BBCBonfires do not serve any purpose, and “older, sinister forces” are exploiting young people to stoke up fear and anger in communities, the Catholic Bishop of Derry has said.
Dr Donal McKeown was speaking ahead of bonfires being lit in the Bogside and Creggan areas of Londonderry on Friday.
There was condemnation after the names of a dead child and a former senior detective who was shot and seriously injured, appeared on a bonfire in Creggan.
Other names on the bonfire included what is understood to be a serving police officer, as well as Billy Wright, the murdered founder of the Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF), and Sinn Féin assembly member Pádraig Delargy.
Aodhán RobertsBBC News NI understands that one of the offending signs, bearing several names, has since been removed from the pyre.
The name of retired Det Ch Insp John Caldwell, who was shot in Omagh in February 2023, appeared on a placard placed on the bonfire in the Creggan area.
The name of Kyle Bonnes, who was 15 when he died in a drowning incident in Drumahoe, near Derry, in 2010, also appeared on the pyre.
Speaking to BBC Radio Foyle’s North West Today programme, Bishop McKeown said bonfires were being used to “exploit fear and anger”.
“In some ways I am conflicted, in that there is a lot of pain and distress for many young people in life – I’m not playing down that reality,” he said.
“The question is how do we deal with that.”
He said he was convinced that having a bonfire that would “encourage anger” was not the way.
“Nothing beautiful grows in an angry head.
“Those who are helping young people to be angry are not doing them any favours.”
‘Ashes of anger’
Bishop McKeown said he was not going to condemn the actions of others, but he believed “a better way forward” had to be found.
“There is always a risk that older, sinister forces will use young people and say this is the way forward – you name people you hate and burn it on the bonfire.
“No future can be built on the ashes of anger.”
Previously, the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) and the Police Federation, which represents rank-and-file officers, condemned the placing of names on the bonfire in Creggan.
The federation described it as “a reprehensible action by people who are filled with hate and have nothing to offer the wider community”.
The police said they were aware of material, including drawings of cross-hairs and people’s names, being placed on the bonfire and they would investigate all offences linked to it.
Why are the bonfires being lit?
Bonfires on 15 August are traditional in some nationalist parts of Northern Ireland to mark the Feast of the Assumption, a Catholic holy day.
Some bonfires are also lit in August to commemorate the introduction of internment without trial of republican suspects during the Troubles, which was brought in by the UK government in 1971.
