President Mary McAleese and her husband Martin have devoted themselves to forging friendships between historic enemies across the island of Ireland over the past decade, it was claimed today.
This honour is ... about all those courageous men and women from communities in Northern Ireland from whom Mary and I and our nationalist community were estranged from for so long Martin McAleese
The couple were conferred with honorary degrees by Dublin City University (DCU) in a ceremony coinciding with the tenth anniversary of the Belfast Agreement.
DCU president Prof Ferdinand von Prondzynski praised the Ulster-born Catholics for tireless efforts to build bridges with the Protestant loyalist community in Northern Ireland.
"They have devoted themselves to forging friendships among historic foes, and over the last ten years they have made their Aras an Uachtarain residence a welcoming house where these new friendships could develop and prosper," Prof von Prondzynski said.
He said last year's Twelfth of July commemoration at Aras an Uachtarain was "an historic and symbolic development"
Mrs McAleese urged DCU's graduating students to apply their talents to help heal the "sometimes-savage" world.
"This is the teamwork that needs your skills, talents, hearts and hands to make things better, to heal what history wounded, to consolidate the peace, renew and refresh the prosperity, to make Ireland the best it can be and to generate in our ill-divided and sometimes savage world a relentless momentum for the full social, political and economic inclusion of each human being."
Dr Martin McAleese said his Catholic family was forced out of East Belfast when he was 20 and his childhood memories were tinged by an atmosphere of fear, intimidation and sectarianism.
"I am honoured today but this honour is much more than about me. It is as much about all those courageous men and women from communities in Northern Ireland from whom Mary and I and our nationalist community were estranged from for so long.
"Men and women who took a chance on us and whom we are now able to regard as friends," he added.