Press Releases
CHURCH OF IRELAND CLERGY MEET SECURITY MINISTER
The Bishop-Elect of Connor, the Venerable Alan Harper, accompanied by Church of Ireland clergy from North Belfast, today met the NIO Security Minister Ms Jane Kennedy at Stormont.
The meeting took place in response to a request for such a meeting by Archbishop Eames and the Bishop-Elect.
The purpose of the meeting was to enable the Minister to hear at first hand the experiences of the clergy of North Belfast and their concerns for the people and communities where they minister.
Archdeacon Alan Harper said: “We are grateful to have been given this opportunity to give the Minister a brief but authentic reflection of the situation in North Belfast.
“We attempted to articulate the real issues, including genuine feelings of alienation, that affect the community of North Belfast. We continue to urge our people to persevere in working for better relationships across the divisions in our society but we were anxious that the Minister should be more fully informed about the difficulties and dangers of such work and the extent and the variety of that engagement.
“We drew attention to the fact that tension and trauma is not confined to interface areas and we expressed our concern at the extent to which feelings of alienation or neglect may fuel community disorder.
“We assured the Minister that we would continue to play our part in seeking to find ways to ease present tensions.”
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