The Belief File
Christianity in Britain
Part 4

Faith in action

Maura Kiely's story

"My anger was never with the boy who killed Gerard, my anger was with God. I would have little fights with Him. I never get the answer to 'Why?'"

Twenty-two years ago I never thought that I would be involved in the work of reconciliation in Northern Ireland. In the late 1960s we had the start of what has now become known as 'The Troubles'. I wasn't part of the conflict, so I thought.

Then in February 1975 my own little private world collapsed around me, and I realised with devastating clarity that one chapter of my life had been completed and that nothing could quite be the same again. I wondered and indeed doubted if my faith was going to be strong enough to help me do what I knew God expected me to do. Forgive remembering Jesus' words "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do."

On that February evening, Gerard, our only son, was gunned down in cold blood as he left Mass in St Bride's Church, Belfast, close to the university where he was a student.

There was no earthly reason to pick on him other than the fact that two soldiers had been shot the night before and the Loyalists felt they needed a Catholic in return. There were 700 students there that night, it could have been any one of them. It's something you always think will happen to someone else.

When I lost Gerard, I was overwhelmed by the number of letters of support I received from complete strangers. I felt the need to meet other people who had suffered under similar circumstances. That summer I began to look through old newspapers searching for the names and addresses of other victims of violence. I just went round to their doors and said who I was.

We formed a support group and met together for the first time in October 1975 and we have been getting together on a monthly basis ever since. From the start the group included Catholics and Protestants alike, and the make-up is now divided evenly between those killed by Republican and those by Loyalist paramilitaries. I was lucky because I had my husband to support me, but for most of the group it's the husband who's been killed.

Quite a number of the more recent members come from families where the father was shot in front of his young children. Whenever we hear about a recent death, a member of the group will visit, or write, or telephone. I'll tell them who I am, that I too lost my only son, shot in a retaliation shooting. We feel that we have a right to tell them, "I know how you feel". I suppose we provide a shoulder to lean and cry on. The group has come to be called the Cross Group. I believe that God had chosen us to suffer for some reason. He had sent us a cross, which we had to carry, but I believe he had measured it and weighed it to make sure we could bear it. I believe there are no accidents in this life as far as God is concerned.

There are many symbols of hope in Northern Ireland. Thousands of people are working quietly together beneath the noise of war, building bridges which may be small, but there they are. Despite the gloom and violence all around, the future cannot be without hope. Peace will come, but it will have to begin with me and 'me' means each one of us. Out of evil, it is said, comes good.

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