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La sécularisation en Irlande

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Paul Brennan

La montée du sectarisme

Early twentieth century secularization

The Irish Response

Mary N. Harris

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1Abstract : Irish catholics’ perceptions of church-state relations elsewhere in the world left them extremely wary. Once independence was achieved, the Catholic church in the Free State enjoyed uniquely favourable conditions. In Northern Ireland however the threat of secularisation was ever present and was exploited by Catholic politicians. As a result Nationalist issues were so closely identified with religion that the possibility of alliances with non-Catholic groups was effectively ruled out, making reform more difficult.

2Résumé : Les changements dans les relations entre Église et État dans d’autres pays du monde ont mis les catholiques irlandais en garde. A partir du moment où les Irlandais ont eu leur indépendance, l’Église catholique en Irlande du Sud a joui de conditions très favorables. En Irlande du Nord, par contre, il existait bien un danger de laïcisation que les hommes politiques catholiques ont su exploiter. Il s’en est suivi que les problèmes des nationalistes catholiques ont été si étroitement liés à la religion que toute alliance pour la réforme de l’État avec des groupes non-catholiques était difficile.

3In 1900 an article entitled “The Modem ‘Reign of Terror’ in France” appeared in the Irish Ecclesiastical Record. Its theme was the secularisation of France. The author, a Fr. C. M. O’Brien, from Cork, wrote of French education,

  • 1 CM. O’Brien, “The Modern Reign of Terror in France”, Irish Ecclesiastical Record, 4th ser., VIII, (...)

The desired effect has been produced and the present generation are little better than pagan. They sneer at religion, delight at insulting priests and nuns, and are steeped in every kind of immorality1.

4He gave instances of harassment of and discrimination against religious and practising Catholics and attributed this “lamentable state of things” to the national characteristic of fickleness, as evidence by upheavals, especially the Revolution, and to the increase in the number of freethinkers and freemasons in the country.

5The article was the subject of some criticism in the English Catholic weekly, the Tablet. Correspondents wrote in defence of French school children. A few months later J. F. Hogan, D.D., of the Irish Ecclesiastical Record wrote about the debate and defended Fr. O’Brien. Hogan had himself studied in France. He recognised that O’Brien had been somewhat extreme, and said that despite editorial attempts to excise the offending statement, it had somehow slipped in. Nevertheless, he defended O’Brien’s intentions and zeal. He had contacted a number of his fellow-students and friends in France and their responses, though in less extreme terms than O’Brien’s, confirmed the existence of problems. Hogan concluded :

  • 2 J. F. Hogan, “The Irish Ecclesiastical Record and the Tablet”, Irish Ecclesiastical Record, VIII, (...)

Now, the first serious reflection suggested to our minds by this rather voluminous correspondence is, that surely the Irish clergy are well inspired, when they proclaim their determination to fortify by every safeguard the position they have won, through the devotion and the wisdom of their forefathers, in the primary schools of Ireland, and to dispute, if need be, inch by inch, and line by line, every attempt that is made, no matter under what pretence, to make a breach in the citadel that means so much to them. It is only a small rift now that might widen out in the course of years, and ultimately admit that demon of secularism which has wrought such havoc in the fairest land in Europe. Indeed it is much more for the information of the Irish clergy that we have gone to the trouble of entering into this correspondence, interesting though it may be in itself, than for the trifling purpose of answering a rude correspondent of the Tablet, or of vindicating ourselves.2

6Hogan’s comments illustrate the thinking of many Irish churchmen in the early twentieth century. This paper seeks to examine the defensiveness of Irish Catholics in the face of early twentieth-century secularisation and to highlight how an intense interest in secularisation elsewhere in the world influenced the way in which Irish Catholics thought about change in their own society and strengthened their resolve to withstand challenges. The period was highly significant because major political changes were imminent and were likely to affect the Church’s interests, particularly in regard to education and social concerns. These latter issues were to become inextricably bound up in Northern Ireland in the 1920s, with significant political consequences.

7The general theme of much coverage of church-state relations was the persecution of the Catholic Church. This aroused great sympathy among Irish Catholics who had endured many disabilities under the penal legislation of the eighteenth century. An example of their sense of solidarity is to be found in a statement issued by the Irish hierarchy on 20 June 1911 on the persecution of the Church in Portugal :

  • 3 Irish Catholic Directory, Dublin, 1912, p. 543-544.

