November 6 is the Feast of All the Saints of Ireland and, since it is the date on which I started Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae in 2012, is also this blog’s patronal feast. To mark the occasion this year I reprint a sermon delivered by an Australian Dominican, Father R. J. Roche, on November 6 in 1931. This was ten years after the feast was instituted, along with an authorized Litany of the Irish Saints, the text of which you can read at the blog here. In his sermon Father Roche presents the realities of the Irish saints, yes, we have many whose names are known throughout the world but we have many more who are now obscure. It has always been part of my work to try and recover the names and memories of these lesser-known saints, all those who found a place on our historic calendars and were regarded as saints by popular acclamation. Wishing everyone the blessings of the Feast and thank you to all who support my work here at Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae and on All the Saints of Ireland on Radio Maria. Beannachtaí na Féile oraibh go Léir! Orate pro nobis omnes Sancti Hiberniae!

SAINTS OF IRELAND.

Father R. J. Roche’s Sermon on Feast Day.

Commemoration of all the saints of Ireland — of that large army, known and unknown, of the spiritual sons of St. Patrick, who have attained eternal glory after lives of virtue and zeal for the spread of the Gospel! Such a comprehensive remembrance has been established by the Church’s institution of the feast of All the Saints of Ireland, to be observed in certain centres of the world on November 6. Preaching at the Dominican Convent, West Maitland, on the day of the feast, Rev. Father R. J. Roche, O.P., recalled many of the prominent names of Erin’s saints, and made a strong plea for an intensification of the spirit which kept Ireland true to the faith through the ages of oppression.

Taking as his text, ‘For we are children of saints’ (Tobias), Father Roche said:

To-day we keep the feast of all the saints of Ireland. It is a feast recently established for Ireland, and by privilege extended to some Australian dioceses, including that of Maitland. Of many of the Irish saints the names are familiar: Columbkille, Dove of the churches and contemplative of Iona: his namesake almost, Columbanus, who found rest in the spiritual fastness of Italy; Kilian, the martyr; Brendan, the mariner; Virgil, Colman, Fiacre, Declan, Lawrence O’Toole, Oliver Plunket, and others whose stories are interwoven with history. Some lived and died in their own land, some became exiles for Christ. Up the Rhine or down the Danube, by the banks of the Seine and the Loire, their names are preserved in the cities they founded, and their memory is enshrined in the hearts of the people to whom they brought the Cross. Amongst those we commemorate are many women saints: the most renowned of them is Brigid, the Mary of the Gael. Beneath an oak tree at Kildare her cell was built, and around her gathered the most illustrious of her countrywomen. She is the mother of all the holy nuns who have come out of Ireland, no matter in what country they lived or to what Order they belonged.

Its Comprehensiveness. 

I said that the names of many of them are familiar to us. It is also true that of many more the names have not been preserved. As the Church instituted a general feast of All Saints to commemorate the unknown saints of all the world, so does to-day’s feast include all the obscure heroes and heroines of holiness whose spiritual father is St. Patrick. The unknown saints of Ireland! Perhaps not all of them are completely unknown. There are saints in every generation. We surely may treasure the memory of a saintly parent or grandparent who, we have every reason to believe, is now with God; those dead of ours whose memories should be deathless. They lived simple, self-denying lives: their companions were hardships, duty, family affection and love of God. Not for them the modern softness and the evasion of all restraint. Their homes were modelled on that of Nazareth; their highest law was the acceptance of the Divine Will. When sorrow and loneliness, desolation and spoliation came into their lives, their lips offered a sincere welcome to the Will of God. They went their simple way unto the end, they left a fragrance upon earth, and we may well believe that in death they found the Rest Eternal promised to those who bear the yoke of Christ. And their feast day is to-day — the feast of All the Saints of Ireland. Some of those whose memory we are keeping may have been born in this sunny land, or they may have come hither in Australia’s morning, come with their stout hearts to make a new nation, and with their strong faith to plant the Cross as a symbol of that nation’s ultimate allegiance and sublimest hope.

We are the spiritual children of the saints. They give us hope, they give us admonition. Behind us is more than a thousand years of tradition, tradition of the faith of our fathers! In mental vision we see the beautiful, unique picture of unbroken fidelity, generation after generation steadfast in the faith in spite of dungeon, fire and sword. A kingdom has been overthrown, a nation oppressed, but the Cross remains. Urban VIII. wrote to the Irish people: ‘Be mindful of your past: in your nation there have been many masters of virtue and athletes of the faith.’ As we praise their memory, we seek to emulate their virtues: their humility, their patience, their outstanding constancy. We ask that God may give us the grace to be faithful to our traditions, and to pass on undimmed the lamp of faith. It is true that the glories of ancient Erin are no more, and that the lamp of Kildare was put out by the spoiler; but the spiritual children of the Irish saints have still their place in the plans of God. May that place be always in the vanguard of those who seek to establish the Kingdom of God. We beg all the saints of Ireland, our own dear saintly dead, where’er they lie, we beg the martyrs of the penal days, we beg the sainted sons of Angus and the daughters of Brigid to be with us that we fail not in the conflict.