OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Category: Uncategorized

  • The "Island of Saints and Scholars" and the Universal Calendar of the Church

    November is the month which opens with the feast of All Saints but which also includes the feast of All the Saints of Ireland on the sixth. In the article below, published in Australia in 1950, the anonymous author poses a very good question – why is Ireland, the ‘island of saints and scholars’, so poorly represented in the universal calendar of the Church? Modern scholars reckon that we have roughly two thousand Irish saints from the early medieval period, i.e. from the fifth to the twelfth centuries. At this time sainthood was very much a local affair, with local bishops acclaiming as saints those holy men and women whose sanctity had been acknowledged by their contemporaries. It was only in the twelfth century that the practice of declaring saints became the prerogative of the Pope alone. The official process of canonisation has developed over the centuries since, although we had a distinct reminder of former times in the shouts of Santo subito during the funeral of Pope St John Paul II. But the fact remains that we have only four officially-canonized saints from this island of saints and scholars. At the time this piece was written there were two saints – Malachy and Laurence and two beati – Oliver Plunkett and  Thaddeus MacCarthy. The cause of Blessed Oliver Plunkett was resumed in 1951, something I have written about here, but it was not until 1975 that he was finally canonized. In 2007 he was joined by Dutch-born Saint Charles of Mount Argus, who came to Ireland in 1857 and ministered as a member of the Passionist community in Dublin until his death in 1893. According to the biography of the new saint at the Vatican website here, his religious superior wrote that “The people have already declared him a saint.”
    Certainly his cause proceeded at a pace not seen since the days of Saint Malachy:

    The cause of his Beatification and Canonization was introduced on 13 November 1935, and on 16 October 1988, His Holiness John Paul II proceeded with the beatification of the one whom everyone called the saint of Mount Argus.

    The writer of this 1950 article makes some interesting observations but ultimately does not offer any explanation for the paradoxical situation that he identified – the conspicuous absence of the Irish on the Universal Calendar of the Church. The writer ends by celebrating Saint Columbanus who was also making headlines in 1950 thanks to the French Foreign Minister, Robert Schuman, one of the founding fathers of the European Union:

     The “island of saints and scholars” was in a curious position

    In the Universal Calendar of the Church one great Catholic race is conspicuous by its absence — the Irish. The Calendar knows no nationality or colour barriers. Greeks, Jews, Italians and Spaniards abound thereon; the English sit down with the Egyptians, the French file in with the Germans and there is a place for St. Rose of Lima, who was a Peruvian.

    The ‘island of saints and scholars,’ however, is in a paradoxical situation.

    Despite 1500 years of remarkably virile Christianity, for 200 of which Ireland was the centre of monastic and missionary activity within the Church, no saint of Irish origin has received international recognition.

    Researchers are more or less agreed that St. Patrick was a Welshman of Roman stock, and, at best, Irish by adoption.

    But there are indications that this strange situation will be remedied.

    There are some who hope that the remedy will come soon; perhaps before the end of the Holy Year the name of the first native Irish saint may be inscribed in the Church calendar.

    Inclusion in the Universal Calendar of the Church means that the saint’s feast is inserted into both the missal and the breviary, and is celebrated on a fixed date throughout the world.

    Though Ireland has what must be the longest litany of uncanonised saints of any country, only four Irishmen have been formally elevated to the altar by the Holy See.

    These are St. Malachy, Bishop of Down and Connor, who died A.D. 1148, and was canonised before the close of the century; St. Lawrence OToole, Archbishop of Dublin at the time of the Norman invasion of Ireland; Blessed Thaddeus MacCarthy, Bishop of Cork, who died on pilgrimage to Rome in 1492; and Blessed Oliver Plunket, Archbishop of Armagh, who was hanged and quartered, at Tyburn in the time of Charles II.

    Because of his famous prophecies regarding the Popes, St. Malachy is the most famous of the four.

    While in Rome, he is said to have received a strange vision of the future, wherein was unfolded before him the long list of Pontiffs who are to rule the Church to the end of time. The signs he has given to indicate individual Popes have been remarkably verified, especially in recent times.

    St. Malachy  also foretold Ireland’s subjection ‘for a week of centuries’ to England, her final success in attaining freedom, and that Ireland would be instrumental in winning back her former enemy to the Faith. All four were Bishops, and all died outside of Ireland. St. Lawrence was canonised at the request of the Bishops of France. Blessed Thaddeus was beatified at the request of the Bishops of Northern Italy, and blessed Oliver was beatified at the request of the Irish Bishops less than a generation ago. The list ends abruptly here.

    In a recent address at an international celebration in honour of St. Columban, held in Luxeuil, France, under the patronage of the French President, Foreign Minister Schuman described the saint as ‘the greatest European of his generation.’ The congress was attended by Church and State dignitaries from six European countries and the United States.

