Pope not visiting NI is another own goal for the Catholic Church
The worst-kept secret in the world is out of the bag: it’s been confirmed that Pope Francis is coming to Ireland in August. Truth be told, while the Vatican likes to keep such things under wraps until official, the free-wheeling pontiff has been telling everyone he meets for almost three years that he’s Dublin-bound for the World Meeting of Families.
It’ll be the first visit of a pope to Ireland since John Paul II’s visit in 1979. That visit was remarkable — close to half the population of the island (2.7 million people) turned out. The Mass at Phoenix Park was attended by more than one million people.
By any objective measure, the visit was an enormous success, not withstanding the later revelations of hypocrisy of two of the frontmen, Bishop Eamon Casey and Fr Michael Cleary.
The pontiff ’s trip to Ireland left its mark on the Church, and Irish officials can also take credit for the creation of the ‘Popemobile’ used to move him around — it was later adopted across the world for the globe-trotting Polish pope.
Of course, the huge disappointment of 1979 was that John Paul II was unable to cross the border, due to a upsurge in violence at the time. It was unfinished business he acutely felt.
John Paul wasn’t the only one who was disappointed. Northern Catholics were gutted.
They understood the risks such a visit would have posed — both to the pontiff and themselves — and they understood why it couldn’t happen at the time. Loyalist paramili- taries had vowed an attack and Ian Paisley had mobilised his hardline supporters, but there was huge disappointment.
John Paul knew this, which is why he pleaded at Drogheda: “Let history record that at a difficult moment in the experience of the people of Ireland, the Bishop of Rome set foot in your land, that he was with you and prayed with you for peace and reconciliation, for the victory of justice and love over hatred and violence.” That victory over violence took almost another 20 years.
Despite the absence of the Executive, Northern Ireland is a place transformed, so much so that DUP MP Sir Jeffrey Donaldson felt bold enough last year to say that he was looking forward to Pope Francis coming to Northern Ireland.
So far, the schedule is unclear. The main act for Francis is the World Meeting of Fami- in Dublin. There have been murmurings about a visit to the Marian shrine at Knock, Co Mayo, but a potential visit north of the border is still up in the air.
The Vatican and Irish-based organisers of the papal trip are playing with fire. The lack of a visit to Northern Ireland would be a huge disappointment to northern Catholics.
It would also be a missed opportunity in terms of reconciliation.
Following the remarkable visit to the Republic by the Queen and the reciprocal trip across the Irish Sea by Irish President Michael D Higgins, a papal trip to Northern Ireland would be the icing on the cake.
It would demonstrate powerfully to Catholics that a region where they once faced institutional discrimination because of their faith had matured sufficiently to welcome a visit from their spiritual head.
It is understandable that organisers of the Dublin-based event that has precipitated Francis’s visit would be anxious that engagements north of the border would not detract from that event, but the absence of a visit to Northern Ireland would display a remarkable tone deafness.
Relatively speaking, the Church, judged by metrics like Mass attendance and parish engagement, is in a much healthier state in Northern Ireland than in the Republic.
How that would survive what could be interpreted only as a papal snub would be anyone’s guess.
But the smart money would be on bewilderment from a community that has often felt itself beleaguered that the head of their church couldn’t manage a 10-minute chopper ride to Armagh.
The Catholic Church in Ireland has scored enough own goals to last a lifetime. The absence of a large papal event in Northern Ireland would be unforgivable for many of the faithful.