THERE IS little to be added to the praise that has already been heaped upon Mary McAleese, except to say that it is fully deserved. During her 14 years as president, aside from representing Ireland immaculately at home and abroad, she and her husband Martin worked tirelessly at building positive relationships, both on this island and between Ireland and Britain.
Regardless of cautionary and sometimes critical comments from others (including me, at times) they stuck to their beliefs, continually reaching outwards or downwards, to wherever it mattered most.
It would be impossible to overstate the role played by Mary and Martin McAleese in transforming the peace process from a largely abstract set of agreements, arrived at by politicians and paramilitaries, to a grounded developing reality for ordinary people. Thanks to their tenacity and courageous decency, there is growing understanding and mutual respect where once there was only suspicion and fear.
The people of Northern Ireland in particular owe them an immense debt of gratitude (some of us, personally so). It seems strange now to think that after Mary Robinson’s term as president, I held little hope for a successor of similar calibre. All hope evaporated when it became clear who Robinson’s successor would be. How spectacularly, wonderfully wrong was I, and how right were the people in their choice (my belated apologies to Mary II).
I believe that in Michael D Higgins the Irish people have again chosen wisely. Somewhat predictably by now, I thought it would be impossible to follow Mary McAleese, until I listened to Michael D during the presidential campaign.
From the moment I heard him mention the need to build a “real” republic in Ireland, he had my full attention. His deliberate and repeated use of the word “real” signalled a rejection of what has gone before as inauthentic: a republic in name only. I could not agree more.
In his inaugural address, Michael D added some meat to the bones. The republic he envisages is caring and inclusive, where individualism is celebrated and encouraged, but not confused with self-advancement at the expense of others (which is the very antithesis of enlightenment republicanism).
Genuine democracy, as Michael D’s address reminded us, amounts to more than the mere ability to vote people in and out of office (indeed, the recent Greek and Italian experience would lead one to question the modern-day worth of even that).
He was surely right also to acknowledge that the most difficult part of a sorely needed transition to a “new version of Irishness” will be in “our consciousness”. I would argue only that what is required is not a new Irishness but – no less difficult to achieve – a general recognition of the existing reality.
There has never been a singular Irish identity. Irishness has always been a river formed by the confluence of many tributaries. This is truer now than it has ever been. None of the tributaries, regardless of its comparative size, can lay claim to being more authentically Irish than the rest. That kind of thinking leads, as we have experienced so often, to division and pain.
It is ludicrous to think that merely by changing religion and politics someone like me can, in the eyes of many, instantly become more Irish. The citizen of colour, or not; of any religion, or none; is as Irish as me: and I am as Irish as you (and please, let us not confuse nation and state). We need not only to accept this reality at an intellectual level, but, the most difficult part as Michael D pointed out, is to actually feel it and live it.
By inviting a disparate group of religious representatives to share equally in his inauguration, Michael D made clear that there is still a special place in Ireland for religion, but that no denomination can be elevated above the others, or above non-believers.
The separation of the Catholic Church and the Irish State has begun, and this must continue to completion if a real republic is ever to be realised.
However, I think care must also be taken that the church does not become a perpetual whipping-boy, or is allowed to solely carry the blame for the horrors that went before. As with the errant bankers and property developers, it was only with widespread acquiescence and collusion that religious culprits could operate undisturbed for so long.
The Catholic Church did not grab unaccountable power in Ireland, it was gifted that power.
During the election, Michael D made much of the limited powers of the presidency. In a strictly legal sense, he is of course right. But, wise old owl that he is, he knows that in many respects a president can be far more influential than any politician. While the latter can introduce legislation, a president has the power to generate fundamental change in public attitudes (as the two Marys showed). Politicians follow the people; presidents lead them by example.
If the broad cross-section of instinctively democratic people I interact with regularly is anything to go by, a “real” republic in Ireland is there for the making. Lead on, President Higgins.