Speech to the Irish Association Armagh City Hotel 12 October 03

"Religion and the future in Ireland"
Mr. Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs Correspondent Irish Times

In a lecture last Monday evening to the Meath Peace Group at St Columban's College in Navan, the Church of Ireland primate Archbishop Robin Eames commented that during the years of intense violence in Northern Ireland the Churches ``buried the dead, comforted the bereaved and condemned terrorism. They also faced the danger of being over-identified with the communities in which they ministered.''

There was, he continued, ``an absence of the prophetic voice chiefly due to the intensity of pastoral care demanded for the suffering of their communities. Now the fragile plant of the peace process presents a new challenge which in many ways is a greater challenge posing questions which probe the integrity of Christianity.''

One could hardly agree more. And, allowing for the great tragedy of the past 30 years and the impossibility this presented to any real surmounting of entrenched identities, it would have to be said that the Churches on this island have been noted far more for cherishing their divisions than for any love of one another.

Indeed such was the passion with which this separateness was held that even in 1998 - the year of the Belfast Agreement - the Roman Catholic Church on this and our neighbouring island chose to publish the One Bread One Body document to clarify for us all that its faithful must not take Communion in a Reformed Church, and a member of a Reformed denomination might take Communion at Mass only in clearly outlined and rare circumstances.

Meanwhile that same year the Presbyterian Church in Ireland continued its refusal to invite a Roman Catholic representatives to attend the annual General Assembly, as in all years since, though all other Churches receive such an invitation. In 1999 it refused to be part of a newly proposed Conference of Irish Churches because the Catholic Church would be a member.

In 1998 the Church of Ireland kept its head buried deep in the sand as the whole world watched while Drumcree became a focus for those most vehemently opposed to the Belfast Agreement. In that year also the three Quinn children were burned to death when their home in Ballymoney Co Antrim was firebombed early on the morning of Drumcree Sunday because of tensions over the Orange parade being prevented going down the Garvaghy Road.

This cherised tribalism was even personified by our two main church leaders in 1997. Personal relations between the then Roman Catholic primate Cardinal Daly and his Church of Ireland counterpart Archbishop Eames hit a low when the RUC forced the march down the Garvaghy Road that year, with the Cardinal believing the Archbishop was told of this in advance at the so-called carpet mills talks, but kept it to himself.

Nothing quite illustrated the truly tribal nature of our Churches than that reality/perception. For if it was true it suggested the Archbishop did not trust the Cardinal not to tell his own people that the march would go down.. And if it wasn't true it suggests the Cardinal believed anyhow that the Archbishop identified very strongly with the apparatus of the Northern State, even before his trusting of his Roman Catholic opposite. And that was the year before the Belfast Agreement.

What a gulf was there, and at the very top in the Churches?

Maybe those were the bad old days. Dare we hope so?
Last Monday night Archbishop Eames, in Navan, suggested as much.
``There is today greater co-operation between the Churches of Northern Ireland than ever before,'' he said..

``When we despair of the way forward, look back to the past and marvel at how far we have come. Things are being said and done today between Christians of different denominations which would have been impossible even 15 years ago.''

But lest we get carried away he pointed out ``the achievement of reconciliation for the Churches in Northern Ireland is a process - not a fact. Many communities find the current situation difficult to address because of political uncertainties. The traditional lines of 'friend' or 'foe' have become blurred and for some reconciliation is a sort of surrender.''

The sad human truth is that many people on all sides prefer the stark definition of solid difference to the confusing blur that follows recognising that ones neighbour is, above all else, just a fellow human being. This is most difficult for those who have become comfortable seeing their neighbour through a glass darkly.

Archbishop Eames made another very valid point in that address. ``Over the years many a situation of community danger has been eased by the courageous words and actions of local clergy. Too little credit has been accorded to this fact. Clergy have been the unsung heroes of many an incident.''

How true that is. But for the efforts of such clergy to reach across the abyss or to soften the visuals in which neighbours were being presented by the hate-filled, the so-called Troubles would no doubt have been bloodier. And it cannot have been easy.

I recall heart-rending conversations with the Rev William Bingham, Presbyterian Minister of Pomeroy, Co. Tyrone, as he recalled burying seven of his congregation who had been killed by the IRA. His restraining influence on his community was marked then, as it was on the morning the three Quinn children died - when he memorably said that walking down a few yards of road was not worth the deaths of three little boys - .

He was County Grand Chaplain of the Orange Order at the time. They dragged him by his collar from the Orange parade in Pomeroy the following day and threw him into a ditch.

And where would the peace process be without the work of Father Alex Reid and Rev Roy Magee?

It was the efforts of such clergy which gave credibility to the Churches in Northern Ireland, even as they waved their divisions at an institutional level while the politicians were trying everything to overcome those divisions.

