Monthly Archives: July 2015

(John Coulter, Irish Daily Star)

This island urgently needs the formation of an Irish Christian Party to combat the potentially fatal crisis which has befallen many churches.

The time is nigh for Christians of all denominations to set aside their theological differences, launch the ICP and get candidates elected to the Dáil and Stormont.

ICP activists must show the same zeal to succeed in getting elected as their forefathers in the Spanish Inquisition and the Puritan witchfinders.

The ICP is not a movement for pussy-footing whimps, who seem to dominate many churches in modern Ireland.

The depth of the crisis facing Irish Christianity cannot be swept behind the pulpit.

If the slide continues, within a generation there will be more people in Ireland who are non-Christians or non-worshippers than currently exist in the pews.

Practically, when – not if – this becomes a religious reality, Catholic chapels will close and the smaller Protestant denominations will cease to exist.

The clerical abuse scandals within Catholicism have created the false stereotype that only predator homosexuals and child molesters want to become priests or join Holy Orders.

At one time, Ireland was one of the Vatican’s beacons of Catholicism in Western Europe. Families saw it as a badge of honour when they proudly declared a son was entering the priesthood or a daughter becoming a nun.

Has it become a case that folk who feel called to religious orders prefer to conduct their vocation overseas away from Irish eyes for fear of being falsely branded a pervert?

Many Protestant churches find themselves in an equally precarious position.

There are more than two dozen different denominations all claiming to be the one, true Protestant faith.

The Irish Catholic Bishops got a right kick in the theological balls when the Republic voted in favour of same-sex marriage.

The island’s largest Prod denomination, the Church of Ireland, is at war with itself over same-sex marriage.

The gay debate is about to split Presbyterianism as liberals and evangelicals lock horns, with some clerics supporting same-sex marriage; others vehemently opposing it.

Some clerics in many churches need to grow a set of balls when it comes to dealing with the problems of young people, as they are more interested in their image in the community than helping folk.

The fundamentalist churches are more interested in fighting over types of worship, women’s hats, men’s ties, what translation of the Bible to read, going to the cinema, heavy metal, and when, where and how to have sex!

Christians of whatever faith need to face the bitter reality that to survive as an influential community in Ireland, they must unite and organise politically. The IPC must copy the tactics and zeal of their opponents.

In less than a generation, the gay community has gone from having homosexual acts branded as a crime to being the most vocal and powerful lobby on the island.

The IPC must adopt this strategy. It must dispel the myth that it is a bunch of fringe religious nutcases to become the majority voice of order, reason and control in parliament and council chambers.

The IPC must instil in its membership the same discipline for Christian devotion as Islam has created among moderate Muslims.

Just as thousands now flock to gay pride events across Ireland, the IPC must sell its message through a series of massive Christian Pride Festivals.

The IPC must rekindle the spirit of the famous 1859 religious Revival which swept across Ireland.

Forget denominational rituals and traditions. When Catholic and Protestants get together under the banner of the Irish Christian Party, they will find there are more issues which unite them than divide them.

July 28, 2015 ________________

Dr John Coulter is a columnist with the Irish Daily Star and Tribune magazine. In this extended version of his Ireland Eye column in Tribune, he puts the case for a merger of the British and Irish Labour Parties to form a single Labour Party of Ireland given the growing warmth in relations between the UK and the Republic of Ireland.

The British and Irish Labour Party – that should be the priority of Labour’s new leader, no matter who gets the post. So far as Irish politics are concerned, it doesn’t matter if British Labour swings to the Left or the Centre, the sole agenda is about contesting elections in Northern Ireland and rebuilding a labour movement in the Irish Republic. Given the way austerity cuts are biting across the whole of Ireland, the border has become irrelevant so far as poverty is concerned. The various agreements since Good Friday of 1998 have cemented Anglo-Irish relations forcing parties to think of an all-island identity. At first sight, this should favour Sinn Fein, which is one of the very few movements organised across the entire Emerald Isle.  While Southern Irish Sinn Fein champions itself as the main anti-austerity party, Northern Sinn Fein along with its Democratic Unionist partners at Stormont have to implement tough cuts if the Assembly is to survive. British Labour is organised in Northern Ireland, but the party hierarchy in London has so far thrown cold water on contesting elections – especially with a crucial Stormont General Election due next May. Irish Labour – like the Southern Green Party – has got its fingers badly burned in the past by entering a coalition government in Dublin’s Leinster House.

