Maybe we will get Pro Life Orange Lodges

Coming out from a day course at QUB (Queen’s University) last Saturday’s centenary Loyal Orange Lodges (LOL) parade grabbed my attention.

It was quite a spectacle to watch and I cancelled a two bus journey route home to see the tail end of the march.

The crowd left less litter or debris behind than was customary in some past times and the good spirited demeanour of the marchers was obvious for all to see.

Credit is due for strides which have been made in how the LOL deals with public relations and the image the group now projects.

In a strange twist of fate ‘Civil and Religious Liberties’ are very much in the picture, with Brandon Lewis seeking to inflict a barbaric abortion regime on Northern Ireland, even though a great mass of local respondents to a consultation exercise opposed this.

‘Temperance Lodges’ make a public statement, even with their very name, so should we also expect to see ‘Pro-Life Lodges’ arise in time? LOL leaders on platforms this Twelfth of July (or Orange Sunday service preachers) might reasonably direct members to look up the NHS website and share the image of the unborn in the third month ‘Dating Scan’.

JT Hardy, Belfast BT4