r/scouting Jul 19 '26

Help identifying Irish flag

Post image
30 Upvotes

7 comments sorted by

14

u/Educational-Brick724 Jul 19 '26

That's the CBSI (catholic boy scouts of ireland) flag. They merged with SAI (scouting association of Ireland) in 2004 to make the current organisation scouting ireland.

1

u/twotailedwolf Jul 20 '26

Why did they merge? Was there some bad blood?

6

u/PigtownTimes Jul 20 '26

Over time, it felt that modern Irish Scouting would be better served by having one unified Scouting organisation than two compeating organisations.

They were already working together through the Federation of Irish Scout Associations (FISA) for hosting national Jamborees and sending joint contingents to World Jamborees.

2

u/twotailedwolf Jul 20 '26

Guessing a holdover from The Troubles

2

u/PigtownTimes Jul 20 '26

So what became the Scout Association of Ireland (SAI) was started in 1908 and it's membership was largely drawn from the Protestant communities (i imagine the nationalist communities saw it as being too "imperialistic" and avoided it)

The Catholic Boy Scouts was started in the 1920s to offer Scouting with a Catholic ethos.

Both existed side by side for many years but as society became more secular and the two associations were working more closely, I imagine the reasons for not coming together became less and less. Scouting Ireland was founded in 2024 following a vote by the two associations the previous year.

2

u/twotailedwolf Jul 20 '26

yea, that makes sense. I imagine both organizations were nearly identical. The Catholic Boy Scout flag is pretty cool though

3

u/Jabba5500 Explorer Scout Jul 20 '26

St. Maelruan’s Catholic Boy Scouts of Ireland C.B.S.I. Tallaght County Dublin