Scottish Catholic Observer

In his homily at the Mass to mark the end of the Edinburgh International Festival last Sunday, the Archbishop said: “With the departure of Britain from the EU, for better and for worse, Europe is going to be a different place; let’s ensure that, if it must be a different place, it will at least be a better place.”

Speaking to a congregation at St Mary’s Cathedral, Edinburgh, that included Baillie Elaine Aitken as representative of the Lord Provost, he said that ‘geographically, historically, culturally, linguistically, even religiously—Scotland and Britain are part of Europe’.

“Until the tectonic plates on which we stand pull us towards America or Africa, we are a part of Europe,” he said. “As it happens, however, it has fallen to our generation to help re-craft our relationship with Europe’s principal political institutions. No matter which way we voted, it’s now up to all of us to make this work. Nothing is a foregone conclusion. And there is nothing to stop this new relationship with Europe perhaps becoming a better one. It will be different; that being the case, let’s also endeavour to make it better. And not just better for ourselves, but for everyone. “

The Archbishop said that ‘as we recall the ideals of European brotherhood and cooperation fostered by the Edinburgh International Festival, as we recall in solidarity those who have been killed in outrages over the last months in Europe, as we remember those in Italy caught up in a natural calamity just this week, we would do well also to recall that it now falls to us and to our times to make sure that, as we change our relations with those nations, we also improve our relations with our brothers and sisters who are our nearest neighbours, those with whom we hold in common so much that is dear to all the peoples of Europe.’