Growing distrust and demoralisation, “tantamount to despair”, particularly among young people, is becoming “really, really scary”, actor Brendan Gleeson has said.
Speaking on Wednesday in support of a fundraising drive for hospice services on Dublin’s northside, Gleeson urged media organisations to give more space to similar, positive stories.
“The demoralisation of people is to me really, really scary now. It is getting to a place where everywhere you look the idea of there being a better side to people is being undermined ... I think it is really important to record there are good things happening in the world.
“It is not right that people, especially young people, are drawn into what is tantamount to despair,” he said.
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Referring to his experiences with St Francis hospice in Raheny, where his mother Pat died in 2007 and father Francis passed away in 2010, he said there was “something about this place” that at times of great pain, fear and confusion “made the world make sense”.
The hospice’s ethos, of prioritising “minding the person” and their family, was “so affecting”.
Rather than feeling debilitated by his grief, the hospice helped him feel “invigorated [by] the nature of life as a continuum [and] death a natural thing”.
His family experienced “kindness, goodness and embrace ... I do feel a bit evangelical about [the hospice] when you see how it brings the best out in people”.
Wednesday’s event marked the start of St Francis hospice’s ‘buy a brick’ campaign, where people and businesses are invited to purchase virtual bricks for €25, €100 or €250, and leave messages on a virtual wall.
The charity aims to raise €20 million to build a new facility in Raheny on land gifted to it, adjacent to the current service.
The new building will have 24 private rooms, replacing the in-patient hospice which includes shared rooms. The HSE is co-funding the project which the charity hopes to open by the end of 2027.
Fintan Fagan, chief executive of St Francis hospice, which also provides palliative care at its Blanchardstown facility, said “modern care” required that patients would have “privacy and dignity” along with space for family if they wished to stay overnight.
“The current in-patient unit can care for around 6,750 patients over the next 25 years but with the planned expansion to 24 single rooms, this capacity will rise to 9,600 patients.
“That means it will serve at least 2,850 additional individuals than the current in-patient unit would allow. In all, the new in-patient unit will positively impact the lives of about 100,000 patients and their loved ones over the next 25 years.”
Describing the campaign as “literally brick-by-brick”, Gleeson said it protected the hospice’s communal, voluntary ethos.
“It is ours. As long as this is coming from the community it means that it starts on a basis of generosity of the public and of people who want to get involved.”
He is preparing to play the lead role of Jack in Conor McPherson’s play The Weir in Dublin and London from August.
He was drawn to McPherson’s “beautiful writing” and an ending where “people choose the better part of themselves”, he says.
“I reserve the right to see goodness in people and to insist it is a really important aspect of our humanity that we are not catering to.”
Though surrounded by “complex, complex difficulties” we “are capable of solving them”, he says.
“But only if we come back to start believing in each other and ourselves, and find some way to re-establish aspects of trust that are in terrible danger of being completely destroyed.
“The hospice is the embodiment of that kindness, community and generosity we need.”
