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Is
it just me, or are there any others out there, sick
and tired of hearing the bleatings of Fr Sean McManus
and wishing he would just go back to what he is supposed
to do, which is being a Catholic priest ministering
to the needs of his flock of sheep?
Many
years ago, when the bold Fr Mac got the go-ahead from
the Archbishop of Corpus Christi in Texas to set up
shop in Washington, there was at least a certain rationale
behind his decision to become a full-time lobbyist
on the issue of the North. The Irish government certainly
wasn't breaking its back on behalf of Northern Nationalists,
the British ruled Washington unchallenged as far as
Irish issues were concerned and the Provos, then in
a revolutionary phase, didn't want to lobby and even
if they had wanted to, were incapable of doing anything
constructive.
Even
so, Fr McManus's Irish National Caucus has had a mixed
history. It has claimed the credit for bringing the
issue of equal employment and the MacBride Principles
to the fore in the US when everyone knows it was really
the Financial Comptroller's office in New York City
that really made it a front-burner topic.
Aside
from that disputed claim and raising lots of money
from Irish-Americans to fund his rather nice lifestyle
in Washington, it is difficult to work out exactly
what Fr McManus's contribution has been to anything
over all these years, aside from being a cheer leader
on the side lines for whichever party promised to
produce the fattest checks.
Even
Fr McManus's fund-rasing raised a few eyebrows. These
days it would be impossible to slide a cigarette paper
between the INC and Sinn Fein in relation to the North,
but those of us with long memories can remember when
he and the Provos were at daggers drawn in their competition
for Yankee dollars, a competition that caused some
in the Provos to mutter and ask dark questions about
just exactly who some of Fr McManus's colleagues in
the INC were really working for.
The
reality is that whatever use there might have been
for Fr McManus and his INC has long gone. The Irish
government and the Provos peddle the peace process
much more effectively than he ever could and let's
face it, no-one who matters in America cares a whit
about what Fr McManus thinks or says about anything.
Compelling
evidence of the INC's utter irrelevance has come recently
in Fr McManus's lobbying for the repeal of legislation
in Britain that forbids a Catholic from ascending
to the English throne. In the name of all that matters,
what the heck has that got to do with Ireland, North
or South? Unless, that is, Fr McManus is trying to
prepare the ground for Sinn Fein MP's to take their
seats at Westminster by swearing an oath of allegiance
to a more acceptable British monarch? If so, he should
come clean. But was this what the INC was really set
up to do? I think not! Time to go back to the bells
and smoke, Father, and to the archdiocese of Corpus
Christi, wherever that is!
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