Madam, - The decision by Éamon Ó Cuív, Minister for Community, Rural, and Gaeltacht Affairs, to grant €250,000 to the Orange Order is most regrettable. Recent media attempts to portray the Orange Order as misrepresented liberals or misunderstood pluralists, and the Twelfth of July marches as Europe's largest folk festival, have been a resounding failure. No amount of soft-focus media airbrushing or high-powered spin-doctoring can disguise the true nature of this sectarian organisation or its supremacist raison d'être.
Have we forgotten the sight of tens of thousands of Northern Catholics fleeing across the Border every July 11th to escape the annual orgy of pyromania and bigotry? This is the same organisation that former Northern Secretary Patrick Mayhew in 1992 said "would have disgraced a tribe of cannibals", as some of the marchers in an Orange parade gave a five-fingered salute in mockery of five men who had been murdered in a bookies' shop on the Lower Ormeau Road by members of the UDA. This is the same organisation that expels any member who enters a Catholic church.
The history of the Orange Order has been a shameful litany of intimidation and supremacy. The nature of the membership oath of the Order, which seeks to ensure that there is no genetic contamination of the loyalist bloodline, is reminiscent of the American Ku Klux Klan.
I regard this funding of the Orange Order as an endorsement of sectarianism. Such sectarianism has no place in a tolerant, diverse society. - Yours, etc,
TOM COOPER, Delaford Lawn, Knocklyon, Dublin 16.
Madam, - As a young person who grew up during the final days of the Troubles, I am as forward thinking and as progressive as the next man when it comes to seeing a peaceful settlement to the conflict on this island. I am delighted at the progress made by political leaders and others from all communities and I doff my cap to the men and women who made peace possible.
But I am not happy about the Orange Order receiving funding from any State body north or south of the Border. The Orange Order, while having obvious cultural and historic merits, is, and always has been, a sectarian organisation.
Please do not misunderstand my sentiments when I object to this funding. I do not believe that the funding of any organisation should be withheld on the grounds of their democratic political beliefs nor do I believe such groups should be made to feel unwanted or unwelcome in our collective society.
I do, on the other hand, believe that to help fund an organisation that restricts the right to membership on religious grounds is to send a dangerous message of acceptance of religious intolerance.
Many will say that there are plenty of Roman Catholic Church groups that receive funding from the State. A distinction exists however; the right to membership of or access to such organisations is not based on one's religion.
What if the State were to fund an organisation that excluded members based on gender, race or ethnicity? Would that be tolerated? I think not. - Is mise,
DARRAGH HIGGINS, O'Daly Road, Drumcondra, Dublin 9.