    Because of his mighty part in the curbing and leading the barbaric invaders of the Roman Empire to the Christian fold, St. Columban has been ‘God’s Fighting Irishman.’ He clashed with kings and princes in his many fights for the poor and defenceless.

    Driven from France after many fruitful years of mission work, he continued to establish monasteries in Germany, Switzerland and North Italy, where he died after the Faith had been planted among the Lombards and the heresy of Arianism had been overthrown.

    The revival of all Christian knowledge and culture in many parts of France, Germany and Italy is due to the labours and zeal of St. Columban is the verdict given by Pope Plus XI on the work of this Irish saint.

    To the French, he is one of the great realities of French history, ranking with St. Louis, St. Joan of Arc and St. Vincent de Paul.

    To the Irish, he is the model missionary. For western Europeans, he is becoming the patron of international co-operation and resistance to the forces of Red barbarism.

    In China, Japan, Korea, Burma and the Philippines, where missionary priests and Sisters of the Society of St. Columban are labouring, he is the object of popular personal devotion.

    An Irish missionary Bishop in China looks on him as the patron of hopeless cases, and has his prayers answered in near miraculous ways.

    Four seminaries In the United States, six religious houses and an unknown number of churches are named in his honour.

    Catholics everywhere, who received the Sacrament of Penance, owe a debt to St. Columban for popularising the practice of private Confession. Before his time, public confession of sin was the general custom.

    The “island of saints and scholars” was in a curious position (1950, October 5). Catholic Weekly (Sydney, NSW : 1942 – 1954), p. 1 (Magazine Section). Retrieved January 26, 2024, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article146735321

    Content Copyright © Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae 2012-2024. All rights reserved.

  • The Rosary of Ireland

    I have come across many items in the Victorian religious press written on the theme of Ireland and the Rosary, but the piece below, published in Australia’s Catholic Freeman’s Journal, struck me as unusual in a number of ways. ‘The Rosary of Ireland’ applies the traditional division of Joyous, Sorrowful and Glorious Mysteries to the history of this country and employs many of the popular tropes of the National Revival. Ireland of the joyous mysteries is romantically portrayed as an island set in a silver sea, filled with fair maidens and valiant warriors, which embraces Saint Patrick and its Christian destiny. The mystic isle is then transformed into the insula sanctorum, home of Patrick, Columba and Brendan and the ‘countless thousands more’ who contribute to the golden age of the saints. It is interesting to see a mention of the angel Victor, described in a footnote as ‘the Guardian Angel of Ireland’. The sorrowful mysteries employ familiar tropes of the Penal era – the Mass Rock, the struggle to maintain faith and nationhood and exile – but it was not until I reached the glorious mysteries that I realized I was not reading something written in the nineteenth century at all. For the glorious mysteries relate to the achievement of Irish independence, and it was only at that point that I noted that The Rosary of Ireland had been published in 1938, one year after the promulgation of the Irish Constitution, article one of which declared that:

    The Irish nation hereby affirms its inalienable, indefeasible,and sovereign right to choose its own form of Government, to determineits relations with other nations, and to develop its life, political,economic and cultural, in accordance with its own genius and traditions.

    It is clear that our writer, M. Eugenie Hill, acknowledged the part played by the literary revival in Ireland taking her place among the nations. She makes more than one reference to ‘Inisfail’, a poetic name for Ireland, but perhaps more specifically a reference to the work of Aubrey de Vere (1814-1902):

    Published in 1862, Inisfail is the longest single poem by an Irish writer in English, a distinction which ought to grant it at least a portion of the critical attention which it currently lacks. Subtitled A Lyrical Chronicle of Ireland, it is composed of a sequence of one hundred and thirty-two lyric poems, each of which is a meditation upon an aspect of suffering and salvation. The sequence as a whole is structured around an historical narrative frame proposing continuities in Irish history from the time of the Cromwellian invasions to the end of the Penal Laws, with references to the events of the 1840s.

    Chris Morash, “The Little Black Rose Revisited: Church, Empire and National Destiny in the Writings of Aubrey de Vere.” The Canadian Journal of Irish Studies 20, no. 2 (1994): 45–52.

    De Vere’s poems were frequently quoted by Victorian writers on the saints and the early medieval Irish church and it was in Inisfail that he wrote of ‘the little black rose that would be red at last’, which the writer of The Rosary of Ireland links with the brilliant Easter sun. Is this a reference to the Easter Rising of 1916 and perhaps by extension to the poet revolutionary, Joseph Mary Plunkett (1887-1916) and his poem I See His Blood upon the Rose? The Rosary of Ireland ends with another Irish revolutionary, Robert Emmett (1778-1803) and a reference to his speech from the dock where he declared ‘when my country takes her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written.’