As the Bishops of a people who have known what it is to suffer for the Faith, in whose solidarity we are united with all Catholics throughout the world, we join our voices to the voices of the supreme Pontiff in earned protest against the atrocious aggression on religion that is in progress in Portugal3.

8Interest in church-state relations elsewhere in the world stemmed partly from Ireland’s links with the Church in other countries. Links with continental Europe had developed through Irish colleges in a variety of cities. Irish priests and nuns served the Irish diaspora in Britain, the United States and Australia. Irish missionary efforts led to interest in the Far East. England was of particular interest because of its many Irish immigrants, and reports of “leakage” there caused particular anxiety. The Irish Church had an opportunity to intervene directly in Church-State relations in Britain through their contacts with the Irish Party who sat at Westminster.

  • 4 J. MacCaffrey, “The Catholic Church in 1911”, Irish Ecclesiastical Record, 4th ser., January-June (...)

9These interests were reflected in Irish religious journals. Each January between 1906 and 1918 the Irish Ecclesiastical Record carried a resume of significant events in church-state relations in a range of countries. In 1912, for example, “The Catholic Church in 1911” dealt with education in England, Germany, Holland and Belgium4. It also reprinted letters from the Pope to the hierarchies of various countries. While the Irish Ecclesiastical Record was read mainly by priests, a number of other publications such as Studies, the Dublin Review, the Irish Monthly, the Irish Rosary, and the Catholic Bulletin had a more general audience. Newspapers also played an important role, particularly the Irish News in Belfast and the Irish Independent in Dublin.

  • 5 Pat Buckley, Faith and Fatherland : The Irish News, The Catholic Hierarchy and the Management of D (...)

10These concerns of these papers reflected those of their owners and boards. William Martin Murphy, whose opposition to trade unionism had led to opposition to the Dublin Lock-Out of 1913, was proprietor of the very popular Irish Independent, and shareholders of the Irish News included a large number of bishops and clergy5.

11Such publications took their information from a wide range of sources. Irish priests living abroad, often in Irish colleges were a valuable source of information. There were articles from foreign churchmen. The Catholic Bulletin had correspondents in Rome and Paris and the Irish Catholic had regular features from Rome and London, as well as many from France. The Record also reprinted popes’ messages to various hierarchies in the world. Newspapers took their material from various sources, including Reuters. The general thrust of these articles was the persecution of Catholics, though progress in the field of Church-state relations was occasionally reported. Areas of particular attention were social unrest and the control of Catholic education.

  • 6 Irish Catholic Directory, 1913, p. 509-510.

12The Irish bishops’ responses to a variety of developments, particularly to social unrest and to possible change in education legislation, were seen in the context of worldwide difficulties. In 1912, Bishop Brown of Ferns, for example, cautioned Catholic workmen against imitating the anarchist Labour Unions of France, Spain, and Portugal6. Cardinal Logue’s pastoral letter of the same year referred to what he saw as an anti-religious wave which had been spreading across Europe, and mentioned in particular France and Portugal. He had first hand knowledge of France, having been Professor of Dogmatic Theology there in the Irish College in Paris from 1866 to 1874, his stay interrupted by the Franco-Prussian war and the Commune. In 1916 a delegation of French ecclesiastics visited Ireland to promote links between Irish and French Catholics and attended the Catholic Truth Society conference. Speaking at the conference Cardinal Logue viewed the French Catholic Church’s position sympathetically :

  • 7 Irish Catholic Directory, 1917, p. 528-530.

They had an uphill struggle against those who unfortunately sold their birthright of faith, and turned away from the Church and got power in France and endeavoured to root out the Catholic Faith and Catholic customs7.

13Bishop Hallinan of Limerick, however, was later to express his views on a different threat to Christianity in France :

  • 8 Irish Independent, 8 November 1919.

I have seen it stated on what I conceive to be reliable authority, that the principal designers of these modem fashions in women’s dress are men, not women, and furthermore, that they are generally Parisian Jews and Freemasons who are bitterly opposed to Christianity, and seek, amongst other means, to uproot it by the introduction into Christian Society of those dangerous and indecent dresses8.

