Health and the Hierarchy
By BRIAN INGLIS Dublin.
FOR the second time in recent years a political contro- versy has sprung up here on the relationship of Church and State; and, once again, a Health Bill has been the cause of the trouble. The'circumstances were curious. Health Legislation has given nothing but worry to Governments here since the war, but it was known that members of Mr. de Valera's cabinet had met the Catholic Hierarchy to discuss the new proposals and it was assumed, when the Government went ahead with the Bill, that some agreement had been reached. The first indication that something was wrong came when the parliainentary Opposition, who had not been antagonistic to the Bill in its earlier stages, suddenly turned and rent it. The same week, certain Dublin newspapers received copies of a, statement from the Hierarchy condemning the Bill as contrary to Catholic Social Teaching. The statement, however, was withdrawn before the newspapers went to press, and it has not since been published. The Opposition, who maintained that their attack on the Bill owed nothing to foreknowledge of the Hierarchy's inten- tions, alleged that the document was withdrawn on the orders of the Government; but although no official pronouncement was made on the subject, it became known that the document was withdrawn by the Bishops themselves. Various explana- tions were put forward : that Mr. de Valera warned them he would treat publication as a casus belli; that he was able to show them their objections were unfounded; or that he gave way, promising to alter the measure according to their instruc- tions. To judge by the amendments to the Bill that have since appeared, the second of these theories came nearest to the truth. - Various declarations of principle have been inserted in the Bill, designed to reassure the Church that no patient will be advised or treated contrary to his religious beliefs, and some minor technical changes have been made; but the Bill in general has been little changed. Mr. de Valera's supporters have been able to boast that he made no sacrifice of principle— unlike the last Government, which abandoned Dr. Browne's Mother and Child Scheme entirely, when the Hierarchy objected.
That a second " Browne affair " has been avoided seems to have been due primarily to the tact of Mr. de Valera himself. Many influential members of his party were ready for a show- down with the Hierarchy, and in the Opposition, too, there were elements who would have liked nothing better than to campaign against the Government's materialist, socialist, and anti-Church policies, with the Hierarchy's blessing. All the materials for a domestic crisis were there, but " Dev " was firm, and the points at issue were settled without, apparently, any great difficulty. Still, the country cannot help wondering what would have happened if he had not been there—what will happen, in fact, when he retires. At present, there is nobody else in Irish public life who could be relied upon to handle so delicate a situation.
The fact is that the Irish have had little experience in such matters. The relations of Church and State , for the last quarter of a century have been satisfactory—remarkably so, considering the circumstances. Well over 90 per cent. of the people of the Republic are Catholics: " good ' Catholics, too, who would accept unhesitantly any pronouncement by. the Bishops on whether a Bill is contrary to the Church's Social Teaching, or to the Moral Law. Dr. Browne himself accepted their verdict, in his own case. But the Bishops have used their power sparingly. The explanation may be sought in the country's history. Since the Penal Laws against the Church were removed, the Bishops have tended to be on the conserva- tive side in politics : they opposed the Young Irelanders, and the Fenians, and the Republicans. Although this attitude did not provoke any violent anti-clerical reaction, it encouraged a capacity among the Nationalists to differentiate between " the Bishops " and " the Church." Mr. de Valera's long spell of power helped to prolong this attitude: he and many of his party had once been excommunicated, and they con- sidered themselves none the worse Catholics for that. It remained a principle with them that if the Bishops wished to discuss the affairs of state, then the Bishops must call upon the Ministers concerned, and not vice-versa. In spite of the fact that the Government took many decisions that must have displeased the Hierarchy—in connection with non-intervention in the Spanish Civil War, for example, or with sanctions against Italy—the system worked; and Church and State rubbed along together, contentedly enough, for many years.
The first serious ,break came over the Browne affair, when the Bishops found that Mr. Costello's Government was pre- pared to accept their decision as final. In this case, however, they could fairly argue that they were exercising a right— indeed, a duty—to communicate their views to the Government, and the fault, if any, lay with the Government for its subsequent mishandling of the business, which left an erroneous impres- sion that the Bishops had done something underhand. Last month.. the Bishops—determined, perhaps, that the same mistake would not be made twice—decided to go straight to the Faithful, through the medium of the press. It looks as if they did not realise that to publish a condemnation of the Bill without first submitting it to the Government could only have been construed by the public as a declaration of war on the Government—particularly in view of the Opposition's attacks. The country would promptly have divided into clerical and anti-clerical camps, the feud beihg the more bitter in that both would have shared the same Faith.
The question now arises how such a situation can be avoided in future, when there may not be a de Valera to deal with it. The heaviest responsibility lies with the Bishops them- selves. Circumstances detached the Hierarchy from the main stream of the Irish national movement in the past; now that the hunger for independence has been allayed, they are naturally anxious to play a more important part in the shaping of the country's political and social policies. Certain sections of the public will urge them not just to advise, but to direct. There are quite a few obsequious politicians who make piety their stock-in-trade: they are known contemptuously as the Pope's Brass Band " after the founders of their lay Order, who flourished for a while a century ago. And there are various neo-Fascist clericalist groups. Both have been more noisy than influential in the past; but the Bishops do not always find it easy to ignore the importunities of these embarrassing allies. especially when there is a common enemy to be attacked, socialism or materialism or bureaucracy, or whatever it may be.
Yet it the Bishops allow themselves to become identified with any group or party—as they nearly, did, unwittingly, last - month—the other side would be forced into antagonism. The absence of anti-clericalism in Ireland today is not just a reflection of some racial or national characteristic : it is also the prOduct of the satisfactory unwritten concordat which Church and State have observed. Irritation when individual Bishops or priests have made ill-advised interventions in local affairs has already given some indication of how easily resentment against clericalism can spread. The old nationalist tradition is still strong, and its inheritors would have no more hesitation in defying a Hierarchy which they consider is acting against the nation's interests, than did the Fenians and the Parnellites in the last century, and the Republicans thirty years ago.
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