Church attacks 'were desecration'

Dr Walsh said any attack on a place of worship was desecretion.

The Catholic Bishop of Down and Connor has condemned loyalist attacks on two Catholic Churches in Ballymena.

Dr Patrick Walsh celebrated Mass on Sunday morning in the two churches which had been damaged.

He told the congregations that an attack on any place of worship was a desecration.

All Saints Church was smeared with paint last week and sectarian graffiti was painted on the door and walls of Our Lady's Church in Harryville.

On Friday, in a gesture of solidarity, members of a Ballymena Presbyterian church, High Kirk, handed out roses to Massgoers at All Saints church.

They also scrubbed sectarian graffiti off the door and walls of the Church of Our Lady in Harryville on Thursday.

The church at Harryville was also the target of a loyalist picket between September 1996 and May 1998, linked to nationalist objections to a march by the Orange Order through nearby Dunloy.

All Saints priest, Fr Paul Symonds, said the High Kirk members' actions were "an absolutely lovely gesture, one of sheer love".