There’s only one solution – copy the communists! At one time, Southern Irish communists had the Irish Workers’ Party, and Northern Irish communists had the Communist Party of Northern Ireland. Both merged to form the Communist Party of Ireland.
The Southern Irish Labour Party boasts of being one of the oldest movements on the island. In Northern Ireland, there have been various attempts to develop a meaningful labour movement, but like the Titanic of old, all have eventually hit their fatal political icebergs. The most successful labour movements were the old Northern Ireland Labour Party, which chalked up a couple of MPs in the original Stormont Parliament before 1972, and a small-lived labour party which had two seats in the 1996 Northern Ireland Forum for Political Dialogue – the fore-runner of the current Assembly. For many years, British Labour’s London leadership fobbed off Northern Ireland socialists by telling them to join its ‘sister’ party – the moderate nationalist SDLP. But since Nobel peace prize winner John Hume stepped down from its leadership, the party had suffered major electoral batterings at the hands of Sinn Fein. The tactics are now simple – park the debate as to whether the labour movement in Ireland should be Marxist or social democratic. A new, all-island party must be created with the merger of the Irish Labour Party and Northern Ireland British Labour activists.

And you can also have the debate over what to call it, be it the Labour Party of Ireland, or the British/Irish Labour Party. Just get the movement up and running in time for next year’s Stormont and Dail elections.
The new British Labour leader should not ignore the significant of 18 Westminster seats in Northern Ireland. With Scotland currently lost to the SNP, if Labour is to return to 10 Downing Street, it must think outside the box – and that means outside London! As well as battering the Tories in inner cities and middle England, it must snatch vital seats from the Welsh nationalists – and contest Commons seats in Northern Ireland. Even if it could win half a dozen of those 18, that could be enough to tip the balance in favour of Labour. And in the Republic, Sinn Fein remains the hot favourite to become a coalition partner in the next Dail along with either Fianna Fail or Fine Gael – unless an all-island Labour Party can emerge as part of a rainbow coalition of parties.
Sinn Fein’s problem is that too many voters still see it as the Provisional IRA’s political wing or the Communist Party under another name. Sinn Fein still has to get over the awkward centenary in 2020-2022 that it was its members who refused to accept the Anglo-Irish Treaty and sparked the bloody Irish Civil War which saw republican inflict atrocities on republican on a scale far more brutal that the Black and Tans did during the War of Independence. British Labour candidates should not ‘spoof on’ about party unity or a socialist alliance so far as Ireland is concerned – a single party for all of Ireland is the only workable alternative.

