“A Lousy Fanatic: Sean O’Callaghan”
From the late 1960’s through the 90’s, Northern Ireland experienced terrible sectarian and political violence, in a period known as “the Troubles.” After the imperfect 1998 peace accords, conditions remained relatively peaceful, but uneasy. Some politicians in recent years have wanted to sweep the history of the Troubles under the rug, sometimes for self-serving reasons. But as Ruth Dudley Edwards wrote, in telling about the members of a family which suffered horribly, “Their lives were taken from them so we owe it to them to tell their stories.” Very true. History should be as objective and fair-minded as possible, with accounts of heroes, villains, victims, and the mass of people trying to get by. And history should not be swept under the rug.
Sean O’Callaghan was an active participant in the Troubles, but before he died in 2017, he wrote some remarkably reasonable, measured and fair-minded accounts of what happened. They also were testimonies to his conscience. As a young member of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, O’Callaghan committed violent acts, yet he became sickened by the violence, terrorism and hatred, and turned in a different direction at great risk to himself. His autobiography The Informer provides a wealth of information, not only about his times, but also on a man transforming from a murderer to a peacemaker.
O’Callaghan was born into a Catholic family in 1954 in the Republic of Ireland. His father was a long-time member of the Irish Republican Army, which tried violently for several decades to end British rule of Northern Ireland, and to reunite the island into one state. Sean O’Callaghan joined the Provisional IRA faction in 1970, as tensions were rising between Protestants and Catholics in the north. Although a teenager, he quickly rose in responsibility, and supervised the training of many IRA members. In 1974, he participated in a lethal attack on a British military base, and murdered a Catholic detective of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, the police force of Northern Ireland. O’Callaghan was a thoughtful young man, though, and soon afterwards he said to himself, “You’re going to have to pay for this someday.”
O’Callaghan also was disturbed when he witnessed other IRA members beating a harmless Protestant man, and by brutal remarks of comrades about the nature of their enemies. He wrote that, “I had joined the IRA… to fight a war against British imperialism. But it was hard to maintain the illusion that Northern Ireland was in a colonial situation. The truth is that I had come to Northern Ireland abysmally ignorant of the realities and yet prepared to kill and bomb.” The IRA’s 1979 murder of Lord Mountbatten and others “was the final straw.”
As a way of making amends, O’Callaghan secretly turned against the IRA and became an unpaid informant for police in the Republic of Ireland, reporting on IRA plans and actions. To serve in this way as a “tout” was one of the worst possible offenses in the eyes of the IRA, and thus O’Callaghan risked threats of torture and murder to the end of his days. For several years he played the role of a high-level IRA operative, while feeding the police information which foiled some major IRA projects and saved lives. He disrupted a plot to murder Prince (now king) Charles and Princess Diana, and aided in the capture of a huge shipment of weapons from America. In 1988, he turned himself in at an English police station, admitting that he had committed murder. He was a prisoner until 1996, when he received a royal pardon. Afterwards, he steadily spoke out for truth and against the continuing violence.
In The Informer, O’Callaghan called himself an atheist, yet he was sympathetic to many devoted Catholics and Protestants. Sickened by the terrorism of paramilitary organizations on all sides, and the collaboration of some priests and clergy, he described young recruits who were well-meaning, but ignorant and easily led by propaganda. He acknowledged the positive aspects of the close-knit Catholic community where he grew up, and the Catholic education which he received. He also recognized the legitimate concerns of Protestants in Northern Ireland who were loyal British citizens, and he admired the sense of duty and fair play which characterized many of them.
Jenny McCartney, a journalist who knew O’Callaghan, wrote soon after his death in 2017, “there were many times when I knew with absolute certainty what I was seeing in him. It was the face of courage.” O’Callaghan himself claimed, “I’ve always been a lousy fanatic.” Many people in Northern Ireland, Ireland and Great Britain can be grateful for that. Like all of us, O’Callaghan wasn’t perfect, but we can pray that he finds a lasting peace in God’s kingdom.