Religions and Conflict
Paul Flesher

The Times of London had a magazine supplement last weekend about "Faith" at the Millennium. One writer extolled the virtues of religions as peace-makers, even though he admitted the role of religions in war and strife. That got me thinking about the role religions play in social conflicts. Even before John Lennon's song "Imagine," we have had a popular notion that religions start trouble, that they cause conflicts. Upon reflection, however, I think that while religions sometimes may do this, they often merely give their names to the combatants. They thus become symbols of a conflict, and perhaps weapons in it, but not its root causes. Let me explain with an example.

Back in August, I spent some time in Northern Ireland, the home of a conflict that has pitted Catholics and Protestants against each other for centuries. While there I saw a prosperous and quiet country, with no signs of unusual religious activity. In fact, apart from the usual church worship services, the only religious activity I saw was a young sidewalk evangelist in a seaside resort exhorting people to follow Jesus.

The present conflict in Northern Ireland has its roots in political and economic oppression. From the reign of Henry II, England ruled Ireland. In the twelfth century, both countries were Catholic. England planted the seeds of conflict when it took the land from the native Irish and gave it first to English settlers and later to Scottish farmers brought over by King James I. This constituted more than just the transfer of land, for political power followed the land. Those without land, the Irish, had no power.

After the English became Protestant during the Reformation, the conflict took on religious overtones. But although the English used religion as a form of repression against the Irish, the root problem remained economic oppression. Britain's forced closure of the monasteries, for instance, brought more wealth and land to the English.

With the founding of the Irish Free State in 1922 and Northern Ireland's remaining in England's United Kingdom, the conflict lost its obvious national links, and the two sides became identified as Catholic and Protestant. The differences remained nationalist and political, but the parties to the conflict now had religious designations.