The Fund In Your Area

The Corrymeela Community, Ballycastle, Co Antrim

The Corrymeela Community is one of Northern Ireland’s oldest and most respected reconciliation organisations. Established in 1965, Corrymeela has forty years experience of managing peace and reconciliation projects. It has consistently provided safe places and programmes of reconciliation tailored to the needs of schools, youth groups, churches and community based organisations throughout the island of Ireland.

In addition to its centre in Belfast, over 4,000 participants take part in programmes at the Corrymeela residential centre in Ballycastle, Co. Antrim, each year.

The centre has also hosted the Public Achievement International Youth Camp in 2005 which brought together 52 young people from 11 nations including Northern Ireland, Ireland, Palestine and Israel to help them understand and appreciate other cultures through a range of interactive activities.

The International Fund for Ireland, through the Community Bridges Programme, has supported several of Corrymeela’s initiatives over the last twenty years including; £220,000 / €321,200 towards the construction of a new residential facility at the Ballycastle site, £93,975 / €137,203 for the highly successful Family and Community Work Project, and £84,650 / €123,589 for the excellent Teacher Education Project.

Corrymeela Community places great emphasis on a residential experience because it can create a new openness to deal with issues that people find difficult in their home territory.

For this reason, the Corrymeela Community has drawn up a development plan for the Ballycastle site that will see the replacement of the current volunteer accommodation, the building of new residential accommodation for up to 34 people, and the refurbishment and upgrading of other units at the site in order to support enhanced delivery of reconciliation programmes. It is hoped that construction will begin in the summer of 2007.

The International Fund is providing £1m / €1.46m of the estimated £1.4m / €2,044,000 cost of the project under its Legacy Programme and, without which, according to David Stevens, Leader, Corrymeela Community, the project wouldn’t be able to go ahead.