OMNIUM SANCTORUM HIBERNIAE

Tag: Irish Saints

  • A Legend of Saint Molua

     

    August 4 is the feast of Saint Molua, an entry on whose life can be found here. Below, is a charming vignette from the Irish Celtic Revival scholar, Maud Joynt (1868-1940), which records the grief of a little bird at the saint’s passing:

    LEGEND OF SAINT MOLUA

    ONCE there lived in Ireland a saint called Molua son of Ocha, who loved
    all living creatures and was of all living creatures beloved. On the day
    of his death it chanced that a certain holy man, Maelanfair son
    of Anfadach, was walking in the woods and he saw a little bird perched
    on a bough and making great lamentation.

    “Oh, my God,” said he, “what can have happened? I will not taste food till it be revealed to me!”

     Then an angel appeared to him and said: “Be no longer troubled, O
    cleric. Molua the son of Ocha is dead and all living creatures bewail
    him; for he loved everything that lives and breathes, and throughout his
    life he never killed any creature, great or small; wherefore men mourn
    not more for him than do the beasts and the little bird thou seest
    yonder.”

    Maud Joynt, The Golden Legends of the Gael, (Dublin, n.d.), Part II, 81.

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  • A Hymn in Honour of Saint Moninne

    July 6 is the Feast of Saint Moninne of Killeevy, one of three women saints along with Brigid and Bronagh important to the people of the historic kingdom of Oriel in south-east Ulster. She is also one of the handful of Irish female saints with an extant written Life. There are many fascinating aspects to Saint Moninne. One was her reputation for asceticism, the Life of Monenna preserved in the Codex Salamanticensis calling her ‘the daughter of John the Baptist and the prophet Elias’. Whilst asceticism was certainly a feature of the Early Irish Church, it is unusual to see a female saint being described in this way. The other was her ‘manly spirit’ for her female body is no barrier to Moninne’s wholehearted pursuit of the eremetical way of life. There is thus a distinct flavour of the desert spirituality of Saint Anthony the Great to the life of this County Armagh abbess. In addition to the Salamanca Life there is also a Vita Sanctae Monennae compiled by a tenth or eleventh-century Irish monk called Conchubranus. He takes Moninne out of her Irish hermitage and portrays her as a pilgrim to Rome and founder of  churches in England and Scotland. The twelfth-century Abbot Geoffrey of Burton was convinced that Conchubranus was writing about his own abbey’s founder and expanded the Irish monk’s text into The Life and Miracles of Saint Modwenna. There has been a great deal of research into Saint Moninne and fresh translations of her various Lives in recent years. Mario Esposito (1887-1975) first published the text of the Life by Conchubranus in 1910 and included two abcderarian hymns in honour of the saint as an appendix. As a tribute to Saint Moninne on this her feast day I reproduce the opening verse from the first hymn and the closing verse of the second:

    Deum deorum dominum,
    Autorem vite omnium,
    Regem et sponsum uirginum
    Sempiternum infinitum,
    Invocemus perualidum
    Sancte Monenne meritum,
    Ut nos ducat post obitum
    In regni refrigerium.

    Let us invoke God, Lord of gods,
    Creator of the life of all,
    King and spouse of virgins,
    everlasting, infinite,
    and the very strong
    merit of holy Monenna
    that she may guide us after death
    to the refreshing of the kingdom.

    Sancta Monenna,
    lux huius mundi ascendit,
    in candilabro nitidum sponsum
    sicut sol in meridie.
    Qui regnas in secula seculorum. Amen.

    The holy Monenna,
    light of this world,
    ascended to her shining spouse
    in a candelabrum like the midday sun.
    Who reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

    Mario Esposito,  Ymnus Sancte Monenne Virginis in Appendix to “Conchubrani Vita Sanctae Monennae.” Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. Section C: Archaeology, Celtic Studies, History, Linguistics, Literature 28 (1910), 202-51.

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  • Saint Colman Steallan of Terryglass, May 26

    May 26 is the commemoration of Saint Colman Steallan, a saint of the monastery of Terryglass, County Tipperary. This foundation produced a number of notable holy men including Saint Colum, one of the ‘12 Apostles of Ireland‘ and Maeldithruib the anchorite. The manner in which the name of today’s saint has been recorded in the calendars has given rise to some confusion, not helped by the fact that Colman, Colum, Columb, Colm, Columba are all different ways of transliterating the same name. In the case of today’s saint, some of the later calendars talk of the feast of Steallan, as if we are dealing with two separate people. The latest authoritative guide to the saints of Ireland, Pádraig Ó Riain’s  A Dictionary of Irish Saints (2011), accepts Colmán Stiallán as a single individual and suggests that the epithet Stiallán attached to the name of this particular Colman may perhaps be translated as ‘the little strip’. Canon O’Hanlon records this of the little strip of
    Terryglass, in Volume V of his Lives of the Irish Saints:

    St. Colman Steallan, of Terryglass, County of Tipperary [Sixth and Seventh Centuries.]

    At the 26th of May, we find inserted, in the Martyrology of Tallagh, the name of Colman Stellain, Tirdoghlass, now Terryglass, as having been venerated. The Bollandists also follow this statement, and have some references to Colgan’s work, where allusions are made to our saint. The present holy man is placed in order of succession, after the Abbot Natchoemius or Mochoeminus—said to have been brother to St. Coemgenus, and who died, A.D. 584. The festival in honour of Steallan—as simply entered—of Tir-dá-glas, was celebrated on this day, as we read in the Martyrology of Donegal. In the table, postfixed to this work, we find his name Latinized Stellanus. It would seem, that this record, as published, distinguishes a St. Colman from the present St. Stellan, for there appears a separate entry of both these names. Marianus O’Gorman follows the Martyrology of Tallagh, in uniting both names, apparently for one person, who was venerated on this day, at Terryglass, on the eastern border of Lough Dearg. Other writers—such as Archbishop Ussher and our annalists—call him by the name of Colmanus Stellanus. However, there can hardly be any doubt, that this latter must be the proper entry, for in the “Annals of the Four Masters,” we read, that St. Colman Stellan of Tir-da-ghlas, died on the 26th of May, A.D. 624. With this agrees, likewise, the entry of his departure, in the “Chronicum Scotorum.” Other accounts place his death at 625; while Archbishop Ussher has it so late as 634. The festival of Stellan was observed on the 25th of May, as we find it in the “Feilire” of St. Aengus; and, appended to this notice is an Irish comment, in that copy, contained in the “Leabhar Breac,” which is followed by a Latin one, giving the series of Abbots, for Tir-da-glas and Cluain eidnech. It seems doubtful, notwithstanding, whether Colman should be separated from Stellan; but, many writers regard them as one and the same person.

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