To some extent a side effect, to some extent a cause of its exacerbation. The denomination was co-founded by Ian Paisley, who became its moderator for 57 years. Paisley dominated Northern Ireland politics for more than 40 years. He founded the hardline Democratic Unionist Party, which he went on to lead for 37 years, serving as a member of the Northern Ireland Parliament, Assembly, Constitutional Convention, and Forum for Political Dialogue, the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the Privy Council, and the European Parliament. Towards the end of his long career he served briefly as First Minister of Northern Ireland. Through his patronage his wife also became a member of the House of Lords and his son received a ministerial position in the Northern Ireland government.
Although he softened somewhat in his final years, Ian Paisley’s theological and political worldview was dominated by hatred of Catholicism (typically termed ‘Popery’ and identified as the Whore of Babylon) and hatred of homosexuality (typically termed ‘sodomy’). He also entertained a fair degree of hatred for Protestants who weren’t quite Protestant enough for his liking. His earliest campaigning was undertaken under the auspices of the National Union of Protestants, which took on causes such as disrupting Anglican services (too Catholic), protesting against a Catholic Mass being broadcast on the BBC, and protesting against a Catholic priest speaking in Westminster Abbey. He made something of a name for himself by protesting against the lowering of flags to mark the death of Pope John XXIII (also known as ‘this Romish man of sin’). He also protested against the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, which he considered too Catholic.
Paisley also expounded a theory that the EU was a Vatican plot to create a Catholic superpower in Europe. For this reason the 666th seat in the European Parliament was kept vacant in anticipation of the Antichrist eventually occupying it. On the occasion of John Paul II’s visit to the Parliament Paisley had to be removed from the chamber when he disrupted proceedings to denounce him as the Antichrist (not for the first or last time). To give credit where it is due, Paisley was fearless in denouncing anybody he considered insufficiently British or Protestant, including the Queen Mother, Princess Margaret, and Margaret Thatcher.
Paisley’s main achievement was in undermining moderate Protestantism and Unionism, promoting extremism, and rejecting any compromise that had the potential to bring about peace in Northern Ireland and the British mainland. He was also active in creating paramilitary organisations and inciting violence, although he was rather careful to avoid too much direct involvement in the actual business of kidnapping and terrorism and consequently acquired only a handful of minor convictions and spent a short time in prison. Throughout his long and destructive career, theology and politics, the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster and the Democratic Unionist Party, were inextricable.
