Archbishop Seán Brady has said upcoming commemorations of the Easter Rising and the Battle of the Somme should be "sensitive and sensible", to avoid them becoming "a deep well of hate and bitterness".
The Primate of All-Ireland was speaking at the Irish College, Paris, at an event commemorating the death 300 years ago of archbishop Dominic Maguire. Maguire was the successor as archbishop of Armagh to the martyred St Oliver Plunkett.
He was Catholic primate at the time of the Battle of the Boyne and died in 1707.
Archbishop Brady said he played a significant role in negotiating the Treaty of Limerick and was skilled at resolving conflict. His death brought to a close one of the most tumultuous and decisive centuries of Irish history.
"The legacy of that century resonates to this day in the cultural, political and religious dynamics of Ireland and other parts of Europe," he said.
"Its significance is reflected in the number of celebrations across Europe of the 400th anniversary of the Flight of the Earls."
He said events of the time, including the Battle of the Boyne, continued to affect politics today. How these events were remembered was important, he said, because it "determines whether the power it unleashes is directed positively or negatively".
He asked if the commemorations of such events encouraged a constructive and healing approach to our historical identity or deepened the sources of division and distrust.
"These questions take on a particular importance as we prepare to celebrate the centenary of the Easter Rising and the Somme offensive," he said.
"I am asking that we be sensitive and sensible about how we conduct these commemorations. The danger is that if we leave these stories untold, or if we tell them in a superficial, triumphalist, selective or partisan sort of way, the hurtful experience of the past may live on. It could then become a deep well of hate and bitterness."
The archbishop said that new stories would be told by immigrants to western Europe.
"Our ability to both hear and believe these stories, of migration and settlement, will have consequences for our societies," he said.
