There are few, if any, good reasons for retaining the so-called ‘Parish’ Rule at this stage in the evolution of Dis Great Assooosheayshun Of Ours, writes An Fear Rua …

Massive shifts in population, changing demographics and social mores have rendered the same Rule about as useful as the proverbial dodo’s egg. Populations of parishes on the eastern side of the country are growing hugely and there is a welcome, increasing diversity of ethnic origin among our population. At the same, even in Midland counties not too far from Dublin, the GAA is feeling the pinch because parish populations have fallen – and are still falling – dramatically. Changes in work patterns, new approaches to schooling for children, commuting over extremely long distances, kids moving away from home for college or work … these too are contributing to major changes in life in rural Ireland. The question must be asked too – of a non-sectarian Assooosheayshun – whether it is right in persisting with a Rule that takes as it basic unit of organisation the parish structure of a church that is no longer adhered to by so many people and that is increasingly discredited. Even the ill-fated Strategic Review Committee recommended alleviation in the rigidity of the Rule as applied in many counties.

For more than a hundred years, the parish represented continuity and stability in the GAA. When Parish X beat Parish Y in a county final after a gap of, say, fifty years, it was still essentially the same two parishes that were competing, with the same families and familiar surnames recurring on both sides. So, the achievement was all the greater. Now, however, if Parish X beats Parish Y, it’s more likely to be because X is near the edge of a town or city and has at last benefited from a major house building boom, while Y is either in the inner part of the town or city or is situated in a remote part of the county, untouched by the Celtic Tiger.

In Meath senior football, for example, there is an inexorable shift in power towards the clubs fortunate enough to be situated near the border with Dublin, and away from those at the Northern end of the county. Waterford senior hurling illustrates the trend as well. The great Mount Sion club (thirty-three senior titles in seventy years of existence!) traditionally drew strength from inner-city areas that are now declining in population and ageing. In the absence of a comprehensive under-age programme, the club is skating on a thin veneer of success. Ballygunner, on the other hand, was once no more than a church, a graveyard, a pub and a few houses. Now, it is the fastest growing – and possibly the wealthiest – suburb and parish in county Waterford.

Sometimes, though, a parish can have a little too much stability and continuity … especially if it is the ‘stability’ of never having won even a Junior county title in its forty years of existence. Stability, after all, is an uneasy first cousin of stagnation. Dunsany, in the county of Meath, is a staggered crossroads with only a scattering of dwelling houses, a school, a Post Office, a church and not even a pub. Yet it boasts the finest pitch and one of the best clubhouses in the county. No wonder, then, it is favoured for so many major hurling and football matches and, in recent years, has been the preferred training ground of the Meath senior football panel. But legitimate pride in the club’s achievements in developing such facilities, and in producing some great individual footballers over the years, cannot offset the nagging doubt that it is still the games – and a modicum of success on the fields of play – that is at the heart of Dis Assooosheayshun. For in the taste and celebration of achievement comes the inspiration for the next generation of footballers.

On Sunday, 10th November, then, the red-and-white clad players of Dunsany will dash onto Páirc Tailteann, in Navan, in a Meath Junior Football Championship final, for the first time in thirty years and only the second time in the club’s history. They carry the hopes and ambitions of an entire parish on their capable shoulders. ‘For the credit of the little village …’ were the words of Mat the Thresher Donovan when, more than a hundred years ago, he first stepped out from the pages of Charles Kickham’s immortal novel ‘Knocknagow’ to take on Captain French at the throwing of the sledgehammer. No doubt, similar sentiments will be in the hearts and minds of the Dunsany men when they face the black-and-amber of Nobber …

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Parish Rules OK?
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Dunsany Ladies GFC Website
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