A friend of mine, Sean, is a Republican. Another, Billy, is a Loyalist. Sean is Irish and thinks Billy is too. Billy is British and has no intention of becoming Irish. Sean assures Billy that he will treat him right when we get a United Ireland, which is inevitable, unlike the way Billy’s crowd treated Catholics in the past. Billy says he is just fine in the United Kingdom. Sean comes from a Catholic background, Billy from a Protestant one. Neither are gospel greedy.
They met on a dialogue event in an hotel. Participants stayed over night. They did not talk much to each other at first. But that night they had a drink together. Later they came on a few more events. Then we told them that they needed to get new people involved and to move on themselves. Billy protested. He said that he had never talked to a Republican before. Not only that, but he could not be seen talking to Sean in his home town. So the events were important to him. Sean said the same. So they came to the next one.
Some time later another friend brought a group of students from Italy to Armagh. They wanted to learn about the conflict. Billy and Sean came and told their stories. Their stories were mostly about the terrible things the other crowd had done to their side. They were passionate because they were still hurting. They disagreed vehemently with each other. You might conclude that the dialogues were a waste of time. But that conclusion would be wrong!
One of the ground rules for the dialogues is that if people begin to agree with each other they have to leave! That surprises most people. But there is a good reason for the rule: we can only dialogue with people with whom we differ because dialogue is about understanding. If we agree with the others about everything then we have nothing to learn from them. So there is no point to dialogue. The rule seems strange because intuitively many think that the way to deal with conflict is to get agreement. Banning agreement seems sort of crazy.
In practice when people realize that they are not being asked to agree they begin to relax and start to do something unusual: they begin to listen. As they listen they slowly hear the stories behind the views of others. So Billy began to hear what it was like for Sean when he and his family were woken up in the middle of the night and their house thrashed by British soldiers. Sean began to understand more about why Billy wanted to remain British, and what it was like for him when his relatives and friends in the police were killed by the IRA. They also realized that there were divisions within the other side. Before that each had assumed that the others were fiercely united and also very clever. When they talked more they saw that in practice the others were insecure, divided among themselves, and often did stupid things. Sean and Billy now understand each other and their community much better. They continue to disagree deeply. Sean is still a Republican and Billy a Loyalist. But I doubt they will kill each other.
The Pope’s intentions for this month are about achieving peace through understanding. We need peace. Last Christmas Day a woman blew up herself and forty other people in Pakistan. We know the impact of bombs like this from our experience in Northern Ireland. In December last North and South Korea were lining up against each other. The North had just attacked the South and killed four people. The South put on a major military exercise and threatened retaliation. At the same time the war in Afghanistan went on and on. Iraq remained unstable. Differences in the Middle East were as deep as ever. In Northern Ireland dissident Republicans showed they had the capacity to kill more people.
Wars can be about different things, including assets - like diamonds and oil - identity or religion. They can also be about fear, status and misunderstanding. Telling stories so that people understand what goes on in others will not stop all wars. Indeed it is normally difficult to do dialogue while violence is on-going, although some groups in the Middle East have managed to do so in the middle of violence.
The peace process in Northern Ireland did not come about because of dialogue. It needed military stalemate, a new set of interests for the British and Irish Governments as a result of joining the EU, international support from the US and other countries, diplomacy, and leadership from politicians, paramilitaries and Church people. But dialogue at a grass roots level was one of many factors that helped the peace process to grow. There are thousands of Billy’s and Sean’s who took part in all sorts of different initiatives, some Church-led, some not.
Dialogue might also be useful within our Church. We have deep disagreements over many issues: women’s ordination, authority, the liturgy, to name but a few. Behind each disagreement lies a story. Hearing that story will not lead to agreement. But it may lead to understanding. If it does it will be easier to handle the disagreement.
That will be one way in which people may grow in harmony and respect.