Art for Anti-clericalism's Sake

ART FOR ANTI-CLERICALISM'S SAKE

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

THE DAY Napoleon escaped from Elba, the headline in Le Monde read "Renegade Leaves Elba".  When he arrived in France, the headline ran "Napoleon Lands at Cannes".  And when he approached the capital, the headline was "His Imperial Majesty to enter Paris".  With this exercise in Realpolitik, the editor exercised the standard of objectivity we expect from today's print and electronic media.

I remember reading Mgr Michael Nolan's thesis some time ago in the Irish Catholic that people do not read newspaper's to inform themselves but to reinforce their prejudices.  He gave an illustration of this some years previously when several respectable news outlets repeating the old canard that St Thomas Aquinas said woman was merely a defective male.  Mgr Nolan is an expert on Aristotelian biology and it did not take him long to correct this.  He could quote the Angelic Doctor's own refutation of the charge, but found it very difficult to find a publisher.  Not even the Dominican Doctrine and Life would take it.  So he continued until the Daily Telegraph carried it.  Then he found another problem.  Clergy were unwilling to purchase the Daily Telegraph because of its anti-Irish bias but seemed to have no problem buying the Irish Times in spite of that paper's well-documented attitudes towards Catholicism.

Obscure painter

You think I'm joking?  Sometimes I wonder am I too harsh on the grey denizens of D'Olier St.  But just when I think it may be safe to look once again at the newspaper rack, they give me something which reaffirms my original position.  And on November 2, 2002, this came in the arts supplement.  So how could the discovery of a painting by an unknown 19th century Irish artist in Edinburgh, and the publication of a collection of verse by a forgotten Irish poet of the same century, illustrate the anti-Catholic vitriol I attribute to Ireland's most influential newspaper?

Aloysius O'Kelly was an obscure painter who would have remained obscure but for the fact his Mass in a Connemara Cabin showed up in an Edinburgh drawing room this summer.  This is a picture of a young priest giving the final blessing at a station Mass in a Connemara cabin and it is quite attractive.  The table is laid for Mass with the altar cards, candlesticks, crucifix, missal and chalice.  The priest's white vestments are depicted with detail; even the maniple can be seen on his left wrist.  And the Spartan furnishings of the cabin - basic, but maintained neatly and not without some pride.  The congregation are devout in their demeanour.  One pious old woman is nearly prostrate.  There is a solemn dignity about these tenant farmers and farm labourers and their families.

Three Redemptorists

Of course D'Olier St has to interpret this for us.  They did so by providing a commentary by Dr Niamh O'Sullivan who teaches art history at the National College of Art and Design.  Dr O'Sullivan allows three Redemptorist priests in Edinburgh do most of the talking.  One, Father Richard Reid (a young priest), sees a prefiguration of the Second Vatican Council - an emphasis on the Eucharist and the sanctification of daily life.  I wonder is ecclesiastical history taught so badly that a young priest would attribute this to Vatican II? Has he no knowledge of eucharistic piety stretching back to apostolic times in both East and West?  Has he not heard the maxim of the English recusants: "It is the Mass that matters"?  And in regard to labour and its sanctifying nature, any study of devotion to St Joseph, promoted by Pope Leo XIII, for example (who was Pope when this painting was exhibited in 1883) would fill in many gaps in Fr Reid's theological education.

Dr O'Sullivan gives more column space to the more subversive Father Hamish Swanston, Professor Emeritus of Theology at Kent University.  Father Swanston sees anticlericalism in the picture.  The laity are oppressed.  Maybe they were, but by whom?  By the clergy or by the largely Protestant ascendancy (unmentioned in this article)?  And if by the latter, the second question is who provided leadership to the oppressed Irish labourers?  The clergy or the Fenians?  It is that last question that makes the painting interesting.  Aloysius O'Kelly's bother James was a member of Parliament in Parnell's party and also a leading Fenian.  So, if there is a hint of anticlericalism in the picture, it should be very obvious it had its origin in Fenian bitterness.

Following the debacle surrounding the Fenian raid on Chester castle in 1867, Mgr David Moriarty, Bishop of Kerry, famously announced: "Hell is not hot enough nor eternity long enough to punish those who have led these young men astray."   The Fenians for their part held they took their religion from Rome and their politics from hell.  It is true that the painting reflects Ireland at the time of the Land War
Outmoded aspirations
Dr O'Sullivan draws a parallel between the founding of the Land League and the apparition at Knock in 1879.  No authentic Marian apparition takes place in an historical vacuum.  To give other examples: the Rue de Bac apparitions which gave the Church the Miraculous Medal took place within weeks of the overthrowing of the Most Christian King, Charles X of France and Navarre, in 1830; Pontmain in Brittany occurred at the height of the Franco-Prussian War in 1871; and Fatima happened as the First World War was in its third year.  The timing of the apparition at Knock in 1879 summoned the country's attention to the efficacy of the Mass and the Communion of Saints when more immediate solutions to Ireland's problems were considered - solutions which could lead to more problems.  To see oppression in this particular painting is no reflection on the Irish Church in the 1880s, but rather the outmoded aspirations of a class of theologian either stuck in the 1960s or narrowly focused on some contemporary Latin American experiences.

The painting was discovered in Edinburgh's Cowgate district, a notorious Irish slum area in the 19th Century.  James Connolly was born here in 1868.  But for all the misery, it was here that the Edinburgh soccer club, Hibernians, had its origin, just as Glasgow Celtic emerged from the Gorbals.

If this were not enough, the arts editor of the Irish Times also ran a review of Selected Poems of James Henry.  James Henry (1798-1876) abandoned his career in medicine on receiving an inheritance in 1846 and chose to wander around Italy instead.  On foot.  So it is hardly surprising his wife died in 1849.  The reviewer applauds Dr Henry as a fearless free thinker.  Yet anyone reading the review would see the poet-surgeon in fact failed to grow out of his adolescence and was most at home with the irresponsibility of an undergraduate.  The reviewer doesn't point out that the Church at which most of the bile in Dr Henry's work is directed is most likely the Established Church of the time - the Church of Ireland.  The reviewer describes Dr Henry as the scourge of humbug.  I wonder?  Some of the absurdities in his work were themselves humbug.  A colleague of mine once told me his father advised him not to be a socialist unless he could afford it.  Dr Henry appears to me to be in a category something like this.  He could afford to versify his whims - and no one really cared until the poems were reissued recently.  And the Irish Times deigned to draw them to our attention.

It is quite typical that the Irish Times should try to re-interpret 19th Century Irish art, literature and history through the spectacles with which it views the turn-of-the millennium period we are now enjoying.  One asks oneself: how far is D'Olier St prepared to take its anticlericalism?

The Brandsma Review, Issue 63, November-December 2002

A Brief History of Irish Monasticism

A BRIEF HISTORY OF IRISH MONASTICISM

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

ST PATRICK was trained as a monk in Gaul.  Christian Gaul was under the influence of the old Greek colonies in south-eastern France and the monasticism of Gaul was of a similar character to the monasticism of Egypt - in the spirit of St Anthony.  The popularity of St Anthony is seen in the copies of St Athanasius' Life of St Anthony in the monastic libraries and more concretely in his image on many high crosses.

St Patrick was particularly influenced by his Gaulish monastic exemplar - St Martin of Tours.  Sulpicius' Life of St Martin was also widely available in Irish monasteries.  The Irish monastic communities followed the spirituality and practice of desert monasticism.  This was ascetic and altogether different from the monasticism that would develop on the continent under the Rule of St Benedict.  Benedictine monasticism paralleled the cenobitic  monasticim of Cappadocia influenced by St Basil.

