EVEN BEFORE composer James MacMillian made his well publicised attack on anti-Catholic bigotry in Scotland the issue had had some media exposure south of the border. In particular controversy over the behaviour of several prominent Rangers supporters had aroused discussion on the topic. CAMPBELL MCGREGOR reports: OPPOSITION to the Roman Catholic Church has a long history in Scotland. Up to 1986 it was part of the official doctrine of the Church of Scotland that the Pope is the Antichrist, and that the Roman Catholic mass is a form of idol-worship.
However in the past two centuries this issue has been dominated by the large immigration of Irish Catholics to the industrial towns of the central belt, although smaller numbers of Catholics have been immigrants from Lithuania and the Catholic enclaves in the Highlands.
Some Northern Irish Protestants have also migrated to Scotland, bringing with them the traditions and attitudes of that community. A significant role was played by shipyard workers who came just before the First World War. This has been an explosive mixture.
The traditions of Orangeism include singing songs about the Battle of the Boyne and the siege of Derry, seen as Protestant victories over the Catholics, though actually it was not as simple as that. (For example the Pope welcomed William of Orange's victory). Curiously, they do not sing about the Williamite victories in Scotland at the battles of Dunkeld and Cromdale.
Racial abuse
Particularly controversial is the song "Billy Boys" which includes the line "We're up to our knees in Fenian blood, surrender or you'll die" ("Fenian" is used as a term of racial abuse for a Catholic).
Anti-Catholic bigotry has been promoted not only through the Orange Order itself but through Protestant football clubs - especially Rangers FC.
Although always seen as a Protestant team Rangers did not have a rigid ban on Catholic players until WWI, and it has recently come to light that they played two Catholics by mistake in the 1950s!
During the seventies one supporter who tried to get onto the board of directors was blocked because he had married a Catholic, even though she had been dead for 20 years. Players who married Catholics were squeezed out, and everyone knew that their occasional claim that Rangers did not have a ban on Catholics was a barefaced lie. One possibly apocryphal story is. that Danny McGrain, the leading Celtic and Scotland player, was not signed by Rangers because he had what sounded like a Catholic name, even though he was really a Protestant who had supported Rangers as a boy.
Credit certainly goes to current manager Graham Souness for ending this ban, but he could not change the whole ethos of the club single-handed. What surprised some people about Donald Findlay's recent episode was not that anti-Catholic songs were sung, but that this was done not by a few mindless bigots who did not know any better, but by an educated man, one of Scotland's leading lawyers. MacMillian has done the left a favour by bringing this discussion out into the open - hopefully discussion will lead to better ideas as to how to challenge this legacy of walk" slogan, which allowed the British to •present the issue as one of community relations. Both these aspects were aimed at alliances with the Catholic bourgeoisie, and it is a significant comment about that policy that the RUC arrests followed an editorial in the main Catholic daily, the News, supporting British policy and denouncing the residents' protests.
When the British moved against the Ormeau road residents, massive demobilisation had already taken place. Behind the scenes the Sinn Fein leadership turned their faces against broader mobilisations and protest was restricted to largely apolitical rioting in Derry. This was followed by a new lurch to the right, when Sinn Fein denounced the rioters.
This is a major shift, because it puts the responsibility for violence on those being oppressed, rather than the sectarians and the state forces oppressing them.
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•by promising them their march down the Gervaghy road. A problem is that they will speak to no-one, demanding their undiluted right to sectarian privilege. The suggestion is that representatives of the Orangemen could speak to representatives of the residents and that this would be enough to force a march down the road.
This success would enable the British to concentrate on a diplomatic process where they already have Sinn Fein where they want them, having successfully demolished action on the streets and put in place structures like the parades commission that would effectively outlaw protest.
Either the resistance will be put down, or it will break free of the restrictions posed by Sinn Fein and make possible a genuine political resistance to the peace process.
Activists in Britain and elsewhere have an important responsibility to send messages of support to strengthen that possibility.
Still waiting for change