Culmination 2009
It is all too often forgotten that immediately before James Craig (Northern Ireland’s prime minister 1921–1940) proclaimed that “all I boast of is that we are a Protestant parliament and a Protestant state”, it was preceded by his asking Northern Ireland’s critics "to remember that in the south they boasted of a Catholic state". But, in an overwhelmingly Catholic Ireland, the old Unionist taunt that ‘Home Rule would mean Rome Rule’ had no force because Rome Rule had become more a cause for pride than for shame. . . . . . In Pat Rabbitte's words, the Vatican seems "to misunderstand the earthquake they have set off in society. Whatever happens, it is the end of the age of deference."
Prof. Ronan Fanning, Professor Emeritus of Modern History (UCD)Read more about this topic: Rome Rule