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Ireland Under the Union 1800–1900

The Catholic Church and the growth of nationalism

  • 3 things to know
  • A2 Unit 1

Overview

The Devotional Revolution and Cardinal Cullen, the Church's attitude to secret societies, and its part in Emancipation, Repeal and Home Rule.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

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Key term

How have historians disagreed about the Church's role in Irish nationalism?

Numbers

What was the veto controversy?

Numbers

How did the Church treat the Fenians?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    How did the position of the Catholic Church change across the century?

    Model answer

    The Church began the century as a barely tolerated body dependent on government goodwill and ended it as a wealthy, disciplined institution controlling schools, hospitals and much of public life for three-quarters of the population.

  2. 2

    What was the veto controversy?

    Model answer

    Between 1808 and 1815 British ministers offered Emancipation on condition that the Crown might veto the appointment of Catholic bishops, and the rejection of the offer by O'Connell and the Irish clergy tied the hierarchy to popular politics rather than to the government.

  3. 3

    Why did the parish become the unit of Irish popular politics?

    Model answer

    O'Connell built the Catholic Association and later the Repeal Association on the parish, with the priest collecting the rent and presiding at meetings, and every later mass movement used the same structure.

  4. 4

    Who was Cardinal Paul Cullen?

    Model answer

    Paul Cullen was Archbishop of Armagh from 1849 and of Dublin from 1852 and the dominant churchman of the century, who reorganised discipline, standardised devotion and set his face against secret societies.

  5. 5

    How did the Church treat the Fenians?

    Model answer

    The hierarchy condemned the Fenians as an oath-bound secret society, refused them church burial and the sacraments, and Rome condemned Fenianism by name in 1870, although some younger priests were sympathetic and the movement continued regardless.

  6. 6

    How did the Church come to dominate the selection of nationalist candidates?

    Model answer

    After the franchise was widened in 1884 the parliamentary party chose candidates at county conventions in which clergy sat as delegates, so bishops and priests had a direct voice in who represented Ireland.

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