Category Archives: International Ethics
Irish Hierarchy’s Statement on the Turmoil in Argentina
The following statement was issued in 1955 by the Irish hierarchy at their June meeting in St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth:
The Catholic Hierarchy of Ireland, assembled at Maynooth on the occasion of their general meeting, express their deep sympathy with the great Catholic nation of Argentina in the grievous trials which it has endured during the last year.
Recalling the many links that bind our countries we ask our people to offer fervent prayers that God may restore peace, liberty of conscience and the tranquility of order to the Argentine Republic.
Given at Maynooth on 21st June, 1955.
Signed on behalf of the archbishops and bishops of Ireland.
Chairman —
+JOHN D’ALTON,
Archbishop of Armagh,
Primate of All Ireland.
Secretaries —
+WILLIAM MacNEELY,
Bishop of Raphoe.
+JAMES FERGUS,
Bishop of Achonry.
Bishop Daniel Cohalan on the Persecution of the Church in Eastern Europe
The following pastoral letter was issued by the Most Rev. Daniel Cohalan, Bishop of Waterford and Lismore, on 1st April, 1954:
Passion Sunday, 4th April, has been set apart by the Church as a day of special prayer for the clergy, religious and many millions of our fellow-Catholics in Eastern Europe and in other countries under Communist control who are enduring persecution for the Faith and reduced to silence.
A bond of union exists between all the members of the Church under Christ as their Head. We should try to make next Sunday, therefore, a worthy manifestation of that spiritual solidarity between all members of the Mystical Body of Our Redeemer.
Think of Catholic Poland, so often compared to Ireland: of Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Slovenia, the other Balkan states; the Baltic states, China, etc. now under the domination of atheistic Communism, with their Bishops often arrested and perhaps taken away to an undisclosed prison; their children taught that there is no God and discouraged from going to Mass or the Sacraments.
Let us pray God, therefore, through the intercession of Mary Immaculate, to give these Catholics (estimated at a hundred million souls) who groan beneath the iron heel of Communist tyranny, strength to bear witness to Christ and His Church as well as consolation in their trial.
Our fathers in the faith here in Ireland were arrested, imprisoned and often condemned to death, so we can understand and sympathise with our fellow-Catholics who are suffering persecution in our own time. The customary trumped-up charges of high treason, espionage, illegal currency dealings, etc., are merely the common formula of indictment against anybody who is obnoxious to a Communist Government.
I ask the clergy and faithful people of the Diocese to pour out their souls in fervent prayer on Passion Sunday on behalf of our suffering fellow-Catholics.
Let each of us try to be as ardent in the cause of Christ as Communists are in attacking God and religion. And in general, let us all try to appreciate the dangers which threaten our Christian civilization and the urgent need of assistance from God if the catastrophe is to be averted.
I authorize the priests to offer up prayers, hold Holy Hours, special devotions, etc., for the intentions of the Catholics who are suffering for the Faith.
+DANIEL COHALAN,
Bishop of Waterford and Lismore.
Letter of the Archbishop of Cashel to King Philip II of Spain, 26th July, 1570
Encouraged by the confidence I have in your Catholic Majesty, I have dared to speak more freely than perhaps I should have done, but I trust your Majesty will excuse me, as the business is of such importance.
I understand that the English, after having done us all the harm they could, wish to make peace with your Majesty, which is with no other intention than that they may be able, after the peace is concluded with your Majesty, to treat us more freely by doing all the mischief they wish against us. These injuries, which will be felt by all in general, will be more terrible for myself, because our chieftains have had great confidence in your Majesty, and I have written many times encouraging them to resist the English, assuring them that your Majesty would not fail to send assistance, as I was told by the Cardinal and other men of high position in the name of your Majesty. We have refused on this account, many times, the pardon the English have offered us for the past, telling us to enjoy our goods and lands as before, on condition we would be of their opinion, and recognise Her Majesty as Sovereign and Queen.
