The Five, and Potential Six, Eras of Irish Nationalism

To anyone that has read a broad history of Ireland, there is a noticeable trend that appears. Ever since the British set foot on our shores, there has been a certain mindset among the Irish that can be characterised as ‘I’ll form an alliance with any nation or ideology that frees us from British control’. 

Most nations have a positive personality where they fight for core ideals, Ireland on the other hand has a history of having this negative personality. It draws parallels with Presbyterians in the North, who created their whole personality around being militantly anti-Catholic. This mindset has led the Irish to sometimes follow contradictory ideologies – that usually stem from either France or Rome – as a mechanism for breaking free from British rule. 

A notable example of this is in the 19^th century when the Irish were following both the nationalist liberalism of Wolfe Tone (that had its roots in the anti-clericalism of the French Revolution) and the ultramontanism of Rome (clerical movement that places strong emphasis on the prerogatives of the Pope) simultaneously. This anti-British sentiment has generally subsided and will never again reappear (as we have gained independence), but the effects of this reaction against Britishness is still with us to this day. 

I: Primitive Celtic Christianity Reaction Against the Roman Catholicism of Britain

Although we may not want to admit this, Ireland was arguably a barbaric nation for much of its pre-Chhristian existence. What is unique about the Christianisation of Ireland is that it wasn’t papal directed. The first notable proselytiser to Ireland was St. Patrick, who had a vision from God to convert Ireland, not the Pope. 

This led Ireland to follow their own Celtic version of Christianity that wasn’t much different from their lifestyle under Celtic paganism. Tribal warfare was endemic; sons often succeeded fathers as abbots of monasteries, which were often filled with men that didn’t even take monastic vows; monasteries sometimes even attacked each other with their own armies; clerical concubinage was tolerated; there were even laymen at the head of the Irish Church. 

Saint Malachy’s biographer describes the people of Ulster as not “men” but “beasts”. Never had Malachy found “men so shameless in morals, so wild in rites, so impious in their faith, so barbarous in their laws, so stubborn in their discipline, so unclean in their life. They were Christian in name; in fact they were pagans”.

A Papal-Anglo alliance occurred to fix the barbarism of the Celtic Church in the form of a reforming crusade; the Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland began in 1169 with approval of Rome under the English Pope Adrian IV. What was supposed to happen was that the Irish would reform to the civilised Anglo way of life and the clerics would abide by canon law. Not only did this not happen, the Anglos started assimilating into the primitive Gaelic way of life. This stubborn mentality against any outsider interference was held by the Irish up until the Protestant Reformation, when the unity of Christendom was questioned.

II: Catholic Reaction Against the Newly Anointed Protestant Monarch of Britain

With the commencement of the Protestant Reformation, the Gaelic Chieftains soon realised that they had strong allies in Catholic Europe for overthrowing British rule; so long as they gave allegiance to the papacy. With the British monarch now a Protestant – and taking into account Irelands anti-British mentality – the Irish soon became unquestioning in their allegiance to Rome. The Catholic powers were only delighted to start another front in the religious wars against the Protestant heretics. Irish clerics had a history of being indifferent to Roman direction, this generally didn’t stop, they only gave affirmations of Papal loyalty to keep the Curia happy.

It is a peculiarity of history that Ireland may have turned Protestant if Britain remained Catholic, in the hope of allying themselves with Protestant powers to overthrow their rulers; and also to show their disdain for anything British. The Irish announcing themselves as Catholic also gave them moral justification for overthrowing British rule. The papacy during Queen Elizabeth’s rule dispensed all Catholics from their allegiance to the British Crown, along with the Jesuits creating the theory of tyrannicide, which justified the assassination of Queen Elizabeth. 

The Irish staged many rebellions against British rule with the majority of them not only getting approval from other Catholic nations, but also getting ships, soldiers, and guns supplied to them to aid their war effort. Notable rebellions financed by either France, Spain, or Rome include the Nine Years’ War (1593–1603), Irish Confederate Wars (1642–52), and the Williamite War (1689–91).

III: Liberal Reaction Against British Monarchism

With the onset of the masonic French Revolution, a new European spirit emerged. The French Revolution could be described as an inauguration to the world of its eventual domination by Masonic naturalism. It replaced the rights of God with the rights of Man. It espoused two erroneous doctrines, the first one being that the government derives its authority from the people, not from God; the other doctrine being that the vote of the people determines what is right and just, instead of God (working through the Church he founded). This reaction is in complete opposition to the previous ‘Catholic reaction’ I mentioned above.

From these two fallacious doctrines, it is not hard to see how this nefarious spirit – which of course benefits the powerful at the expense of the weak – divulged into nationalism and liberalism. The Protestant Wolfe Tone seeing what was happening in France (and also America) sought to emulate it in Ireland. As monarchs are not elected and claim their rights are from God, they must be abolished. Religion (especially the Catholic Church) must also be destroyed for that reason too. Britain being both a monarchy and a confessional state – also considering Ireland’s anti-British spirit – it is no surprise that liberalism would be a good fit for a reaction against Britain.

