We're losing our religion and have little faith in our leaders but seem happier than ever. What's going on, asks Patsy McGarry.
Sure, we're not ourselves at all. That's if we ever were. In Ballaghaderreen, Co Roscommon, that lodestone of Irish reality, they don't know who they are any more. Not that anyone is too bothered. There has, comparatively, been a flood of immigrants into the town, which has a population of 1,200. One in six children at the national school is Pakistani. The children's fathers work in the local meat factory. Many Latvians and other eastern Europeans pick mushrooms. And there are Czechs, Chinese, Indians. It is said there are 14 nationalities in the town.
So it's no wonder there's been confusion about its complexion. So much so, indeed, that after a recent pub break-in a wag was heard to report that gardaí were questioning three people - "two locals and a white man".
Not there have been any incidents between the old and new inhabitants. The town has hardly a family that hasn't been touched by emigration; many have experienced it directly. Most know what it is to be a stranger in a strange land.
What is happening in Ballaghaderreen illustrates what is happening in so many places. Preliminary figures from the 2002 census show the population of Co Roscommon has risen for the first time in 32 years - back in 1971 it had increased for the first time since the Famine. It dipped again, to a new low, in 1991; then, in the six years between 1996 and 2002, the county's population rose by 1,828, to 53,803.
But a closer look tells its own story. Between 1996 and 2002, deaths exceeded births by 309. So the growth in population came from the migration of 2,137 people to the county, most of them immigrants. Fifteen per cent of the inhabitants of the county's main town, Roscommon, are immigrants, including, at 500, or 10 per cent of the population, the largest concentration of Brazilians in the Republic.
Another reason that native-born Roscommon people might be in danger of extinction, as my late father predicted, was the closure of St Anne's maternity ward at the county hospital. There was no other in the county. "There will be no more Roscommon people," he thundered, as even his grandchildren were born in Ballinasloe, Sligo and, God help us, Castlebar. There are no Roscommon-born among his grandchildren. I am of the last generation of Roscommon-born people. And I am of Ireland, the once holy land of saints and scholars, themselves now as rare as Roscommon people.
"What ish my nation? Ish a villain, and a bastard, and a knave, and a rascal. What ish my nation?," asked the irascible Irishman Captain MacMorris in Shakespeare's Henry V. And that was at the end of the 16th century. How much more confused he would be today. Though we still have villains, the odd bastard, knaves and rascals. Everything changes, some things remain the same. We are even confused about our religious beliefs. According to the Quality of Life Report 2003, carried out for Diageo Ireland by Amárach Consulting, as of January this year 87 per cent of us believe in God, but just 69 per cent believe in the soul, 66 per cent in sin, 65 per cent in heaven, 56 per cent in life after death, 39 per cent in the Devil, 37 per cent in hell and 22 per cent in reincarnation.
It also established that we are among the most secular of Western countries. In this we are most certainly closer to Berlin - well, Paris - than Boston. Religion is very important for about 10 per cent of French people, about 12 per cent of Japanese, about 20 per cent of Germans, 27 per cent of Italians, 30 per cent of the Irish, about 33 per cent of the British and almost 60 per cent of Americans. Britain and the US have more religion than we do, it seems.
Looked at more closely, we also have a wide spiritual generation gap. Just 56.2 per cent of our under-25s are satisfied with their religion or spirituality, compared with 55.9 per cent for the 25-34 age group, 64.8 per cent for 35-49, 72.9 per cent for 50-64 and a whopping 82.3 per cent for 65-74. Overall, just 64 per cent are satisfied with our faith - although we seem to have little faith in much else.
Just 2 per cent of us have a great deal of confidence in the Government, 5 per cent in the health service, 6 per cent in the media, 7 per cent in the legal system and 9 per cent in the hurch.
Yet we are such a happy bunch. The survey found that 77.7 per cent of us were happy with our lot, up from 73.4 per cent in 2001. In general, where family, health, and financial issues were concerned, 75.2 per cent were happy, compared with 72.3 per cent in 2001.
The figures were presented at the Talking Irish symposium on Tuesday, marking the opening of the St Patrick's Festival.
Captain MacMorris would have felt at home with its questions about Irishness, although the Dublin Castle location might have unnerved him. "Who talks of my nation?" he asked. Well, they all did.
An eclectic collection of people discussed "success Irish-style", creating balance in Irish society, Ireland's contribution to the world, Irish identity in Europe and, would you believe, "could Ireland save civilisation again?"
It was Fintan O'Toole of this newspaper who, chairing a session, repeated the remark that "if you laid the entire body of Irish intellectuals end to end, you would never reach a conclusion". By the end of the day, however, it seemed more likely that, were you to indulge in such an exercise, you'd most likely never arrive at a beginning.
The Diageo Ireland Quality of Life Report 2003 is available at www.amarach.com