IN Sir Anto’s Organ last Sunday, Paul Colton, Church of Ireland Bishop
of Cork, Cloyne and Ross, suggested that the centenary commemoration of
the 1916 Rising should be broadened to include other ‘notable events’.
Remarking that Ireland is approaching a ‘decade of centenaries’ that included the signing of the Ulster convention 1912, the outbreak of the First World War, the sinking of the Lusitania, the War of Independence, the Treaty, and the Civil War, he wondered how Irish Protestants would engage with these occurrences.
It was a strange question to ask but, presumably, well meant within the context of his observation that he did not want the reappearance of ‘polarising caricatures’ from the history books of his Irish childhood. (He didn’t explain what he meant by ‘polarising caricatures’. He should have).
The Bishop of Cork is a very intelligent person, sharp as a pin and no slowcoach in putting forward the Protestant perspective, as Fianna Fail’s Education Minister Batt O’Keeffe discovered to his cost. Faced with the possibility that private Protestant schools could lose some of their financial grants, the Bish bluntly told Batto that his decisions were turning Ireland into a hostile place for the children of the Protestant minority.
Batto responded with the argument that elite Catholic schools were as much affected as elite Protestant schools, but the damage was done. A whiff of sectarianism wafted through the corridors of Leinster House. It eventually succeeded in forcing Batto to pull in his horns.
Belt of a crozier
Bishop Colton also shone at the annual convention of the Association of Community and Comprehensive Schools where he took a well-prepared swipe at the trendy Labour Party notion that a pluralist, secular, non-religious education was the best way forward.
‘Diminishing the rights of Church of Ireland parents wasn’t an effective way of addressing the rights of new minorities,’ he growled. ‘Proposals to force Protestant schools to employ non-Protestant teachers, to withdraw ancillary grants and to increase the pupil-teacher ratio in Protestant second-level schools placed a question on the very existence of the provision of Protestant education in parts of Ireland’, he warned new Education Minister Ho Chi Quinn. Again, the whiff of sectarianism.
Indeed, eyes widened at the very serious belt of a Protestant crozier that the Cork bishop delivered to the back of an eminent smoked salmon socialist. It was as if the ghost of Bishop Lucey, an expert at laying waste gobsh**e politicians, had passed the baton (in this case a crozier) to a new kid on the block.
Nor did Cork County VEC escape Colton’s ecclesiastical ire. He hammered a Fine Gael attempt to tuft the Bishop’s man off the VEC, the excellent Canon George Salter, and replace him with a party hack. Squirming in embarrassment, the Blueshirts capitulated and let him have his way.
In other words, Bishop Colton is no shrinking violet. He’s there to represent his religious constituency and that he does with considerable vigour, even if the ‘cold house for Protestants’ bit is becoming somewhat overworked. However, the serious question is what’s behind his utterance on the 1916 centenary?
Protestant heroes
Is he suggesting that Irish Protestantism has a problem with anti-imperialism? Or is it that he thinks Roger Casement, Erskine Childers, Bulmer Hobson, Countess Markievicz, Ernest Blythe and other revolutionaries with a Protestant background will be presented as ‘polarising caricatures of Irishness’?
For instance, does he want the hero, Ian MacKenzie Kennedy, a Protestant shot by Free State Forces in Rochestown when he was only 23, to be remembered? (There is a small plaque to his memory in Ballingeary and a mention on the republican monument in Macroom). Or, Peter Monahan, an explosives expert who was killed at Crossbarry?
Is he making the case for Protestants such as George Plant (executed by De Valera), Jack White (his family, ashamed of his republican-socialist politics, destroyed all his papers including a study of the Cork Harbour ‘Soviet’ of 1921), George Gilmore or, for that matter, Ivor Bell, one-time comrade of Gerry Adams, and Chief of Staff on the IRA Army Council?