  • 9 John Gray, City in Revolt : James Larkin and the Belfast Dock Strike of 1907, Belfast, Blackstaff, (...)
  • 10 Robert Fullerton, “Social Unrest and Its Remedy”, Catholic Bulletin, 3, 1, 1913, p. 41.
  • 11 Irish News, 24 February 1915.

14The search for a Catholic solution to the social question was a more serious matter, particularly in Belfast where the large industrial population and the Dock Strike of 1907 had led to fears of socialism. On that occasion Cardinal Logue had stated, “Socialism as it is preached on the continent and as it has commenced to be preached in these countries, is simply irreligion and atheism” and found it strange to find politicians “entering into an alliance with secularism and socialism under the pretence of securing Home Rule for Ireland”9. Belfast priest Fr. Robert Fullerton was anxious to present the Catholic position on social unrest, noting with alarm the social unrest in France, Austria, Germany, the United States, Spain and Portugal, and the growth of socialist movements in Britain10. In 1912, Bishop Tohill of Down and Connor warned, “With regard to questions that are called Social questions, the irreligious and anti-Christian doctrines of Socialism must be opposed, and must get no countenance among Catholics”11. As an alternative approach to social problems the Church emphasised the lay apostolate, particularly the Society of St Vincent de Paul. Great emphasis was placed on the dissemination of information on Catholic social teaching. In 1915, the Knights of St Columbanus were founded in Belfast, having grown out of a university graduate conference which aimed to study and promote Catholic social principles. The impetus for the society came from Fr. O’Neill of Oldpark who had been in contact with Germany and the United States. The Catholic Truth Society of Ireland, which also had its origins in Belfast, was to prove an important means of disseminating Catholic teaching and its annual October congress received extensive coverage in the press.

  • 12 E. H. McLaughlin, “Belgium’s Primary Schools : A Striking Parallel”, Irish Independent, 11 March 1 (...)

15Education was also a matter of grave concern in Belfast where Unionist proposals to deal with the shortage of school accommodation by raising a local rate caused much alarm. The dropping of these proposals in favour of national reorganisation of education, involving a three man department of education to replace the old school boards and education committees, caused even more concern. In course of the ensuing debate, Belgium was suggested as a model for the Irish. Belgian Catholics, faced with the threat of secularisation under education legislation in 1879, had opened a subscription fund to provide for independent schools12.

  • 13 Irish Catholic Directory, Dublin, 1913, p. 510.
  • 14 Logue to Walsh, 24 March 1912, Dublin, Dublin Archdiocesan Archives, Walsh Papers.
  • 15 2 Geo. V, Government of Ireland Bill.
  • 16 Logue to O’Donnell, 3 December 1912, Armagh Archdiocesan Archives. O’Donnell Papers.

16While the second decade of the century was significant because of the threats to the educational statu quo and the existing social order, it was also a period of intense concern because a measure of home rule seemed imminent and the Church hoped for the emergence of a “sterling Christian nation”13. The hierarchy sought legal advice regarding certain clauses in the Home Rule bill which might restrict Catholic education. The Cardinal feared that the Irish Party M.P.s would “consent to clauses in the Home Rule Bill directly pointing to and restricting the action of Catholics”14. The greatest threat to the Church’s interests seemed to lie in Clause 3 of the bill which prevented the proposed Irish parliament from giving “a preference, privilege, or advantage” or imposing “any disability or disadvantage on account of religious belief or religious or ecclesiastical status”15. The Cardinal was prepared to accept provisions in the bill prohibiting laws making “any religious ceremony a condition of the validity of any marriage”. Looking outside Ireland, he read the signs of the times and accepted the clause, noting that “in every country now, expect in Malta, the Province of Quebec and perhaps Spain and some parts of South America, the Church must enforce her own marriage laws by her own sanctions”16. The Church’s concern regarding the nature of the forthcoming Home Rule settlement grew from 1916 onwards in the face of proposals for a separate northern administration which, it was felt, would pose a very serious threat to separate Catholic education. On the issue of education there was unanimity among the bishops, though many also opposed the idea of a separate northern state as an affront to the national ideal. The state was eventually set up by the Government of Ireland Act which included restrictive clauses regarding religion.

  • 17 Dermot Keogh, The Vatican, the Bishops and Irish Politics, Cambridge University Press, 1986, 178 f (...)

