GAA president Nickey Brennan has expressed "great disappointment" that more Protestant schools have not opened their doors to Gaelic games since the association lifted the ban on soccer and rugby. Patsy McGarry, Religious Affairs Correspondent, reports.
Agreeing that while there was a minority tradition of Protestant involvement in the GAA, he felt the biggest factor in whether people had an interest in Gaelic games would be where they went to school "and the dominant sport in Church of Ireland schools would probably be rugby," he said.
"There have been very few instances of Protestant schools where Gaelic games have made any headway, if any."
Since the ban was lifted, "rather ironically, it has been very much the other way round, actually, where many Catholic/GAA schools have embraced other codes more so," he added.
In relation to the playing God Save the Queen in Croke Park today, he could "categorically state there was no tension in relation to that . . . both associations [ IRFU and FAI] have been extremely understanding of the sensitivities of the occasion and I know they will do nothing to upset people".
But he agreed the visit of the England rugby team to Croke Park today "evoke residual memories of Bloody Sunday."
The GAA would be more nationalist and more aligned with Catholicism than any other Christian denomination, he agreed, in an interview in the current issue of the Church of Ireland Gazette.
He believed when it came to playing football with a local team these days nobody cared about one's religion. Indeed such was the debate among Catholics about worship today that "it might very well be [the case] that there are people involved in teams and they may very well be Catholics in name only".
He felt "if a young lad from a Protestant community really wanted to play Gaelic games he may feel intimidated because his own community might not see that as the right thing to do".
He had met a Democratic Unionist Party politician and discussed the issue of playing football on the Sabbath, he added.
"From our point of view, the GAA traditionally always played its matches on Sunday, but that has changed considerably."
He was of the view that when the Lord said to rest on the Sabbath, "I don't think he meant you should sit in a chair and do nothing. Rest was also about enjoying yourself and about meeting your friends and about socialising and an important part of socialising was sport."