Alison O'Connor: Armagh service was meaningful, and President Higgins should have gone

Feelings would already have been running high on both sides — understandably — but this unforgiving attitude that currently pervades across almost all societies has certainly heightened the response to this ceremony and shown the real need there was for leadership, writes Alison O’Connor.

Archbishops Francis John McDowell and Eamon Martin during a service to mark the centenary of Northern Ireland at St Patrick's Cathedral in Armagh. Picture: Liam McBurney/PA Wire

Even homer nods. For all you Michael D Higgins fans out there, even a very good President can make a mistake. Ours did so in not being present in St Patrick’s Church of Ireland Cathedral in Armagh today for the service to mark the centenary of partition and Northern Ireland’s foundation.

On a crisp but lovely morning, people gathered on what the Dean of Armagh, Rev Shane Forster, described as “this ancient hill of Armagh” in “this ecclesiastical capital of Ireland” where St Patrick established a faith community and church over 1,500 years ago.