy in her native Ireland. My, my, but what a difference a decade makes!

For the last five years the entire world (not just Ireland) has been forced to watch while the Catholic church has diverted multi-billion dollar payoffs from the pockets of parishioners into “hush-and-shush!” money.

Ireland has not been alone in this exposition of systematic depravity. Yet, Irish Americans have, for the most part, treated O’Connor like a pariah ever since.

Even after the scandals broke in a tsunami of malfeasance in the late 1990s, and Roman Catholic dioceses worldwide were scrambling for attorneys and filing bankruptcies, O’Connor was still castigated by her own people.

Even after important American sources like Salon.com published headlines like “Sinead Was Right,” O’Connor was still treated with the same kind of shame and “secret-keeping” repression by her own people — treatment that threatened to ruin her career as an artist in the early 90s. It would appear that loyalty runs in a very shallow stream in Ireland.

The amazing catch is that, even though her own people (and most of the denial-adoring world) seemed to reject O’Connor, her career was not destroyed. Somehow, the woman went on to sell 20 million albums and work with the best artists in the cross-cultural business, even after such pretty-yet-soiled feathers were ruffled in 1992.

I personally know Irish American people who, to this very day, will not forgive O’Connor for her moment of “truth-telling” even when their own children have been abused by an institution gone awry. This kind of foolery is astonishing to any rational mind.

Yet, judging from the output of the Irish Voice concerning Sinead O’Connor, it appears that all the fish stuck in the net are happy to drown in order to “save face.” Forget about the fact that some of them, if brave enough, can summon the wherewithal to swim through the “trap” into freedom.

It is time for Ireland and all Irish abroad to stop treating Sinead O’Connor like some sort of disowned, prodigal daughter. Is she eccentric? Perhaps.

Is Padraic Murphy, who sings the songs of his native land “down the local,” here in the nearest Irish American pub, eccentric? Think about it.

Sinead O’Connor is a living legend. Millions have benefited from her artistic honesty.

It is well past time for the nation of Ireland to embrace its most honest and gifted daughter-not as a prodigal, but as a warrior along the lines of Grace O’Malley.

Shame on Irish Americans who disdain O’Connor when Bono lunches with the “esteemed” Senator Jesse Helms!

It’s easy to be loved by everyone when a photo-op covers-up the blandness of one’s message. It’s far more difficult to be a truth-teller.

Sinead O’Connor — priestess, prophet, child, singer, soul, mother, woman, and human being — has chosen the latter path. I would like to believe that there is some room for such a brilliant and successful artist to be treated with the unwavering respect that she so obviously deserves.

Finnian Ransom, Palm Desert, California