Northern Ireland’s future isn’t Catholic or Protestant

For the first time in Northern Ireland’s history, Catholics now outnumber Protestants. Census data on national identity and religious from 2021, which was published today, shows that Catholics born into or practising their religion make up 45.7 per cent of the population, with Protestants at 43.5 per cent. In the bleak zero-sum world of Irish confessional demographics, that translates into a headcount victory for those champing at the bit to end British rule there.

There’s no denying the figures are momentous. They will be gleefully weaponised by those who have no interest in a truly shared or reconciled future. But the headline numbers don’t reveal everything about the state of play in Northern Ireland.

Roman Catholicism has always been a majority religion in the Province since the Protestant religions split into multiple denominations. Still, added together, the census data shows that they number fewer than their Catholic neighbours by a small margin.