Contrary to the widespread belief in Ireland's rapid secularisation, religion continues to play a significant role in twenty-first-century Irish culture, though not in the familiar forms of Catholicism and Protestantism. This volume seeks to redress the balance and demonstrate that religion intersects with and informs past and present Irish culture. While writers from Sean O'Casey to Edna O'Brien have challenged religious oppression, Joyce's heresy, Patrick Pearse's fusion of Christian and pagan sacrifice, and Yeats's pan-Asian eclecticism are among the manoeuvres by which the Irish have sought to push beyond the prescribed limits of spirituality. This book takes an interdisciplinary and global approach that encompasses the affinities of Celtic thought with Asian philosophy, the legacy of Irish missions in Africa, new ways to see the religiosity of canonical works, and Irish cultural engagement with traditions such as Buddhism, Daoism, Judaism, and Shinto.
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Counters pervasive belief that religion is declining, to establish the diverse and far-reaching forms of Irish spirituality in culture.
Notes on Contributors; Acknowledgements; Introduction Chris Murray;
1.
Religion and Irish Poetry Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin;
2. Thinking Theologically
about Irish Anglican Gothic Fiction Jarlath Killeen;
3. Faith and Religion in
Irish Theatre: 'The Mercy of Fathers' Victor Merriman;
4. Institutional
Catholicism in the Irish Novel: 'As much Power as We Give Them' Kate
Costello-Sullivan;
5. Women and Religion in the Irish Diaspora: Memoirs,
Fiction, and Lecture Tours Dianne Hall;
6. James Joyce the Heretic
Jean-Michel Rabaté;
7. Seamus Heaney's Religious Palette: Catholic, Roman,
Greek Lorna Hardwick;
8. Poetic Ontologies in Seamus Heaney and Derek Mahon
Bruce Stewart;
9. The Prospect of Truth: Catholic Feeling in the Language of
Conor Cruise O'Brien Marion Kelly;
10. 'A Cleansing and Sanctifying Thing':
Mythic Landscapes in Patrick Pearse's Sacrificial Imagination Hunter Dukes;
11. Modern Irish Marianisms: The Virgin Mary in Literature after the Second
Vatican Council Chris Murray;
12. Restless for the Future: Eschatology and
Evangelical Time in Ulster-Scots Writing and Culture Frank Ferguson and Willa
Murphy;
13. Church Domination and Control Tom Inglis;
14. Religious Material
Culture Mary Ann Bolger and Lisa Godson;
15. Ireland and Africa: Religious
and Cultural Connections Fiona Bateman;
16. Judaism and Irish Culture Natalie
Wynn;
17. 'The Unseen Bay': Japanese Spirituality and Irish Literature Ciaran
Murray;
18. The Dao of Irish Culture Jerusha McCormack.
Willa Murphy lectures in English at Ulster University. Murphy's publications explore the intersection of theology, literature, and culture, from the eighteenth century to the present day. She is the recipient of the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Research Fellowship and of the KeoughNaughton Hesburgh Library Research Award. She is also Assistant Editor of the Steinbeck Review. Chris Murray is Senior Lecturer in Literary Studies at Monash University. With interdisciplinary interests in transcultural exchange, his writing includes the books China from the Ruins of Athens and Rome: Classics, Sinology, and Romanticism (2020); Tragic Coleridge (2013); and a memoir, Crippled Immortals: Shaolin Enlightenment on a Singapore High-Rise (2018). He serves as Treasurer for the Irish Studies Association of Australia and New Zealand, is an editor of the Australasian Journal of Irish Studies, and has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland.
