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McAleese, trailblazing former Irish president, speaks of peace and reconciliation at Misericordia

Mary McAleese, the first President of Ireland from Northern Ireland, answers questions during Misericordia University's Winter Commencement Ceremony earlier this month as university President Daniel Myers listens. McAleese received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters Degree during the ceremony.
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Mary McAleese, the first President of Ireland from Northern Ireland, answers questions during Misericordia University's Winter Commencement Ceremony earlier this month as university President Daniel Myers listens. McAleese received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters Degree during the ceremony.

Northeast Pennsylvania was a prime destination for presidential visits in 2024, but one earlier this month stood out from the rest.

The high-ranking guest at Misericordia University's Winter Commencement Ceremony didn't come to campaign for votes, but to receive an honorary degree and share some wisdom from her time in office. (See full video here.)

During that time Mary McAleese lived and worked not at the White House, but at Áras an Uachtaráin in Dublin as the eighth President of Ireland from 1997 to 2011.

McAleese, the first President of Ireland from Northern Ireland, felt very much at home at Misericordia, which was founded in 1924 by members of the Sisters of Mercy, a Catholic religious order that originated in Dublin.

"I'm an old Mercy girl," McAleese said.

"I started with the Mercy nuns when I was five years of age," she added, describing her early education in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

"And believe it or not, when I arrived here today, in the magic and mystery that is meeting total strangers, I met two young women, also from Belfast, who went to my school," McAleese said.

"We did well, thanks to Mercy," she continued. "With the Mercy education that we got, back then, we got a really good start in life."

'A little chat'

Rather than giving a traditional commencement address, McAleese sat across from university President Daniel J. Myers on the graduation stage for what he called "a little chat."

"This is a very special commencement. It's the 100th anniversary of this university, and so we thought we'd do something a little different," Myers said.

McAleese also offered a little confession: At the age of 11, her education continued with a different order — Dominican nuns — though she praised all the sisters who taught her as "great educators, phenomenal educators."

"It was particularly true of women. They were determined that we were going to live the kind of lives that were different from the lives of our mothers," McAleese said.

"My mother left school at 15 and became a hairdresser at a time when there was no prospect of staying on at school, because education was not free," she said.

McAleese, 73, said she was fortunate that free secondary education had been introduced by the time she was in school, and the nuns who taught her encouraged students to pursue the opportunities it afforded.

"They wouldn't let us settle for our second best selves," McAleese said.

Misericordia University President Daniel Myers, left, helps adjust former Irish President Mary McAleese's sash as part of the granting of an honorary degree at the university's Winter Commencement Ceremony as Misericordia University Board of Trustees President Deborah Smith-Mileski, right, assists.
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Misericordia University President Daniel Myers, left, helps adjust former Irish President Mary McAleese's sash as part of the granting of an honorary degree at the university's Winter Commencement Ceremony as Misericordia University Board of Trustees President Deborah Smith-Mileski, right, assists.

A distinguished career

McAleese lived that message.

She worked as an attorney, journalist, and educator, holds a doctorate in Catholic canon law, making lasting impacts in the fields of law and social justice.

Those impacts were born of what she saw in Belfast.

The eldest of nine children from a working class family, McAleese grew up during "The Troubles," a period of sectarian and ethnic conflict that continued on and off from the late 1960s until the late 1990s, with the signing of the 1998 "Good Friday Agreement" that facilitated power-sharing in Northern Ireland.

Before that Belfast was, she recalled, "a sectarian quagmire," as was Derry.

The two main cities of Northern Ireland were "dreadful places to grow up, particularly if you were a Catholic," she said.

McAleese explained how the island of Ireland is partitioned between the Republic of Ireland — where she became president — and her native Northern Ireland. It remains part of the United Kingdom, and ongoing divisions between Catholics and Protestants set the stage for The Troubles.

"Thankfully we have peace now, but for most of our lives we grew up with what was effectively a civil war. We had death every day, we had bombings. We had paramilitary confrontations," she said. "All those tensions were around politics and the politics of religion, regrettably, a toxic mix of religion and politics."

Her own family was driven out of their home by sectarian attacks, McAleese said.