It’s time to wipe out ISIS fanatics: West must get extreme

Western democracies need to waken up to the bitter reality that the only solution to the threat posed by Islamic State and other radical groups is to use chemical weapons and biological warfare.  Sounds brutal, but given the fanaticism of these radicals, conventional tactics will never defeat this type of new millennium suicide terrorist.  Next month marks the 70^th anniversary of the nuclear attacks on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which ended World War 2.
The Allies had calculated that given the fanaticism of the Japanese people, it would have cost up to a million casualties to capture Japan. Okay, so hundreds of thousands of Japanese died directly or indirectly because of the two nukes. But how many Allied soldiers lived to enjoy their children and grand-children because they did not have to fight a bloody battle to capture Japan?  Ireland is now constantly commemorating the centenary of events and battles of World War 1.
How many Irish troops died or suffered in the trenches because of German mustard gas attacks?  Next to the Zyklon B gas used by the Nazis in their death camps, mustard gas was the most notorious chemical weapon of the 20^th century.
Boots on the ground is not the solution to the global Islamic radical terror threat. The Russians and Allied forces learned nothing from the actions of the Crusaders in the Middle Ages. All the Crusades did was unite the various sectarian-ridden muslim tribes under a single commander, Saladin. The might of the Soviet empire could not tame those muslim tribes in Afghanistan. Eventually, with casualties mounting heavily, the Russians left with their tails between their legs. The same has happened British and American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Gulf Wars may have stopped Saddam Hussein; they didn’t stop the Taliban, Muslim Brotherhood, Islamic State, al Qaeda, or ‘Basher’ Assad in Syria. The Allied powers must swallow the bitter medicine that the only way to protect their nations from Tunisia or Paris-style massacres is not an invasion of Syria or explosive drone strike – they must use mustard gas against ISIS. The Allied nations must adopt the same mindset in 2015 as they did in 1945 when they realised victory could not be achieved by conventional means – atomic bombs were the only solutions. No doubt, the do-gooders who believe passionately in the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), the arms control treaty organisation which seeks to limit chemical weapons, will be calling for my head for suggesting the use of mustard gas to eliminate ISIS. But Ireland could lead the fight for an extermination of Islamic State.

Stormont and Dublin want to pump with little educational cash is available into the STEM subjects – Science, Technology. Engineering and Mathematics. What an accolade it would be for Ireland if our STEM students and scientists developed the mustard gas needed to be dropped in ISIS strongholds. Think of the number of tourists who could return to sun traps without any fear of Islamic radicals. More importantly, think of the number of jobs which could be created in Ireland for Irish people who develop these mustard gas weapons to exterminate ISIS?

The Shinners can further undermine the Union by sucking up to the rapidly emerging legion of Latte Libs in the Prod community.

Latte what, I hear you ask? Unionists are in electoral fear of the so-called Garden Centre Prods.These are stereotype Protestants who stay at home on polling day, creating the impression these Unionists would rather visit a garden centre than a voting booth.But in recent years, and especially since the signing of the notorious Stormont House Agreement, a new weapon has emerged for republicans to bash the Brits – the Latte Libs, short for Latte Liberals from the Protestant community.
The stereotype is that these Prods drink copious amounts of latte coffee while planning how to undermine any Unionist to the Right of the Alliance Party. While Garden Centre Prods remain at home, the Latte Libs are active in political life, especially in the Alliance and Green parties, and have many activists within the mainstream Presbyterian Church, the North’s largest Prod denomination.  Such has been the quietly growing influence of the Latte Libs that even the once-hardline Unionist parties, the DUP and UUP, are locked in a bitter battle for the centre vote in the North.
The Shinners should abandon their policy of baiting the Orange Order and the Unionist parties and leave the job to the Latte Libs.  Northern Sinn Fein should focus on finishing off the Stoops and ensuring an electorally serious dissident republican political movement does not emerge.  The Latte Libs have as much dislike for the Prod Loyal Orders as the nationalist residents groups who oppose contentious parades.
Many of these Latte Libs are luke-warm on the Union. The more the Shinners can create the impression in London and Dublin that Latte Libs represent the majority voice in the Prod community, the more the Union can be undermined from within.  If Stormont can survive until next year’s Assembly poll, republicans should give their preferences after Sinn Fein to Alliance, the Greens and whatever is left of Basil McCrea’s NI21.   The more of these Latte Libs who get elected, the less Unionism’s majority over the Shinners becomes.
If Marty McGuinness can concentrate on smashing the SDLP, and let the Latte Libs kick the Unionist parties in the electoral balls, he’ll be First Minister by 12 July next year.
The DUP and UUP have generations of expertise in beating the Orange drum, but both parties are complete amateurs when it comes to courting the centre ground in Irish politics.  Both think this means sucking up to Catholic Unionists. In reality, the centre ground is dominated by pluralist and liberal Protestants.
It’s a case of history repeating itself for Unionism, as a century ago Unionist leaders Carson and Craig were constantly haunted by the spectre of liberal Protestantism.  And Shinners can deliver a double whammy on Unionism – they can also suck up to the Fundie Faction of Irish Christianity’s so-called ‘born again brigade’.   Many of these fundamentalists, once they become ‘born again’ Christians, or ‘saved’, abandon the Prod Loyal Orders, loyalist band scene and even the Unionist parties.
They adopt the strict Biblical advice of ‘Come Ye Out From Amongst Them.’ This is the view that once a Christian becomes ‘born again’, they should leave the worldly organisations they were part of – including Orangeism and Unionism.  The Sinn Fein tactic should be to publicly challenge all Christian Churches to turn their backs on the Loyal Orders.   In the meantime, the Shinners’ double-edged sword must entail a charm offensive with Latte Libs and the Fundie Faction. Do this, and it’s a case of ‘United Ireland, here we come!’

