We may not be a sectarian State but will someone please tell that to RTÉ?Wesley Boyd argues for the abolition of the Angelus.
If David Trimble wants evidence to support his contention that the Republic is a sectarian State he need only point to the daily broadcast of the Angelus on RTÉ.
Seven parishioners from Ballyhaunis in Co Mayo have participated in a revamped version for RTÉ Television according to Lorna Siggins in her Out of the West column in The Irish Times recently. It was not stated whether the parishioners are of the Protestant, Jewish or Islamic faiths but one presumes, given the nature of the Angelus, they are Roman Catholics.
The Ulster Unionist leader's comments may be exaggerated and self-serving but is it not time, in a changing Ireland, that our national broadcasting service abolished the transmission of the Angelus on television (and radio) instead of making another attempt to embellish its presentation?
The Constitution guarantees freedom of conscience and the free profession and practice of religion, subject only to public order and morality.
It is doubtful if it envisaged a practice unique to one religion being imposed daily on the population at large, including those of us who do not subscribe to that religion.
Yet RTÉ, alone of all the broadcasters in the state, persists in relaying the Angelus. It was introduced to radio on the Feast of the Assumption, August 15th, in the Holy Year of 1950 and was adopted tamely by the new television channel when it came on air on New Year's Eve in 1961.
The decision to broadcast the Angelus ran counter to a long-standing piece of Ministerial advice. Soon after 2RN - the seed from which RTÉ sprouted - came on the radio waves in 1926 its Director of Broadcasting, Seamus Clandillon, consulted the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs, Mr J.J. Walsh, about a request he had received from a priest. The priest wanted an announcement carried about a public lecture, which he was to give in Dublin about the work of the Church in Africa.
Walsh advised Clandillon "it would be safe to steer clear, as far as possible, of religion and politics." (The announcement was not carried, although the priest had offered to pay for it.)
In 1949 the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr John Charles McQuaid, suggested that the Angelus should be transmitted daily on Radio Éireann, according to the director of broadcasting, Maurice Gorham in his book, Forty Years of Irish Broadcasting. The Archbishop proposed that the bell of the Pro-Cathedral in Dublin should be relayed but stipulated that the first stroke should be heard precisely at the start of the hour.
To achieve this degree of accuracy elaborate mechanism had to be designed and installed to link the master clock in the GPO, itself controlled from Dunsink Observatory, to a microphone and amplifier on the roof of the Pro-Cathedral. This ensured that the first stroke of the bell was synchronised with the last pip of Radio Éireann's time signal.
The live relay has been replaced by a recording to allow some flexibility to programme output, although the early evening bulletin on television still has to carry the unwieldy title of Six One News.
It can be of no comfort to RTÉ that the rigidly controlled broadcasting services of totalitarian states, particularly in the Islamic world, also feel obliged to minister to the faithful. By the same coin the Angelus identifies RTÉ exclusively with a single church, albeit the predominant one in this country.
DURING the period of more than 20 years that I served on the executive board of RTÉ, no serious consideration was given to the question of whether the continuing transmission of the Angelus was relevant to the evolving pluralism of a multi-cultural and multiracial Ireland.
My colleagues were, without exception, all from the Catholic tradition; some were of conservative conviction, some enthusiastically ecumenical, some disinterested, some agnostic. None ever took the initiative in raising the question.
When I did - infrequently - the cautious shibboleths were uttered: "Sure it does no harm"; "People regard it as a time signal"; "It lets them know that the news is coming up"; "You'd only annoy more people than you'd please."
Like a cow on the banks of the Ganges, the Angelus was a sacred entity that must not be disturbed.
At worst the transmission of the Angelus may offend some listeners or viewers, although there has been little public expression of opposition. But the transmission of the Angelus is clearly discriminatory.
RTÉ has a fine tradition of balance in its religious programming but I am not advocating that proportionality be applied to the God-slot with, say, a Salvation Army band on Mondays, Moslem prayers on Tuesdays and Bible readings by the Moderator of the Free Presbyterian Church on Wednesdays.
But the continuing transmission of the Angelus by the principal broadcaster on this island is bound increasingly to be questioned as RTÉ extends its radio and television coverage farther into Northern Ireland.
The Director General, Bob Collins, has predicted that another 140,000 viewers will be available there when the station's channels are carried on the Sky digital network.
The Angelus bell may sound fine o'er the Liffey's swell. What happens when it reaches the banks of the Lagan?
Wesley Boyd is a former
director of news at RTÉ