Indeed, but for the standing of local Roman Catholic clergy in the south particularly this past decade and also here in Northern Ireland where the problem seems - and I say seems, no one ever knows with this issue - not to be as acute, the scandal of clerical child sex would have exacted an even greater toll.

But this is not enough. We need real change at a leadership level.
Archbishop Eames continued last Monday ``the challenge to give Christian rather than merely "tribal" leadership is a constant one.''
`` The peace process makes demands some find hard to address. The cost they are asked to pay is too great because of their memories. Trust continues to be at a priority. Trust has been the real casualty of our Troubles and we have yet to achieve it …''

On this island we have not been well served in actions by our Church leaders when it comes to exercising trust. Yes, we have had fine words, but those have become as meaningful now as the annual ritual that is Christian Unity week every January.

Indeed, and without being gratuitous, one has to wonder what is the purpose of this Week while Churches seem pro-occupied with emphasising what separates. It has become a parody, a charade even. It ought to be abandoned until it comes to mean something.

And it is not good enough to say as Archbishop Eames did on Monday that ``while there is of course great emphasis on the political aspects of the Peace Process the real test lies at the local level between ordinary people in their daily lives. How they relate to each other and how they regard each other will finally dictate the nature of society.''

That is just too easy. One would be tempted to say even that it is something of a cop out, while by no means downplaying the hugely important role of `ordinary people' in this matter. But there must be strong positive leadership in this where the Churches are concerned, just as it has taken strong political leadership to keep the peace process on its somewhat bumpy track todate.

Churches leadership has a vital role to play in ensuring a more equitable, peaceful society on this island..

``Protestants need a new confidence that they have a secure future in Northern Ireland. Roman Catholics need to recognise they are no longer second-class citizens and accept the privileges of equality. Both traditions must find a new confidence in themselves and in each other,'' Archbishop Eames said.

He is absolutely right but few are as well placed as our Protestant and Roman Catholic Church leaders to persuade their own and each others people towards that new confidence. But they must do so in actions taken together, not just by the usual method of fickle language. They must win and exercise the moral authority that can help bring this about. And is that not what they are supposed to be about, in the context of loving your neighbour?

They have also a major task to undertake when it comes to leading the people to loving God.

Faith has rarely faced the challenges it does in Ireland today. It is far too pat and easy to ascribe this merely to affluence, consumerism, secularism, and whatever -ism of the West/developed world you are having yourself.

It is also to insult the intelligence of the most educated population that has ever lived on this island. More and more people are losing faith, not because this is a fashion, as some churchmen would have your believe.

Educated people, especially among the young, are losing faith because it is becoming increasingly incompatible with the knowledge and signs of the times. While divinity itself presents real problems for some, even for those who retain belief in some sort of vague unknowable God the salvation myth presents major problems for many.

The notion of a Trinitarian god who sacrifices his son for sins he could have anticipated in a world he created calls for the suspension of just too much disbelief where they are concerned. Indeed, nothing less than the suspension of intelligence itself. Calling for a faith that seeks the abandonment of intelligence hardly commands respect.

Indeed, as we have come to know through history, it is a recipe for disaster.

We need to evolve the concepts of God, faith etc using the language of the times to meet the knowledge and experience of the times. Mere assertion no longer commands belief.

It has led to indifference about religion, particularly among the young. And this is a different generation of young. In the past it could have been predicted credibly that when they had children of their own they would return.

It no longer seems to be the pattern. Today's young are just not interested. They are not hostile, just disinterested.

A survey in the Roman Catholic diocese of Killaloe, published last month, found that people there believed the greatest threat to the Roman Catholic faith was the indifference of young people. (35 per cent of those surveyed). It was perceived as an ever bigger threat than the scandals, (which 27 per cent saw as the greatest threat). And that is in a predominantly rural diocese in the mid-West of southern Ireland.

An RTE poll conducted for the Prime Time programme on September 20th and 22nd last found that of Catholics in the Republic just 23 per cent of 18 to 24 year olds attend Mass once a week, - down from 37 per cent for the same age group in 1998., five years ago. The figure was down to 25 per cent for 24 to 38 years olds, from 38 per cent five years ago.

It was down across all age categories from 55 per cent in 1998 to 44 per cent.

Thirty years ago, in 1973, 91 per cent of Roman Catholics in the Republic attended weekly Mass. And all the indications are that this drop-off is reflected in attendance at weekly Mass in Northern Ireland.

Accompanying this drop-off in practice is a drop-off in belief.

A Quality of Life in Ireland study last Janaury showed that 87 per cent of Irish people believe in God compared to 95 per cent in 2001.

Only 66 per cent believe in sin compared with 85 per cent when the last survey was conducted in 2001. 65 per cent believe in Heaven, while only 56 per cent believe in life after death.