Neither can your Majesty conscientiously refuse to send us some assistance in virtue of the promises made through me by your Majesty, and that without delay, as we have already been kept in suspense for one year and three months; for, you must hold in mind that your Majesty is the Catholic King, having received that name from your ancestors for the increase of Catholic faith, by favouring the cause of Catholics. In, the same way as the Queen of England has favoured and favours the rebel heretics in France, your Majesty can, in an underhand manner, send some assistance to our chieftains, in arms and men, under pretence of their going to Holland, who, contrary to your will, or for some other cause, should go to Ireland.
Your Majesty has now a good opportunity for so doing, by taking advantage of the arrival of that Englishman, Thomas Stukely, who has received such insults from his own countrymen that he will not fail to do them all the harm he can. He is a very daring man, clever in war matters, in which he has been engaged most of his life. He is well acquainted with our own country, its forts, its harbours. I have been informed that he has brought with him experienced mariners from all parts of Ireland. This is the most favourable season in the year, because now our land abounds with good corn and meat, much more than at other seasons of the year; besides if your Majesty does not send some succour within three months, the English will take such hold of our forts and harbours, that even if your Majesty were to make use of all your power, you would not overcome them. I mention this, because I have been informed that the English are making great preparations, and are endeavouring to take possession of the whole country, and to keep it in such subjection that the natives shall no longer be able to make any resistance as they have hitherto done in some places. If the English succeed in their plans (which God forbid), your Majesty will have the worst enemies whom you have ever known. All this your Majesty can prevent now, with the assistance of a few men, by being the first to take possession of the ports and fortresses. The whole success depends on celerity, for your Majesty will be able to do with 10,000 men, and a little expense, what you will not afterwards be able to accomplish with 100,000 men and all available power. If perchance your Majesty is not satisfied with my embassy, or doubts lest perhaps those who sent me should not keep their word, let your Majesty send some one with me to my country, and I shall make those chieftains place their fortunes and estates under your Majesty’s jurisdiction by oath, or give any security required by your Majesty until they fulfil what they have promised. If it does not please your Majesty to send prompt assistance, as I was promised by the Cardinal and other noblemen in your Majesty’s name, I request your Majesty to grant me the favour of allowing me to return to my native land, that thus I may discharge my conscience of the great weight I have from the Church, and apologise to my brethren for my delay, by testifying my willingness to die for the Catholic faith, and for the liberty of my country, as much as each of them does. My remaining here would only serve to increase the expenses of your Majesty, without any benefit to myself or my country.
The humble servant and chaplain of your Majesty,
MAURITIUS CASSELLENSIS,
Archiepiscopus.
Multiculturalism and Disbelief
by Brendan Clifford,
Labour & Trade Union Review, No. 11
If Britain had, like the United States, citizenship tests for immigrants, the basic test as to whether an immigrant had caught the British spirit should be the answer to the question: Do you accept that the right to blaspheme is an inalienable human right?
Societies flourish in connection with their communal piety. Britain is the first society which has flourished through impiety.
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The Catholic Bulletin versus William Butler Yeats
by Helen Hilton,
Irish Political Review; January, 2004
On 27th November 2003 I went to hear Roy Foster speak at the Royal Festival Hall to promote his new book on Yeats. The event took the form of a talk by Mr. Foster and an interview afterwards by Tom Paulin.
I must say that I never heard such trite remarks about Yeats as those made by Mr. Foster. He said that he had attempted what he seemed to think were unique and revolutionary approaches to biography in that he believed life and art were related and he aimed to get behind the other biographies and autobiographies of Yeats. He also sought to clarify his public life, including his para-fascism. Foster was ‘embedding’ Yeats’ poems in their context to show how he renegotiated his relationship with Ireland. Then we were told he was one of the founding fathers of the new State (which would, I believe, come as a big surprise to its actual founders). His political sense was keenly developed, we were told. Moreover, there was great entertainment to be had from ‘the vituperation’ of the Catholic Bulletin concerning Yeats. His stances were responses to the torrent of such vituperation.