Or is he suggesting something else entirely? That the 1916 Rebellion itself was nothing more than a ‘caricature of Irishness’? For instance, why is he associating it with ‘notable events’ such as the sinking of the Titanic?
Remarking that Ireland is approaching a ‘decade of centenaries’ that included the signing of the Ulster convention 1912, the outbreak of the First World War, the sinking of the Lusitania, the War of Independence, the Treaty, and the Civil War, he wondered how Irish Protestants would engage with these occurrences.
It was a strange question to ask but, presumably, well meant within the context of his observation that he did not want the reappearance of ‘polarising caricatures’ from the history books of his Irish childhood. (He didn’t explain what he meant by ‘polarising caricatures’. He should have).
The Bishop of Cork is a very intelligent person, sharp as a pin and no slowcoach in putting forward the Protestant perspective, as Fianna Fail’s Education Minister Batt O’Keeffe discovered to his cost. Faced with the possibility that private Protestant schools could lose some of their financial grants, the Bish bluntly told Batto that his decisions were turning Ireland into a hostile place for the children of the Protestant minority.
Batto responded with the argument that elite Catholic schools were as much affected as elite Protestant schools, but the damage was done. A whiff of sectarianism wafted through the corridors of Leinster House. It eventually succeeded in forcing Batto to pull in his horns.
Belt of a crozier
Bishop Colton also shone at the annual convention of the Association of Community and Comprehensive Schools where he took a well-prepared swipe at the trendy Labour Party notion that a pluralist, secular, non-religious education was the best way forward.
‘Diminishing the rights of Church of Ireland parents wasn’t an effective way of addressing the rights of new minorities,’ he growled. ‘Proposals to force Protestant schools to employ non-Protestant teachers, to withdraw ancillary grants and to increase the pupil-teacher ratio in Protestant second-level schools placed a question on the very existence of the provision of Protestant education in parts of Ireland’, he warned new Education Minister Ho Chi Quinn. Again, the whiff of sectarianism.
Indeed, eyes widened at the very serious belt of a Protestant crozier that the Cork bishop delivered to the back of an eminent smoked salmon socialist. It was as if the ghost of Bishop Lucey, an expert at laying waste gobsh**e politicians, had passed the baton (in this case a crozier) to a new kid on the block.
Nor did Cork County VEC escape Colton’s ecclesiastical ire. He hammered a Fine Gael attempt to tuft the Bishop’s man off the VEC, the excellent Canon George Salter, and replace him with a party hack. Squirming in embarrassment, the Blueshirts capitulated and let him have his way.
In other words, Bishop Colton is no shrinking violet. He’s there to represent his religious constituency and that he does with considerable vigour, even if the ‘cold house for Protestants’ bit is becoming somewhat overworked. However, the serious question is what’s behind his utterance on the 1916 centenary?
Protestant heroes
Is he suggesting that Irish Protestantism has a problem with anti-imperialism? Or is it that he thinks Roger Casement, Erskine Childers, Bulmer Hobson, Countess Markievicz, Ernest Blythe and other revolutionaries with a Protestant background will be presented as ‘polarising caricatures of Irishness’?
For instance, does he want the hero, Ian MacKenzie Kennedy, a Protestant shot by Free State Forces in Rochestown when he was only 23, to be remembered? (There is a small plaque to his memory in Ballingeary and a mention on the republican monument in Macroom). Or, Peter Monahan, an explosives expert who was killed at Crossbarry?
Is he making the case for Protestants such as George Plant (executed by De Valera), Jack White (his family, ashamed of his republican-socialist politics, destroyed all his papers including a study of the Cork Harbour ‘Soviet’ of 1921), George Gilmore or, for that matter, Ivor Bell, one-time comrade of Gerry Adams, and Chief of Staff on the IRA Army Council?
Or is he suggesting something else entirely? That the 1916 Rebellion itself was nothing more than a ‘caricature of Irishness’? For instance, why is he associating it with ‘notable events’ such as the sinking of the Titanic?