Egyptian monasticism tended to be eremitic; this phenomenon, beloved of the Irish, was later common in Orthodox Russia.  The great Irish monasteries began as hermitagesw.  Anchorites such as St Enda attracted huge followings and thus laid the foundations of influential monasteries - St Kevin's in Glendalough was a good example of this.

When St Colmcille - whether voluntarily or otherwise - went to Iona in 563, he set a very important precedent in the development of the Irish church.  Ever after, Irish monks would seek to preach the Gospel overseas.

Very soon afterwards, Irish monks left their mark all over the continent.  St Columbanus was particularly influential in France and Italy, and his disciple St Gall established a monastery in a canton that still bears his name in Switzerland.  St Fiachra became particularly associated with Paris taxi-drivers.  All over the German-speaking world, the phenomenon of the Schottenklöster or "Scottish monastery" is indicative no of the Scots, but of the Irish.  Scotus was Latin for Gael.  There is a district in Vienna called Schottentor which is indicative of this Irish invasion.  Irish monks went as far east as Kiev and perhaps Novgorod.  St Brendan the Navigator may well have reached Newfoundland.

In time, the Irish monasteries in Europe adopted the Benedictine rule, but continued to be Irish in character until the Reformation.  The Schottenklöster were known for the asceticism of their monks; St Macarius was the prior of the Schottenkloster in Würzburg in the 1100s and he was said to have changed wine into water.  Würzburg is at the heart of the Franconian wine producing region along the Main.
Strict asceticism
Irish monasteries, as remarkable for their distinctive craftsmanship and scholarship as for their asceticism, fell into disarray due to the political instability of the following centuries.  The Viking raids maid a well-publicised impact; but many monasteries suffered at the hands of Irish nobles.

A reform movement was already in place at this time.  In around 800, the Céle Dé (Slaves of God) were established in Tallaght, Co Dublin, principally by the anchorite St Óengus.  The Céle Dé, also known as Culdees and currently fêted among New Agers, were an incredibly strict monastic movement, analogous to orders which developed later.  Their concept of stabilitas loci was very literal and they lived on a very meagre vegetarian diet - they seem to have anticipated the Carthusians.

The movement spread rapidly and soon had foundations all over Ireland - some more questionable than others.  The ninth century king-bishop of Munster and Cashel, Feilimid mac Crimthaind, was a Céle Dé.  Feilimid was both very able and politically astute.  He set about claiming the high kingship and nearly succeeded until he was killed in battle against the Uí Néill in 847.  During Feilimid's reign, the cause of reform had a momentum unlike at any other period.  Not many abbots would risk taking on his wrath at the time.
Malachy and Bernard
The political upheaval that began after the Battle of Clontarf in 1014 was damaging to the Church in Ireland.  Clontarf was no great victory; when Brian Boru died, the notion of a country under a single high king was established, but it was at least another century before a given dynasty established a claim to the high kingship.

In the late 11th century, the Irish Church faced another threat as the Archbishops of Canterbury began claiming jurisdiction over Ireland.  A movement of Irish Churchmen  saw it was important to for Irishmen to reform the Church here before others would come to reform it.  The star of this movement was St Malachy of Armagh - and the most significant element was the relationship of St Malachy to the most influential churchman of the day - St Bernard of Clairvaux.  The relics of Ss Malachy and Bernard are kept together before the high altar in the monastery of Clairvaux - and it is said they cannot be separated.

St Malachy introduced the Cistercians and the Augustinian canons regular into Ireland, and other orders followed.  When the Cistercian Pope Blessed Eugenius III was in exile, he asked St Bernard for advice and St Bernard told him to model his life on St Malachy.   Blessed Eugenius perhaps made the most significant contribution to the Irish Church in its whole history in 1152, when he sent John Cardinal Paparo as his legate to the Synod of Kells.

The embryonic Irish hierarchy erectic dioceses and petitioned for pallia for Armagh and Cashel.  This was not what Blessed Eugenius granted.  Cardinal Paparo delivered not two, but four pallia to Ireland - recognising Dublin and Tuam as metropolitian sees in addition to Armagh and Cashel.
English Pope's role
It is a tragedy of Irish history that there was rivalry between the Cistercians and Benedictines.  The more ascetic Cistercians held the upper hand in Ireland as they do today.  Blessed Eugenius had difficulties with King Stephen of England who retained the throne after a civil war against the Empress Matilda.  Eugenius was succeeded by the English Benedictine Adrian IV who had no sympathy for Cistercians and a better relationship with Matilda's son Henry II (who was later excommunicated for the murder of St Thomas Beckett).  Adrian issued the Bull Laudabiliter to Henry granting him Ireland as a papal fief, on the condition he would reform the Church.

So, within the space of a few years, a Cistercian pope saw the Irish church as being in such a good condition that it deserved four metropolitans, rather than just the two it had requested; and then a Benedictine pope came to the conclusion that the only hope for the Irish church was to entrust its reformation to a foreign monarch who happened to be a fellow countryman of his!

However, there is no doubt that the post-Norman invasion Irish Church maintained its vigour and continued to journey far afield.  To mention two examples, the tutor of the young St Thomas Aquinas was a teacher called Petrus de Hiberniae (Peter of Ireland).  One imagines he did a good job.  And when the Franciscans sent a mission to China in the mid-13th century, among the friars was Jacobus de Hiberniae (James of Ireland).  The Mongol dynasty was quite amenable to external ideas, including Christianity; and an archdiocese was erected in Beijing.  The Mongols were overthrown by the more inward looking Ming dynasty around the time the Black Death wreaked havoc with the Western Church.  And thus a tremendous opportunity was lost.
The Great Schism
In the later Middle Ages, the Irish Church suffered the decadence that was the lot of the Western Church after the Black Death.  Religious communities were particularly affected - and devastated.  The Great Schism of the West happened soon aftertwards.  It is well worth noting that two canonised saints of the Dominican Order, St Vincent Ferrer and St Catherine of Siena disagreed as to which purported Pope was legitimate.  Every order had at least two claimant superiors-general, based in Avignon and Rome.  And after the schism, there was still much disagreement as to the balance of power between a Council and a Pope.

The fifteenth century saw three of the mendicant orders - the Augustinians, Dominicans and Franciscans - develop reform movements within themselves.  These observantine congregations went back to their original rule, constitutions, spirituality and purposes, and also depended directly on the superior general rather than a local provincial who might have had political biases injurious to the interest of the order.  The observantine Augustinians particularly established themselves in the west of Ireland and principally among the Irish-speaking population.  This one bright spark offered a hope to the church which was standing on the brink of chaos.
Disaster on disaster
One immediate consequence of Henry VIII's schism was the suppression of religious houses in Ireland simply to gratify the avarice of the king's henchmen.  Some houses lasted as late as the reign of James I, but excepting a respite during Mary I's reign, the so-called Reformation led to one disaster after another for Ireland, culminating in the Penal Laws which lasted into the 19th century.

However, attempts were made to run religious houses in Ireland during penal times.  My favourite story relates to the presence of incognito Dominican nuns in Drogheda in the 17th century.  The local sheriff called to the house to discuss rumours of "Popish nuns" living there.  The prioress, an aristocratic Irishwoman, received him in her finest gown and put on all her airs and graces, dispelling the suggestion with the truthful statement: "Sir, the women in this house are no more Popish nuns than I am."
All over Europe
All this time, Irish religious houses were established all over the continent, many to parallel the Irish colleges there.  To this day, there is still an Irish Dominican convent in Lisbon and until the First World War there was an Irish Benedictine convent in Ypres (now Kylemore Abbey).  There were Irish religious houses in Paris, Louvain and Salamanca, all now tragically closed.  At one stage, there was an Irish college in Prague, associated with Charles University.