    So I think that these literary allusions distinguish The Rosary of Ireland  from the many other offerings found in the popular religious press on the theme of Ireland’s relationship to the rosary. It was interesting too to see the survival of the ethos of the Victorian ‘Celtic Revival’ in a work published in the 1930s and I only wish I knew more of its author:

    THE ROSARY OF  IRELAND.

    Joyous.

    Before the Christian era ages agone,
    Ere Bethlehem’s bright star in glory shone,
    A beauteous land there was, a land most fair,
    Set in a silver sea, a jewel rare.

    A land of joy and peace, laughter and song,
    Famed for her ladies fair, and warriors strong.
    Erin the brave, for glorious deeds renowned,
    Is still, alas! by Pagan fetters bound.

    But lo! a guardian watches o’er the land,
    ‘Tis Victor, from the shining angel band;
    The time is come at last to break the chain.
    And for his chosen children, Heaven to gain.

    The Angel Victor* speeds like lightning rays,
    Bends o’er the sleeping Patrick, softly says,
    ‘Come, holy youth, the Irish voices call,
    Come with the Light of Faith, and lift the pall.’

    And now for Erin dawns the wondrous day.
    Nearer, and nearer still, with flashing ray,
    A dazzling light appears, as from afar,
    Glimmering and twinkling like the Morning Star.

    ‘Who dares enkindle fire’ the Druids cry,
    ‘Before our sacred fire is lit must die.
    Go! quench the light that now on Tara gleams,
    Or never shall we dim its shining beams.’

    Clothed in his Sacred Vestments, Patrick spoke,
    And Erin from the sleep of death awoke,
    The Druid idols from her now she spurns,
    Then gladly to the Faith of Patrick turns.

    Swiftly the torch of Patrick lights all round
    — Monasteries, Churches, Convents, Schools abound.
    Island of Saints and Scholars thro’ the ages,
    Leaving no blot nor stain on Erin’s page.

    Columba, Brendan, countless thousands more
    Sail o’er the ocean far from Erin’s shore,
    With Cross in hand, and Patrick’s flag unfurled,
    Her Missioners go forth, to teach the world.

    *Victor is the Guardian Angel of Ireland.

    Sorrowful.

    But Erin’s star of joy is setting fast,
    And bitter sorrow must be hers at last,
    Since she has had the joy of happy years,
    She now must share her Lord’s deep woe and tears.

    Ireland of Sorrow, like your Lord to be
    Despised, derided, spat upon, as He,
    Pierced to the Soul and garments dyed bright red,
    Holding the Cross through centuries of dread.

    Deep as the sea, as Mary’s sorrows were,
    Dolorous Ireland, in her grief you share,
    Faithful till death, and setting death at nought,
    Guarding the Priceless Pearl by Patrick brought.

    The fight goes on against the demon band,
    The powers of darkness rend the faithful land.
    And Erin, of the Chalice, drinks so deep,
    Her treasured Faith and Nationhood to keep.

    And as a light in darkness shines more bright
    The Faith of Ireland shone through darkest night.
    Tho’ trodden underfoot by ruthless foes,
    More gloriously with deeper lustre glows.

    A vivid redness floods the evening sky,
    As flames from burning churches mount on high,
    And bells give forth a harsh and clarion call,
    When lofty towers and noble spires fall.

    The shamrock shows a deeply crimson stain,
    Where round the Mass Rock Priests and people slain,
    And bowed in grief, as Erin’s thousands fell,
    Unconquered still, she braves the gates of hell.

    Scattered afar the Children of the Gael,
    Exiled and banished from their Innisfail,
    They plant the Cross of Christ in foreign climes,
    And thro’ these exiled ones, the Mass bell chimes.

    Glorious.

    But Erin’s long and dreadful woe is past.
    The sun burst’s rising in the East at last,
    And spite of centuries of pain and loss,
    She stands Victorious beneath the Cross.

    Hail! valiant Eire, bravest of the brave.
    Her exiled Children call across the wave,
    The ‘small black rose’ *puts on its crimson bloom,
    The brilliant Easter sun dispels the gloom.

    Then silvery clear ring out the joyous bells,
    Victory and peace their happy message tells,
    Erin among the nations takes her place,
    A noble nation and a noble race.

    Hail glorious Eire, let us joy with you;
    To God and Patrick may you e’er be true
    Thro’ all the ages that are still to be
    May you maintain your spotless purity.

    The sin of heresy will ne’er defile
    The peerless Faith you hold, dear Emerald isle,
    You who for centuries have been appointed
    The Cradle and the School of God’s Anointed.

    The glorious band of patriots we hail
    Who gave their lives for you, sweet Innisfail,
    Your freedom won, and now in letters gold,
    May gentle Emmet’s epitaph be told.