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Irish Hierarchy’s Statement on the Spanish Civil War
The Irish hierarchy issued the following statement in 1936 at their October meeting in St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth:
We, the Bishops of Ireland, avail ourselves of the opportunity of expressing our profound distress at the sufferings inflicted on the Catholics of unhappy Spain.
We know how shocked and horrified our people have been by the brutal outrages on religion and humanity perpetrated by the Communistic faction there and how deeply they sympathise with that great nation in the tragedy of ruin and shame it has been made to endure at the hands of an infamous minority under foreign direction.
Spain at this moment is fighting the battle of Christendom against the subversive powers of Communism. In that fateful struggle it has, we believe, the prayers and good wishes of the great body of Christians throughout the world, and nowhere more than in Ireland, which is not unmindful of Spain’s kindness to our ancestors.
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The Glorious Revolution: Church and Class
by Peter Brooke
Labour & Trade Union Review; 1988
What did the Glorious Revolution of 1688-1689 achieve? Or, rather, what followed it and may have resulted from it? England is distinguished in Europe as the only country which achieved the transition from a peasant/craftsman economy to an industrial economy without a violent transformation of its political structures. The Glorious Revolution instituted political structures which were sufficiently flexible to accommodate economic change.
There are many aspects to this question, but the one on which I wish to concentrate is the elimination of the idea of government as a spiritual authority. This is not exactly the same thing as the elimination of the Church as a political power in the land. That had already been achieved; it was the principle work of the Reformation. The whole thrust of Lutheranism and Anglicanism was the subjection of the Church to the national government. Calvinism attempted to reverse the process and reassert the independent authority of the Church but everywhere it was defeated. It came closest to success in Scotland after the Glorious Revolution, but the defeat of the Church of Scotland was a major consequence—and purpose—of the Act of Union with England in 1707. This was shortly followed by patronage acts which asserted the authority of the British parliament over the Church.
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.
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Irish Hierarchy’s Reply to the Joint Letter of the Spanish Bishops
Cardinal Joseph MacRory: “There is no room any longer for any doubts as to the issue at stake in the Spanish conflict . . . It is a question of whether Spain will remain as she has been so long, a Christian and Catholic land, or a Bolshevist and anti-God one.“
The Irish hierarchy issued the following reply to the Joint Letter of the Spanish Bishops at their October meeting in St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth, 1937:
Venerable Brethren,
It is not without profound emotion that one can read the noble and touching Letter addressed by your Excellencies to the Catholic Episcopate throughout the world.
There, in a document of rare dignity and calm sobriety of expression, instilled throughout with the true spirit of Christian charity, may be found an exhaustive vindication of the Venerable Church of Spain against the odious calumnies heaped upon her by the enemies of the Christian faith, and an overwhelming answer to the reckless misrepresentations with which so large a section of the Press seeks to cloud the issues at stake in the lamentable conflict now raging in your sorely distracted country.
In a simple exposition of the facts and a calm and authoritative analysis of the situation, devoid of vehemence and rhetorical device, you have given the world your solemn witness to the truth, in language at once restrained and convincing, making cogent appeal to the conscience of mankind and to the ultimate verdict of history.
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Joint Letter of the Spanish Bishops to the Bishops of the Whole World Concerning the War in Spain, July 1st, 1937
Venerable Brethren,
The Catholic peoples are wont to help one another mutually in days of affliction, thus practising the law of charity and brotherhood which joins in one mystical body all of us who hold communion in the thought and love of Jesus Christ. The natural organ of this spiritual interchange is formed by the Bishops, who were put by the Holy Ghost to rule over the Church of God. Spain, which is now suffering one of the greatest tribulations of her history, has received many proofs of affection and condolence from the Catholic Episcopate abroad, either in collective messages or singly from many Bishops. And the Spanish Episcopate, which has been so terribly tried in its members, in its clergy, and in its churches, wishes to give response to-day in this joint document to the great charity which has been shown us from all parts of the world.