There were several other centres throughout the Catholic world which also provided Catholic gentlemen with education for vocations in the world.  A relative of Daniel O'Connell once said their clothes, their wine, their education and their religious were all contraband.  O'Connell and his brother were students at Douay at the time of the French Revolution and witnessed the bloodshed first hand - and the anti-religious nature of the revolution.  The Napoleonic era marked much upheaval for the church in Europe, so the relaxation of the penal laws afforded the Irish on the continent an opportunity to come home.

The 19th century was marked not only by the re-establishment of older religious orders in Ireland, or those founded on the continent in the interim, but by the foundation of new religious orders specifically for Irish needs: Blessed Ignatius Rice's Christian Brothers and Presentation Brothers; Nano Nagle's Presentation Sisters; Mother Catherine McCauley's Sisters of Mercy; and Mother Mary Aikenhead's Sisters of Charity.  As Cardinal Cullen dominated the Irish church in the mid-nineteenth century, convents and monasteries dotted the country.

Once again the Irish took to the missions, building up the Church throughout the English-speaking world, prior to moving into more difficult territories.  Three endeavours arose from Maynooth  alone in the early 20th century.  Following the failure of the Maynooth Mission to India, the Maynooth Mission to China and the Maynooth Mission to Africa became the Society of St Columban and the Society of St Patrick.
A sudden drought
Religious life continued to expand in Ireland until the late 20th century, when it suddenly slowed down and went into reverse.  Religious houses closed.  Religious were no longer visible.  Religious spokesmen and women sent out mixed messages in a confused age.  The source of religious vocations suddenly dried up where only a short time ago they had been plentiful.

This is not altogether new in the Irish church.  Religious life in Ireland had many dark and bleak periods.  These coincided with a general decline in the health of the Church.  When the Church recovered, religious life was strong - but such a strengthening was evident in the fervour of the religious; the pride in which they wore their distinctive habits, practiced the ascetic life, proclaimed the teaching of the Church  in and out of season, and stuck to the original intention of their founders.

The world is not without such religious houses - more in France than anywhere else.  So when are we going to look once again to continental Europe for guidance?

The Brandsma Review, Issue 65, March-April 2003

Two cheers for Father Twomey

Book Review

TWO CHEERS FOR FATHER TWOMEY

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

THE END OF IRISH CATHOLICISM?

By Fr Vincent Twomey SVD.  Veritas, Dublin, 2002. 220pp.  €12.95

MY friend, An tAthair Dáibhéad Ua hAnluain, will not mind me citing O'Hanlon's Law.  This states that no Irish Catholic cleric can abide the presence of anyone ideologically to his right.

For this reason, the Catholic Left do their utmost to cultivate the secular Left, who have as little time for former Céide readers as they do for those who read this Review.  The conservative Catholics try to attract liberal Catholics by excluding traditionalists, though the liberals make no distinction between the two.  (It will be interesting to see how the Irish Catholic develops under its new editor.)  And Father Vincent Twomey writes a new book.

I have a certain regard for Rev Dr Vincent Twomey.  For many years, he has been one of the few orthodox paragons in the Pontifical University, Maynooth's theology faculty.  It could not have been so comfortable to work in a moral theology department in which both Rev Enda McDonagh and Rev Patrick Hannon were professors.

For the gossip of many ill-informed (usually lay) theology undergraduates, one might think that Fr Twomey is an arch-conservative reactionary occupying a position of the politico-religious spectrum only slightly to the left of Mère Angelique Arnaud.  And to confirm their analysis, they invariably remind us of the professor under whom he studied at Münster and Regensburg: Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger.

Contrast with Bavaria

For these reasons, I read Fr Twomey's book with interest.  At first I had much to agree with in the opening pages.  Like Fr Twomey, I first realised how devastating the effects of the penal laws were on Ireland while in Catholic Germany.  So many aspects of what Bavarians take for granted are missing from Irish Catholic life: gilded roccoco churches; mediaeval wayside shrines; images of Christ and the Madonna on public display from private houses; observance of Advent; crucifixes hanging in civil service offices; and public holidays on holydays of obligation.

Fr Twomey is particularly interested in this last point.  He contrasts Bavaria, where Ascension Thursday and Corpus Christi are holidays, with Ireland, where the bishops apologetically moved the observance of these feasts to the following Sunday.  This move was intended to woo the lapsed.  As with similar gestures, it did not bring anybody back, but infuriated the faithful.  It occasioned the greatest intake of protest letters that David Quinn received during his editorship of the Irish Catholic.

The comparison is there.  Bavaria (whose relationship with Protestant Prussia resembles our own with Protestant England) has a much more self-confident public Catholicism than Ireland.  And despite the stereotype of the German, Bavaria has more in common with Mediterranean Catholicism than Ireland has.  (I have a thesis that Ireland, Bavaria, Quebec, the southern Netherlands and possibly Lithuania have the common experience of strong regional Catholic identity in the face of persecution by Protestant or Orthodox power.)

Folk festivals

Fr Twomey also points to the folk festivals in Southern Europe on Church holidays.  It should be noted that post-Penal Law Ireland retains one distinctive folk festival - Hallowe'en.  But the Eve of All Hallows has lost  its intimate connexion with the Feasts of All Saints and All Souls.  In Ireland, there seems to be a Calvinist-like obsession with purifying Catholicism of allegedly pagan elements.

Fr Twomey then analyses the present state of the Irish Church in the light of recent historic events.  If I were to caricature this assessment, it would run like this: the Irish Church never took theology seriously and therefore misunderstood the spirit of the Second Vatican Council and implemented it improperly, causing major problems.  And now, the administrators of the Irish Church are shocked into a state of inertia and are unsure of what to do next.

He may have a point, but he should first look at those countries that did take theology seriously.  I am reminded of the Rhine-basin countries referred to in The Rhine Flows into the Tiber.  All these took theology very seriously indeed and all have deeper problems than the Irish Church.

Developments ignored

One of the most positive moves by an episcopal conference I can recall is the Lithuanian bishops' decision to educate all their seminarists in Lithuania, only sending select priests for further study in Rome.  This is not an option for any Irish bishop, unless he has the courage to do as Cardinal Pell has done in Australia, or as Mgr Bruskewitz has done in the United States. (That is, to take personal charge of seminary education and stand no nonsense from dissenting professors.)

But the conservative and traditional lay movements in continental Europe, and moves by the likes of Cardinal Pell and the Lithuanian bishops, and the many positive developments in North American frequently discussed in this Review are not factors in Fr Twomey's thesis.

What Fr Twomey does propose is a radical re-drawing of ecclesiastical boundaries, reducing the number of dioceses and parishes.  This, he argues, will free many priests from administrative duties for pastoral endeavours.

This may well be true, but the scheme is problematic.  The constitution of the Irish dioceses was effected mainly in the 12th Century.  The prelates who oversaw this were saints and scholars under the leadership of St Malachy of Armagh.  It is difficult to see a committee drawn from Ireland's current clergy and bishops (or religious and laity) coming up with something better, should they indulge in a moment of neo-Josephism.