17With the establishment of the Irish Free State, threats to the influence of the Catholic Church south of the border were averted. In the 1920s the church’s involvement in party politics declined, but informal links between church and state were strong. Irish Catholics’ familiarity with church-state struggles throughout the world was on occasion turned to political advantage. This was particularly the case in 1931 when WT. Cosgrave, then head of government, circularised the bishops with extracts from the Republican organ, An Phoblacht, linking republicanism with the Soviet Union and communism. This was soon followed by a statement issued by the hierarchy condemning the IRA and the recently formed left-wing republican Saor Éire17.

18Because of Ireland’s memories of past persecution, there was a continuing sense of solidarity with Catholics in difficulties elsewhere, particularly in France, China, the Soviet Union and Mexico. For example, the Irish Independent on 12 January 1927 stated :

In the face of the most cruel and heartless persecution the people of Mexico have demonstrated, even when looking down the barrels of Calles’s guns, that their Fidelity to the Faith and to its preachers is not to be shaken... To the Catholics of Mexico Ireland can extend the sympathy of a people that has endured a more cruel persecution of the kind.

  • 18 Catholic Bulletin, September 1926, p. 893-895.
  • 19 E.g. Northern Whig, 13 January 1927.
  • 20 Irish Independent, 15 April 1928.
  • 21 Irish Independent, 9 May 1928.

19The nature of such coverage was itself the subject of debate and variations reflected the cleavages in Irish society. The Catholic Bulletin, a journal fanatically opposed to the Protestant ascendancy, was scathing of some types of coverage of Church-state matters. In May 1925 it roundly condemned the Irish Statesman for suggesting that the attitude of the Herriot government in France towards Catholics was not well understood in Ireland, and that Herriot was not at all anti-clerical – he simply believed in extending French law to Alsace Lorraine. This was in contrast to widely – publicised Catholic interpretations of Herriot as a persecutor of the Catholics of Alsace-Lorraine. Mexico was the subject of further debate. The Irish Catholic took its reports from a variety of sources – eg. Osservatore Romano, N.C.W.C. News service. The editor of the Catholic Bulletin, under the heading “Cromwellians on Mexico” condemned the Irish Times, claiming that its coverage had been taken from the London Times18. In particular it took exception to the Irish Times’s view that “in all the quarrels between states and the Roman Catholic Church the bases of the state’s hostility have been political rather than religious”. The Irish Times article, judiciously written and somewhat sympathetic towards the Catholic Church there, had stated, “It is possible that some indiscreet clerics may have medelled in Mexico’s hot-bed of political conspiracy”. In Northern Ireland Unionist interpretations of events also caused controversy. While the Nationalist press reported the persecution of Catholics in Mexico, the Northern Whig spoke of the Catholic episcopate in Mexico “fomenting trouble”19 and the coverage of events in Mexico by the Belfast press was the subject of an angry letter to the Irish Independent20. Attempts to have members of Ballycastle Urban Council pass a resolution condemning the persecution of Catholics in Mexico caused bitterness on that council21.

  • 22 Irish Catholic, 16 February 1929.

20Such views on relations between the Catholic Church and other states both coloured and were coloured by relations between the Church and the state in Northern Ireland. Threats to Catholicism there were of immediate concern. Catholics’ sense of grievance at the position of the Church in the North was heightened by the ideal situation of church-state relations they saw south of the border. While Catholic politicians had for decades supported the Church’s demands regarding education, and the Free State’s government respected them, many Unionists were openly hostile to the Catholic Church’s position. Such was the sense of deprivation and bitterness that during the 1929 Catholic Emancipation Centenary celebrations one northern bishop, referring to Catholic disabilities, particularly regarding education in Northern Ireland, asked, “How can we sing the song of the lord in a Strange Land !”22.

  • 23 Mary Harris, The Catholic Church and the Foundation of the Northern Irish State. Cork University P (...)
  • 24 Irish Catholic, 27 August 1921
  • 25 Irish Catholic, 19 July 1930.
  • 26 Irish Independent, 8 February 1922 ; Times Higher Education Supplement, 8 February 1930.
  • 27 Irish Independent, 21 October 1924.
  • 28 Irish Independent, 19 October 1928.

