Accusing Dr Ian Paisley of displaying rank hypocrisy in condemning the state of church burnings in the North, Mr David Norris (Ind) said: "That man, more than any other, has fuelled the fire of sectarianism, and until he eats his words of antagonism towards the papacy and towards the Roman Catholic Church, no one will take his condemnation seriously. He gave those people a motivation for doing it."
Mr Norris said it was time the Church of Ireland, of which he was a member, told the Orange Order it was not entitled to use church property until it disinfected itself of the sectarian elements of its procedures, rituals and handbook and its nasty anti-papal language.
There was universal condemnation of the arson attacks which were described by the Leader of the House, Mr Donie Cassidy as a "new low". His hope was that the strength and resolve of the people of Northern Ireland would show, once again, that good will would triumph over evil.
Mr Maurice Manning (FG) said that even by the standards of depravity witnessed in the North over a period of three decades, a new line had been crossed. It was his earnest hope that this act of provocation would not attract the kind of response that it was intended to generate.