Don't ask me to explain the nine per cent who believe in Heaven but not in life after death!

Only 39 per cent believe in the Devil, with 37 per cent believing in Hell.- so for at least two per cent the Devil ain't got no home!

A chart contrasting GDP per capita in 2002 with the proportion of people in each country for whom religion is "very important" showed that Irish people are now less religious than their British counterparts.

Religion was `very important' for 29 per cent of Irish people, compared to 33 per cent of people in Britain and 60 per cent of people in the US. Below Ireland was Italy on 28 per cent, Germany on 21 per cent, Japan on 12 per cent, and - lowest of the country's surveyed - France on 10 per cent..

The recent Prime Time poll found on similar lines. It showed that of the Roman Catholics surveyed ,88 per cent believed Jesus was the Son of God - five per cent did not, seven per cent didn't know.

There a peculiar lot these same Roman Catholincs. - ten per cent did not believe in transubstantiation, while a further 25 per cent did not know.

Ten per cent did not believe in life after death, while a further 19 per cent did not know.

Thirteen per cent did not believe in the Virgin birth, while a further 17 per cent did not know.

Two thirds did not believe in celibacy for priests, while a further eight per cent did not know. Sixty six cent were for women priests, while a further 10 per cent did not know.

Sixty seven per cent did not believe divorce was wrong, while a further nine per cent did not know. And 68 per cent disagreed with the statement that divorced people should not be allowed marry in a Catholic church with a further 11 per cent not knowing.

However 60 per cent agreed abortion was morally wrong, while another 10 per cent did not know..

Forty five per cent agreed homosexual acts were morally wrong, 39 per cent disagreed, and a further 16 per cent did not know. Forty five per cent - probably the same 45 per cent - agreed with a statement that gay couples should not be allowed to marry in church. Thirty five per cent disagreed and a further 20 per cent did not know.

Just 29 per cent believed the children of mixed marriages should be raised Catholics, 47 did not agree and 24 per cent did not know.

Just 20 per cent agreed artificial contraception was wrong, 71 per cent believed it wasn't and eight per cent did not know.

And where many southern Roman Catholics are concerned the Pope is no longer himself at all. Just 41 per cent believed him infalliable, with 38 per cent saying he isn't and a further 22 per cent who say they do not know.

What we seen from these surveys is the increasing Protestantisation of Roman Catholics on the island but also a growing apathy where religion was concerned. There is no reason to think these trends will not continue.

Indeed the pace is likely to speed up as, particularly in the South, the authority of the Roman Catholic Church continues to be eroded, through its fault !

Then there is the growing pluralism of the island.

In the Repuiblic last year alone 40,000 work permits were issued to people coming to work there from outside the EU. Most are from Eastern Europe, some from the Middle East, Pakistan, Chinese, and South America.

Fifteen per cent of the inhabitants of my own county town, Roscommon, are now foreign workers, including, at 500, or 10 per cent of its population, - the largest concentration of Brazilians in the Republic.

In my own hometown of Ballaghaderreen, population 1,200, one in six children at the local primary school is Pakistani. Their fathers work in the local meat factory. Many Latvians and other eastern Europeans pick mushrooms on farms nearby. And there are Czechs, Chinese, Indians.

It is said locally there are now 14 nationalities in the town.
So it's no wonder there's been a certain confusion about our town's complexion. So much so, indeed, that after a recent break-in at a bar there a local wit was heard to report that police were questioning three people - "two locals and a white man!"

The Muslim population in Ireland has soared from a few hundred a decade ago to almost 20,000 today. There are two mosques and a Muslim school in Dublin, with smaller mosques throughout the country including the first purpose-built mosque in Ireland at Ballyhaunis, just 13 miles from my home town in the West of Ireland.

The Russian Orthodox Church opened its first Church in Ireland at Harold's Cross in Dublin earlier this year. There is already a Greek Orthodox Church in the city. Meanwhile the Methodist Church in Ireland, particularly, and to a lesser extent the Presbyterian Church have benefited from a fresh influx to their congregations of new members, mainly from Africa, particularly Nigeria.

And a plethora of new evangelical Churches have sprung up all over the country for Christian immigrants who do not belong to or identify with the mainstream Churches.

This mix of new churches and religions has added a vitality to things spiritual in Ireland. No doubt a sluggish economy will lead to a slow down in this, but their influence will be lasting.

In summary , on this island we are immediately confronted with overcoming to tribal nature of our Churches. Meanwhile belief is being challenged as never before, while at the same time a new a vital spirituality had come onto our shores from overseas.

It is a time of great flux in religion in Ireland, but those three factors will be the over-riding influences in the years ahead. It is an interesting time. But then is there not a Chinese curse - `may you live in interesting times'!