Religion: Fethardism

Ireland, which enriched the English language with the word boycott,* has invented a refinement of the term. The new word: fethardism, meaning to practice boycott along religious lines.

When, eight years ago, Sean Michael Cloney, 22, a Roman Catholic farmer, married Sheila Kelly, 22, Protestant, in London, she made the usual agreement imposed by the Catholic Church on mixed marriages: the children would be brought up as Catholics. Sean brought Sheila back to his big brown farmhouse called Dungulph Castle, a 600-year-old rebuilt Norman mansion in the southern county of Wexford, two miles from the village of Fethard-on-the-Sea (pop. 107).

Unphair to Protestants....

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