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Showing posts with label Loyal Orders. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Loyal Orders. Show all posts
Dr John Coulter ✍ As tens of thousands of Orange brethren, sisters, band members and the public celebrate the Battle of the Boyne today, the event should also be used as a springboard to launch a Shared Union offensive aimed at persuading the 26 Counties to rejoin the a new Union of the British Isles.

Much is being made by elements of the Pan Nationalist Front (PNF) as to when they will be in a feasible position to have a Border Poll. While that is unlikely in the foreseeable future, it has not stopped the PNF from launching various projects and ventures to spark debate on Irish unity and what, in their eyes, a united Ireland should look like.

Rather than Unionism playing the constant Ulster Says No to any such debates, the Protestant Unionist Loyalist (PUL) community should start its own project to promote a Shared Union by persuading the 26 Counties of Southern Ireland to ultimately rejoin a new Union of the British Isles.

Whilst at first reading this will ultimately be dismissed by nationalists and republicans as a ‘rejoin the British Empire’ stunt, given the broad global tensions, the Irish republic may soon need to rethink both its relations with the European Union and its supposed military neutrality.

But primarily, how should a Shared Union campaign move forward beyond the theoretical into the practical given that the Irish unity debate is still firmly bogged down in the theoretical, if not downright fantasy politics.

The practical outworking of the Shared Union project should not wait until any future - if ever - Border Poll is called. In fact, it is already underway, and it lies in the hands of the Loyal Orders and marching bands.

Saturday witnessed the traditional Rossnowlagh parade in County Donegal when the Southern border county Orange lodges are joined by many Northern Ireland Orange members and bands for the annual so-called ‘Donegal Dander’.

It is one of the showpieces of the Orange Order in particular and is a far cry from past scenes at Drumcree during confrontations between the Order and the security forces. There are no political speeches at Rossnowlagh; just a route of around a mile, followed by a religious service, plenty of ice cream and a wee walk along the Donegal coastline.

The traditional Rossnowlagh parade is always held on the Saturday prior to the Twelfth to allow Southern lodges and bands to march in the main 12 July demonstrations across Northern Ireland. As 12 July 2026 falls on a Sunday, only annual divine services and church parades will be held that day with the traditional demonstrations scheduled for Monday 13th.

The Rossnowlagh model of Orangeism could be a blueprint for venues, not just across Northern Ireland, but also for an increased number of Orange and Black parades in Southern Ireland.

Whilst the Order is strongest in the Southern border counties of Donegal, Cavan, Monaghan and Leitrim, the Rossnowlagh model could be used as an organisational springboard to launch more Loyal Order parades throughout the 26 Counties, especially deeper into Southern Ireland.

Republicans like to talk a lot about ‘persuading’ Unionists about the fantasy benefits of the mythical united Ireland. But the reality is that Southern Ireland may have to abandon its ‘republic’ status and be ‘persuaded’ that its future as a nation like Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England lies within a new Union of the British Isles.

Military neutrality will have to be binned with the increasing threat from Russia. During the Cold War, the Right-wing National Monday Club pressure group portrayed Southern Ireland as Britain’s Cuba.

History is now repeating itself and its only a matter of time before the Ukrainian conflict becomes a head on war between the West and Russia. In this new impending war, the island of Ireland will play a crucial geographical role.

The Irish Defence Forces have already acquired an impressive peace keeping record serving with the United Nations. But the time has come for Southern Ireland to stop playing the neutrality card and become a full member of NATO.

Politically, too, Southern Ireland needs to realise that it has milked the European Union cow to the maximum and it is only a matter of time before Eire is forced to become a substantial giver to EU coffers rather than a receiver.

Irexit must follow Brexit. If the so-called Celtic Tiger economy goes bust again, there will be no British millions to bail out Southern Ireland. Practically, the 26 Counties also needs to be part of a major power bloc politically in the event of Irexit.

That bloc will be the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA), which represents some 50 plus national and regional parliaments and assemblies across the globe. It must be noted that Ireland was a founder member of the Empire Parliamentary Association - the forerunner of the CPA - in 1911 when all 32 Irish counties were an integral part of the British Empire.