Orange Order’s Flag Day: Tricolour must be reclaimed

(John Coulter, Irish Daily Star)

Orangemen, especially those in the Southern border counties, should reclaim the Irish tricolour as part of their heritage and history.

Orangeism likes to boast about its brother organisations across the globe, such as Canada, New Zealand, Australia as well as the African states of Togo and Ghana.

The Order’s new European Union-funded Orange Heritage Museum in east Belfast has up to nine different flags associated with Orangeism.

But the Order has delivered a massive two-fingered salute to four of its thriving county lodges in the Republic – Donegal, Monaghan, Cavan and Leitrim.

In a few days’ time, those Southern lodges will host one of the most popular of the Orange commemorations in the Republic – but not a tricolour in sight.

Southern Irish-based members of the Loyal Orders must be the only brethren and sisters who cannot parade proudly behind the national flag of the state in which they live.

Using its cartoon character, Diamond Dan, the Order has launched a charm offensive in Catholic schools to convince young pupils that Orangeism is not about ‘hating Fenians’.

So it’s okay for Orange historians to lecture young Catholics about the history of the Order, but it’s not proper for its own Orange members to walk behind the national flag of a country where it has a substantial presence.

The pathetic spin which the Order pumps out is that all its Southern members see themselves as pro-British in culture and, therefore, prefer to march behind the banner of St Patrick, noting that St Paddy’s Cross is part of the Union Jack.

More militant Orangemen may point to the fact that IRA and INLA murder gangs used the Republic to launch sectarian genocide against the Northern Protestants from the safety of their bases.

They point how dead IRA men would often be honoured with the Irish tricolour bedecking their coffins.

And it was supporters of that same flag which ambushed Orangemen at prayer in the Tullyvallen Orange Hall massacre in the 1970s.

But the Order has got to start thinking with its head and not its feet. The Shinners would be left in a real mess if Orangemen paraded through the Donegal seaside resort of Rossnowlagh with the Irish tricolour at their head.

With the formal centenary of the 1916 Rising less than a year away, the Order could really pull a fast one by getting as many of its Southern lodges to make the Irish flag as part of their colour parties.

After all, the tricolour and Union flag have already been displayed side by side at a few events to mark the centenaries of some of the bloodiest battles of World War One.

Folklore has it that Rising boss James Connolly wanted the tricolour to symbolise the coming together of the Orange and Green traditions in a new, independent Ireland.

But a leading Orangeman once told me the Irish tricolour was really the Papal flag of the Vatican couple with the green of nationalism.

I once preached a Gospel sermon in a Protestant church during which I produced the Irish flag as my prop! I got out alive, too!

The green stands for the green hill of Calvary where Christ was crucified; the while for the Great White Throne where God will sit on Judgement Day; the orange for the fruits of the Holy Spirit.

Using this religious interpretation of the Irish flag, perhaps churches hosting all Loyal Order services could have the tricolour on display.