This is where the concept of Ireland as a republic with religious indifferentism as a cornerstone started. These naturalistic concepts made their way into our supposedly Catholic constitution. Irishmen knowing that they could ally with the new French Republic against the British state staged many rebellions with the help of France, or otherwise, most notably the Irish Rebellion of 1798, Young Irelander Rebellion of 1848, and the most famous of them all, the 1916 Easter Rising.

IV: Ultramontanist Reaction Against the Protestantism of Britain

This reaction can be seen as a more fervent continuation of the second ‘Catholic reaction’, but this time it had to deal with both the heresy of Protestantism and Masonic naturalism. It started with the introduction of Cardinal Paul Cullen into the Irish Hierarchy in 1850 and ended with the death of Archbishop John Charles McQuaid and Fr Denis Fahey over a hundred years later. This reaction battled it out with the liberalism of Wolfe Tone for the hearts of the Irish during the 19^th century. With the concept of the ‘priest in politics’ – coming from the tribalism against the Protestant Ascendancy and encouraged by Daniel O’Connell – gave the clergy of Ireland a high standing among the people, as they were successful in material attainment for the people. 

Nationalism was high among the Irish people, which was worrying to the prelate Paul Cullen, who saw Masonic nationalism in Italy invade the Papal States and install the Masonic values explained above. It was his task to guide this nationalism into an anti-Protestantism movement instead of a Wolfe Tone inspired anti-British movement. Based mainly on the unceasing work of Cullen alone in guiding the hierarchy, Ireland at the turn of the 20^th century was the most Catholic nation in Europe. Although liberalism won over many hearts with the execution of the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising, Ultramontanism was still a force to be reckoned with as Bunreacht na hÉireann did have strong Catholic elements to it, even if it did also encompass some liberal elements.

With Irish independence, the spirit of anti-Britishness faded as the decades went on, as we ceased to be ruled by London; however the spirits of the age still remained. Catholicism was a major guiding force in Irish life up until the ‘60s and ‘70s. The Archbishop at the time, John Charles McQuaid, only discovered too late in a survey he conducted on the beliefs of the different classes that the Church had fallen out of favour with the upper-class – although it was still strong with the general population. This could be attributed partly to the fact that primary and secondary schools were operated by the Church, while the ‘godless’ third-level colleges were irreligious.

With the introduction of mass media in the 1960s, which is by default controlled by the upper-class, the anti-Catholic opinions they held were soon propagandised onto the populace. Another contributing factor to Catholicism’s downfall would be the liberal spirit created by Vatican II. The council itself doesn’t repudiate any traditional teaching but the way it was propagandised by the media made it seem as if it did. This Vatican II spirit turned the Church into just a place for people that needed a spiritual outlet, and turned God into a sort of a cheerleader for their actions; which inevitably results in people deifying themselves, which completes the Masonic goal of turning man into God.

V: Americanist Reaction Against the British Common Law

As we are literally living in the current year of ‘progress’, it is hard to understand a time when European, not American affairs, dominated our culture. This transition started during the World Wars when America exploded in prosperity while the rest of Europe had to rebuild their societies. Notable events for this transition include the world reserve currency being switched from the British pound to the US dollar in 1920, and the US being seen as the saviours of the world for defeating Germany twice in the World Wars. America started to be seen as a model for the world to follow, especially when it came to the Irish intelligentsia.

As our governmental ruling class were dominated by the rebels involved in the liberal rebellion of 1916 (which as we’ve noted earlier has its roots in the anti-clericalism of the French Revolution) and our literary sphere was dominated by Protestants, it is no surprise that they sought to discard the Church and create an Americanist system in Ireland. An example of this Americanist push is laid out in further detail in this article on the Supreme Court. Our first Chief Justice successfully implemented putting American customs into our court system, and our Taoiseach Seán Lemass even secretly told two influential Supreme Court judges to interpret the constitution like the Americans do (i.e. conform the constitution to their opinions).

As our ruling class was now following the lead of America, what they didn’t realise was that America was turning its back on its Americanist ideology and turning towards new theories devised by the Jewish intellectuals of the Frankfurt School. These theories devised by these intellectuals go by many names: Western Marxism, neo-Marxism, Cultural Marxism, Bio-Leninism. It is undoubtedly a Marxist theory as it uses the oppressed-oppressor dynamic to agitate and achieve political control, but the masses have been led on to believe that this is liberalism; and the reaction to this supposed ‘liberalism’ is the liberal nationalism described above. 

Will There Be a Sixth Reaction?

As I don’t want to go past the bounds of this article – it being about the five reactions against Britain, if you want to read more about the ideology of our new régime I’d suggest reading these longform articles. The Americanist reaction is the last surviving anti-British reaction in Irish history. If we look around this is plainly obvious. The American imperialist culture dominates everything; most music, film, television, politics, news seems to be American. 

This Americanised culture devolves into lunacy when we see these decadent yuppies stage a BLM protest. They are protesting a black man being killed, even though it didn’t happen in Ireland, Gardaí do not carry guns, Gardaí have never shot a black man before, and black people only make up 2% of the population. Going forward, the only reaction I can see is an anti-American reaction against these virtue-signallers (not in the anti-Trump form though), that will leave people embracing either Irish or British media. One can only hope this reaction occurs, and occurs soon.