Fr. SEAN Mc MANUS, Sean@IrishNationalCaucus.org
Fr. Mc Manus is founder and president of the Irish National Caucus. He said today: “The coronation of King Charles and the words of the oath he swore — solemnly, formally, and as King — raises anew the issue of state-sponsored anti-Catholicism in the UK and Northern Ireland. The Guardian in a 2001 editorial highlighted this issue, describing ‘the basis for the modern-day monarchy — an act of parliament which explicitly discriminates against Catholics.'”
Charles said while kneeling before clergy: “I Charles do solemnly and sincerely in the presence of God profess, testify, and declare that I am a faithful Protestant, and that I will, according to the true intent of the enactments which secure the Protestant succession to the Throne, uphold and maintain the said enactments to the best of my powers according to law.” See video.
Mc Manus added: “If the sectarian words of the King’s oath don’t mean much to the average person, their anti-Catholic resonance mean everything to a significant number of extreme Orange/Protestant/Unionist supremacists in Northern Ireland.” But he added, it was not the the Irish Protestants “who created Northern Ireland, but the London Parliament by its ‘Partition Act’ (December 23, 1920), with the assent of the King of England, George VI, the grandfather of King Charles.”
In his piece in the Irish Echo, “Don’t mention anti-Catholicism in the North,” Mc Manus wrote: “In the early 80s, I launched a campaign to expose the constitutional foundation of anti-Catholicism in Ireland: The Act of Settlement, 1701 — the foundation stone of the Royal Family.
“This act still today forbids a Catholic from being the monarch. It’s like having a provision in the U.S. Constitution barring a black person from being president.”
See IPA news release from 2017: “DUP Deal Highlights British Anti-Catholicism, Threatens Peace in Ireland.”
