Conway: who succeeds?
John Horgan
Dublin A day or two before the 1965 general election to the Northern Ireland Parliament at Stormont I happened to be talking to Cardinal Conway in the ugly but comfortable house on the hill in Armagh in which he died last week. Not long before, the Catholic bishops in Northern Ireland had caused something of a stir by issuing a joint pastoral letter in which they advised their flock to have done with the traditional policy of political abstentionism, and to play as full a part as possible in the political life and institutions of Northern Ireland. Even before the introduction of proportional representation, it seemed that this opened up a minute possibility of change in a political system in which, for almost half a century, some 50 per cent of the candidates in Northern Ireland elections had been returned unopposed.
The cardinal's secretary came into the room. 'The Belfast Telegraph is on the phone,' he said, 'and they want to know whether they could take a photograph of you voting in the election.' What would you do ?' said the cardinal, turning to me. He could hardly do otherwise than agree, 1 suggested, given that he had just been enjoining the faithful to play a full part in the life of the province. 'It's not quite as simple as you might think,' he demurred. 'The only two candidates in this constituency are a Unionist and an IRA man ...' He turned to his secretary. 'Tell the Belfast Telegraph,' he said carefully, 'that I would prefer not to be photographed.'
Thus was an ignorant Southerner given an early lesson in the subtleties of clericopolitical relationships in Northern Ireland. And the story illustrates sharply the sense of caution which was the cardinal's hallmark, and which was many times in evidence in the tempestuous years which followed, both in political and in religious terms.
It is not often enough remembered that he was a Falls Road man—that is, a product of the urban Northern Ireland Catholic ghetto, and a ghetto, moreover, which either was or frequently felt itself to be in a state of siege. Many of the characteristics bred in this situation accompanied him to Armagh, where he sat as Primate of a church that included not only the quarrelling back streets of Belfast but the self-satisfied valleys of Munster in its domain. He had to deal with two political systems, at least two cultures, and of course with the other members of the Irish hierarchy itself.
Even in church affairs, it was his political ability which was most in evidence. He saw the extraordinary homogeneity of the Irish Catholic population as a value to be de
fended almost at any price, whether from the ravages of the secularists without or from those of the evangelists within. As a result, he disappointed many people who would like to have seen more rapid progress on some key issues—mixed marriages, for example, in which the Irish bishops managed to appear slightly less open even than the Vatican. In this and in a number of similar areas, often related to ecumenism, his caution, and his Northern background, led him seriously to underestimate the preparedness of Irish Catholics for change He had his problems, too, with his brother bishops. The Irish Catholic hierarchy is not, as is generally supposed, a well disciplined body of fighting men, but a loosely-organised confederacy of mediaeval princes. Just as the cardinal tried to steer the wilder members of the clergy and laity towards his view of things, and to acceptance of the need for patience in progress, he also had to contend with some bishops for whom anything that could be described as Progress was too much. He carefully nudged as many of the older bishops as he could towards his new policy of using social rather than religious arguments to back up clerical warnings about such dangers as contraccPtion and divorce—although he once strained the limits of credibility by linking contracePtion with homosexuality. Most of the bishops obliged, with the notable exception, until his death, of the late ArchbishoP McQuaid of Dublin. Others relapsed into a resigned silence. The problems of the succession are substantial. It would be normal for the next archbishop of Armagh to come from the Northern province, but most of the bishoPs there are comparatively recent appointnlentS and do not carry much weight. One of the, few exceptions, Bishop Ph il bin of Down OW Connor (whose present diocese includes Belfast), is a theological and social conservative whose elevation to Armagh is extremely unlikely. He is also an object lesson in the danger of appointing a Southerner to a Northern bishopric: wile.° he was appointed to Down and Connor, his only previous episcopal experience had been in the rural Southern diocese of Clonfert, and he quickly found himself out of ho depth in the turbulent Northern city. Bishop Daly of Ardagh and Clonmacnois. perhaps carries most weight among the fe._ Northern contenders. A protege of both th," Cardinal and Archbishop Morris of Cashel he became a bishop in 1965. He is a coni; servative intellectual who once lectured it. philosophy in Queen's University, Belfasrd His younger namesake, Bishop Edwa,,e Daly of Derry, is more of an outsider. Ot Southerners, only the present ArchbishoP Dublin, Dr Ryan, can be considered a PI:),!,,sd bility. Like the late Cardinal, he has n'ee little pastoral experience, but his influent° within the episcopate is out of proporti°nuis his comparatively brief tenure of office. ".,I° appointment, were it to take place, add a new dimension to the age-old rival' between the sees of Dublin and Armagh.
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