Talk in Ireland of a Second Republic puts everything back on the table. The present Constitution was opposed by an alliance between the far wealthier and better-connected Southern Unionists, and the far more numerous Catholic "ultras" who considered it inadequate on that basis.
They were united, not only by the fact that most Protestants were far closer to much of Catholic moral teaching in those days than is often the case today, but also by a common aversion to what looked like a sort of Irish Bolshevism which they were equally determined to resist, a resistance to which they both saw the continuation of Commonwealth ties, ties among which the monarchy was not then optional, as an indispensable weapon.
And they were right. Let those who want even more of the Mammon-worshipping secularisation, and even more of the no less Mammon-worshipping loosening of the ties to Britain, make the case for a new Constitution in those terms. And let them be answered by those who recognise recent and current events as the vindication of an alternative vision, a fully and proudly Catholic-based entity fully and proudly integrated into the natural economic and cultural unit that is this archipelago.
We shall all see who wins out in the end. The proponents of a British-style social democracy such as Irish Catholics, acting on the Church's Social Teaching, have been so successful in building in the United Kingdom and in the Old Commonwealth, but such as Dev's Republic has never approached becoming? I rather expect so.
Or is that noble and realistic vision of the 26 Counties to go by default, lost once again to the fantasies of wannabes from Dev to Gerry Adams?
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What a lot of rot. Is this the Roman Catholic Church who toppled the first Costello government due to its objection to the Mother and Child bill in 1951 who thought that state provision for children's health was communist. Belt of the Crozier.
ReplyDeleteYour neo-imperialist dreams go on. We know when the UK lost its independence. It was when it went to war in Iraq.
See, you should have stayed in the United Kingdom.
ReplyDeleteDL condemns the wisdom of Bishops!
ReplyDeleteWhen boyhood's fire was in my blood
I read of ancient freemen,
For Greece and Rome who bravely stood,
Three hundred men and three men;
And then I prayed I yet might see
Our fetters rent in twain,
And Ireland, long a province, be.
A Nation once again!
A Nation once again,
A Nation once again,
And lreland, long a province, be
A Nation once again!
And from that time, through wildest woe,
That hope has shone a far light,
Nor could love's brightest summer glow
Outshine that solemn starlight;
It seemed to watch above my head
In forum, field and fane,
Its angel voice sang round my bed,
A Nation once again!
A Nation once again,
A Nation once again,
And lreland, long a province, be
A Nation once again!
It whisper'd too, that freedom's ark
And service high and holy,
Would be profaned by feelings dark
And passions vain or lowly;
For, Freedom comes from God's right hand,
And needs a Godly train;
And righteous men must make our land
A Nation once again!
A Nation once again,
A Nation once again,
And lreland, long a province, be
A Nation once again!
So, as I grew from boy to man,
I bent me to that bidding
My spirit of each selfish plan
And cruel passion ridding;
For, thus I hoped some day to aid,
Oh, can such hope be vain?
When my dear country shall be made
A Nation once again!
A Nation once again,
A Nation once again,
And lreland, long a province, be
A Nation once again!
A Nation once again,
A Nation once again,
And lreland, long a province, be
A Nation once again!