"First time they came with bricks, then they came with bullets," she recalled.

Her father's pub was firebombed and a young woman was killed, which caused him to suffer from depression for years afterward.

"He didn't speak, actually, for quite some time," McAleese said.

Her own career focused on healing many of the wounds suffered by her family, her community and her country.

McAleese co-founded several organizations, including Belfast Women's Aid and the Campaign for Homosexual Law Reform, and frequently spoke out against homophobia.

As president — the second woman to hold the post — she worked to bring peace and reconciliation in Ireland, seeking to build relationships between Catholic and Protestant communities. Those efforts were not always welcomed — sometimes not by fellow Catholics.

"I could not be a president who would accept those estrangements," McAleese said. "These were all Christians, allegedly, after all."

"I just wanted them to be friends. I just wanted them to be neighbors. I wanted us to be friendly enough that we could talk hard politics eventually without walking away from each other."

Her "bridge-building" symbolically culminated with McAleese hosting Britain's Queen Elizabeth II for a historic state visit in 2011 — the first formal visit by a British sovereign to what is now the Republic of Ireland, where no monarch had been since 1911, when the whole island was still under British rule.

She has continued her activism, speaking and teaching since leaving office, and has been a prominent figure in higher education.

Sister Carol Rittner speaks during Misericordia University's Winter Commencement Ceremony. She and Sister Deirdre Mullan, both members of the university's Board of Trustees, were instrumental in bringing former Irish President Mary McAleese to Misericordia to receive an honorary doctorate and to speak about her life and work.
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Via Misericordia University.
Sister Carol Rittner speaks during Misericordia University's Winter Commencement Ceremony. She and Sister Deirdre Mullan, both members of the university's Board of Trustees, were instrumental in bringing former Irish President Mary McAleese to Misericordia to receive an honorary doctorate and to speak about her life and work.

A special visit

McAleese was brought to Misericordia thanks to the efforts of two Sisters of Mercy — and distinguished fellow academics — with a special Irish connection.

Sister Deirdre Mullan has lived in the U.S. for 21 years, but she is a native of Derry, Northern Ireland, which McAleese mentioned in her remarks.

She and Sister Carol Rittner, both of whom are members of Misericordia's Board of Trustees, knew the university's centennial year would call for a noteworthy speaker and honoree.

"We thought about nominating somebody for an honorary degree who would be distinguished, who might have roots in Ireland — because we, Deirdre and I, are both also Sisters of Mercy, and our order was founded originally in Ireland, so we were trying to think about who could we nominate?"

McAleese was obviously from Ireland, and had been educated by the Sisters of Mercy in her formative years.

But there was more.

Both had previously met McAleese. But Sister Deirdre's brother, Don Mullan, is an Irish author and producer whose book about Bloody Sunday, an infamous 1972 massacre of unarmed Irish civilians by British soldiers, was turned into a film and helped inspire a formal inquiry into the tragedy.

"So we call Don on the telephone. 'We say, Don, can you put us in touch with Mary McAleese,'" Rittner recalled.

"Within 24 hours, he came back and said, 'Mary said yes,' Rittner said.

McAleese was the second woman to serve as President of Ireland, something Sister Deirdre Mullan feels was beneficial for the nation.

"Sometimes we underestimate the contribution of the female in Ireland," Mullan said. "She, particularly with her very quiet diplomacy and bringing Queen Elizabeth to the island, helped to heal the hurts of history. It all contributed to four days during which two women sought to help heal the hurts of history."

That's a subject Mullan understands all too well.

"When I was a young teacher walking to school, you were walking through bomb sites. You were dealing with children who were traumatized," she said.

And today?

"Things are better than they were," said Mullan, who was headed back to Northern Ireland for a visit.

"It's better, but we still have an awful lot of work to do."

Roger DuPuis joins WVIA News from the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader. His 24 years of experience in journalism, as both a reporter and editor, included several years at The Scranton Times-Tribune. His beat assignments have ranged from breaking news, local government and politics, to business, healthcare, and transportation. He has a lifelong interest in urban transit, particularly light rail, and authored a book about Philadelphia's trolley system.

You can email Roger at rogerdupuis@wvia.org