Statement of the Northern Bishops on Conscription

The following statement was issued by all the Irish bishops with dioceses partially or wholly in the territory of the Six Counties on 30th April, 1939:

In view of the anxiety that exists at present among our people on account of the rumours of conscription, we deem it a solemn duty to make our considered judgement on the situation that confronts us in the Six Counties.

We are convinced that any attempt to impose conscription here would be disastrous.

Our people have been already subjected to the gravest injustice in being cut off from one of the oldest nations in Europe, and in being deprived of their fundamental rights as citizens in their own land. In such circumstances, to compel them to fight for their oppressor would be likely to rouse them to indignation and resistance.

It would be regarded by Irishmen not only in the Six Counties, but in Éire, and throughout the world wherever they are found, as an outrage on the national feeling and an aggression upon our national rights.

If those who think they have benefited by Partition desire to show their gratitude, it should not be necessary to impose upon them compulsory military service.

In actual fact the British Government stands to lose rather than gain by such an attempt.

In conformity with the expressed wish of Our Holy Father Pope Pius XII that all Catholics, and in particular the children, should implore the intercession of the Holy Mother of God for peace among nations and peoples, we order that during the month of May there shall be evening devotions wherever possible in all parochial churches. The devotions shall consist of the Rosary, the Litany of Loreto, and Benediction of the Most Holy Sacrament.

In addition to the intentions for which Our Holy Father asks the prayers of the faithful, we request our people to pray earnestly for the peace of our beloved country.

+JOSEPH CARDINAL MACRORY, Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of all Ireland

+PATRICK MCKENNA, Bishop of Clogher

+EDWARD MULHERN, Bishop of Dromore

+DANIEL MAGEEAN, Bishop of Down and Connor

+PATRICK LYONS, Bishop of Kilmore

    LAURENCE HEGARTY, Vicar Capitular, Derry [Dr. Neil Farren, who was yet to be  appointed Bishop of Derry, would later ‘warmly approve’ of the statement – shane]

Following a Confirmation in Armagh the next day, Cardinal MacRory said that “war was one of the greatest evils in which a country could be involved, and it was the duty of all to defend their land against foreign aggression and to assert its rights, but to be compelled to fight for a Power that partitioned their country and held hundreds of thousands of their people in captivity would be the greatest tyranny. They had a moral right to resist such an imposition; and to allow it to take place would be to renounce their proper allegiance.”

Two years later, on 22nd May, 1941, he issued the following statement:

Nothing that happened since these words were written lessens their force in the slightest degree. That the people of all creeds and classes in Belfast have recently suffered heavily at the hands of the Germans, however regrettable it may be, does not touch the essence of the question which is that an ancient land, made one by God, was partitioned by a foreign Power against the vehement protest of its people, and with conscription it would now seek to compel those who still writhe under this grevious wrong to fight on the side of its perpetrators.

+JOSEPH CARDINAL MACRORY, Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of all Ireland