It is true that Irish dioceses are very small and the current vocations crisis will result in a shortage of worthy candidates for the episcopacy in the future (some might say this has already happened).  Prevailing factors may bring about this redrawing of ecclesiastical maps anyway, but I am not without hope that the situation will turn around.  In the circumstances, I disagree with Fr Twomey's prescription for the present.

Weak on catechetics

On the whole, I find Fr Twomey's presentation full of good intentions.  The trouble is that he is unwilling to contaminate himself with the religious Right, preferring (futile) conciliation with the Left.  So the Brandsma Review is unmentioned in the book, in spite of the fact that our readers have a natural sympathy for Fr Twomey.

It is a tragedy that he seems to have missed Éanna Johnson's dissection of the Alive-O series.  Fr Twomey is aware of concern about primary catechesis, but he is reluctant to probe the area.  This reluctance seems like a fudge.

He is vaguely more positive about secondary catechesis, but this affirms the effectiveness of the Maynooth BATh programme he teaches.  In my experience, not only is secondary catechesis negligible, but most informed laypeople under 40 became so by setting aside a lot of their spare time for personal homework.

On political matters, he proffers a pathetic excuse about clergy and laity who knew "in their heart of hearts" that the liberal agenda was wrong, but did not feel competent to enter the debate.  Does this mean that divorce, among other things, was legalised because a considerable number of Irish Catholics were afraid of their own shadows.

I note that Mgr Francis Cremin is conspicuous by his absence.  But the article in the Irish Catholic that described the launch of Humanae Vitae - in which Mgr Cremin played a leading role - as a public relations disaster is reprinted in the book as an appendix.  I wonder if Fr Twomey is hoping to woo those who take this line.  If so, he will fail.
Confidence unjustified
Another disappointment is that Fr Twomey doesn't reflect his former teacher's support for the traditional movement.  Cardinal Ratzinger has been very supportive of new orders such as the Priestly Fraternity of St Peter and lay movements like Una Voce International.  Nor does Fr Twomey note the vitality of Eastern Catholicism - even with the presence of a very active new Byzantine Catholic parish in Dublin.

He prefers to confine his praise to groups which are conservative on faith and morals, but liberal on liturgy, spirituality and general approach.  I would contend that experience of this grotesque age simply does not justify the confidence in modernity displayed by the non-traditionalist neo-conservative movements.

One certainly sympathises with Fr Twomey's endeavours.  It was very brave of an individual priest to produce a work like this in the current ecclesiastical climate.  But one could wish he could bring himself one step closer to the Right.

The Left wrote him off a long time ago.  And those of us on his right really aren't all that odious.  I wonder does O'Hanlon's Law apply outside Ireland.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 69, November-December 2003

Hellowe'en

Hellowe'en 

by Melancholicus

Melancholicus is not sure which day he despises most—St. Patrick’s day (March 17, and a holy day of obligation in the dioceses of Ireland), or today, Hallowe’en.

Both days are—at least in their origins—religious festivals of unimpeachable character. But their celebration today has been robbed of all recognisably Christian content, whereat they are perverted to the level of bacchanalia in a spectacle of which words such as ‘orgiastic’, ‘frenzy’ and ‘excess’ would not be an unfitting description.

The feast of St. Patrick, the apostle of Ireland c. 500 A.D., is today an occasion for inebriation of a kind to which even the drunken Irish are unaccustomed. The so-called “St. Patrick’s Day Parade” held in Dublin (and mimicked elsewhere throughout the country) has nothing to do with St. Patrick, or with the coming to Ireland of the light of the Christian faith, but is an unedifying spectacle reminiscent of Mardi Gras and (public nudity excepted) with a similar degree of wild abandon. The only remaining religious aspect of the day is the Mass, but even this has been infiltrated by the same kind of trivialising frivolity that has given us enormities such as green beer in the pubs and green milkshakes at McDonalds. Melancholicus has even seen the liturgical abuse of green vestments being worn during the celebration of the saint’s Mass.

But enough of poor St. Patrick, and the degradation to which celebration of his feast has sunk, for today is your blogger’s other most hated day.

The name Halloween (more properly Hallowe’en) is a contraction of All Hallows’ Even, namely the vigil of the feast of All Saints (1 November). Melancholicus traditionally celebrates Hallowe’en by reciting First Vespers of All Saints, after which he pours himself a double gin and tonic, then enjoys his dinner and—external factors permitting—relaxes by the fire. He has no time for the neo-pagan mummery now associated with Hallowe’en, or for the glut of horror films typically shown on the television, nor for the pagan apologetics and sympathetic publicizing in the media of hazards like wicca, and he has absolutely no time whatever for the frenzied youths that run wild, shoving matchboxes filled with excrement through people’s letterboxes, or inserting fireworks up the exhaust pipes of parked cars (or even in the fuel pipe in an attempt to ignite the contents of the tank), or hurling explosives at those unlucky enough to be compelled by their employment to be out in public on this night.

The association of Hallowe’en with the preternatural world is in its origin Celtic, since 1 November is Samain, which begins the dark half of the year and functions as a kind of Celtic new year’s day. What makes Samain particularly auspicious (or inauspicious, as the case may be) is that it is a junture of particular importance. In the Celtic reckoning of time, it was not days and nights that were regarded as particularly important with respect to the preternatural, but the divisions between them. Boundaries between different places were invested with a similar significance for the same reason. According to this belief, one is most likely to encounter a ghost not at night, but at dusk, since dusk is the boundary between night and day. Similarly, one may meet with greatest misfortune at the boundary between this world and the síd (otherworld), rather than in either one or the other.

So the eve of Samain is a juncture of particular danger, because many different boundaries co-incide at once. Once the sun has set but before darkness has fallen completely, it is neither day nor night; we are neither in the light half nor in the dark; we are neither in the old year nor in the new. At such times the boundaries between this world and the other are blurred, the tides of chaos are loosed and preternatural forces have free play with the world of men. Hence the origin of the association of Hallowe’en with ghosts and spectres and hauntings and that sort of thing.

This night is indeed a night of horror, but not owing to Celtic superstitions; Melancholicus is far more concerned about a potential confrontation with those who walk on two legs in a living body than with the spirits of the dead. It is prudent to keep an eye on one’s car until the chaotics have gone home to bed and the nocturnal fracas has died away. If one has a household pet such as a dog or a cat, one MUST keep the animal indoors on this night; dogs, particularly, with their amplified sense of hearing, suffer great distress on being exposed to the noise of fireworks (which, incidentally, are illegal in this country, but the law is in no wise enforced). The chaotics have been known to throw smaller animals onto bonfires, deriving a sick amusement from such cruelty. Other animals have had fireworks strapped to their bodies, or inserted into their orifices. This is the busiest night of the year for the emergency services; the police, the fire brigade, the ambulance service (and doubtless the ISPCA) will be kept going all night.

The celebration of Hallowe’en was not always so lawless and fraught with peril; it used to be, as recently as Melancholicus’ childhood, a gentle evening of fun and entertainment (with mild scariness) for the benefit of children. Today it has been taken over by the yob element, whom one cannot safely ask to move on elsewhere, never mind remonstrate, for fear—literally—of being killed. I do not exaggerate.

Excess is tolerated in our society, and from some avenues even positively encouraged.

This is the fruit of social inversion.

First posted here: http://infelixego.blogspot.ie/2008/10/helloween.html 31 October 2008

Hallowe'en: Threat or Opportunity?

HALLOWE'EN: THREAT OR OPPORTUNITY?

By PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

Sancta ergo, et salubris est cogitatio pro defunctis exorare, ut a peccatis solvantur (2 Macchabees, 12:46)

WHEN I was ten, I had to write an essay on Hallowe'en.  I went home from school, researched the customs and background of the festival and was commended for my work by the vice-principal.  Which was ironic as he had imposed this on us as a punishment.  Much later I graduated in Celtic Studies and with the passage of time observed the changing nature of Hallowe'en.

Hallowe'en is a phenomenon.  In the United States, it is second in commercial value only to Christmas.  It surpasses Easter, the distinctly American feasts of Thanksgiving and Independence Day and all the other holidays and commemoration days in the calendar.  This explains how Hallowe'en is encroaching rapidly upon countries and cultures where it is not traditional.  It is no exaggeration to say it has taken the German-speaking world by storm.  From being almost unknown in Germany in the mid-1990s, it is now marked even in small towns and villages all over the country.

Powers of Darkness

It is also the case that Hallowe'en is changing.  Traditionally, Hallowe'en was primarily focussed on children and, in Ireland at least, adults indulged in some innocent amusements.  But in recent years, Hallowe'en has taken a distinctly adult character.  This stems from the United States and is mainly an exploitation of the festival's market value.  And this has become a very successful export, as the profitable new Hallowe'en becomes universal.

It is more than fair to say Hallowe'en presents a threat.  Hallowe'en, as currently understood, gives us every reason for concern.  This does not relate to Hallowe'en in itself or any of the folk customs I understood to be part of Hallowe'en when I wrote my fifth-class penalty essay.  Hallowe'en is almost exclusively associated with the powers of darkness.  The post-Christian West denies these powers' existence, but increasingly pays annual tribute to them on October 31.  The witch movement keeps this date as its most important sabbath.

New Ageism in general appeals to the four principal Celtic festivals.  These festivals, which the witch movement has more or less taken as "sabbaths", mark the turning of the seasons in the British Isles.  Samain, on 1 November, was the most important of these; and all feature in so-called Celtic spirituality.  For its part, the Satanist/Luciferian movement also keeps Hallowe'en as a feast.  Though this is very much a fringe movement, this is the direction in which the ubiquitous shop window displays point.

How much do we know about the original Hallowe'en?  The Celtic feast of Samain was kept around the beginning of November.  This was a new year celebration, which also represented a harvest thanksgiving.  This new year differed from ours.  We are accustomed to go immediately from the old year to the new.  Samain was a three-day feast between the end of one year and the beginning of the next.  This "out of time" quality of Samain led the Celts to believe the dead were free to walk the earth again and that they would visit their old homes.  For this reason, the Celts were particularly mindful of dead relatives and friends around this time.

.But there is really very little evidence in source material as to how Samain was celebrated.  I have read many secondary accounts about some gruesome practices the Celts indulged in at Samain.  While I have no trouble believing the Celts to have been thoroughly barbarous as heathens (despite what Celtic Spirituality devotees may believe), I have seen no evidence for most of the claims made by occultists about Samain.  Much of this is the product of overactive imaginations.

 The Celts dominated Europe before the Roman Empire took shape.  It is impossible to reckon the extent to which Samain was observed in Europe, but it is certain it was still strong among the Gauls when they were evangelized.  The Church recognised the significance of Samain.  So two great feasts were initiated at the time - All Saints (All Hallows) on November 1 and All Souls on November 2.

Samain was providential

So was the Church culturally imperialistic or opportunistic?  Did the Church attempt to suppress Samain or use it as an instrument for conversion?  Let us say Samain, whatever it might have been in heathendom, was providential.  It served two purposes; for the Celts in helping them assimilate Christianity and for the Church, in compelling her to clarify the doctrine of the Communion of Saints.

After the institution of the two feasts, Samain became Hallowe'en, taking the name Eve of All Hallows or Halloweven, later Hallowe'en.  Thus the three day festival of Samain was maintained in the Celtic world, but with a distinctly Christian ethos.  It may well be that many of the Hallowe'en practices have their origins in pagan times.  Or it may not.  Folk traditions only last as long as they are supported by the prevailing culture and they rarely survive indefinitely without alteration.

In the case of the Irish Hallowe'en, the public practice of All Saints and All Souls was suppressed in Penal Times, but Hallowe'en continued.  Over time, the celebration apparently lost its intimate connection with the Church feasts.  It is difficult to say.  For a few generations, wake practices in Ireland were held to be in direct continuity with pagan practices.  Then some scholar suggested some were invented in Penal Times to conceal the presence of a priest illegally performing the necessary ministrations.

If I apply Occam's Razor to Hallowe'en - unbroken continuity with pagan Samain or an attempt to keep a suppressed feast alive - which is the more probable?  I am mindful of the coincidence of Hallowe'en/All Saints and Guy Fawkes' Night on November 5.  That a distinctly anti-Catholic holiday should be instituted in England to commemorate the foiling of one of the many highly dubious Catholic conspiracies in Tudor and Stuart times is very interesting indeed.  I don't believe Guy Fawkes' Night would have emerged had All Hallows not been strong in previously Catholic England.

Distorted notion of fun

So I believe that instead of reconstructing a lost heathen new year, one should compare Hallowe'en with the outlandish folk festivals associated with Catholic feasts in Mediterranean Europe. Such festivals are even more bizzare in the Orthodox world and anyone steeped in a Calvinist anthropology would shout “paganism”.

Hallowe'en was brought to the United States by Irish immigrants in the 1800s. This Hallowe'en had long lost its close ties with All Saints and All Souls. Any older significance was long forgotten. But it took many generations to take its present horrific form. It is easy to see how an apparently non-religious festival could be so attractive in a society in the process of advanced secularization. It is also easy to see how Hallowe'en could become a horror Fest once the Catholic understanding of the next world has been extracted.  Following that, it is not too difficult to see how competing groups - New Ageists, Occultists, Luciferians - could impose their own meaning on Hallowe'en.  And in the process, the commercial value increases.  Especially in a world in which adults have a distorted notion of what constitutes fun.  The terrifying new Hallowe'en is now a successful American export - even to countries in which Hallowe'en is traditional.

Television is to blame.  When I was a child, we used to go from house to house asking for apples and nuts.  More advanced children would ask for help for the Hallowe'en party.  Now it is almost universal for children to say "trick or treat" in the American manner.  One wonders about the educational value of allowing impressionable children to get what they want by threatening people with tricks.

It is a long established custom in Ireland to tell ghost stories around Hallowe'en.  These stories are told as true stories and are of a local nature the audience will identify with.  Though many may be scary, the purpose is not to frighten people.  In fact, some reflect the Catholic belief that the souls in Purgatory need our prayers and the ghosts are there to alert our attention to this fact.  Film and television does not present us with this type of ghost story.  Instead, it transmits plain and simple horror, just for the sake of shocking the viewers.  But this is all part of the Hallowe'en industry and it builds up the Hallowe'en various neo-pagan and satanist elements wish to impose upon the general public.  They have made great strides in this direction.

The Mystical Body

So what do we do about Hallowe'en?  There is very little we can do in the short term, as it is impossible to immunize oneself from the dominants culturee.  So Hallowe'en has to be put back in the context of All Saints/All Souls.  If there are to be fruit and nut collections and fun and games, this should be done as a harvest thanksgiving and in preparation for the great feasts.  In Ireland, a minor fast is kept in November to assist the souls in Purgatory.  The celebration of Hallowe'en may point in this direction.

