Fr. Kelley Division Accomplishment and challenges:
Raffle Ticket Sales – – I would like to thank JP McCusker and Co-Chair Greg Rebbert for working the Raffle Ticket Sales and all the other Brothers that bought or sold tickets. I am very impressed to sell out this year; of all years. No easy task. Also, congratulation to one of our own Mickie Krause wife of Mike Riley for winning the trip to Ireland (see pictures on our Website).
Annal Gaelic Mass in Honor of St. Patrick – – 43rd Annual Gaelic Mass on Monday, March 15th, 2021 hosted by AOH Col John Fitzgerald Division – Arlington, VA. Thank you to VP Pat Sullivan for organizing the event for us and for Pat, Dan, Hugh O’Brien and myself for attending. It was broadcast nationally and internationally. (See pictures in AOH Hibernian Digest)
AOH Hosted Fish Fry – Excellent AOH turnout and curb side customers. Our Project Manager was Past President John Masarick and Mike Curry for staffing and assignments. Very organized – all aspects from food prep to audit to delivery.
Month of March 2921 was Irish American Heritage Month. We received Proclamations from PWC BOD of Supervisors Ann B Wheeler, Chair and the Mayor of Manassas Michelle Davis-Younger.
Thank you Vince Fitzpatrick for accepting the Proclamations).
Shamrock Degree – – Preparations and planning has started for our first Shamrock Degree of 2021. There are 20 potential Candidates. More info to follow. Thank you VP Pat Sullivan and Mike Riley for planning what is expected to be a top notch event.
Irish Music – Thank you to 3 very talented musicians that entertained us last month via WebEx with song and Bagpipes. Thank you Dominic Preston for you vocals and guitar playing and my favorite beer drinking sone Tim Finnegan. Also, thanks to Gerry Lafferty for bagpipes and mentoring us on background and lyrics and off course thanks to Kevin Byrne’s known and respected for his bagpipes to entertain and requested for funerals of fallen AOH Members. All three were Outstanding.
- The following is a report from Bill Halprin, the AOH National Chairman for Political Education on Northern Ireland dated April 10:
On January 13 and March 16 divisions were encouraged to write letters to U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., voicing the importance of expediting the appointment of a U.S. Special Envoy to the north of Ireland. The need for a U.S. voice in Irish affairs may be as critical today as in was in 1997-98 when George Mitchell chaired negotiations resulting in the Good Friday Agreement.
On March 4h and 16th, division was advised that Ulster loyalist paramilitaries (the Ulster Volunteer Force, Ulster Defense Association and Red Hand Commando) had withdrawn their support for the Good Friday Agreement and oppose the BREXIT Northern Irish Protocol.
BREXIT may have ruined the Good Friday Agreements as “loyalist groupings are herewith withdrawing their support for the Belfast Agreement … please do not underestimate the strength of feeling on this issue right across the unionist family”.
We know support for a united Ireland is on the rise. Some sources estimate that 60% of the people residing in the six counties of the North have Republic of Ireland passports. To the loyalist mindset, this is a worst case scenario. So they need reasons to stem the flow:
- BREXIT imposition of using the Irish Sea as a border is cited for the growing loyalist tension. But that’s a London/EU issue and pretty much a “done deal.”
- Closer to home, an excuse is the announcement that deputy first minister Michelle O’Neill and 23 Sinn Fein members will not be prosecuted for allegedly breaking coronavirus restrictions at the June 2020 funeral for former senior IRA officer Bobby Storey. Arlene Foster/DUP called for the responsible police chief to resign. Is it illegal to ignore a COVID mask protocol?
- Many analysts point to the recent police crackdown on drug gangs and criminal activity run by Loyalist paramilitary forces. Most of the unrest has been concentrated in areas where criminals linked to loyalist paramilitaries and involved in organized crime are in control.
- Growing evidence suggests breakaway factions from the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) and Ulster Volunteer Force may be encouraging the unrest to continue.
This is my analysis knitted together from multiple media reports:
As flimsy as it is, an association of Protestant, Unionist and Loyalist (PUL) groups are citing the COVID mask issue as reason to spread violence across the north. Riots are in predominately unionist controlled areas of Derry, Belfast’s Shankill Road, Sandy Row and Tiger’s Bay and the loyalist strongholds in Ballymena, Carrickfergus, and Newtonabbey.
Last week the police reported “some entity” is organizing the violence. However, they “feel” the people connected to “proscribed organizations” (loyalist paramilitaries) seen at the riots are not orchestrating the violence. Ironically, PUL groups were asked to postpone “protests” until after the royal family’s period of mourning. Go figure!
There is genuine concern on both sides of the Atlantic (London is quiet). Taoiseach Micheál Martin said, “political leaders must not allow Northern Ireland to spiral back to that dark place of sectarian murders and political discord”. This statement was followed by State Department spokesperson Ned Price’s warning that the “GFA must not become a casualty of Brexit.”
Could it be that PUL groups have an objective of creating a situation in which the DUP can request the reintroduction of the English military “to restore/maintain order?”
I hope not – because if that happens, it will be “déjà vu all over again”.
