London City Luncheon : Thursday, March 09, 2006

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The Ireland Funds London City Luncheon was held the at The Banqueting House in London’s historic Whitehall Palace, on March 9th. This was the first of many Ireland Funds’ events celebrating Ireland’s national day around the world. The Luncheon raised over £110,000 profit which will support projects in the UK and Ireland. We would like to thank Anglo Irish Bank for their generous support of this event and Independent News & Media for their ongoing assistance.

Full list of grants that the IFGB made in 2005 >

The London City Luncheon was once again co-chaired by IFGB trustees, Peter Kiernan and John Rowan, both of whom also co-chair The Ireland Funds’ campaign to assist the elderly Irish in Britain. Peter Kiernan described to an audience made up of some 400 international business leaders how his parents had come to Britain in the 1920’s. Like so many others of their generation and beyond, they never had an opportunity to return home. In common with many Irish immigrants to the UK, they raised their family in a challenging time. However, they were fortunate to have a happy family life and were blessed with a wide circle of supportive friends amongst a tightly knit Irish community. Sadly, this has not been the case for many Irish people still living in the UK, especially as they grow old and face adversities of one sort or another.

Peter Sutherland then took the stand, and before introducing the keynote speaker, His Eminence Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, he too spoke of the plight of many elderly Irish people still living in isolation and often distressed circumstances in Britain. He urged the many Irish in the audience not to forget “the people who provided, over a very long period of time, substantial support to a less prosperous Ireland than the one we have today”.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, Archbishop of Westminster opened his keynote speech with a fascinating description of his experience as one of the 115 Cardinal-Electors locked into the Sistine Chapel to elect a successor to Pope John-Paul II.

• Cardinal's speech >

• Cardinal's biography >

He went on to speak of Pope Benedict’s concern for Europe: its direction or lack of it, the question of its roots, and what truly nourishes it. Living as we do in a strongly secular society, we must remember that economic wealth and democracy are not the only forces driving our society and shaping our history. Nations are not ultimately shaped by ideology or by the free market – but by what society deems to be true and good. “Almost everything that we modern Europeans value, and which makes Europe so exceptional – our respect for human rights, our legal traditions, the balance of powers, the concern for the poor – is precisely the fruit of centuries of a community in relationship with God”.

The Cardinal said Ireland has a special role to play in reminding Europe of the need to cherish the roots of our core social values. Although Ireland is now in many ways part of the culture of forgetting those roots, Ireland has a mission, a vocation, which sooner or later it must return to in order to be truly itself.

He commended The Ireland Funds’ concern for the needs of the less well off; “You are honouring and cherishing what is true and what is good and what is important…. Your contributions will not just make a difference to people’s lives in a very direct way, but will enhance all our lives by shoring up the true roots of our European civilisation”.