| Catholicism of the Irish variety |
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The following extract is from the Editorial comment section of the Irish Catholic by Gerry O'Sullivan. Fr Kieran said that although the last 10-15 years had been a ''dark time'' he had hope, ''hope in rebuilding an identity of Church that will be very special and uniquely our way of doing it in Ireland''. What does he have in mind when he stresses our 'unique way'? It's worth looking at our way of doing it in Ireland in the more recent past which was far from unique. The best analysis of this I've come across is in a book called "Irish Catholics - Tradition and Transition" by John Jo Riordain, a Redemptorist priest.
In explaining how ''Irish Catholicism'' came about, he opens by lamenting ''that all of the fifteen hundred years of Christianity in Ireland, its 'public image', so to speak, should have been taken from the nineteenth century, which in many ways was probably the least 'Irish' and indeed, the least 'Catholic'.'' The term 'Irish Catholic' is now so loaded, so layered in its meaning that the positives of 1,500 years have slipped into the darkness of history.... Key factors Fr Riordain examines the key factors involved in the making of modern Irish Catholicism, which he says has been referred to on the continent as le catholicisme du type irlandais, different to traditional Catholicism. To understand the development of Catholicism in Ireland from the late eighteenth century to the mid-twentieth Riordain looks at three factors: a) The cultural influence of Anglo-Saxon Puritanism; b) The large-scale importation of spiritualities; c) The centralisation and 'Romanisation' of the Church in Ireland. Riordain argues that in the late 1700's a new breed of Catholic merchant and propertied class emerged who saw a future in Ireland for themselves if they accepted the language and tradition of their English masters - the tradition was an Anglo-Saxon puritanical culture which dominated the English-speaking world. The Catholic Church collapsed in Britain at the Reformation and was replaced by puritanical culture; in Ireland ''a whole people was cut adrift from fourteen hundred years of Christian tradition and over two thousand years of native language and custom.'' This gap was filled according to Riordain by a new brand of Irish Catholicism, a Catholic-Protestanism which expressed itself in the context of an Anglo-Saxon puritanical Protestant culture. ''Small wonder,'' writes Riordain, ''that it produced something of a bastard religion . . . which to this day cannot be categorised by the ordered Continental mind and is, therefore, set aside in a special category all to itself under le catholicisme du type irlandais.'' Vague term Riordain says that while the oft quoted 'Irish Jansenism' did exist it became a vague term for a certain austerity which always existed in Irish piety and that 'Anglo-Saxon Puritanism' is the proper expression. He also describes the litany of devotions and religious orders which came in from Europe which while doing much good, didn't take account of the Irish people and the tradition. The third factor was the 'Romanisation' of the Church in Ireland, dealt with in this column before, specifically in relation to Cardinal Cullen. Riordain acknowledges the need for reform in structure and discipline in the Irish Church - ''in the eyes of the bishops the main problems were wine, women and avarice''. What the reforms and new expressions of spirituality led to was the people being ''moulded into a thoroughly sacramental and Mass-going Church. Fifty years after Cardinal Cullen arrived in Ireland, the Mass attendance increased from an estimated 30-40 per cent to over 90 per cent and ''the great mass of the Irish people became practising Catholics, which they have uniquely and essentially remained both at home and abroad down to the present day''. This was a triumphal march of Catholicism in Ireland in the nineteenth century and brought many good things to the Irish Church. However, this form of Catholicism is only 200 years old here, what existed before it has an older pedigree. Riordain wrote his book 30 years ago and could not have known the rot that lay under the foundations of Le catholicisme du type irlandais but even then he was able to recognise that that era ''may well be drawing to a close...A decline seems inevitable; but in that decline we may rediscover a more enduring link with the tradition of Irish spirituality''
(taken from the website www.irishcatholic.ie ) |
