ARTSAWONDER

The Artsawonder Collective was created in early 2017, recognising the many divisions at home and in the wider context of conflict, migration and arrival of new people with differing beliefs and points of view. 

 

Reconciliation is often referred to as something that must happen after a conflict. Artaswonder aims to create a free space where we work together to see pre-emptive reconciliation happen

to avoid further conflict.  Artsawonder has become an important and respected forum for creating improbable relationships between differing religious and political groupings in Ireland, north and south.

 

In 2008 Sinn Fein’s Gerry Adams and the DUP’s Jeffrey Donaldson took part in the discussion section of the Music of Healing event. The two leaders did refuse to shake hands at the seminar but in a momentous breakthrough they sang a song on stage together with Tommy.

 

On the 9th and 10th of March 2017, a special conference bringing together people, politicians, artists and scholars from Christian, Muslim and Jewish backgrounds took place in Rostrevor, Co. Down.  This event was anchored in the tradition of the annual "Music of Healing" seminar begun in the early nineties in Rostrevor, and based on a song of that name penned by Tommy Sands and the late Pete Seeger. The Music of Healing event uses music and song to bring together people from diverse cultures, faiths, paramilitary organisations and political affiliations in Northern Ireland.

 

The conference included experts in Scriptural studies as well as experts in dialogical engagement in religiously motivated conflict. Discussions focused on study of some religious texts which appear to support prejudice and violence.  Participants committed to embarking on a journey with people with whom they may strongly disagree, understanding and accepting that at all times they can continue to disagree.

A key focus of the gathering examined the concept of 'a higher quality of disagreement’ that would allow for furthering understanding, peace building, reconciliation, justice and healing by exchanging each other’s traditional teachings and visions on major current issues such as hospitality, homelessness and respect for reciprocal pluralism.

“The Rostrevor evenings became ground-breaking events in the calendar of reconciliation work”

 (Belfast Telegraph 2017)