ISOBEL Hyland's exhibition, detailing the names, ages, location and cause of death of every person murdered in Northern Ireland since 1966, formed the backdrop to yesterday's session at the Glencree Summer School in Co Wicklow.
Addressing the theme of the summer school "Healing the Wounds of Political Conflict", and its subtext, "Forgiveness in the peace process", participants listened to the stories of family members of victims of violence over the past 25 years. The session, at times emotional, heard first-hand accounts of the experiences of bereaved families and their attempts to address the concept of forgiveness.
Ms Sandra Peake, a counsellor with the Belfast-based organisation Wave, said there was a perception that Northern Ireland was well-served by social support services for the bereaved, but the reverse was actually the case.
She said that there were several emotional stages in response to a family member becoming a victim of violence. These included tension, shock, denial, realisation, anger, guilt, physical exhaustion, working with the problem, acceptance and recovery. Forgiveness was generally seen to be part of the recovery stage, at the end of the process.
However, the process could be held up for any number of years, at any stage, due to complicating factors such as the release from custody of the perpetrators, or the common medical response, which, she said, was to prescribe tranquillisers.
Ms Peake also asserted that one of the greatest barriers to the grieving process working its way through towards forgiveness was the practice of paying compensation to the victim's family. According to Ms Peake, some individuals with a criminal record were not allowed to be the subject of compensation by the authorities. In these and other cases for example where somebody was unemployed - a monetary value appeared to be placed on a life. This had a negative effect on widows or widowers who were forced to compare the value placed on the lives of partners.
"It is one of the most unjust processes we have," said Ms Peake.
Ms Una O'Higgins O'Malley, president of the Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation said she had been told by people who had managed to forgive that forgiveness was a form of enlightened self-interest.
Ms Delma Sweeney, of the Turning Point organisation, said she believed that what the individual sent out, in terms of forgiveness or otherwise, would return to them. I truly believe that," she added.