THE “anti-Catholic” Orange Order is in terminal decline and can only survive if it abandons sectarianism, according to historian Tom Devine.

He said members of the Protestant fraternity are ageing and their marches in July commemorating the defeat of Catholic King James II by Dutch Protestant William of Orange in 1690 are “widely condemned by mainstream Scottish opinion”.

Our sister site the Sunday Herald revealed last year that the first prize in a fancy dress competition organised by Airdrie-based Whinhall True Blues Flute Band and held in an Orange Hall went to a man and woman dressed as Adolf Hitler and wife Eva Braun, and two children dressed in rags branded with a yellow star similar to the one Jewish people were forced to wear by the Nazis.

Other pictures of the 2013 competition, and an earlier contest in 2010, show men dressed as Catholic clergy, and one who appears to be dressed as the Pope has a noose around his neck to simulate a lynching.

To read the full article, head over to our sister site the Sunday Herald here.