The first step towar a new understanding of Hallowe'en is a new understanding of the relationship between the Church Militant, the Church Triumphant and the Church Suffering.  The Church - in Heaven, on Earth and in Purgatory - is the Mystical Body of Christ.  Hallowe'en should ultimately mark the launch of a festival to restate our belief in these realities and especially for charitable works towards the relief of the sould in Purgatory.  And those who think Hallowe'en too flamboyant to precede a fast ought to recall Mardi Gras and Fasching are very colourful ways of marking the beginning of Lent.

Yes, Hallowe'en is a threat; it is a battleground upon which the forces of darkness appear invincible.  Our Lord Himself reminds us the children of this world are wiser than the children of light.  But Hallowe'en is also an opportunity - for the children of light to prepare for a reaffirmation of the Communion of Saints and to do something for the souls in Purgatory.  In the early years of the Church, Samain was taken from real pagans to become All Saints and All Souls, upon which Hallowe'en depended.  Taking Hallowe'en back from neo-pagans should be less of a challenge.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 74, September-October 2004

St Malachy, Architect of Church Autonomy

SAINT MALACHY, ARCHITECT OF CHURCH AUTONOMY

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

Beatus servus, quem, cum venerit dominus, invenerit vigilantem: amen dico vobis, super omnia bona sua constituet eum. St Matthew 25: 46-47

NOT far from Fatima is the fortress monastery of Alcobaça, resting place of many early kings and queens of Portugal and a monument to Portugal's history as a frontier territory between Europe and the Moorish empire.  This is why so many castles appear on the Portuguese flag and arms.  Alcobaça was Cistercian and among the saints particularly venerated by the mediaeval Cistercian order was one Irishman.  His statue is to be seen in the cloister there.  That was St Malachy of Armagh (1094-1148).

St Malachy, like so many historical figure, has a posthumous reputation that represents a distortion of his career.  In the English-speaking world, his is associated with a series of epigrams concerning future popes.  Assuming the present Holy Father is De Labore Solis, we are left with Gloriae Olivitiae and Petrus Romanus prior to the Second Coming.  I plead agnosticism on both authorship and authenticity of these prophecies, but that does not subtract from either the holiness or significance of the saint.

The Church in early 11th-century Europe sank into a mire that would make the Church on the eve of the Reformation seem positively virtuous - with dubious characters such as Benedict IX occupying the Throne of St Peter.  The one beacon that blazed on Continental Europe was at Cluny and from Cluny came a reform unlike any other - unequaled even by the Counter-Reformation.

Though many saints were raised up in this movement, the pontificate of St Gregory VII (Hildebrand) left its stamp on the Church even after Catholic monarchs throughout Europe implemented these reforms - such as St Edward the Confessor in England and St Margaret in Scotland, queen of Malcolm III Canmore, who succeeded Macbeth as King of Scots.

Ireland was on the outer periphery.  Between 1002 and 1014, Brian Boru O'Kennedy usurped the High Kingship and centralised it in a way his predecessors never could have done.  By the end of the 11th century, Turlough O'Brien had instituted attempts to reform a demoralised church.  Monasteries had ceased to be the centres of learning and piety that earned Ireland the title Insula Sanctorum et Doctorum.  The descendents of the Vikings had long been Christian, but the Ostman dioceses of Dublin and later Waterford and Limerick looked to Canterbury for jurisdiction rather than to Cashel or Armagh.

Ecclesiastical jurisdiction was problematic in Ireland anyway.  St Patrick instituted the episcopacy but as there were no towns in Ireland before the Viking raids, no diocesan structure evolved.  The monasteries became the centre of ecclesiastical, commercial and even political life.  Monasteries linked by a common founder grouped together into federations called paruchiae to advance a common cause.  So the Columban paruchia, centred first in Iona and later at Kells, represented the interests of its founder St Colmcille (or Columba).  It sought an ecclesiastical primacy consistent with the political primacy of its patrons: the house of O'Neill.  The monastery of Armagh and its paruchia represented the interest of St Patrick, who was clearly venerated as the Apostle of the Irish, but until Armagh was universally accepted as the primatial see, not universally recognised as patron saint.

The Comarba Pátraic (successor of St Patrick) claimed primacy but was not acknowledged as such.  The would-be primate was only definitively an abbot of the monastery in Armagh, was not necessarily a bishop and from time to time may not have been a cleric in major orders.  Many of these officials were lay beneficiaries who were lesser nobility - theoretically in minor orders but essentially living a secular life serving the interests of their families or their superiors in the social order.

Other reforms were needed.  Lanfranc of Canterbury, who claimed Ireland was within his jurisdiction, wrote to Turlough O'Brien on the matter - on one occasion complaining the Irish had a law of fornication rather than of marriage.  The shortcomings in the Irish church delineated by Lanfranc were far from unique to Ireland, and the pace of reform was slow.  In Ireland, as elsewhere, it would take a very powerful personality to implement the Hildebrandine reforms.

There certainly was a mood in favour of reform among some political and religious leaders.  Some were aware of the claims of Canterbury and York.  Some were appalled at the prevailing state of the church within Ireland.  No one could question the high king's commitment to reform, but it would take a supernatural effort to bring order to an unruly Irish Church.

In 1096, St Anselm of Canterbury consecrated Malchus O'Hanvery as the first bishop of Waterford.  During a pilgrimage to Rome, Turlough O'Brien's son Murtagh realised how isolated Ireland had become from the Church and civil society on the continent.  In 1098, he invited the reform-minded Meath bishop, Maelmhuire O'Doonan to become Bishop of Killaloe.  O'Doonan was subsequently appointed Legate to Munster by Pope Paschal II.

Murtagh and O'Doonan together set an agenda for reform in the First Synod of Cashel in 1101 and were later joined by the scholarly Gilbert (previously a monk in Rouen) who became Bishop of Limerick at about the same time as Murtagh made Limerick his capital.
Celsus of Armagh
The drive for reform had its base in the south of Ireland and might have remained there had not an educated layman named Celsus become Successor of St Patrick in 1105 following the death of his great-uncle.  Celsus was a member of the Clann Sinaich, who monopolised the abbacy of Armagh for several generations.  When he succeeded his great-uncle, he was already zealous for reform.  One of his first acts was to receive ordination to the priesthood.  As there was a bishop in Armagh at the time, he waited until his death in 1106 to receive episcopal consecration.

The articulate Gilbert of Limerick outlined the plan for reform not only of the Church, but secular society as well, in De Statu Ecclesiae ("On the State of the Church") while Celsus made circuits of all the provinces in his capacity of successor of St Patrick.  In 1111, Gilbert presided as Papal Legate over the Synod of Rathbrasil (Co Tipperary) where the Irish hierarchy proposed an ecclesiastical map of 26 dioceses.  Though there have been a number of variations in the interim, the number of sees in Ireland remains at 26.
The rise of Malachy
Over the next decade and a half, the pace of reform slowed down and might have come to an end, had not Celsus picked out a gifted protegé.  Mael Maedog O'Morgair was a young man, born in Armagh in 1094.  His father was a teacher and his mother was from a family that had a claim over the abbacy of Bangor similar to that which Celsus' family had over Armagh - her brother, a layman, became successor of St Comgall and Abbot of Bangor.  Mael Meadog felt called to the monastic life from an early age, but in spite of many attempts, it was a vocation he would never realise.  Celsus saw in this young man a reformer like no other.  Mael Maedog became known to history as St Malachy of Armagh.

