Ireland (Lonely Planet, 9th Edition) - Fionn Davenport [19]
Coupled with Ireland’s economic growth was a steady social shift away from the Catholic Church’s overwhelmingly conservative influence, which was felt virtually everywhere, not least in the state’s schools and hospitals and over every aspect of social policy. From the 1980s onwards, steady campaigning resulted in new laws protecting gay rights, access to contraception and a successful referendum on divorce. One major issue to remain unresolved, however, is the thorny question of abortion: in theory, abortion is legal if there is risk to the life of the woman, but the cloudy legal status does nothing for the thousands of women who still go to Britain every year for termination.
The dramatic decline in the influence of the Church over the last two decades is primarily the result of global trends and greater prosperity in Ireland, but the devastating revelations of clerical abuse of boys and girls in the care of the Church over the last half century have defined an almost vitriolic reaction against the Church, particularly among the younger generation. The Church’s perceived reluctance to confront its own responsibilities in these shocking scandals – including reports of a number of senior members knowing about paedophiliac priests and consequently shuffling them from parish to parish – has heightened a sense of deep betrayal among many of the faithful.
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Ireland Since the Famine by FSL Lyons is a standard text for all students of modern Irish history.
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IT’S (NOT SO) GRIM UP NORTH
On 8 May 2007 the Northern Ireland Assembly, the devolved legislature of the province, finally met again for the first time since October 2002. The first minister, the Rev Ian Paisley, smiled, shook hands and posed for photos with the deputy first minister, Martin McGuinness.
This was no straightforward meeting. Even if you’d only kept a lazy eye on Irish affairs these last 30 years, you’d know that the sight of a Loyalist firebrand like Paisley – who has a history of deep-rooted, often vicious enmity towards Irish Nationalism and Republicanism – and an ex-IRA commander like McGuinness shaking hands was nothing short of highly improbable. Needless to say, this historic agreement was the culmination of a painstakingly long road of domination, fighting, negotiation, concession and political posturing that began…
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The events leading up to the Anglo-Irish War and their effect on ordinary people are movingly and powerfully related in JG Farrell’s novel Troubles, first published in 1970.
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Well, it began in the 16th century, with the first Plantations of Ireland by the English Crown, whereby the confiscated lands of the Gaelic and Hiberno-Norman gentry were awarded to English and Scottish settlers of good Protestant stock. The policy was most effective in Ulster, where the newly arrived Protestants were given an extra leg-up by the Penal Laws, which successfully reduced the now landless Catholic population to second-class citizens with little or no rights. Interestingly, from 1707 the Penal Laws also applied to Presbyterians (of which Paisley is one, albeit the founder of his own Free Presbyterian Church), who were considered not much better than Catholics.
But let us fast-forward to 1921, when the notion of independent Ireland moved from aspiration to actuality. On 22 June the Northern Ireland Parliament came into being, with James Craig as the first prime minister. His Ulster Unionist Party