You can read my post comparing the efforts of families of victims in the Malaya Emergency to gain a public enquiry about Batang Kali to Northern Ireland’s dealing with the past debate, on the Slugger O’Toole blog.
Photo: Chong Koon Ying, whose father was killed at Batang Kali.
I think what Northern Ireland (and Ireland) needs is a good dose of Divine Mercy: let us forgive one another.
Let us look to the Bible:
Now indeed it is, in any case, a failure on your part that you have lawsuits against one another. Why not rather put up with injustice? Why not rather let yourselves be cheated? Instead, you inflict injustice and cheat, and this to brothers.
— 1 Corinthians 6:7-8
Suing each other and holding endless, expensive public enquiries achieves nothing. It does not obtain closure, it does not aid forgiveness. What it does do is line the pockets of lawyers and barristers. Can we really afford that in these difficult economic times?
No. So let us forgive one another, as the Lord has forgiven us. That is all that is necessary. The rest is following the prince of this world who revels in all of our downfalls.