In 1119, Celsus ordained Malachy to the priesthood and sent him to the monastery of Lismore to study under Malchus O'Hanvery, the Bishop of Waterford, who was previously a monk of Winchester.  In 1124, Celsus recalled Malachy north to set him in the position of Successor of St Comgall, Abbot of Bangor and Bishop of Down.  During the following years, Malachy would introduce the rule of the Augustinian Canons and the Savignac Benedictines into his diocese.  In 1127, he was expelled from Bangor following political upheaval and he brought his monks into exile in Lismore.

In 1129, Celsus died leaving clear instructions that Malachy should succeed him as Successor of St Patrick and Primate.  Clann Sinaich were not going to surrender without a fight and nominated Murtagh to succeed.  Malachy refused to challenge Murtach until he had the backing of Ireland's secular and religious leaders.  Murtagh retained the revenues until his death in 1134, though Malachy was recognised as Primate.  When Clann Sinaich nominated Celsus' brother Niall in 1134, it was clear no one in Ireland was prepared to listen - so the Clann Sinaich pretensions came to an end in 1139.

When Malachy was satisfied the independence of the primacy was secured, he resigned the See of Armagh in favour of Gelasius, the Abbot of Derry and head of the Columban paruchia.  This was a deft political move, as Gelasius was uncompromised politically yet was dedicated to reform.

Malachy went back to Down as bishop.  He thought this was the end of his active life and he could retire to the cloister.  But first, the bishops of Ireland asked him to go to Rome to present their petition to Pope Innocent II to grant pallia to Armagh and Cashel, setting them up as metropolitan sees and guaranteeing the independence of the Irish Church.  Malachy undertook the task.

On his way, he visited Clairvaux where he made friends with St Bernard of Clairvaux.  St Bernard was the most influential churchman of his day and also became the biographer of St Malachy.  Malachy was thoroughly impressed with the Cistercian life and he petitioned Pope Innocent to be released from his obligations as a bishop in order to enter the Cistercian monastery at Clairvaux.  The Pope was not without sympathy but recognised St Malachy's calling was to reform the Irish Church.  The pallia were not to be granted to Cashel and Armagh just yet - and Malachy was ordered to return to Ireland.

The cause of reform prospered.  Malachy established the Cistercian Order in Ireland with monks from Clairvaux, and it spread rapidly.  There were some problems between Irish and French monks, but that did not lesson the Cistercian influence in Ireland.  He also introduced the Arroasian congregation of the Augustinian Canons Regular to Ireland, judging them to be particularly suited to Irish conditions.  The Canons Regular of St Augustine would eventually become the biggest order in pre-Reformation Ireland, but were never re-established after penal times.  St Malachy's legacy is still seen in the Cistercian houses in Ireland.
Wine into water
Though the main influence on the Irish Church form abroad was French, there are German influences to be seen to.  The Schottenklöster (Irish monasteries in Europe - in the early middle ages the Latin Scotus or the German Schotte designated an Irishman) had adopted the Benedictine rule at the time of Charlemagne.  In the mid 12th century, the king of Munster's cousin was the Abbot of the Irish monastery at Regensburg, so Irish Benedictines from Germany came to establish houses in Ireland.

At this time an unknown but rather interesting Irish Benedictine was Abbot of the Irish monastery at Würzburg.  St Macarius (died 1153) was so ascetic that he is said to have changed wine into water.  But the more ascetic discipline of the French Cistercians made a greater impact on Ireland that did the German Benedictines.

In 1148, St Malachy, armed with the authority of Papal Legate, summoned a synod of the Irish church to Inis Pádraig, Co Dublin.  At the time, Blessed Eugenius III was pope and had began his pontificate with two years in exile.  As he was a Cistercian, he asked St Bernard for advice on what he should do.  Bernard told him to model his life on the Irishman, Malachy of Armagh.

Malachy set out on another trip to Rome to petition Eugenius for the pallia.  This time he was not to return.  He died in Clairvaux on the way on the night of November 1-2, attended by St Bernard.  Very soon after St Malachy's death, St Bernard regarded him as a saint.  He was canonised by Pope Clement III in 1190.  His feast day is 3 November.

Though St Malachy never reached Rome, the petition did.  And in 1152, Blessed Eugenius III sent John Cardinal Paparo as Papal Legate to Ireland.  Cardinal Paparo convened the bishops of Ireland at a synod in Kells  where he unveiled the Pope's plans for the Irish Church.

Blessed Eugenius did not grant the two pallia as requested.  Instead he sent four - also recognising Dublin and Tuam as metropolitan sees.  In this way, the pope showed a profound understanding of the political and regional divisions in Ireland.  He also guaranteed the independence of the Irish church and recognised the strides made in its reform over half a century.  The pallia are the legacy of St Malachy of Armagh.

Not long after this triumph, St Bernard died.  He was buried with St Malachy under the high altar at Clairvaux as he requested.  The relics of the two saints are still together and according to some traditions cannot be separated.  They are in death as they willed to be in life.

St Malachy may or may not be the author of the prophecies I referred to at the beginning of this article.  It doesn't matter.  The vocation of St Malachy of Armagh represents the transition of Ireland from being an isolated Church with many distinctive characteristics into one which was definitively part of the Western Church.  The drive for this reform came not from without but from within.  The native Irish monastic rules were eclipsed, but that was an unintended effect of the reform.  Nobody foresaw how readily and completely Irish vocations would drift toward the Cistercians, Augustinian Canons and other continental orders.  Nor did this reform destroy the autonomy of the Irish church - on the contrary, obtaining the pallia from Rome in the manner achieved ensured that the Irish Church would be autonomous.  Had it been otherwise, the Archbishops of Canterbury would have gladly instituted a reform of the Irish Church to their own liking.

The saint's lasting memorial is not in imprecise predictions but in securing the independence of the Irish church and guaranteeing its reform by native Irish ecclesiasticsw.  That Church survived the upheaval of the next few centuries, the Reformation and Penal Laws, onl to be seriously threatened in our own day.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 75, November-December 2004

St Lorcan the Peacemaker

SAINT LORCAN THE PEACEMAKER

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

Beati pacifici: quoniam filii Dei vocabuntur - St Matthew, 5:9

A Muire as mor in gním ado ringed in hErend indiu.(Mary, terrible is the deed done in Ireland this day) - A Leinster scribe lamenting the banishment of Diarmait Mac Murchada in 1166)

WE often judge past in the light of subsequent events.  For example, there is a tendency to see the First World War through the prism of the Second.  Notwithstanding nasty Prussian militarism, the Central Powers were not comparable with the Axis Powers a generation later.  The former's defeat was no great triumph for the West - it rather set Europe up for something much worse.

Likewise, we should not look at Brian Boróma through post-Norman invasion spectacles (pardon the anachronism).  A disgruntled, dispossessed Gaelic noble gave his version of events in Cogadh Gaedel re Gallda.  The central thesis was that the Ua Conchobair dynasty was as incompetent against the Norman as the Uí Néill were against the Viking - but Brian Boróma was the Irish military exemplare and ideal king.

The truth was different.  The Vikings were long defeated and baptised prior to Clontarf, in which more of them were allied to Brian's real enemy, Máel Mórda, than to Brian himself.  Contemporary Irish aristocrats regarded Brian as a parvenu of inferior ancestry (the monks of Cashel could even point at two pedigrees - one was obviously flawed).  And Clontarf was a Phyrric victory - it resulted in several generations of internecine warfare preparing the country for the Norman invasion.

For all that, Brian was ruthless and able, and if he allowed his admiration for Charlemagne carry him away (signing the Book of Armagh as Imperator Scottorum), it was his vision of a centralised Irish kingdom which dominated Irish political thought ever since.

