YOU could hear a lone trombone before you saw the procession. The deep toned strains of Nearer My God To Thee, once so solemn and sombre, now sounded disconsolate and wistful - mournfully comic but retaining just enough gusto to avoid being abject or pathetic. Then the procession appeared. It was a village affair, in itself a relic of an Ireland that has passed, with few sweet scented petals strewn to mourn its own procession into history.
The Rev John Dunlop, former moderator of the Presbyterian church in Ireland, had crossed from the North to the Republic. His documentary, Crossing The Borders, had to include a Catholic procession. After all, such processions have become iconic in Irish film and documentary. Alan Gilsenan, Barry Devlin, Louis Marcus (intelligently plundering the Amharc Eireann archives) and just about every other director has used the summer procession as a funeral cortege for traditional Catholicism.
The opening episode of this new six part series was titled Pure. Pastoral And Papist. "De Valera's Ireland was a frightening spectacle to Protestants in the North," said the presenter. Fair enough - De Valera's Ireland was a frightening spectacle to many Catholics in the Republic too. When they looked across the Border, Northern Protestants saw, he said, "a neat mixture of state ideology and Catholic certainty, where politicians took guidance from the bishops".
This was, we must admit, an accurate picture. But it was, too, a picture most Northern Protestants wanted to see. John Bowman, appearing as a referee turned commentator, recognised the incongruity: "The irony was that Dev's policies were inimical to the goal of uniting Ireland," he said. So they were. Protestants in the North should have, at least secretly, loved him. Like, say, Patrick Mayhew for nationalists, he inevitably helped to sustain their distaste.
But the Republic of De Valera has changed - not changed utterly; nor has any beauty, terrible or otherwise, been born. But it has changed sufficiently for Dr Dunlop to discover here a society of individuals "self consciously in the midst of change, which they embrace". This too is an accurate picture, even allowing for the fact that there is a certain smugness, crudeness and (typically nouveau) self congratulatory priggishness in the "Celtic Tiger" Republic.
But for Northern Protestants, the old images which they used to sustain their own certainties about the Republic's poverty and priest domination, are no longer sustainable in fact - they are, of course, sustainable in the imagination and in the heart. But Northern economic superiority has been wiped out and, irony of ironies, the Republic, in the sense of accommodating diversity, is now more Protestant minded than the North, where pressure to conform to one of two dominant traditions has replicated the kind of hierarchical orthodoxy more typical of Catholicism.
In other words, it is easier to protest - to be, at least, a lower case protestant - in the Republic than it is in the North. Dr Dunlop didn't go quite so far, but his journey and his interviews can have left no doubts that the domineering, old style Catholicism, characterised by "pay, pray and obey" has largely left the Republic and is continuing to wane. Traditional fear and loathing among the Protestants of the North will have been shaken by John Dunlop's trip. Quite simply, they have less to fear and less to loathe.
This first episode was, really, a context setter. Anecdotes about Catholics threatened with eternity in hell" for the "reserved sin" of attending a Protestant service will have reassured some unionists in their view. Mrs Nora Bennis, insisting "our government has gone pagan" and "we're close enough to being a pagan state" will have offered them further succour. But the dominant tone of Dr Dunlop's opening episode was generally realistic and we can hope that he will attract a few fellow travellers.
NO such travellers will come from the Spirit of Drumcree Orangemen, of course. As the marching season (perhaps not what it once was, but certainly not as dissipated as the procession season) gears up, Spotlight investigated the risks. It cited Ian Paisley's DUP as the prime force likely to wreck plans for talks and agreement. "Walks and no talks" is the slogan of the hardliners and it could yet lead to disaster.
According to Spotlight, Dunloy Orange Lodge was, in January, prepared to meet nationalists. The four Dunloy Principles" included respect, equality, freedom of movement and the common good. So, such language is aspirational, its shades of meaning easily appropriated and abused by people (of both traditions) who do not wish to subscribe to its spirit. But, at least, it is a language which recognises that compromise need not mean defeat.
To hardliners such as Gerald Marshall, the deputy master of Dromore Orange Lodge, however, compromise in effect means capitulation. The response of New Labour to Old Orange Order will be defining: for the Spirit of Drumcree adherents, No Surrender and Mo Surrender will be synonymous and it would be foolish to underestimate the current dangers. But, there is a brighter side and the Spirit of Drumcree will not inevitably become the spirit of the Orange Order.
