Posted on 05/10/2006 5:22:21 PM PDT by NYer
BALLYMENA, Northern Ireland, MAY 10, 2006 (Zenit.org).- The death of a Catholic teen-ager at the hands of a Protestant gang has shocked residents of Down and Connor, the second largest diocese in Northern Ireland.
"A tragic murder where the victim is a very young boy, killed just because he was a Catholic," said Father John McManus, a Church spokesman in the diocese, when commenting on the death of Michael McIlveen, a 15-year-old from Ballymena, County Antrim, who was beaten to death with baseball bats.
McIlveen was attacked Saturday night and died Monday.
"Our prayers and our minds are with his family, bereaved of the life of this son of theirs, just out of his childhood," Father John McManus continued.
According to the Belfast Telegraph, five people are being questioned by police.
In statements to Italian bishops' SIR news service, Father McManus said, "I am not a politician -- this murder reminds us how tragic the loss of a human life is, the most sacred gift we have.
"We must forsake the political violence of the past and concentrate, all together, on the dignity of human life, every human life."
"This after-Easter time is full of hope and light," added the priest. "We hope we will see daylight in the darkness generated by the death of this very young boy, at this time of ordeal for Michael's family and for all of our community."
The diocese has 300,000 Catholics in a total population of 1 million.
"Protestant" = Scots-Irish. "Catholic" = Irish Irish. Religious devotion means nothing in this idiotic conflict.
It's an alien concept to most Americans. My family is mostly Protestant, a few Catholics and a Jew.
Maybe he could be put on the fast track to canonization as a martyr!
Prayers offered for everyone involved, especially for the murderous religious bigots who are clearly on the verge of eternal damnation.
They might be "religious bigots," but they might not be. There's a whole lot of malice, rancor, teenage-male swagger and machismo, turf-rivalry, sadism and stupidity that uses religious "identity politics" just as a pretext for murderous violence.
Ping
I'll trust the priest who lives there and knew the victim, but thanks.
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That's a good point. My thought, though, is that the boy could have been killed for being a Catholic --- as the priest says --- without the killers necessaily being religious bigots. They could have been irreligious bigots.
Do you really think the killers were religiously fervent youths who had a theological dispute with Catholicism? After all, one can be unchurched, an agnostic, or an atheist and be murderously anti-Catholic.
You make a good point. True Christians, whether Catholic or Protestant don't go around killing fellow believers who are from a different tradition. I'm reminded of the story of the man in that part of the world who was asked his religion and answered that he was an athiest. Then he was asked "Are you a Catholic or a Protestant athiest?".
Thanks for the ping, annie laurie.
It's high time all terrorist groups are eradicated from this island!!
Good links, but remember that Protestantism , unlike Islam, unequivocally condemns such bigoted attacks.
I have relatives in Ballymena.
Ballymena is a hotbed of Loyalists.
Probably including my relatives, although I don't think any of them are especially thuggish.
Ok.
I've been reading about this attack in the Belfast Telegraph. It is the latest in a series of escalating tit-for-tat attacks in Ballymena between rival gangs of youths. A real shame. They have charged 5 teenagers with the murder. Looks like the marching season in Antrim is going to be very interesting this year .
It was a ridiculous notion of pursuing peace by negotiating with terrorists - the Anglo-Irish Agreement should have been tried a second time instead.
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