politics and religion in ireland cauldron of conflicts rev peter o’reilly

Politics and Religion in Ireland

Cauldron of ConflictsRev Peter O’Reilly

Irish Icebergs

The Papal Bull Laudabiliter

Legitimizing the Norman Invasion

• 1155 Pope Adrian IV issues Laudabiliter

• Henry II given Lordship over Ireland

• Mandate to bring in the Gregorian Reforms

• Norman barons begin a process of conquest

Growing Influence

Reformation Rupture

• Influence of the Catholic Church grew until 1535 when Henry VIII declared himself head of the Church of Ireland breaking with Rome

• From now on the Crown sought to control or suppress the Catholic Church

• Colonial Process begins in earnest

The Plantations

The Colonial Project

• From the sixteenth century onwards the plan was to replace native Catholic landowners with loyal English and Scottish settlers

• The Tudor state set course on a policy to reinforce political power with religious and ethic loyalties – Penal Laws

• Not unlike what happened in the Ukraine with the import of Russian settlers

The Rise of Parliamentary Democracy

An Gorta Mor – The Famine

• 1845 – 1850 Potato Crop Fails. 1 Million People Die

• Population falls from 8 Million to 3.5m due to Starvation and subsequent Emigration

• Huge resentment over continued food exports to England during the period

Changing Fortunes

• Catholic Emancipation 1829

• Disestablishment of the Church of Ireland 1871

• 19th Century Catholic and Protestant Revivalism. Gaelic Revivalism

1921 The Irish Free State and Northern Ireland

Political and Religious Asymmetry

• By 1921 when the 28 counties making up the Free State gained a measure of Independence and the 6 Northern counties stayed within the UK, religious divides mirrored political ones

• Eire was over 80% Catholic in Population• Some parts of Northern Ireland had a

population ranging from 90% to 50% Protestant with the remainder Catholic

Trouble Ahead Craig and De Valera

Confessional States?

• James Craig Prime Minister of Northern Ireland from 1922 – 1940 declared ‘ All I boast is that we are a Protestant Parliament and a Protestant State’(Speech at Stormont 1935)

• Eamon De Valera shadowed Craig as Taoiseach in the South and in 1937 launched a new Constitution for the Irish Republic which declared the ‘special position of the Catholic Church”

Religion and Identity

• Both states utilized religion to shore up their shaky existence, the Republic reeling from a vicious civil war, Northern Ireland struggling for viability

• The Republic’s Protestant population was small and declining, NI’s Catholic Population was sizable and growing and suffered serious discrimination

The Civil Rights Movement

The times are a changing

• The 1960’s in Northern Ireland saw the growth of a civil rights movement based on that in the United States

• Its aim was an end to all forms of discrimination in areas such as housing, employment and voting rights.

• Mass protest ended in violence with events such as ‘the battle of the Bogside’

The British/Irish Agreement

• The British/Irish agreement popularly known as the Good Friday Agreement came into effect on 2nd December 1999

• Dealt with a wide range of cross community and Intergovernmental issues recognizing the broad basis of conflict

• Set NI on the road to Peace and Reconciliation

Politics, Social Deprivation and Religious Difference

• Religion, Cultural and Political differences boiled over into violence with the emergence of paramilitaries on both sides

• Religion here was only part of a much more complex picture which saw the breakdown of the civil order in Northern Ireland

• Religion’s greatest significance was as a bearer of social identity

The breakdown of Civil Society

Pope John Paul II Drogheda 1979

Words of Passionate Pleading

• ‘On my knees I beg you to turn aside from the paths of violence and return to the ways of peace’

• ‘May no Protestant think that the Pope is an enemy’

Drogheda 29th September 1979