President McAleese is on her way to Scotland; leaving Dublin where the hyphenated identity of being simultaneously Irish and British has been deemed by many to be, in Terence Brown's descriptive phrase, an "evident absurdity". She will be welcomed in a place where Scottish-British double belonging is a long-standing part of political and economic reality. Scottish civil society as expressed in the fields of education, church and law were all different from what obtained in England, but could be accommodated within the diversity of what was British.
There is a strong east/west orientation to my life. I studied in Edinburgh as well as Belfast, our daughter is married and living in Scotland, our son is married and living in England. I read The Independent from London and listen to and watch British radio and television much more than their southern Irish equivalents.
On a recent visit to an Encounter conference in Edinburgh concerned with "identities in these islands", I returned to a city for which I have considerable affection, having studied there in the heady and hopeful days of the 1960s: Vatican 2 and all that. I had once again the strong impression of being at home, being given space to stand up and be myself without having to hug the clothes of my northern Irish Presbyterian identity about me to keep me warm from the chill winds of those in Ireland who deem my double belonging to be absurd.
From some sections of the lovely Antrim coast road between Larne and Cushendun, the peninsulas of Scotland appear so close that they seem to be part of Ireland. Across that narrow strip of water the people from the northern part of Ulster and the people of Scotland have travelled back and forth for centuries. At times the Glens of Antrim and the islands of Scotland formed one kingdom. For an Irish Presbyterian to stand on that road looking across to Scotland, the place whence we came seems but an arm's length away, while Dundalk, Dublin and Cork can seem a very long way away indeed.
The ecclesiological, theological and historical roots of Irish Presbyterians lie across that narrow strip of water and go through Glasgow and Edinburgh to Geneva and thence, through the pre-reformation church, to Jerusalem, to Jesus and to the apostles with their definitive affirmations about the significance of Christ.
MOST of our families came from Scotland in the 1600s and 1700s. When it was not possible for students for the Presbyterian ministry to receive university education in Ireland, they made their way from Ireland to Scotland, making their way by foot from Portpatrick to Glasgow.
These connections are important for many Irish Presbyterians, being part of their self-definition. The double-belonging is expressed as Scots/Irish. On the other hand we know that the kind of affection which many Presbyterians in Ireland have for Scotland is not reciprocated with the same intensity, if it is reciprocated at all.
On the way into the temporary home of the Scottish Parliament in the refurbished Assembly Hall of the Church of Scotland, one has to walk past the statue of John Knox in the Quadrangle of New College, which houses the theological faculty of the University of Edinburgh, simultaneously a college associated with the Church of Scotland. The statue is a reminder both of the Presbyterianism of the country as well as its turbulent church-state relations.
The visits of Donald Dewar to Dublin and President McAleese's visit to Scotland need to be treated with care. If a Northern Ireland executive works well then Edinburgh's relationship with Ireland will be triangular, involving Edinburgh, Belfast and Dublin. If that executive does not function well, Belfast will be marginalised and the Dublin/Edinburgh axis will become pre-eminent. It is important that the Belfast/ Edinburgh axis is strong and is not subsumed within either London or Dublin.
The personal ties between Scotland and Northern Ireland remain significant. In 1998 to 1999 over 5,500 Northern Ireland students were studying in Scottish universities. Received wisdom has it that a high percentage of these were from the Protestant community in Northern Ireland. Sadly, many of them never return. A number of students for the ministry of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland continue to read theology in Scottish universities.
Identity is a construct which is constantly changing. Hopefully the visit of President McAleese will further erode those definitions which depended heavily upon poisoned memory and our opposition to one thing or another. Maybe the visit will encourage us to locate our distinctive particularities within wider networks of belonging and co-operation.
John Dunlop was moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland 1992-93. His book A Precarious Belonging - Presbyterians and the Conflict in Ireland was published by the Blackstaff Press in 1995
