The Politics of Sexual Difference: The Enduring Influence of the Catholic Church

Abstract

In order to understand anything about Irish society and the politics of sexual difference in Ireland today, it is necessary to understand the enduring influence of the Roman Catholic Church. “The Church,” as it is usually called, has wielded considerable power for centuries in this country. In the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century, the drastic restrictions imposed upon the rights of Catholics by the British government through the Catholic Relief Acts merely served to strengthen the Church’s position in society, and the will of the people to practice their chosen faith. Catholicism thus became the religion of social and political defiance, of nationhood and patriotic identity—inevitably, this makes for a potent cocktail.