As a Ballymena man myself, there is the old saying - money talks. The PNF can spoof all it likes politically about Irish unity, but the crucial financial bitter medicine which the 26 Counties must swallow - it can never afford to economically run all 32 counties.

Southern Ireland cannot make Irish unity financially viable, but the UK can make a new Union of the British Isles economically effective. Unionists must sell not only the benefits of remaining in the UK, but also the political, economic and military advantages of Southern Ireland becoming an integral part of the Union of the British Isles.

Over the coming days tens of thousands of folk will commemorate the Boyne victory at Orange demonstrations as well as the traditional Sham Fight at Scarva. That 17th century Williamite settlement heralded in the Glorious Revolution and the Protestant Ascendancy.

It is time for the UK to take back what is rightfully and historically our’s. It is time for the Dublin establishment to waken up and smell the poteen - Southern Ireland belongs in the Union.
 
Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter
Dr Coulter has been a journalist since 1978 and is currently a political commentator with GB News.

PUL Community Should Launch Shared Union Offensive!

Dr John Coulter ✍ The repercussions of the Jeffrey Donaldson convictions will rumble on for weeks, perhaps months, to come and while we must never forget the suffering of the convicted sex offender’s victims, the current marching season can provide an opportunity to give Unionism some respite amid all the gloom.

Since Donaldson’s guilty verdicts for numerous sex offences, including rape, against two women when they were children were announced last month, more allegations have surfaced about the disgraced former MP’s private life - especially the allegations aired in the hard-hitting BBC Spotlight documentary.

Donaldson was very well known, not just in Unionist political circles, but also in the Loyal Orders and especially in Christian Church circles. The DUP - a party he once led - has launched a supposedly rigorous investigation into ‘who knew what and when’ about the ex-leader’s private life.

In terms of the specific trial, the testimonies of the two women Donaldson abused when they were children - known as Complainant A and Complainant B - shocked many, many people. As even more post-verdict allegations emerged, hundreds of folk must have been asking the same questions - who was the real Jeffrey Donaldson; who got a hint of these allegations; and who allegedly kept quiet about them or turned a blind eye?

And it will not only be the DUP and the UUP who will have to face these questions. Donaldson also held rank within the Loyal Orders, especially the Orange. Did anyone within the Orders know of Donaldson’s secret persona?

And then there’s the Christian churches and places of worship. Again, like the probing questions which the DUP, UUP, and Loyal Orders will have to address, do any Christian folk who mixed with Donaldson on the preaching and testimony circuits have awkward questions to answer?

However, the bottom line still remains that everyone should keep the victims of Donaldson’s sexual crimes in their thoughts and prayers. Even if you don’t believe in God, you should still spare a thought for Complainants A and B - and any other alleged victims which may emerge in the coming days.

Many folk who knew Donaldson personally may be asking themselves - was there anything, any triggers, which they missed, which could have unmasked his vile behaviour earlier in life?

While we’ve already enjoyed the colour and pageantry of the 1st July Somme commemoration parades, affectionately known in many circles as the Mini Twelfth parades, will the Donaldson saga and the horrors of what Complainants A and B had to endure both as children and during the trial cast a dark shadow over the Twelfth commemorations?

When the Orangemen, Orange women, band members and the public reach the respective demonstration fields next week, will the talk still be about ‘who knew what’ concerning Donaldson, or will the expected heatwave lift spirits - even for a day.

Even more pointedly, given Donaldson’s once high profile in the Loyal Orders, will anyone dare to mention the issue in their demonstration speeches or comments? Or, at the Twelfth parades and the traditional Sham Fight at Scarva, will talk of Donaldson - privately or publicly - become like Voldemort from the Harry Potter series - the name that must never be spoken?

The judge at Donaldson’s trial after the jury gave their guilty verdicts said the former DUP boss could expect a lengthy jail term for his crimes. I wonder how many folk will now utter the prophetic words - “I always knew there was something fishy about Donaldson!”

