Sunday, January 28, 2007 11:34 PM

Sister Sarah Clarke
Aug 2005
By Grandpa Al Lewis

Hello, everybody, this is Grampa Al Lewis with another edition of Drum Beat.  I thought I'd talk a little about Sister Sarah Clarke, an Irish nun who worked to help the families of Irish prisoners during the terrible repression of the Irish in the 1970s and onward.

Not too many people know about this remarkable woman, but Karen recently presented an Award on behalf of the Irish Freedom Committee,  to our favorite priest, Father Lawrence E. Lucas, Chaplain at Rikers Island and head of Catholic Affairs, for his prison mission, and his Award was called the Sister Sarah Clarke Memorial Award.  So Karen and I learned a little bit about her and would love to pass it on to you.

Sarah was born in Galway, Ireland on November 17, 1919 and was raised by parents who ran a farm and a pub.  Like many Irish girls in large families, she wanted to become a nun...from her earliest memories, that was her fervent wish.  And she did.  She joined an Order call La Sainte Union, nuns who were teachers.  Sister Sarah passed her novitiate in this rather strict Order and became a teacher of school children.  This she happily did until she was in her fifties. She had moved to London to follow the directives of her Order.

Sister Sarah experienced a transformation one day, after attending her first political meeting EVER.  It was a community meeting on the treatment of the Irish in England under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. The meeting held such import for her that she immediately asked her superior if she could take on this kind of work as her dedication to God.  Permission was granted as long as the group she allied herself with was not political.  So she joined the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Movement.

Much like Karen and I, Sister Sarah had her eyes opened when she went to prisons to help the Irish who were being swept up by the hysteria of the IRA bombings.  She saw many innocent people interrogated, abused and mistreated under the banner of the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

This individual help draw attention to numerous cases such as the Birmingham Six, the Maguire Seven and the Guilford Four.  Did you ever see the movie, "in the Name of the Father"? That was about the Guilford Four. Sister Sarah was invaluable to the Irish who were visiting loved ones in British prisons; she aided them in many ways.  It is hard to understand the level of repression, unless possibly, you know of someone, probably a Muslim, who has been placed in detention since 9/11.  No evidence of any kind was really necessary for the squad to pick up an Irish person, interrogate them brutally, whether they were innocent or not.

Sister Sarah was fond of saying, "If you keep on poking with a pin, eventually you'll make a hole." That was her philosophy, that every small gesture adds up and can eventually make a difference. The hundreds of people who were helped by her, to meet their families, to deal with prison officials, to make contacts in the government, etd, loved her dearly.

I really hope you'll take the time to look into the life of this remarkable nun who died on February 4th, 2002 at the age of 82.  Her autobiography, "No Faith in the System," reads like a diary; it really takes you into the period in question.  Karen got a lot on the Internet, too, by Googling Sister Sarah Clarke. 

Until next time, this is Grampa Al wishing you what I would wish for myself!

Al "Grandpa" Lewis, famous for his role in the classic early sixties series "The Munsters", also a well known actor, comedian, entertainer, book author and acrobat, and his wife, Ms. Karen Lewis, run an inmate pen-pal program as humantiarians. Grandpa and Karen Lewis are honorary lifetime members of the H.A.D. Organization since October, 2002. Grandpa, with his vast knowledge of life, will be regularly contributing articles on a variety of topics, along with his wife. Grandpa has his own radio show, known as "Al Grandpa Lewis Live", which airs every Saturday from 12:00 noon until 1:30 pm on Radio Station WBAI, 99.5FM. If you are interested in writing to an incarcerated individual, through Grandpa and Karen Lewis's penpal program, please feel free to email us at grandpa@hadofnyc.org with your information.