Scottish independence: Pope Francis weighs in

Well, one thing we can be sure of: virtually nobody will listen to the Pope. They’ll listen to the headlines all right –  “Pope Says No to Scottish Independence!” – and so he’ll join the list of Barack Obama, Hilary Clinton, J K Rowling and George Galloway who are being used to prop up Alistair Darling’s shaky Better Together outfit.

The details of the Pontiff’s speech are, predictably, more nuanced. “They [cases for independence] should be studied on a case-by-case basis. Scotland, Padania, Catalonia. There will be cases that are right and ones that are not.”

Like Barack, Hillary, J K and George, Francis has a right to a view on Scotland’s remaining within the UK or seceding and running its own affairs. “Yes, except the Pope’s supposed to be infallible!” I hear the squeaks of protest. Quite right, Papal infallibility is a doctrine of the Church, one devised in the nineteenth century. It states that when the Pope speaks ex cathedra  – that is, when he speaks officially as leader of the Catholic Church on a matter of faith and doctrine to be held by the whole Church, his words are infallible. Scottish independence, while important, is not a matter of Catholic faith or doctrine. So we can toss Francis’s views in there with Barack, Hillary, J K, George and the rest. No better, no worse. As someone said, it’ll be interesting for the Orange Order to find itself on the same side as the Pope.

But will Francis’s words affect the way people vote? A number, quite possibly, will be affected. However, in the 2001 census, just 16% of the Scottish population described themselves as Catholic, while 42% said they had affiliation with the Church of Scotland. Assuming that it’s Catholics who are most likely to be affected by the Pope’s views – and as the quotation shows, he’s pretty tentative about it – it’ll be a relatively small number. Even there, you might want to remember the late Pope John Paul II with his famous on-my-knees-i-implore-you speech, aimed at ending IRA violence. That was 1979. The history of the 1980s in Ireland shows the degree of attention his plea received.

My guess is that even fewer Scottish Catholics will use Francis’s words as a prompt to say No in September. In fact, its influence might well be counter-productive, as Alex Salmond’s comment regarding Scottish thrawness suggests. The headlines on the Pope’s comments could in fact have a Gerry-Adams-arrest effect on the Scottish populace: they may say “To hell with the lot of them – we decide our future!”. And they’d be right. Meanwhile, though, it’s a delicious thought, isn’t it? Ian Paisley Jr on one side of Francis and Nelson McCausland on the other, both getting itchy in their kilts at the thought that between them, apparently their brother-in-arms, stands the Anti-Christ.