Will these folks, especially those in politics, the Church and the Loyal Orders, be pondering over their various meetings with Donaldson to see if they could remember a hint about his private life?

Many will ask - did the mask of the good-living, born again Christian husband, well-polished politician ever slip ever so slightly in front of them even on just one wee occasion?

Does anyone in the political arena, Christian Churches and Loyal Orders feel any sense of guilt that they did not spot any hint of Donaldson’s private life and could have formally reported it?

Many, too, especially in Christian and Loyal Order circles, will feel a sense of embarrassment at the court convictions and post-trial allegations that every Christian and Orange Order member has become wrongly tarnished with the same brush.

Is it possible the Orange and Black parades in the coming days could give the Unionist community ‘a wee lift’, or is it a case that the demise of Donaldson has cast such a shadow over Orangeism and the Royal Black Institution that there’s a feeling - let’s just get this year’s Marching Season over and done with as soon as possible.
 
Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter
John is a Director for Belfast’s Christian radio station, Sunshine 1049 FM. 

Loyal Order Parades Could Lift Gloom Of Donaldson Saga For Unionism

Dr John Coulter✍ With the countdown to this year’s annual Twelfth demonstrations well underway, Loyal Order chaplains will have an increasingly important role in preventing what happened in Ballymena, Larne and Portadown from re-igniting across the Province.


In the Loyal Orders - the Orange, Black and Apprentice Boys - as well as the smaller Independent Orange Order each lodge, preceptory and branch has a chaplain whose job it is to read a portion of Scripture during each meeting. 

In the structure of the Loyal Orders, especially the Orange for example, District, County and Grand Lodge also has its specific series of chaplains, many of them ordained clergy from various Protestant denominations. 

My late father, Rev Dr Robert Coulter MBE, was a Deputy County and Deputy Imperial Grand Chaplain in both the Orange and Black orders and also served a three-year term in the Eighties as Assistant Sovereign Grand Master of the Royal Black Institution when then UUP Leader Jim Molyneaux was Sovereign Grand Master. 

My father viewed his roles as chaplain as an extension of his work as a Gospel preacher and used the many annual divine services, Loyal Order missions and Twelfth and Black Saturday demonstrations to preach the Gospel message of Salvation. 

The photo accompanying this specific column pictures my dad, right, resplendent in his Royal Black chaplain’s collarette at a traditional August Last Saturday demonstration beside his fellow Ulster Unionist, Roy Beggs Senior, then MP for East Antrim. 

Given the tensions which the recent period of unrest has revealed in Northern Ireland where the perception is that racism is the new sectarianism, the Loyal Order chaplains have a vital role in keeping the lid on this volatile tinderbox to ensure that the Eleventh Night bonfire celebrations and the Twelfth itself are not hijacked by the genuine Far Right to stoke up more trouble - especially with the PSNI being so cash-strapped and having to rely on British mainland forces to supply additional riot cops if required given the number of police officers who have been unfortunately injured. 

The skeptic might think; if ultra Right-wing trouble makers won’t listen to senior politicians’ appeals for calm, what chance have the ordinary Loyal Order chaplains in trying to persuade hardliners to keep cool heads? 

After all, I recall the terrible events in the summer of 1998 during that year’s Drumcree dispute when three young Catholic brothers died in a loyalist arson attack in Ballymoney in the heartland of my dad’s North Antrim Assembly constituency. 

When dad and two other senior Loyal Order chaplains attempted to get the Orange Order to leave Drumcree Hill as a mark of respect to the three murdered Quinn brothers, they received a death threat from the dissident Loyalist Volunteer Force - the anti-Good Friday Agreement terror gang established by Billy Wright in the aftermath of the Combined Loyalist Military Command ceasefire of 1994. 

The LVF was essentially a breakaway from the Mid Ulster UVF in which Wright had been a leading light. Wright was shot dead inside the Maze prison in December 1997 just over six months before the Quinn massacre in July 1998. 