Our country is undergoing a profound upheaval; it is not only one of the bloodiest of civil wars which fills us with tribulation, it is a tremendous commotion which is shaking the very foundations of social life, and has put in danger our very existence as a nation. You have understood it, Venerable Brethren, and ‘Your words and your heart have opened unto us,’ we will say with the Apostle, letting us see the depth of your charity towards our beloved mother country. May God reward you for it.
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Animosities In A Vacuum
by Brendan Clifford,
Church and State; Third Quarter, 2008
Oxford University was appealed to by Raymond Crotty (founder of the Irish Sovereignty Movement) to take Ireland in hand intellectually, because the Irish were unable to think for themselves. It has now published a volume on Ireland as part of its Oxford History Of Modern Europe. But, alas, it farmed out the work of writing it to a Stickie academic, who was a political adviser to David Trimble during the years when Trimble was leading the Ulster Unionist Party to disaster, and who has now joined his leader in the House of Lords.
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Irish Hierarchy’s Statement on World Refugee Year
Stamp of the Holy Family issued by the Irish state postal service to mark World Refugee Year
The following statement was issued in 1959 by the Irish hierarchy at their October meeting in St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth:
The Holy Father has recently appealed to the whole Catholic world for support for the World Refugee Year.
At the present time, fourteen years after the cessation of hostilities, there are still vast multitudes of men and women and children, herded together in refugee camps, for whom even a humble home is only a memory or a dream. They are without adequate food, clothing or warmth, and are far away from their native lands. Their condition is humiliating to their very dignity as human beings. As the years go by there is growing in their hearts a sense of hopelessness and despair. Their hardest cross is the feeling that the world has forgotten them.
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Irish Society Before the Sixties: Insular or Outward Looking?
De Valera returning from the League of Nations. He served as president of the League’s congress in 1932 and of its assembly in 1938.
Editorial Statement,
Irish Foreign Affairs; April-June, 2008
“Every nation, if it is to survive as a nation, must study its own history and have a foreign policy” — C.J. O’Donnell, The Lordship of the World, 1924, p. 145
This is the first issue of Irish Foreign Affairs, a quarterly journal established to comment on foreign policy and on global affairs from an independent Irish perspective.
The Irish State was founded with a core foreign policy idea – the notion of the right of the Irish nation to have an independent state of its own and through that state to make a distinct mark in the world. The limits of this independence were necessarily first and foremost the ability of the state to develop and act free of British constraints.
Until the 1960s, Irish citizens took for granted that this was what the state was about. People knew the Proclamation of 1916 with its foreign policy position, and there was in general a remarkably high level of knowledge about foreign affairs. This knowledge of the world was not derivative of the British liberal media and was informed by commentaries from a uniquely Irish perspective in newspapers such as the Irish Press, various journals, and even in early RTE television.
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1641: Some Context
by Pat Muldowney,
Church and State; First Quarter, 2011
Historic massacres have been in the news recently. Large numbers of British Protestant settlers were killed in horrific circumstances by hordes of rebellious natives in a frenzy of religious hatred. This despite the fact that the settlers, whatever their faults, were bringing civic values, industry, modernity and progress to an antiquated country mired in backwardness and superstition.
In the ensuing chaos, order was finally restored by a determined military campaign in which the Irish Brigadier- General John Nicholson played a leading part, but at the cost of his own life.
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Irish Hierarchy’s Statement on the Dangers to Faith and Morals Faced by Irish Emigrants in Britain
The following statement was issued in 1941 by the Irish Hierarchy at their October meeting in St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth:
More than two years have elapsed since the war, still raging so fiercely, began. From the outset it was evident that agencies of destruction, more fearful than anything hitherto known to history, would be loosed upon the world, and would be used with utter ruthlessness and a complete disregard for moral right. The worst anticipations of disaster are being exceeded by the event.
