While there is a significant section of the DUP wants to return to the Assembly and restore devolved government, even the dogs in the street know that whilst publicly the issue is the Windsor Framework, privately the stumbling block to any return is who controls the DUP - the devolutionist wing around party boss Jeffrey Donaldson, or the Westminster faction around Lord Dodds, Sammy Wilson and Ian Paisley.
The pan nationalist front of Sinn Fein, the SDLP and Alliance certainly wants devolution restored. There are many in the Unionist community, too, who want Stormont up and running, especially within the UUP.
If the DUP rejects any future proposals from the British Government, would the Westminster establishment be prepared to introduce controversial legislation which allows MLAs who want to make Stormont work the chance to resume their seats.
This option would be much better than see Stormont permanently mothballed again, as in 1972, to be replaced by either Direct Rule from London, or some form of Joint Authority involving the Dublin administration.
Perhaps there is one last ace card which can be played to save Stormont - a united front by all the Christian Churches. Whilst we may live in an increasingly secular society, a lot of people are still involved in church life. This has been an issue I addressed two years ago.
With a UK General Election expected next year, and with less folk from the pro-Union community putting their trust in the ballot box, there is the real danger that some DUP Commons seats could fall to some shade of green in the pan nationalist front.
Stormont’s future depends on who will rule the DUP. Put bluntly, will the DUP put Province before party unity? Earlier this year, I penned another column in which I suggested the Christian Churches should form a mobilisation front to get voters not only registered, but organised to turn out on polling day.
But with the situation deteriorating to the point that the Assembly may not be restored by later this month and the DUP may wish to extend its Stormont boycott until at least after the General Election, the spectre of long-term Joint Authority looms ever larger.
The problem with any influence of the Christian Churches is that as soon as their representatives meet together to form some kind of united influential front, they start arguing over petty theological matters.
Numerous gatherings of church groups already exist, such as the Irish Council of Churches (ICC), Evangelical Alliance (EA), the Caleb Foundation, and the Evangelical Protestant Society (EPS).
Whilst the ICC would be perceived to represent the liberal wing of Irish Christianity, the EA as its name clearly suggests would be evangelical in theology, whilst Caleb and the EPS would be largely fundamentalist.
Whilst these groups would largely represent the majority of shades of theological Christian opinion in Northern Ireland, trying to get these various groups to work together is a challenge in itself.
In hard practical terms, any proposal for the ICC and Caleb to join forces to get the British Government to pass legislation to restore Stormont would be shot down before it had ever left the runway!
Could the leaders of the four main Christian denominations in Northern Ireland - Presbyterian, Church of Ireland, Methodist and Catholic - take a delegation to 10 Downing Street to directly lobby PM Sunak as part of a ‘Restore Stormont United Front’?
If the Westminster establishment can push ahead with the legacy legislation in the face of strong opposition, surely too, that same Westminster establishment could get cross-party support for a law which would allow those MLAs who want devolved government restored (included any potential rebel DUP MLAs) to set up power-sharing?
In short, how many of the existing 90 MLAs would sign up to this potential legislation? Opponents of such a plan would point out that the so-called ‘Big Four’ denominations do not speak for all Christian Churches and places of worship in Northern Ireland.
For example, there have been suggestions that some Pentecostal churches and churches from the Reformed Presbyterian denomination (also known as the Covenanters) have been heavily infiltrated by supporters of the TUV.
Irish Christianity could find itself in the unenviable position that the ‘Big Four’ go to Downing Street to ask for specific legislation to kickstart Stormont, while hardline evangelicals and fundamentalists attached to other Christian denominations form an equally strong delegation to demand that there be no Stormont until the Windsor Framework is entirely scrapped.
The bottom line is that Northern Ireland society needs Stormont restored. The Christian Churches now have a tremendous opportunity to assert their authority by lobbying for special kickstart laws.
But the big question still remains - will the Christian Churches have the courage of their convictions to demand such legislation. Its not just the future of Stormont which hangs in the balance, but the very influence of the Christian faith itself.
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Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter Listen to commentator Dr John Coulter’s programme, Call In Coulter, every Saturday morning around 10.15 am on Belfast’s Christian radio station, Sunshine 1049 FM. Listen online. |
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