Dad was the guest religious speaker during the platform proceedings at the Twelfth demonstration in Irvinestown in Co Fermanagh and we had to have a police escort from the Ballygawley roundabout into Irvinestown because of the LVF death threat. 

At that time, too, dad had been elected as an Ulster Unionist MLA for North Antrim, but he was speaking in Irvinestown that 1998 Twelfth in his capacity as an Orange chaplain. 

Dad was going to preach the Gospel of Salvation. However, the speaker before dad was Fermanagh South Tyrone UUP MLA Sam Foster, who, like dad, was a supporter of the Good Friday Agreement.

Foster was heckled non-stop during his speech by supporters of the militant Orange pressure group, the Spirit of Drumcree. We feared the worst. But like Daniel in the Biblical Old Testament story of the man of God who is cast into the dens of lions and the Lord kept the lions’ mouths shut, a similar situation happened at the demonstration field at Irvinestown that day. 

Spirit of Drumcree hecklers who minutes earlier had voiced their strong and loud opposition to Sam Foster, remained absolutely silent during dad’s Gospel sermon. Indeed, the preaching of the Gospel seemed to act as a calming factor on those militants. 

The big advantage is that many Orange lodge chaplains are ordinary men of the people, with clerics tending to take a more open role at District, County and Grand Lodge levels. 

Put bluntly, if the hardmen of loyalism are tending to ignore the Unionist elected representatives, would they listen to people on the ground who are Orange chaplains? Indeed, perhaps the Unionist leadership of the various parties should consult the Orange chaplains - many of whom come from ordinary loyalist working class areas - on how to get their messages across to elements in loyalism who still feel violence is the only vehicle of communication through which to get their voices heard.

Traditionally, it is an ordained cleric who holds a senior chaplaincy within the Orange Order who has the privilege of preaching the sermon at the Twelfth demonstration fields as part of the platform proceedings. 

Perhaps the time has come this year for the Order to tell the various Orange clerics to each give their sermons this Twelfth based on Christ’s Sermon on the Mount where He talked about ‘blessed are the peacemakers’. 

Then again, how many in the working class loyalist community still take the religious part of the platform proceedings seriously enough to listen. But if the Orange chaplains can speak with one voice this summer, they might, just might be able to create a situation whereby the tap of street unrest is turned off permanently. We live in hope. 
 
Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter
John is a Director for Belfast’s Christian radio station, Sunshine 1049 FM. 

Time For Loyal Order Chaplains To Step Up The Mark

Dr John Coulter ✍ While there has been much discussion in recent years about political Unionism’s clear disconnect from the Protestant working class in Northern Ireland, a similar problem is facing the Loyal Orders that it needs to build firm bridges with all of the various Protestant denominations and places of worship.

The Loyal Orders are made up of three organisations - the Orange Order, its senior body, the Royal Black Institution, and the Apprentice Boys of Derry. There is also the smaller Independent Orange Order.

Whether it be an Orange lodge, a Royal Black preceptory or Apprentice Boys branch, there is one major item in the calendar of each organisation - the annual divine service and church parade.

This was an opportunity for the Loyal Orders to clearly demonstrate their Christian principles. It was very much a family occasion. My late father, Rev Dr Robert Coulter MBE, was a Deputy Imperial Grand Chaplain in the Orange and Black, and a Past Assistant Sovereign Grand Master in the Black. He was also a member of the Apprentice Boys.

Dad was always a staunch preacher of the Gospel of Salvation and used annual divine services to tell the congregations about the need to become ‘born again believers’.

On occasions, he would be a main speaker at traditional revivalist missions organised by the Loyal Orders. On many occasions, he would preach at the religious service which formed an integral part of the platform proceedings at Twelfth and Black Saturday demonstrations.

However, while dad and many other Loyal Order chaplains played a key role in cementing the relationships between the Orders and places of worship, I honestly believe it was the disastrous events surrounding the Drumcree protest in Portadown in 1998 which marked a change - indeed a cooling - of the relationship between the Loyal Orders and Protestant places of worship.

