Devout Christians

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Are Travellers the last remaining Devout Christians in the country? I personally only know 4 members of the travelling community, all lovely people, but all extremely religious to an extent that they pray for you if you give them a hand with any simple job, has the religion been drained out of the rest of the country completely?

Larbre34

You have to put the situation in context.

The Traveller Community would never have had much truck with the Catholic system and orthodoxy, going way back to the emancipation era. In the same way that they don't participate in a good number of societal institutions in the same way that settled people traditionally do.

Theirs is a deeply felt personal, quite superstitious faith, maintained on a direct line to the Holy Trinity, Mary Mother of Jesus and the Saints.

There would be priests that work with them, Chaplains to the Community, as the sacraments are very important to them, as is the religious funeral, albeit with lots of trappings your typical settled Catholic mightn't see too kindly.

There is even a large annual summer pilgrimage of Travellers to the Shrine at Knock, such is that reverance of Mary.

You suggest that religion may have been drained out of the rest of the Country, but remember, it was the settled community for the most part that suffered the injustices of the institutional Church over the last century. That was no small thing in the huge decline of the RCC

It simply registered less with Travellers, because their kids and loved ones weren't at those places where abuse happened; schools, detention centres, mother and baby homes etc. They would always keep their own within their community.

And anyway, Travellers were so used to wholesale abuse and disdain that it hardly would have registered with them as unusual, had the Church done wrong by them too.

And so, a strong faith is still fairly evident in that community, by contrast with an almost fully secularised settled element.

Dial Hard

Does anyone else ever look at an OP's post history and find themselves utterly unable to decide if they're an absolutely masterful troll playing a very, very, long, slow game, or just a bit special???

con747

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058331469/devout-christians

Would the 4 you know be Pat Joyce, his brother Pat Joyce and their sons Pat Joyce?

Mrs OBumble

Ahh, you have forgotten the Burkes: They're more devoted to their faith than any Traveller I know.

Also google "non denominational church ireland" to learn about some other churches you probably never heard of. Most of their members are more committed than 99% of Catholics.

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Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121621759#Comment_121621759

The following week at a different shop after returning to returning to my table my jacket was placed on another chair & a block of cheese was placed beside my pint

Sounds like one of Jesus' less successful miracles that didn't make the final edit of the Bible.

Slightly Kwackers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058331469/devout-christians

Call me a cynical soul, but there are vast quantities of Evangelicals in the States that will happily pray for you too.

Dollars help the flow of prayers, but I expect at a pinch, euro might do the trick also.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058331469/devout-christians

Can't really call yourself a christian if you think there's only nine commandments.

bnt

Could Ireland be heading for an Enlightenment at last? We're only 300 years behind France and Scotland.

TinyMuffin

And the angles. Don’t forget the angles.

Victor

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/munster/arid-41307634.html

...

taxAHcruel

Don't forget those ones with the dodgy microphone and speakers who stand around the oconnell street end of Henry Street talking all Fire and Brimestone. There has to be a good 3 or 4 of those to include in the OPs little Census here :)

The Survey of Faith by the Bishops Congress Convention thing in Ireland a few years back was great for a giggle. There are significant portions of people who identify as Catholic who say they do not believe in an After Life, or some a Virgin Birth, or some that consecrating the wafers does anything - and some who even say they do not believe in a god. What aspect they are using to identify as Catholic or Christian therefore is a little opaque to me. But sure anyone can identify as anything these days with few if any of the attributes normally associated with a given Label.

Slightly Kwackers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121623496#Comment_121623496

Maybe I have it wrong, but wasn't it something to do with some bloke with a tumbler of water testing to see if you were soluble?

If you didn't melt and run down the grid you were in.

taxAHcruel

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121623532#Comment_121623532

Mad. You just made me remember an old TV show called "Alien Nation". I don't think I have thought about that show since around 1991. In it the aliens who came to our planet and lived with humanity - were allergic to salt water as if it was the most potent of acid. And they did test your humanity or alien status at times by going at you with a tumbler of salt water :)

EmmetSpiceland

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121623560#Comment_121623560

It was a film before it was a tv show. James Caan is in it. Worth checking out.

Deebles McBeebles

Sounds a bit like First Wave, the aliens looked exactly like humans but if they ingest salt, full on heroin high.

RobbieTheRobber

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121623102#Comment_121623102

Imagine being 604 wrong.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121621759#Comment_121621759

Different burkas compared to the oul Taliban though

EmmetSpiceland

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121623819#Comment_121623819

Didn’t watch ‘First Wave’ but I do remember watching Deer Hunter-esque Russian roulette with an automatic saltwater spray in the ‘Alien Nation’ tv show as a kid.

Cheddar Bob

Recovering addicts can sometimes be found posting some wildly religious sh1t.

And McGregor waffles on about God the odd time, possibly because his sport is heavily American and that's still the done thing (there seems to be few outwardly athiest American celebrities even today. A Presidental candidate admitting to athiesm agnosticism would be the kiss of death to any campaign, there's not a chance Sanders is a believer and I'd say Trump hadn't seen the inside of a church from his wedding until he decided to run in 2015)

Brian?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121621424#Comment_121621424

Be the Jaysus that’s a great post. More power to you.

I’d also add they’re not real Christians in the way most would be. Irish people used to be the same. We replaced our pagan gods with Saints, most Christians wouldn’t worship saints and Mary like Irish Catholics.

An equivalent is the cult of Mary in Mexico. Santa something. Can’t remember it.

Speedsie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121625173#Comment_121625173

There's Santo Diame in Brazil which is quite Mary centric, though not necessarily Christian.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santo_Daime