The Catholic Church in Ireland Today

Abstract

Studies • volume 106 • number 421 9 The Catholic Church in Ireland Today The Catholic Church in Ireland Today1 Gerry O’Hanlon SJ In the middle of summer 2016, commenting on a controversy surrounding Ireland’s national seminary, St Patrick’s College Maynooth, the country’s leading broadsheet, The Irish Times, had this to say in an editorial: The Maynooth controversy would once have given rise to major public disquiet. That it no longer does so reflects the Church’s recent history. Many Catholics have long since abandoned the institution – its princes, priests and politics – and are choosing to interpret the faith according to their own conscience.2 Coincidentally, earlier in the same year, an academic study in the field of the sociology of religion was published with the title Transforming PostCatholic Ireland.3 The author, Gladys Ganiel, in explaining her choice of title, refers explicitly to an article written by Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin in 2013 titled ‘A post-Catholic Ireland?: Renewing the Irish Church from within’.4 Ganiel defines a post-Catholic Ireland in terms of ‘a shift in consciousness in which the Catholic Church, as an institution, is no longer held in high esteem by most of the population and can no longer expect to exert a monopoly influence in social and political life’.5 She argues that the future of faith in Ireland will depend on the development of ‘extra-institutional’ forms of religious expression (religion practised outside or in addition to the institutional Catholic Church).6 Her analysis ties in with the frequently observed characteristic of modern Catholicism in Ireland – and indeed further afield – as becoming individualised and de-institutionalised. With the new emphasis on personal conscience as opposed to magisterial teaching, this is sometimes referred to as the ‘Protestantisation’of the Catholic Church in Ireland. Dr Martin himself has spoken and written frequently about the crisis confronting the Irish Catholic Church, warning that it ran the risk of becoming an ‘irrelevant minority culture’.7 I propose in what follows to describe briefly some of the background to this crisis and then to suggest some ways forward. 10 Studies • volume 106 • number 421 Gerry O’Hanlon SJ Background to the crisis ThetraditionalCatholicismwhichisnowbeingsupersededinIrelandhadmany distinguishing features.8 It was a defining characteristic of Irish nationalism and identity, with ‘a monopoly on the Irish religious market’, a strong relationship with state power, elevating the status of cleric to extraordinary heights and emphasising the evils of sexual sin.9 This was Catholicism with high levels of religious practice, a stress on rule-keeping and sin, a strong ethos of sacrifice and delayed gratification, a familiarity with austerity and a hope for fulfilment in the after-life. It was characterised by a deep popular devotion featuring the likes of the rosary, benediction, sodalities, indulgences and processions. It provided comfort and fuelled the spiritual and ethical imaginations of its adherents, and had a deeply committed, global missionary outreach. However, its un- and even anti-intellectual nature meant that it was ill-prepared for the challenges posed by a late-emerging modernity in Ireland. It was a religion in which the voice of the priest, the bishop, and the Pope could rely on its formal authority to get a serious hearing, not just from the faithful, but also from the politician. A paternalistic ethos reigned and was almost universally accepted. Apart from the popular devotion already mentioned, this was Catholicism deeply institutional in form, dependent on a type of clericalism which was vulnerable to a more critical culture. From the 1960s onwards this more critical culture emerged in Ireland. The influence of television and other media, economic development and increased urbanisation, foreign travel, EEC membership and enhanced educational opportunities all conspired to open Ireland up to the waves of critical questioning and secularisation already well advanced in many other parts of Europe. Internally, the Church was at best lukewarm in its reception of the Second Vatican Council – there was liturgical change which was received for the most part positively, some increased lay involvement, not least in various episcopal commissions established in the wake of the Council, and a real energy around some issues of social justice (not least in the establishment of...