21Antagonism on the education question was evident from the first election to the northern parliament. Catholics spoke of imminent attacks on their schools and unionists of their resolve not to have education reform blocked by the Catholic Church23. Under the Education Act of 1923 schools which chose to remain voluntary lost the two-thirds capital expenditure grants they had formerly received from the British government. The struggle for Catholic education in Northern Ireland had many parallels elsewhere in the world and Irish Catholics were well aware of them. The Irish Catholic commented, “Ireland is not the only country in which the secularists are busy with the promotion of their schemes. They are, for instance, active at the present time in the U.S.”. It went on to mention a Bureau of Education being set up by one of the bishops there to collect information on proposed education legislation for the bishops and others. “In view of the threat now held out for Catholics to the North-East and their schools, it is instructive to take note of what our American co-religionists are accomplishing and propose to accomplish”24. The Irish Catholic referred to Yugoslav legislation endorsing the Catholic Church’s views on education under the heading “An Example for Northern Ireland”25. The Northern Irish clergy sometimes referred to this wider dimension when concerned about local education problems : Mgr Quinn of Dungannon’s referred to the danger to Catholic schools of an unfriendly government, recalling what happened in France under a Freemason Ministry26 and Fr. MacFeely of Deny referred to the dangers of subordinating education to the will of the state, as was the case in Russia. Bishop McKenna of Clogher, speaking at the Catholic Truth Society conference in 1924, stated that secularists had caused a lot of havoc in Latin countries27. Bishop O’Kane, of Derry, speaking a few years later, adopted a more moderate stance on Northern Ireland, anxious “not to exaggerate what is the merest trifle in comparison with the issued at stake in other lands”28.

  • 29 Who Was Who, 4, London, 1980, 5th ed., p. 208, 696. Londonderry’s father had been president of the (...)

22The conflict was complicated by the fact that Northern Protestants also saw the Act as secularist because of its exclusion of religious instruction from the hours of compulsory instruction, and because of procedures for appointing teachers which excluded religious tests. The Act was circumscribed by Clause 5 of the Government of Ireland Act (drafted at Westminster) which had prevented endowment of religion. Northern Ireland’s first two ministers of education, Londonderry and Charlemont, both born and educated in England29, were out of tune with the strength of religious feeling in Northern Ireland. As the Church of Ireland primate, Charles D’Arcy noted,

Our Ulster people are a religious people. It is quite impossible that they desire a system of education more thoroughly secularised than any other part of the United Kingdom.

23The crucial difference between the Catholic and Protestant positions lay in Catholic unwillingness to relinquish clerical control. Protestants noted the Catholic Church’s reluctance to admit laity to positions of influence. The Northern Whig commented on the Bishops’ opposition to the 1923 Act :

  • 30 Northern Whig, 15 October 1923.

The bishops do not want equality of treatment ; they want to be placed in a favoured position. What they fear most of all is that the RC laity will be associated with the clergy in the management of the schools30.

24This was true, and Catholic intent was strengthened by the threat of interference in their schools by Protestant laity.

25Fears of secularisation in education soon began to influence party politics in Northern Ireland. The Catholic Church was anxious to ensure the election of Catholic candidates who would promote Catholic education. In the case of local government elections, it was hoped that successful Catholic candidates would be appointed to local education committees. This led to bitter clashes between Catholic Nationalist candidates and Labour candidates who contested seats in predominantly Catholic areas.

  • 31 Irish News, 12 January 1925.
  • 32 Irish News, 14 and 15 January 1925,
  • 33 Irish News, 17 January 1925.
  • 34 Michael Farrell, Northern Ireland : the Orange State, London, Pluto. 1980, p. 103.

26The conflict began soon after the Northern Ireland Labour Party (NILP) was established in 1924. In January 1925, the NILP contested two traditionally Catholic wards in municipal elections. One of their candidates, William McMullen, caused outrage by commenting that a recent declaration by the Pope on socialism was “a purely private expression of opinion and that Catholics could take it or leave it.” He argued that any devout Catholic had a perfect right to disagree with the Pope and say whether he was right or wrong31. Letters to the press expressed outrage at this comment32, and the Irish News spoke of “the emblem of Bolshevism flaunted in the streets,” and the strains of the “Red International” war-song borne on every wind that blows33. Nevertheless, McMullen was elected, and in the subsequent general election won a seat in the largely Catholic constituency of West Belfast34.

  • 35 In 1925, 1927 and 1929, a Labour candidate was returned for one of the “Catholic” wards.
  • 36 Irish News, 5 January 1928.

