Wednesday 17 June 2015

IRISH CATHOLICISM - POST GAY VOTE

IRISH CATHOLICISM - POST GAY VOTE



The vote of the Irish people to extend civil marriage to gay and lesbian citizens was the biggest kick in the testes the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland has ever received.

And it was a well deserved and long overdue kick! 

Since the foundation of the Irish State in 1922 Ireland was a Roman Catholic Ireland for a Roman Catholic people.

Just as from the same date Northern Ireland was a Protestant statelet for a Protestant people.

This situation led to grave injustices against Protestants in the Republic of Ireland and great injustices against Catholics in Northern Ireland.

In 1922 some 12% of the population of the Republic of Ireland was Protestant - but in a confessionally Roman Catholic state that population soon sank to only 3%. This was a form of "ethnic cleansing".

Having said that it must be said that the 12% Protestant population of the Republic owned something like 80% of the wealth! This was obviously a result of the injustices of 800 years of British colonisation.

In Northern Ireland Catholics were discriminated against by consecutive Unionist regimes at Stormont. Catholics suffered greatly in areas like housing and employment.

Both the Republic and Northern situations show how evil it is when religion dictates to the state.

I happen to be a believing, practising Christian of the "catholic" variety. Note the small "c". I am an Irish Catholic - not a Roman Catholic.

The esteemed Irish writer Tim Pat Coogan hit the nail on the head when he said that Ireland suffered under two "colonialisms" - the British one - and the Roman one.



In the Republic we have gotten rid of the British one. But we are still in the process of throwing the Roman ones off our backs.

I believe that ALL modern democracies should be secular and pluralist in the vest senses of those words.

I believe that people should be absolutely free to practice their religion in private. But I do not believe that there should be, in any sense, a state sponsored religion.

In that context I think it is crazy that at the present time over 90% of our schools are run by the Roman Catholic Church.

We need to get the Romans out of our schools as soon as possible.

Is it not crazy that in the 21st Century the Irish tax payer is paying for the religious proselytsing that is part and parcel of Irish schools run by religions?

9 comments:

  1. I said it before. Ireland is a very young state. if it were a person I d say a teenager. Separating church and state is a long process. However the mindset of the old regime takes generations to leave the Irish psyche. The problem is that the good things of Catholicism may disappear along with the bad. Now is the time for a new evangelism. The door is open for you Pat.

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  2. More utter claptrap from Buckley's poisoned pen. No one but oddballs like Sean Page and Mad Micky from the Mts is impressed. It is not "romans" in charge of our Church and schools but Irish Catholics - the descendants of those who would not be separated from the Vicar of Christ on earth by 'dungeon, fire and sword'. We are not handing the pitch over to rabid secularists. We will keep our schools because the Irish people want it so.

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    1. No you NOT keep your schools - unless YOU pay for them.

      The Irish people, who have finally seen through you, will take those schools and appoint non abusers to run them :-)

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    2. Comments like that at 23:46 above serve well to show an extremely limited mindset. Those unable to discuss and debate alternative opinions without degenerating into personal abuse usually have well defined character traits. Openmindedness, generosity of spirit and intelligent understanding are often conspicuously absent. Authoritarianism, intolerance and self deception are likely to be present.
      A major problem dealing with, and trying to debate with such people is that their very limitations adversely affect their perceptual understanding, so it's often a waste of energy trying to engage constructively with them.
      MourneManMichael

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    3. June 18th 23.46 The hour is late. The adjectives in use suggest a biased and non objective sense of justice to say the very least

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  3. Pat even for you and by your sordid standards that is an outrageous slur of countless generations of good and devoted men and women who served (and serve) in parishes and schools all over the land. Shame on you. You really are a source of scandal.

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    1. I am afraid we must agree to differ.

      The good and devoted men and women who taught in these schools were also victims of the bullying parish priests that ran these schools.

      I was not talking only about sexual abuse. I was talking mainly of the mental and emotion abuse of teachers, parents and children by bullying priests - a bullying that is still going on today. I hear about it everyday from good, frustrated teachers.

      They too want rid of the "Little Hitlers" who make their daily life a misery.

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    2. As a long serving and long abused teacher in a Down and Connor primary school I must agree with Bishop Buckley.

      I and most of my colleagues are tired of our clerical overlords and masters who control daily life, appointments and promotions in our schools.

      I have been passed over for promotion on two occasions by less experienced and able colleagues who were well in with the clergy or were related to them.

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    3. Sorry to hear about the injustices you suffered. Sadly this is a common story.

      Proof we need to get clerical bullies out of schools.

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