An army chaplain has started a one-man campaign to cut the carnage on the state's roads. His shocking posters carrying the chilling message "Love God, Love Your Neighbour, Don't Meet Them Both By Accident" beside a graphic picture of a mangled car.
The campaign was launched to mark the first anniversary of the death of a soldier, Kevin Dullaghan (30), who died as he was driving from Gormanstown Army camp to his home in Drogheda four miles away.
The camp chaplain, Father Robert McCabe, was a close friend of Kevin's and had been arranging a Christmas dinner with him and within hours was instead helping to choose his coffin.
Kevin had been on his way home to his parents, Carol and Eddie, and was in good spirits as his fiancée, Alison, had just told him she was pregnant with their first child. He did not survive to celebrate his son Conor's first Christmas.
At the weekend Carol and Eddie Dullaghan erected a plaque beside where Kevin died as he emerged from the road leading to the camp and on to the old Dublin-Belfast road.
His car collided with another car whose driver was convicted of driving without insurance or tax earlier this year. He received a three-year driving ban and a fine of €500.
Father McCabe said: "There is no point in people having a St Anthony air freshener if their driving stinks, if their behaviour changes when they get behind the wheel of a car.
"I hope people will make a resolution that through Christmas and the New Year they will consider their traffic behaviour as something that merits Christian dimension."
He has sent copies of the poster to more than 3,000 priests in Ireland as well as each local authority, every Garda station and every Police Service of Northern Ireland station .
The priest has secured the backing of the National Safety Council and the NRA as well as the two police forces on the island for his campaign.
Father McCabe said that for every person killed on the island of Ireland as a result of the Troubles eight times as many were killed on the roads.
Current statistics show that approximately 400 people have died in the last year as a result of road traffic collisions or crashes, and the same number will next year.
"At least 400 families this Christmas will be making a wreath for a cemetery or for the side of a road where their mother, father, son or daughter was killed or injured," Father McCabe said.
"I ask them to introduce a Christian element to their driving, and our behaviour is based on not meeting both God and your neighbour as the result of an accident."
Mr Pat Costello, chief executive of the National Safety Council, said: "We endorse this campaign totally and congratulate Father Robert on his creativity in doing it and hope it will impact on all drivers to take more care on the roads."