Tuesday will be Edward Stevenson's first Twelfth of July as grand master of the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland, and he has his work cut out for him. Stevenson, a farmer from Ardstraw in Co Tyrone, inherits an organisation that is both in decline and in two minds about its future.
On the one hand, Ardoyne and large parts of east Belfast will be in lockdown for this week's parades. By contrast, shops will be open in Belfast city centre and there will be an open-air market at the city hall to service the crowds.
"In terms of visitor numbers, the Twelfth of July is simply the largest annual event we have," said Andrew Irvine of Belfast City Centre Management Company. This aspect of the event is promoted as Orangefest by the order in Belfast. Across the province, other parades are being designated "flagship twelfths". These are expected to pass off without incident, watched by happy crowds and providing a boon to stalls selling ice cream, lemonade and kitsch.
They call it the largest street festival in Europe. Both Tourism Ireland and the Northern Ireland Tourist Board have put considerable resources into promoting Orange and Scots-Irish culture to visitors. But is the Orange Order, and its rowdier followers, capable of utilising this marketing opportunity? Can it reinvent itself to meet the power-sharing mood of 21st-century Ulster? Or will it remain a throwback, carrying the religious bitterness and triumphalism of the 17th century into the modern era? One recent exchange between the Parades Commission, the body with the unenviable task of adjudicating on contentious routes, and the order in east Belfast illustrates the problems faced by Stevenson. One of the most difficult routes is in east Belfast, a majority unionist area, where many Orange marches and feeder parades pass the large nationalist enclave of Short Strand.
Short Strand is one of Sinn Féin's strongest areas of support yet the order refuses to speak to the party to improve the atmosphere or negotiate a way forward. In the past, feelings have run high, and have been inflamed by the playing of anti-Catholic tunes at the interface or near churches. More recently, the Parades Commission has ruled that only a single drumbeat, to help the marchers keep time, would be allowed.
This gave rise to suggestions from the order that, as a Christian organisation, it would like the bands it engages to be able to play hymn tunes that would offend nobody. This wasn't put directly to the commission – the order officially refuses to meet it, though some members break ranks – but the message got through.
The commission ruled that the order could choose between a single drumbeat or the tune of Abide With Me as members parade past Short Strand on May 1. This provoked a furious reaction. Ballymacarrett District Lodge accused the commission of launching a "jihad against the loyalist people of east Belfast, in an action worthy of the Taliban religious police" by specifying which hymn could be played.
"What have the mullahs of the Parades Commission got against other hymn tunes?" the district wondered in a statement that quoted the Rev Mervyn Gibson, a Presbyterian minister and Orange chaplain. The commission hit back, perhaps tongue in cheek, with a letter of complaint to the Presbyterian church saying the statement would be offensive to Muslims and the Rev Gibson should disassociate himself.
It all seems a bit small-minded, but there was a reason to specify the tune. When a parade passed the shops at Ardoyne, a similarly sensitive interface, the commission took the order's hint and specified that hymn tunes could be played. The band picked a great Protestant hymn, What a Friend We Have in Jesus. It goes: "O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear. All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer."
The sentiments expressed seem inoffensive, but unfortunately those were not the words actually sung passing Ardoyne. A video posted on YouTube shows the tune was announced as Holy Mary by a band leader. A crowd of women chanted: "Holy Mary, I am dying. Just a word before I go. Set the Pope upon the table, and stick a poker up his ... Holy Mary, I am dying."
No doubt the Orange Order, which likes to wash its hands of any trouble at events, will say that marchers did not join in this sectarian chanting, and that it had nothing to do with them. This would be somewhat disingenuous.
The order has a duty to ensure good behaviour at its events, or else cancel them to avoid the huge drain on police resources caused by contentious parades. It should be talking to both the Parades Commission and residents to ensure that everything passes off peacefully in the spirit of Orangefest. It should ensure that there are no attempts to push the boundaries so as to poke touchy nationalists in the eye as parades pass their areas. What the order certainly can't say is that it is a mystery why certain tunes are specified.
Of course, there are people trying to stir up trouble and score victories on the nationalist side, too. On Tuesday, as a parade passes Ardoyne, a breakaway nationalist group is threatening a counter demonstration.
In the past, leading dissidents from as far away as Derry have travelled to join in the trouble, and last week a Spaniard was jailed for dropping a concrete block on a policewoman's head during a parade past Ardoyne shops last year.
It can be argued that the parade, both in Ardoyne and east Belfast, passes quickly and residents have to go out of their way to see it and be offended.
That was the argument which the Orange Order made in Drumcree – and they lost it. Their parade from Drumcree church has been banned from passing along Garvaghy Road for 13 years. Every year, a dwindling band of brethren turn up to ask to be allowed to complete it, and every year they are refused. The order is now willing to talk to residents and the Parades Commission, and is prepared to accept almost any restrictions – it has even met Gerry Adams to ask for his help – but it is too late. The argument has been lost.
The order is facing another defeat if it continues with present tactics. There is another way, as shown by the Apprentice Boys of Derry, a loyal order whose parades along the city walls overlooking the Bogside were bitterly contested for years. The Apprentice Boys were well led and changed course just in time. They engaged with the Sinn Féin-led residents' groups who opposed them, and they met city centre traders. Their annual event has been wrapped into an annual Maiden City festival, and is tolerated by the majority Catholic population, maybe even enjoyed by some.
That is the way to go. Stevenson is said to be a level-headed and decent man who gets on well with his Catholic neighbours. These are qualities that need to be displayed by the order if it is to survive.
