Waterford city councillors have rejected a motion to replace a prayer at the beginning of council meetings with a moment of silent reflection.
The motion was proposed by Independent Cllr Mary Roche at this week's meeting of city area councillors:
“That Waterford City & County Council resolves to replace the recitation of the Opening Prayer by the members with ‘a moment of silent personal prayer or reflection’ with the duration at the discretion of the Mayor”.
Reg. No. 61 (dated, 19th October, 2021)
The motion was seconded by Green Party Cllr Jody Power.
In her opening address, Cllr Roche said she didn't have anything personal against the prayer but “times have changed”:
“I do think that in 2021 it’s more appropriate that the council would not have a prayer at the beginning, but that if people wanted to make a prayer silently themselves they would be welcome to do so and we that we would replace the opening prayer with a moment of silent reflection or prayer in whatever religious denomination or none that any of the particular members may have."
Sinn Fein Cllr Pat Fitzgerald was the first to respond to the motion:
"I'll be voting against it anyway... I don't see what's wrong with the prayer to be quite honest with you. I think it would be hypocritical of counselors to kind of vote in, to remove the prayer from the meetings, which only takes about 20 seconds. But yet decide they will wear the robes, which are also a link to the Catholic church."
Independent Cllr Davy Daniels also was not in favour
"With my years on the council, Mayor, many years, many elections, and meeting many people over the years, I can say it has never been raised once regarding the prayer."
Fianna Fail Cllr Eamon Quinlan said he didn't feel it was a barrier to participation in the council:
"If I genuinely thought that the prayer was a barrier to participation in local government, whether that be like the old oath of allegiance where you had to do it in order to participate in the meeting, or if it was a denominational prayer, excluding people of different faiths or no faiths, I would probably come around to Cllr Roche's way of thinking, but that's not the case."
Cllr Jason Murphy agreed saying it was not an issue and was part "of a puritanical secularism that was coming into Irish society, that wants religion gone out of the public sphere completely".
The current Mayor of the City and County Joe Kelly was also opposed. In his contribution he said he was "totally opposed":
"As a matter of fact, the prayer, as you know, is recited in Irish and most people probably don't even understand what it says. It's not a Catholic prayer as such, what it actually says and I'm summarising, is that it's asking for guidance that we, as the counselors representing the people will make proper and just decisions in the interest of the people.
Supporting Cllr Roche's position were Green party councillors Cristiona Kiely and Jody Power.
Responding to the point raised by earlier contributors that the issue had never been raised 'on the doorsteps', Cllr Kiely said she didn't believe a lot of people " would be aware enough of the proceedings at council meetings to know that there is a prayer". She said looking around the virtual meeting room of councillors that there was not a lot of diversity and she would like to see that changed.
Her colleague Jody Power agreed:
"We are in the 21st century guys, we have to be as inclusive as possible for all the people. 20% of our people now in Waterford have been born outside of this country, all sorts of religions coming in, Hindus, Muslims, you name it. We have to represent those people as well. We can't have them feel that they're excluded."
Seamus Ryan said he would also be supporting the motion:
"And I don't see this as removing the prayer. It's allowing people to have that moment of reflection. And if they want to use that moment of reflection to say the prayer in their own minds, in their own head, leave them do so".
In total, six voted for the motion: Mary Roche (Ind), Cristiona Kiely (GP), Jody Power (GP), Joeanne Bailey (SF), Seamus Ryan (Lab) and Donal Barry (Ind).
Ten were opposed: Jason Murphy (FF), Eddie Mulligan (FF), Joe Kelly (Ind), Davy Daniels (Ind), Pat Fitzgerald (SF), Eamon Quinlan (FF), Frank Quinlan (FG), Joe Conway (Ind), Jim Griffin (SF) and Lola O'Sullivan (FG).
Cllr John Hearne (SF) abstained and Cllr Adam Wyse (FF) had left the meeting before the motion.
