NEWTON'S OPTIC:GIVEN HIS widely reported dislike of "establishment" Protestants, former Anglo Irish boss Seán FitzPatrick must wonder if he was deliberately driven to bankruptcy on July 12th, writes
NEWTON EMERSON
Such fears would be well-founded, for I was at the Protestant secret meeting where we plotted his downfall. Also present were Bono; Trevor Sargent; a farmer from Monaghan who pretends to be poor although he really owns half the county; the Archbishop of Howth; the Grand Wizard of the Reformed Orange Order; and my Irish Timescolleague Róisín Ingle (real name Rosie England), who has been under deep cover in the Portadown area for quite some time. At the heart of our concerns was the issue of transubstantiation.
For years, FitzPatrick had stood up before the masses and declared “This is the actual value of an apartment,” when in fact it was merely the symbolic representation of an imaginary economy.
I should point out that there is no question of FitzPatrick’s sincere faith in this regard. When he was told the same thing about apartments in Bulgaria he believed it without reservation.
Faith, values, belief and Bulgaria tied into the broader theme of being saved. To be frank, Protestant souls are saved through Christ, while Catholic souls are borrowed from God.
There was a general feeling at the meeting that this explained a great deal about FitzPatrick, Anglo Irish and the aforementioned imaginary economy.
We had further concerns about the practice of confession. As a Catholic, FitzPatrick would expect to confess his sins by entering a small wooden box and whispering them privately to one other person, on the strict understanding that all would be forgiven and nobody would ever mention it again. There was a suspicion that this might closely mirror his attitude to financial regulation.
It would of course be absurd to claim that there was anything uniquely “Catholic” in moving loans around on certain dates to stop them showing up in annual accounts. However, the Catholic Church does have a habit of moving the calendar around on a whim and it must be asked if this is what first gave FitzPatrick the idea. Religion may also have swayed some of his more unusual business decisions. Certainly, no Protestant would invest in an empty Nigerian oil well as Protestants do not believe in magic oil.
It all came down, as it so often does at our meetings, to questions of Catholic doctrine. Is the apostolic succession a divine “golden circle”? Should a small group of people be above secular law? Can one man be infallible and make the rules up as he goes along? It may well be that no one who believes these things should ever have access to Fianna Fáil and money.
Finally, we noted that when arguing for a bailout, FitzPatrick told the Government to tackle the “sacred cows” of child benefit, pensions and medical cards, suggesting that he also has a serious problem with Hindus.
Taking all these factors into consideration, I am afraid we were left with no choice but to roll up our trouser legs and put in a call to the global Protestant financial elite. FitzPatrick will now spend the next 12 years in a bankrupt’s purgatory. No doubt the rest of you will want to light a candle for him.