Shortly before the Twelfth that year and just a few months after the signing of the historic Good Friday Agreement, the successful referendum in support of the Agreement, and the inaugural Stormont Assembly elections, three Catholic brothers died in an arson attack on their home in Ballymoney.

Dad had been elected as an Ulster Unionist Party Assembly member weeks earlier and Ballymoney was at the heart of his North Antrim constituency.

Interviewed at that time about the murder of the three Catholic brothers, dad said:

We are burning our children on the altar of our hatred. This is the harvest of inflammatory speeches and intransigence on both sides.

When dad and two other senior Loyal Order chaplains called on the Orange Order to leave Drumcree hill as a mark of respect to the dead brothers, they received death threats from a breakaway loyalist death squad.

However, Drumcree generally after that 1998 massacre in Ballymoney was to witness a slow distancing of many in the pro-Union middle class from the Loyal Orders, especially the Orange.

More than a quarter of a century on from those horrific days in 1998, the key question which the Loyal Orders must now address is - given the importance of the annual divine service, can the Loyal Orders say they are welcome in every Protestant place of worship across Northern Ireland?

Without doubt in recent years, the Loyal Orders have indulged in a massive charm offensive with the community to show that events, such as the Twelfth, the Sham Fight in the Co Down village of Scarva, and Black Saturday, are family fun days.

While all these events continue to be well supported by the community, there is a creeping suspicion that the Loyal Orders may not be as well received in certain Protestant places of worship and denominations since the start of the new millennium.

On one hand, there is the problem of theological liberalism and wokeism within Protestantism.

The ecumenical movement still has a strong influence within the Christian faith and many of the Protestant clerics who consider themselves theologically liberal or ecumenical may not want to have a Loyal Order parade to their place of worship, or even an annual divine service given that the Loyal Orders are emphatically Protestants-only organisations.

On the other side of the coin, those on the militant fundamentalist wing of Protestantism can regard the Loyal Orders as sinister secret societies which they perceive as running contrary to Biblical commands to ‘come ye out from amongst them’.

The Loyal Orders, especially the Orange, have always been viewed as the social cement which keeps the various elements of the pro-Union community together. In the lodge room, the upper class businessman could sit shoulder to shoulder with the working class labourer and call each other ‘brother.’

The Loyal Orders have to be pro-active and reach out to places of worship and denominations which in 2025 regard those Orders with an unhealthy dose of suspicion.

With the so-called ‘Big Three’ main denominations within Protestantism - Presbyterianism, Methodism, and the Church of Ireland - suffering a decline in numbers in the pews, perhaps the time has come for the Loyal Orders to reach out to some of the newer and popular Pentecostal movement places of worship.

Has the time come for the Loyal Orders to launch a charm offensive to build bridges with the Faith Mission movement and Christian Workers’ Union network of halls across Northern Ireland?

Could we ever witness a time when the Loyal Orders would also be regularly holding their annual divine services in Gospel Halls run by the Exclusive and Plymouth Brethren denominations?

In much of the last century, the Loyal Orders played a key role in encouraging the pro-Union community to also have faith in the ballot box. It has now been suggested that some 48 per cent of the pro-Union community has snubbed the ballot box in elections.

Could a new plan of action for the Loyal Orders in cementing their relationship with all places of worship would be to encourage Christians from all Protestant places of worship to get registered, and ensure that they physically go to the polling booths on elections days.

Perhaps the banner which the Loyal Orders could promote is - ‘you can’t complain if politicians vote to bring in anti-biblical legislation if you won’t go out to vote for Christian candidates’.

That should be a key theme for those Orange chaplains and clerics working on their Twelfth platform speeches and sermons.
 
Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter
John is a Director for Belfast’s Christian radio station, Sunshine 1049 FM. 

Time For Loyal Orders To Cultivate All Protestant Churches

What route do the Protestant Loyal Orders take if they are to have a continued relevance in Irish society? That’s the key issue which contentious commentator Dr John Coulter addresses in his Fearless Flying Column today.

Loyal Order Dilemma

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