The Orders must recognise that the Irish tricolour is as much as part of their heritage as the Union flag, rather than just an emblem to be burned. That would be a unique 12 July Resolution for the traditional Demonstration Fields!

Facing Austerity and Saving Stormont

First the South had to endure the pain of the collapse of the Celtic Tiger economy and the humiliation of the multi-million euro bailout; now the North is dealing with its so-called ‘fantasy budget’, bouncing cheques for funding – and the prospect of Stormont folding once again.
Austerity cuts will bite deep on both sides of the Irish border, but the Northern crisis over welfare reform has been caused by Sinn Fein riding two economic horses – both now running in opposite directions.
The one-time apologist for Provisional IRA terror has now realised it cannot bring about Irish unity with a bombing and shooting campaign in Northern Ireland.
So Sinn Fein has changed direction and is now focusing on becoming a minority government partner in the Republic after next year’s expected Dail General Election.
It has remodelled itself as the voice of anti-austerity. But as a government partner in Stormont with the DUP, it was in danger of having to implement welfare reform sparking the query – will the real Sinn Fein please stand up?
Sinn Fein has tried to delay the implementation of welfare reform in Northern Ireland long enough so that Southern voters can elect the party into power in Leinster House.
But Sinn Fein has taken its eye off the ball in Northern Ireland to the extent that it has been backed into a dead-end political cul-de-sac. The solution is brutally simple. The Unionists will have to compromise to get Sinn Fein out of this corner, otherwise Stormont will collapse.
The British Government wants the Stormont House Agreement implemented. The two clubs to be juggled by Northern politicians are how to implement these stinging welfare reform cuts, while at the same time preserving the Assembly.
If the Assembly parties refuse to implement welfare reform, Westminster will step in and do the job for them – but the cuts will be considerably deeper than anything which the DUP and Sinn Fein have to impose.
Another solution is to let Stormont fold, and transfer many of its powers either to the newly-formed 11 super councils, which came into existence formally in April, and even divest additional powers to the North-South bodies and British-Irish institutions.
This sounds like Home Rule by the back door, or Joint Authority of Northern Ireland by Dublin and London. With the loyalist marching season about to reach its peak in less than a month, it is in everyone’s interest to keep the militant loyalist genie in the bottle for the next few months.
The harsh political reality is that the new super councils are still bedding in, so it would be an act of sheer stupidity to dump even more powers on them.
And with Sinn Fein – unlike the Scottish and Welsh nationalists – still refusing to take their Commons seats, the imposition of Direct Rule from Westminster suits the Unionists, especially if Cameron needs a few extra votes if his Right-wing backbenchers start to rattle cages over the European Union.
The compromise to get out of this latest politically tasteless Irish stew is a watered down version of the Stormont House Agreement. Welfare reform can be implemented in tiny steps by the Northern Ireland parties, rather than by giant leaps from Westminster.
The DUP still gets to keep its beloved Assembly and Sinn Fein quietly brushes cuts under the green carpet so that it remains the champion against austerity in the Republic, yet imposing the same measures in the North.
Republicans will then have to juggle two versions of the same party. A hard Left party in the South, and a softly, softly Right-wing movement in the North.
Could this ‘dual image’ tactic put an irreparable strain on the Sinn Fein leadership piloted firmly by party president Gerry Adams in the Dail and deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness at Stormont?
Republicans will be hoping the centenary celebrations for the doomed Easter Rising next year can paper over any ideological cracks in Sinn Fein, which lead to the splits in the movement in the early 1970s between Official Sinn Fein and Provisional Sinn Fein, and in 1986 between Provisional Sinn Fein and Republican Sinn Fein.
As yet, the dissident republican movement has limited itself to a stop/start terror campaign rather than the IRA’s ‘long war’ vision. Politically, dissident republicans are leaps and bounds behind Sinn Fein.
Perhaps with Sinn Fein riding two horses, it’s time for a new moderate nationalist party to emerge to replace the split-ridden SDLP?