The objective of Ireland's EU presidency should be to provide the most enlightened legislation possible on the movement of peoples and to avoid a "fortress Europe" mentality, the Catholic Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland, Dr Seán Brady, has said.
In his St Patrick's Day message, Dr Brady said St Patrick pushed back frontiers and therefore it was appropriate that the accession of 10 new EU states would be signed into law in Ireland.
When St Patrick came to Ireland, he encountered what we today would label racism. He was regarded as a hostile foreigner. Irish suspicion of immigrants could be said then to stretch back to St Patrick's time, the archbishop asserted.
Surely St Patrick's writings, coupled with our centuries-long experience of being ourselves an emigrant people, should help shape our views towards immigration policy.
Dr Brady said Ireland, as holder of the EU presidency, should make reference to its Christian heritage and the experience of Irish people abroad, in contributing to the debate about appropriate policies and legislation the EU needed to adopt on the movement of peoples.
"In its term of presidency of the European Union, Ireland has a duty to lead public opinion and debate on this critical issue and not fall victim to scaremongering and myths," he said.
The objective of the presidency should be to provide the most enlightened legislation possible and to avoid a "fortress Europe" mentality.
Dr Brady also said he hoped the forthcoming referendum on the Irish Constitution on the subject "of the constitutional right to Irish citizenship to children born on this island to parents who have no right of residence" and related matters, would be conducted throughout in a tempered, compassionate and responsible manner.
Dr Brady said he wanted to extend a special Lá Fhéile Pádraig greeting to Irish emigrants living in Spain.
Terrorism had visited the Spanish capital in a most callous and barbaric way.
It was easy to identify with the suffering and anguish currently being experienced in Spain, he said. On August 15th, 1998, Ireland and Spain felt the deathly hand of terrorism in Omagh.
"Just as the Spanish people prayed for us at that dark time, so too should we remember all those who died in Madrid last week," he said.
If the awful and tragic events of last week taught anything, it was that all of us must work unceasingly for peace on our own island, Dr Brady continued. "Here, at this time, in Patrick's own land, the challenges to peace are many and great."
A just and lasting peace must consign for good an end to all forms of paramilitarism and the restoration of an inclusive, stable and effective executive in Northern Ireland, Dr Brady said.
The primate referred to our emigrants in Britain, who he said had lived lives of decency and honour but had fallen on hard times in old age and should not be forgotten.
Homelessness in Ireland was a problem, too, but could be solved if everybody worked together, he said.