With British Army?
Or has it all something to do with the British Army? Much of the Bishop’s article centred on his family background, which was humble, working class, and British Army. But then, that’s a heritage shared by thousands of Irish people.The Bishop described how the Queen of England’s presence at Islandbridge was a public acknowledgement and validation of his ancestors. Many other people, Catholics included, thought the same.
Indeed, while ambiguity always existed concerning service in the British Armed Forces, it was rare to find a sense of shame. The historical reasons for Irishmen joining the British Army were well-understood – adventure, family or economic reasons that were as complex as a page from the Book of Kells or a poem by Francis Ledwidge.
Some, like Tom Barry, had no problem reconciling contradictions when they put their military experience to good use at Crossbarry and Kilmichael. Their reasons were straightforward: get the conquerors out.
For others, the attitude was, and is, ‘OK, the grandfather took the King’s shilling, but what else was there to do? In other words, joining the British Army was a bread and butter fact of life. The ex-British Army soldiers who escorted the coffin of Lord Mayor Tomas MacSweeny through Cork city knew that.
Or has it all something to do with the British Army? Much of the Bishop’s article centred on his family background, which was humble, working class, and British Army. But then, that’s a heritage shared by thousands of Irish people.The Bishop described how the Queen of England’s presence at Islandbridge was a public acknowledgement and validation of his ancestors. Many other people, Catholics included, thought the same.
Indeed, while ambiguity always existed concerning service in the British Armed Forces, it was rare to find a sense of shame. The historical reasons for Irishmen joining the British Army were well-understood – adventure, family or economic reasons that were as complex as a page from the Book of Kells or a poem by Francis Ledwidge.
Some, like Tom Barry, had no problem reconciling contradictions when they put their military experience to good use at Crossbarry and Kilmichael. Their reasons were straightforward: get the conquerors out.
For others, the attitude was, and is, ‘OK, the grandfather took the King’s shilling, but what else was there to do? In other words, joining the British Army was a bread and butter fact of life. The ex-British Army soldiers who escorted the coffin of Lord Mayor Tomas MacSweeny through Cork city knew that.
Post-colonial fable
Consequently, Bishop Colton’s complaint that poor Protestants with a British military tradition were ‘blotted out because they did not slot into a suitable stereotype and spin’ sounded like a Sunday Independent post-colonial fable. For instance, what did he mean by being ‘blotted out’?
Interestingly, the Bish in his article admits to having been influenced by Sir Anto’s scribblers, the chaps who pine for a British identity or seek to recover one if they have lost it. Apparently, such characters ‘empowered’ the Bishop to tell his story.
That’s a curious admission because the general perception of these writers is as Colonel Gussets, eccentrics who believe Ireland would all be better off if we had less of the nationalism and more of the monarchy.
Considering that they never fail to denigrate the struggle for Ireland’s independence from Britain between 1919 and 1921, let’s hope the Bishop is not firing a salvo on their behalf.
In particular, they have vehemently opposed republicanism while at the same time whitewashing the record of British colonialism.
Consequently, Bishop Colton’s complaint that poor Protestants with a British military tradition were ‘blotted out because they did not slot into a suitable stereotype and spin’ sounded like a Sunday Independent post-colonial fable. For instance, what did he mean by being ‘blotted out’?
Interestingly, the Bish in his article admits to having been influenced by Sir Anto’s scribblers, the chaps who pine for a British identity or seek to recover one if they have lost it. Apparently, such characters ‘empowered’ the Bishop to tell his story.
That’s a curious admission because the general perception of these writers is as Colonel Gussets, eccentrics who believe Ireland would all be better off if we had less of the nationalism and more of the monarchy.
Considering that they never fail to denigrate the struggle for Ireland’s independence from Britain between 1919 and 1921, let’s hope the Bishop is not firing a salvo on their behalf.
In particular, they have vehemently opposed republicanism while at the same time whitewashing the record of British colonialism.