27Labour continued to contest these wards, and Nationalists fought back, with varying degrees of success35. During the 1928 municipal elections Catholic candidate Thomas Agnew, who had been defeated by a Labour candidate the previous year, stated he “could not conceive that they wished to see the happenings in Mexico, China and Russia in Belfast”36. The Irish News likewise referred to China, Russia and Mexico as examples of socialist despotic rule, and concluded :

  • 37 Irish News, 13 January 1928. See also Irish News, 6 January 1928.

When the issue lies between Catholicity and Socialism there is only one road which a Catholic is bound by the laws of God and his church to travel without pause or delay37.

  • 38 Graham Walker, The Politics of Frustration : Harry Midgley and the Failure of Labour In Northern I (...)

28In previous years, with few exceptions, the campaigns with all their religious arguments were waged by the laity. In 1928, however, clerical support for the two Catholic candidates was well publicised. Both were successful. Such was the publicity given to the Catholic Church’s opposition to Socialism during this election campaign that a handbill reiterating the Irish News’s main arguments about socialism and Catholicism was circulated by the Unionist opponents of Labour’s Harry Midgley, who was contesting Dock, a ward with a potentially crucial Catholic minority38.

29The identification of Catholic politics with religious issues was the cause of particular bitterness during the parliamentary election campaign of 1929. The Catholic candidate for West Belfast argued,

  • 39 Irish News, 18 May 1929.

a non-Catholic could not be expected to be sympathetic towards the determination of Catholics to secure that the solution of all social problems must be in accord with the Christian principles of charity and justice39.

  • 40 Michael Farrell, op. cit., p. 116 and Irish News, 21 May 1929.
  • 41 Irish News, 21 May 1929.

30This was greeted with cheers. The day before the election the Irish News published an article by Fr. T. McCotter on “Socialism, the Enemy of Religion”40, quoting from an article in the Catholic Encyclopaedia which pointing out that all three popes who had come into contact with modern Socialism had condemned it. He drew on arguments by Pope Leo XIII and by the Jesuit theologian Viktor Cathrein. He went on to refer to the rejection of religion and private property, and state control of education and the care of the sick41. The Nationalist candidate won comfortably. This emphasis on religious factors led to resentment on the part of opponents who viewed the Catholics arguments as far-fetched. During the election campaign for Westminster a few days later the Nationalist candidate was opposed by Sir W.E.D. Allen who wrote,

  • 42 Irish News, 25 May 1929.

... The priests are back at the old Nationalist game of gulling the people into the idea that the Church is in danger. That is not the case. The British Empire gives the most complete equality to all religions, in contrast to the USA42.

  • 43 Hibernian Journal, January 1964 : Article on Joe Devlin by W. G. Fallon.
  • 44 Irish News, 21 May 1929.
  • 45 Irish News, 14 January 1930 and 19 January 1934.
  • 46 Irish Catholic Directory, Dublin, 1939, p. 610 ; see also Mary N. Harris, «Catholicism, Nationalis (...)

31While Nationalists consistently opposed Labour, they were not unconcerned about the problems of the poor. One point raised frequently in the course of the debate was the concern of the Nationalist candidates for social issues. Social problems were increasingly addressed within the framework of the Church rather than the state. Leading Belfast Nationalist politician Joe Devlin shared the Church’s views on social issues, having “shaped his views to accord with Pope Leo XIII’s famous Rerum Novarum, The Worker’s Charter 1891”43. During the 1929 election campaign Devlin had emphasised the social question as focus of his attention44. Politicians were praised for their support for Catholic charities. In the municipal election campaigns of 1930 and 1934 Catholic candidate Boyle pledged to support continued grants to all Catholic welfare institutions45. Catholics looked after their own poor and the lay apostolate flourished. By 1937 Bishop Mageean was able to announce that his diocese of Down and Connor had about one fifth of all the members of the St Vincent de Paul Society in Ireland46.

***

32Irish Catholics’ perceptions of church-state relations elsewhere in the world provided a context for interpreting changes in church-state relations at home. Their perceptions of change elsewhere left them extremely wary and fearful of what Fr. Hogan termed “a small rift now that might widen out in the course of years”. Once independence was achieved, the Catholic Church in the Free State enjoyed uniquely favourable conditions. In Northern Ireland, however, the threat of secularisation was ever present and was exploited by Catholic politicians. To what extent the arguments presented were merely rhetorical one can only surmise. The emphasis on religious issues in world politics and in Irish politics sometimes obscured political difficulties. As a result Nationalist issues were so closely identified with religion that the possibility of alliance with non-Catholic groups was effectively ruled out, and reform within the state rendered more difficult.

