Inside the live TV moment that ended Sinead O’Connor’s career

Sinead O’Connor recounts the moment she tore up a picture of Pope John Paul II on live television – and why she has no regrets over what was considered a career-derailing moment.

The day my mother died, myself and my siblings went inside her house for the first time in several years. I took down from her bedroom wall the only photo she ever had up there, which was of Pope John Paul II. It was taken when he visited Ireland in 1979.

“Young people of Ireland,” he had said after making a show of kissing the ground at Dublin airport like the flight had been overly frightening, “I love you.” What a load of claptrap. Nobody loved us.

Not even God. Sure, even our mothers and fathers couldn’t stand us. [O’Connor writes in the book about her troubled childhood and difficult relationship with her deeply religious mother.]

“No-one ever asked me what my dreams were; they just got mad at me for not being who they wanted me to be.” (Picture: Getty Images)

My intention had always been to destroy my mother’s photo of the Pope. It represented lies and liars and abuse. The type of people who kept these things were devils like my mother. I never knew when or where or how I would destroy it, but destroy it I would when the right moment came.

And with that in mind, I carefully brought it everywhere I lived from that day forward. Because nobody ever gave a sh*t about the children of Ireland.

I’ve woken after going to bed at 6am. It’s 1pm. Only a few hours until camera rehearsal for SNL [O’Connor appeared on an episode of famous US skit show Saturday Night Live in October 1992].

I’ve been pissed off for a few weeks because I’ve been reading The Holy Blood And The Holy Grail, but also finding brief articles buried in the back pages of Irish newspapers about children who have been ravaged by priests but whose stories are not believed by the police or bishops their parents report it to. So I’ve been thinking even more of destroying my mother’s photo.

I decide tonight is the night. I know if I do this there’ll be war. But I don’t care. I know my Scripture. Nothing can touch me. I reject the world. Nobody can do a thing to me that hasn’t been done already. I can sing in the streets like I used to. It’s not like anyone will tear my throat out.

“No. It wasn’t derailed. It was re-railed.” (Picture: Kate Garner)

Showtime. First song, ‘Success Has Made A Failure Of Our Home’, is a dream. Second song is set up beautifully. With one candle beside me and my Rasta prayer cloth tied to the microphone, I sing ‘War’ a cappella. No-one suspects a thing.

At the end, I don’t hold up the child’s picture. I hold up JP2’s photo and then rip it into pieces. I yell, “Fight the real enemy!” And I blow out the candle.

Total stunned silence in the audience. And when I walk backstage, literally not a human being is in sight. All doors have closed. Everyone has vanished. Including my own manager, who locks himself in his room for three days and unplugs his phone.

Everyone wants a pop star, see? But I am a protest singer. I just had stuff to get off my chest. I had no desire for fame. In fact, that’s why I chose the first song. ‘Success’ was making a failure of my life. Because everyone was already calling me crazy for not acting like a pop star. For not worshipping fame. And I understand I’ve torn up the dreams of those around me.

But those aren’t my dreams. No-one ever asked me what my dreams were; they just got mad at me for not being who they wanted me to be. My own dream is only to keep the contract I made with God before I ever made one with the music business. And that’s a better fight than murder. I gotta get to the other side of life.

“I’m not a pop star. I’m just a troubled soul who needs to scream into a mic now and then.” (Picture: Supplied)

I am in my dressing room with my personal assistant, Ciara. We pack up my bags and leave the building. Outside 30 Rock, two young men are waiting for me and they throw a load of eggs at us both.

But what they don’t know is myself and Ciara are able to run 100m in 11.3 seconds. So we run after them when they flee. We catch up with them in some alley. They are leaning, gasping for breath, against a black fence they didn’t have the strength to climb.

All we say, laughing at them, is “Hey, don’t be throwing eggs at women.” The two of them are so shocked at being chased and caught that they start laughing too, and it all ends very friendly.

They straighten up and help us find a cab back to the hotel. The matter is being discussed on the news and we learn I am banned from NBC for life. This hurts me a lot less than rapes hurt those Irish children.

People say or think that tearing up the photo derailed my career. That’s not how I feel about it. I feel that having a number-one record derailed my career and my tearing the photo put me back on the right track. I had to make my living performing live again. And that’s what I was born for. I wasn’t born to be a pop star. You have to be a good girl for that. Not be too troubled.

Sinead O’Connor features in this Sunday’s Stellar.

I wasn’t comfortable with what other people called success because it meant I had to be as others wanted me to be. After SNL I could just be me. Do what I love. Be imperfect. Be mad, even.

Anything. I don’t define success as having a good name or being wealthy. I define success by whether I keep the contract I made with the Holy Spirit before I made one with the music business. I never signed anything that said I would be a good girl.

I have supported my four children for 35 years. I supported us by performing live, and I became, if I may say so, a very fine live performer. So, far from the Pope episode destroying my career, it set me on a path that fit me better.

I’m not a pop star. I’m just a troubled soul who needs to scream into a mic now and then. I don’t need to be number one. I don’t need to be liked. I don’t need to be welcome at the AMAs [American Music Awards].

I just need to pay my yearly overheads, get sh*t off my chest, and not compromise or prostitute myself spiritually. So no. It wasn’t derailed. It was re-railed. And I feel I’ve been extremely successful as a single mother providing for her children.

This is an edited extract from Rememberings by Sinéad O’Connor (Penguin, $45), available now.