Sir, - Some asylum-seekers, and I know of a few, have received unexpected and tragic news from home since their arrival here in Ireland. At times, little more than brief messages bring the dreadful news of the death of a close relative or friend.
Today in Ireland, quiet tears are being shed by many lonely and frightened people who find themselves able to do little more than silently commune with the faces, memories and fading photographs of loved ones, whose passing is the cause of much hidden pain and sadness.
More often than not, bright faces and gentle manners mask hearts that are heavy and trauma that goes untold and unrecognised. How many more asylum-seekers grieve inwardly as they grapple with displacement, the ever-dawning reality of separation from both home and kin?
That Irish people have to be "educated" to understand that asylum-seekers are human beings is surely our greatest indictment to date. If being Irish ever meant anything, it has surely never meant pushing people to the point of breaking, reducing people to the point of despair and being crushed.
This particular chapter of Irish history runs the risk of being our most shameful yet. To my mind at least, the powers-that-be and the mob are seeking to shape policy with too great a reference to politics, self-interest and expediency, and too grudging a regard for justice, openness or care.
As some asylum-seeker sleeps uneasily in our country tonight, I feel ashamed and diminished by what I have, up to now, been willing to tolerate from my Government, from some of my fellow countrymen and women, and even at times from myself.
To you, my brothers and sisters who have come to my country, I unreservedly offer my abject apology. I humbly ask that you bear with us, as we seek to show you what we can and ought to have already done better.
Of my fellow Irish sisters and brothers I ask for a change of heart and mind. Together let us now resolve to do as much as basic justice would require and more, as much for our own dignity as for the dignity of those we are collectively called to serve. - Yours, etc.,
Fr John Carroll, St Aidan's Cathedral, Enniscorthy, Co Wexford.