    *’The Little Black Rose,’ by Aubrey de Vere.

    M. EUGENIE HILL.

    Catholic Freeman’s Journal Thursday 19 May 1938, page 37

     

    Content Copyright © Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae 2012-2024. All rights reserved.

  • An Old Irish Prayer

    When I saw a 1912 article entitled ‘An Old Irish prayer’  in the The Sacred Heart Review I was expecting to find an early medieval text, but instead found the familiar bedtime prayer, ‘Now I lay me down to sleep’, known to generations of children but not, as far as I was aware, one with any particular Irish associations. But the anonymous writer claims that this prayer originated in Ireland, at ‘the golden time when Eire was Eirie’ no less. I haven’t myself come across the ‘wilder surmises’ linking Saints Patrick, Colum Cille and Aidan with the spread of the prayer, but its survival is attributed to ‘those conservators of tradition, the Irish peasants’. Having argued for the prayer’s Irish roots we suddenly find ourselves at the court of the Norman king William Rufus, where a pious child recites the prayer as the wicked monarch lies ill. The author ends by giving us a modern English version followed by an alleged ‘ancient Irish’ version. I suspect that this prayer is part of a later medieval European-wide tradition in which Ireland was represented, but was not the original source. The collection of traditional prayers by An t-Athair Diarmuid Ó Laoghaire S.J., Ár bPaidreacha Dúchais, includes an Irish language version, as does the Abhráin diadha chúige Connacht, of Douglas Hyde. So, I will append one of the Irish versions (with updated modern spelling) from Hyde’s 1906 Religious Songs of Connacht, along with his literal and poetic translations:

    An Old Irish Prayer.

    The universal night prayer of the children, beginning “Now I lay me down to sleep ” is only one thousand years older than Protestantism, although many of the misinformed appear to believe that it is of Protestant origin, says the Dublin Irish Catholic. The old, old Catholic prayer runs back to the golden time when Eire was Eirie, and there have been wilder surmises than this: that St. Patrick taught it to the children of the High King at Tara, that St. Columbkille bore it to Iona, and that St. Aidan carried it from Iona to England when he founded Lindisfarne Abbey. In one form or other the little prayer has descended through the ages from mother to child among those conservators of tradition, the Irish peasants. In the days of that precursor of Henry VIII the irreligious, dissolute William Rufus -that is to say, in the eleventh century— the old baby prayer was suddenly presented at Court. It was at a time when the corrupt monarch lay dangerously ill. He had banished St. Anselm and Anselm’s clergy, and in the hour of mortal need he was without spiritual help. Trembling for the salvation of his soul, he commanded his ungodly courtiers to kneel and pray for him. They knelt and muttered some jargon. The king would not be satisfied: he ordered them to pray audibly. But these, his chosen friends and flatterers, were of his own impious stripe; not one of them could say an intelligent prayer. At last they bethought them of a little page who had but lately come to Court, and who had been observed and mocked at his night prayers. The child was brought to the king’s bedside; he knelt and prayed:—

    Matthew, Mark, Luke and John
    Bless the bed that I lie on.
    There be four corners on my bed;
    There be four angels overspread;
    Two at my head, two at my feet,
    To be my guardians while I sleep —
    And if I die before I wake,
    Sweet Mary’s Son, my soul pray take.

    The modern English form is very much shorter: —

    Now I lay me down to sleep;
    I pray Thee,
    Lord, my soul to keep,
    If I should die before I wake,
    I pray Thee, Lord,
    my soul to take.
    Amen.

    One ancient Irish version runs thus: —

    Or ere I go this night to sleep.
    I give my Lord my soul to keep.
    There are four corners to my bed;
    Four angels round about my head—
    Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
    God bless the bed I rest upon.
    And if I die ere I awake,
    I give my Lord my soul to take.
    Amen.

    The Sacred Heart Review, Volume 47, Number 14, 23 March 1912.

    Ceithre Phosta ar mo Leaba.

    Ceithre Phosta ar mo Leaba,
    Ceithre aingeal orthu scartha
    Mathú, Marcas, Lúc a’s Seán
    Agus Dia do mo chumhdach arís go lá.

    FOUR POSTS. 

    Four posts around my bed,
    Four angels have it spread,
    Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John,
    Keep me, O God, till the day shall dawn.

    Literally. —
    Four posts on my bed
    four angels on my spreading (?)
    Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John
    And God keep me again till day.
    I have heard an English verse very like this. It ran thus if I remember right—”Four corners to my bed
    four angels round it spread
    Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John
    bless the bed that I lie on.”

    Douglas Hyde, Abhráin diadha chúige Connacht, Religious Songs of Connacht II,  (London and Dublin, 1906), 216-7.

    Content Copyright © Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae 2012-2024. All rights reserved.