The order's grand master, Robert Saulters, said that another standoff, like last year's, would "be doing the work of the IRA". Certainly, last summer's TV pictures of the RUC wading into Garvaghy Road residents; of David Trimble's triumphalism; and of Billy Wright's swagger in the churchyard gave unionists a Pyrrhic victory. They marched the route they wanted but paid a huge price for the privilege. As so often during the Troubles, television defined the moment.
As a slice of investigative journalism, Spotlight did well to highlight the divisions within Orangeism. The unionist North, to refocus John Dunlop's phrase was, especially at Drumcree 1996 a frightening spectacle to Catholics in the Republic. Marches, with their military connotations are, of course, more aggressive than processions which, in contrast suggest passivity and obeisance.
The problem is that the sort of heterodoxy (as far as traditional Protestants are concerned) expressed by John Dunlop which could disabuse unionists of their views of the Republic, does not flower best during the marching season. With tensions, fears and aggressions raised by traditional tribalism, the North risks marching to hell. Indifference on the part of the Celtic Tiger's cubs could see us all processing along the same route, if New Labour is unable to Mo down the extremists.
FOR all its awfulness, the Eurovision Song Contest was, clearly, a success for RTE. Carrie Crowley; the set (which looked like an extravagantly lit, giant Celtic tore arching over a crashed Starship Enterprise); the fact that Marc Roberts's second place was perfect . . . all these deserve praise. But the real stars - the ones you won't forget in a hurry - were the smutmasters from Iceland.
With a wonderfully revolting routine, which involved simulated bondage, obscene crotch rubbing and a general celebration of sado masochism, Iceland spiced up the traditional naffness with a dose of ultra naff, Playboy Channel sleaze. Official Europe was not impressed. But in Germany, Sweden, the UK, Switzerland and Austria, the five countries from which punters at home could telephone in their votes, Iceland was clearly redhot.
In contrast, the awful winner, described by Terry Wogan as "anthemic" (though "anathema" springs to mind) was an horrific, formulaic, Up With People ditty. Boyzone, looking like leather fetishists, produced a watery - most certainly not in the Riverdance sense - interval gig. Indeed, the boyz are getting a bit hardy looking at this stage and Manzone or Menzone is unlikely to whet the hormones of the lads' pubescent fans.
Still, at least RTE won't have to stage it next year and, away from home, Pat Kenny (or whoever has to do the commentating) should not feel so compelled to keep the script so syrupy. All that PR guff about "redefining and enhancing the integrity of print" and "the chemistry of water and light" - as vile as the pseudo poetic ads for Bulmer's cider can be ditched. Wogan's wisecracking is tired xenophobic too - but the public doesn't treat the event with reverence. It is, at best, a bit of crack. Just as expensive too.
WITH the expense of Eurovision no longer a viable excuse for RTE's dereliction of duties towards drama and investigative journalism, perhaps things will change. Perhaps. Thought it wasn't exactly Pulitzer material, Nationwide's report on Arthur Broomfield was, at least, a faltering step in the right direction. Arthur, who, in the unusual combination of dickie bow and opennecked shirt, looks like a bottom of the bill amateur magician, claims to have a cure for arthritis.
A consultant, the Arthritis Foundation of Ireland and the company which manufactures ActivVite, which is the principal ingredient of the, eh "cure" are, however, not quite so sure. Still, Arthur claims an "80 per cent success rate". Curiously reporter Ciaran Mullooley interpreted the claim as referring to 80 per cent of the arthritis, rather than 80 per cent of sufferers.
Still, in terms of public service TV, it was a thorough little report, even if it hardly deserved the amount of time given to its repeat on the Nine O'Clock News. So, a faltering step - indeed, arguably an arthritic step - but a step away from PR generated events masquerading as news. Shorn of the Eurovision excuse, RTE may, like John Dunlop's co religionists, have to consider new, promising realities and not treat them all as a threat.
FINALLY, Debut this week screened Out Of The Deep Pan, a delightfully mad little drama about a couple (Conleth Hill and Maria Connelly) who set up a pizza delivery service in Belfast during the ceasefire. Not surprisingly, they get sandwiched between paramilitaries and the RUC. But, with their entrepreneurial spirit (or, at any rate, their dope) burning, they battle ahead.
Along the way, they got raunchy enough to suggest they might have been auditioning for next year's Iceland - Eurovision entry. But, forgetting pepperoni, four seasons, cheese and tomato and all those dreary, conventional toppings, they decide to market marijuana pizza. So, an armoured carrier load of RUC; men orders in a take away. Legless with laughter, the coppers give a whole new meaning to stoning the RUC. Hard to see The Joint My Father Smoked becoming a new unionist anthem or the Orange Order going Rasta - but, you never know!