Notes

1 CM. O’Brien, “The Modern Reign of Terror in France”, Irish Ecclesiastical Record, 4th ser., VIII, September 1900, p. 258.

2 J. F. Hogan, “The Irish Ecclesiastical Record and the Tablet”, Irish Ecclesiastical Record, VIII, 4th sen, December 1900, p. 529-530.

3 Irish Catholic Directory, Dublin, 1912, p. 543-544.

4 J. MacCaffrey, “The Catholic Church in 1911”, Irish Ecclesiastical Record, 4th ser., January-June 1912, p. 1-15.

5 Pat Buckley, Faith and Fatherland : The Irish News, The Catholic Hierarchy and the Management of Dissidents, Belfast, Athol, 1991, p. 90-91.

6 Irish Catholic Directory, 1913, p. 509-510.

7 Irish Catholic Directory, 1917, p. 528-530.

8 Irish Independent, 8 November 1919.

9 John Gray, City in Revolt : James Larkin and the Belfast Dock Strike of 1907, Belfast, Blackstaff, 1985, p. 166.

10 Robert Fullerton, “Social Unrest and Its Remedy”, Catholic Bulletin, 3, 1, 1913, p. 41.

11 Irish News, 24 February 1915.

12 E. H. McLaughlin, “Belgium’s Primary Schools : A Striking Parallel”, Irish Independent, 11 March 1920.

13 Irish Catholic Directory, Dublin, 1913, p. 510.

14 Logue to Walsh, 24 March 1912, Dublin, Dublin Archdiocesan Archives, Walsh Papers.

15 2 Geo. V, Government of Ireland Bill.

16 Logue to O’Donnell, 3 December 1912, Armagh Archdiocesan Archives. O’Donnell Papers.

17 Dermot Keogh, The Vatican, the Bishops and Irish Politics, Cambridge University Press, 1986, 178 ff.

18 Catholic Bulletin, September 1926, p. 893-895.

19 E.g. Northern Whig, 13 January 1927.

20 Irish Independent, 15 April 1928.

21 Irish Independent, 9 May 1928.

22 Irish Catholic, 16 February 1929.

23 Mary Harris, The Catholic Church and the Foundation of the Northern Irish State. Cork University Press, 1993, p. 92.

24 Irish Catholic, 27 August 1921

25 Irish Catholic, 19 July 1930.

26 Irish Independent, 8 February 1922 ; Times Higher Education Supplement, 8 February 1930.

27 Irish Independent, 21 October 1924.

28 Irish Independent, 19 October 1928.

29 Who Was Who, 4, London, 1980, 5th ed., p. 208, 696. Londonderry’s father had been president of the English Board of Education.

30 Northern Whig, 15 October 1923.

31 Irish News, 12 January 1925.

32 Irish News, 14 and 15 January 1925,

33 Irish News, 17 January 1925.

34 Michael Farrell, Northern Ireland : the Orange State, London, Pluto. 1980, p. 103.

35 In 1925, 1927 and 1929, a Labour candidate was returned for one of the “Catholic” wards.

36 Irish News, 5 January 1928.

37 Irish News, 13 January 1928. See also Irish News, 6 January 1928.

38 Graham Walker, The Politics of Frustration : Harry Midgley and the Failure of Labour In Northern Ireland, Manchester, Manchester University Press, 1985, p. 52.

39 Irish News, 18 May 1929.

40 Michael Farrell, op. cit., p. 116 and Irish News, 21 May 1929.

41 Irish News, 21 May 1929.

42 Irish News, 25 May 1929.

43 Hibernian Journal, January 1964 : Article on Joe Devlin by W. G. Fallon.

44 Irish News, 21 May 1929.

45 Irish News, 14 January 1930 and 19 January 1934.

46 Irish Catholic Directory, Dublin, 1939, p. 610 ; see also Mary N. Harris, «Catholicism, Nationalism and the Labour Question in Belfast, 1925-1938», Bultan : An Irish Studies Journal, vol. 3, n° 1, Spring 1992, p. 15-32.

Author

National University of Ireland, Galway

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