Appalling as are the material losses caused by the war, the spiritual evils resulting from it are of even greater consequence. War usually brings with it a decay of morals, and the present one is no exception to the rule. The Church, too, has been attacked in many places, and has suffered terribly. Our Holy Father Pope Pius XII, speaking on this matter has said: ‘We tremble to think of what the true story of human suffering will disclose. What we know these days is enough to crush the heart. These days are rivalling some of the blackest days in the history of mankind, and the Pope knows it.’
Ireland, although its position, comparatively speaking, is a privileged one, has not come off unscathed. The scars which disfigure Dublin and Belfast bear testimony of this. But, perhaps, the war’s most disastrous effect for us is the great increase in unemployment, with all its attendant evils, spiritual and temporal, including, especially, the exodus from our shores to Great Britain of such large numbers of our adult population. Evidently to find a remedy for unemployment is one of our most urgent problems; and in this connection the Hierarchy desire to place on record their appreciation of bodies such as the Catholic Social Service Conference, which are devoting much time and energy to its solution. This problem, indeed, has a deep interest for every citizen, and especially, indeed, for every Catholic citizen. All should co-operate whole-heartedly with those who are specially engaged in its solution; all should realise that they have in greater or less degree a personal responsibility in the matter.
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Will the Irish Stay Christian?
by Desmond Fennell,
Doctrine and Life; May, 1962.
There is no reason to suppose that the Irish Catholic people will continue indefinitely to be believing Christians. In Europe during the last one hundred and fifty years the majority of people have abandoned Christian belief and practice; there is no reason why the same should not happen here.
Sweden is often cited as an extreme example of modern paganism. But eighty years ago it was the scene of impassioned public controversies about the nature of Christ’s Redemption and the proper ordering of the Communion service; wide sections of the people believed these matters to be of urgent concern.
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1937 – The Year in Review
From the Irish Catholic Bulletin, January, 1938:
by Fear Faire
Seldom did we survey the world, at the turn of the year, in more critical circumstances than now; and only twice before did the affairs of our own country stand at so vital a turning point. The world to-day shivers in the shadow of a threat as dark as that which hung over it in the last months before the World War broke in 1914. Ireland, on the other hand, stands a new stage in her national progress; and we recall the New Year of 1919, and that of 1922.
At the New Year of 1919, Ireland was fresh from the General Election which authorised her leaders to set up Dáil Éireann and declare the nation’s independence. At the New Year of 1922, the Treaty which had been signed under an infamous threat of devastating war on civilians awaited approval or rejection, and Ireland was about to be condemned to the years of strife and decay which the approval, a few days later, drew down.
To-day, the Declaration of Independence of 1920 has been renewed, ratified by the electorate, and carried into effect, and an Independent Sovereign State came into being in the last days of 1937, while the New Year sees the nation embarked on the task of the recovery of the still-occupied Six Countries.
Truly, this is a momentous stage in Irish and world history. We will consider world affairs first.
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Rev. Dr. Ryan on the Church and the Spanish Civil War
From the Irish Press, Tuesday, 20th October, 1936:
Noted Catholic Scholar on “Spain”
_______________________
REV. DR. RYAN TRACES ORIGINS OF THE STRUGGLE
______________________
Basques and Moors
“If the people of Spain hadn’t risen against such atrocities they would not have been the valiant sons of Spain that they are but despicable cowards,” declared Very Rev. Dr. A. H. Ryan, Professor of Scholastic Philosophy, Queen’s University, Belfast, in an address on “Spain” in St. Mary’s Hall, Belfast, last night.
Over 200 people attended, among them the Bishop of Down and Connor, Most Rev. Dr. Mageean. Mr. Raymond Burke presided. Dr. Ryan said that the deplorable events in Spain since the outbreak of the civil war had produced most extraordinary reactions in many places and especially in Ireland.
The fact that the Catholic Church had suffered had produced the usual type of exultation in those bigoted circles that could not see that the Catholic Church was fighting the battle, not alone of Catholicism, but of every religion.
Lux Occulta 