Clontarf devastated Leinster.  A ruler with the unlikely moniker of Diarmait mac Máel na mBó attained the kingship of Leinster in 1042 and claimed the high kingship a generation after Brian.  His sept, the Uí Cennsalaig, would dominate Leinster politics in the following centuries (though they hadn't provided a king for several centuries previously).  Many lines vied for the high kingship and the country was beset by intermittent civil war and anarchy.

The former Viking towns looked to Canterbury for spiritual guidance, and Gaelic churchmen recognised Lanfranc and St Anselm's designs on Ireland.  They delivered the reform of the Irish church during the ceasefires.

Blessed Eugenius III approved the Irish Church's reforms by granting the requested pallia to Armagh and Cashel and granting additional pallia to Dublin and Tuam on his own initiative.  Thus he guarranteed the independence of the Irish Church in 1152.  Eugenius was a Cistercian and saw that the reform was Cistercian-driven.  His mentor, St Bernard of Clairvaux, was very close to St Malachy of Armagh.  The black monks and white monks were engaged in a power struggle at the time and Eugenius was succeed by an English Benedictine, Adrian IV.

Young Henry II wanted to conquer Ireland and sent John of Salisbury to get Adrian's approbation.  In 1155, Adrian saw the Irish Church differently to his predecessor (there were few Benedictines in Ireland), so he commissioned Henry to bring Christianity to Ireland in Laudabiliter.  The Empress Mathilda was still alive and had no desire to see her son engage in wasteful adventures.  So Henry neglected his charge for another decade and a half.

Twelfth-century Ireland was dominated by the career of Diarmait MacMurchada.  He became king of Leinster in 1126.  Unable to compete for the high kingship like his great-grandfather, he could and did make it difficult for others.  The year he took the throne, Lorcan Ua Tuathail (Laurence O'Toole) was born in Wicklow.  Until the advent of Diarmait mac Máel na mBó, the Ua Tuathail were a more prestigious family than MacMurchada.  Lorcan's mother was an Ua Brain princess of Uí Faeláin, from North Leinster's second family (Wicklow and Kildare were in north Leinster at the time).  In the Gaelic custom, Lorcan was sent to the Ua Conchobair of Uí Fáilge for foseterage, which aligned him to a third powerful house in Leinster, as befitted a young prince.  All was well until Leinster nobles intrigued against the king in 1141.  Diarmait killed or blinded 17 of the conspirators in anticipatory retaliation.  Muirchertach Ua Tuathail became head of the Uí Muireadaig and his only daughter was married to Diarmait.  As a safeguard against further plots, Diarmait dragged Lorcan with other Leinster princes to Ferns as hostages.
A clear insult
The old Gaelic order was very strict on the treatment of hostages, but Diarmait did not comply.  He sent Lorcan to an inferior household, a clear insult to his wife's family.  Muirchertach seized a few of Diarmait's key officers and threatened to kill them if his son was not released.  Diarmait placed the boy in the custody of the Abbot of Glendalough until Muirchertach let his men go.  Lorcan was tired of politics now and wanted to remain in Glendalough as a monk.  An ironic beginning to a vocation that would place him at the epicentre of a political crisis which would have permanent repercussions in Ireland.

There were doubts about Lorcan in Glendalough.  His education was martial rather than literary.  And there was discontent when his father nominated him as abbot in 1153 (which was in Muirchertach's gift).  Lorcan had already been ordained to the priesthood when younger than the canonical age of 30.  However, it is a tribute to Lorcan that he was the near unanimous choice as Bishop of Glendalough when Gilla na Náemh died in 1157.  He refused on the grounds he was too young.

In 1161, he became Archbishop of Dublin.  There had been eight Bishops of Dublin before his immediate predecessor Gréne (Gregory) got the pallium in 1152.  These were all Ostmen (as the descendents of the Vikings were called) with no love for the Gaelic Irish and until the Synod of Kells, they looked to Canterbury rather than Armagh.  Lorcan's brother-in-law, Diarmait, was overlord of Dublin and he had a hand in the election.  The Primate, Gilla mac Liag MacRuaidri, consecrated Lorcan.

The Dublin Ostmen were not enthusiastic about the appointment.  Christ Church Cathedral was Lorcan's first priority.  He introduced the observantine Arrouasian Congregation of Augustinian Canons into the cathedral and as far as his administrative duties allowed, he took an active part in Christ Church's liturgical life (wearing the Arrouasian habit) and he was known for his prayer, penance and almsdeeds.

The best known Irish twelfth century scandal was Diarmait's abduction of Derbforgall, Tigernan Ua Ruairc's wife in 1152.  Commentators suggest Derbforgall had a role in this, but the king of Breffny became Diarmait's sworn enemy for the insult - even after Derbforgall was returned with her fortune.  The other party to the insult was Mór, Lorcan's sister, who withdrew to a convent in Dublin.  This event would have a disproportionate bearing on subsequent Irish history.

Things came to a head in 1166 when the kings of Ireland combined under Ruaidrí Ua Conchobair to expel Diarmait from Ireland.  They accomplished this and Ua Ruairc drew sinful pleasure form plundering Diarmait's castle in Ferns.

It was a short-lived victory.  Diarmait spent the next year seeking Norman aid.  Though Henry II was too occupied to give him immediate help, he did see the request as a golden opportunity (to rid himself of troublesome vassals).  Diarmait still had a problem persuading the Norman Earls on the Welsh Marches to join him, but they did come, to stay.  Initially Diarmait recovered his own territory.  Then he attempted to take Leinster.  The high king successfully thwarted him, but the worst was yet to come.

Strongbow's advance party camped at Baginbun in 1169.  They were reinforced by the main force and took Waterford, after which Strongbow married Diarmait's daughter (Lorcan's niece) Aífe.  Strongbow turned on Dublin.  The Ostman king, Asgall MacTorchaill's fleet controlled the Irish Sea.  A formidable Irish hosting protected Dublin, but Diarmait and Strongbow avoided them, and when Dublin sought terms, Ruaidrí withdrew.  Lorcan now had to intercede with his in-laws on behalf of his flock as Dublin's finest went with Asgall and the navy (and their valuables) to the Isle of Man.  When Asgall returned with reinforcements, Norman luck again prevailed and Asgall, defiant to the end, was beheaded in the hall of his own palace.  A Manx naval squadron blockaded Dublin for two months and Strongbow got into deeper trouble as Diarmait died, but now Henry arrived in Ireland.
Parallel with Becket?
Henry was an unlikely crusader.  He had been excommunicated for his role in St Thomas Beckett's murder, as England faced an interdict - and he came to Ireland to restore Christianity!  His obsequiousness to the Papal Legate, Christian O Conarchy was in marked contrast to his refusal to admit legates to England at the time.  Henry's main motivation in Ireland  was not its conquest, for religious or secular reasons, but the containment of his own Anglo-Norman subjects.  He didn't want an independent Norman kingdom to his west.  He attended the Second Synod of Cashel in the winter of 1171-1172 to convince the Pope of his fidelity.  The Irish bishops were prepared to accept Henry's lordship if he would bring an end to Ireland's protracted political instability.

Though the Normans were as politically divided as the native Irish, they had a clear military superiority and only mutual rivalry and apathy (the former encouraged by Henry) prevented them from overrunning the whole island.  In 1175, Lorcan was the chief negotiator of the Treaty of Windsor between Henry and Ruaidrí.  As the treaty was not honoured, we can only deduce that Lorcan was more interested in securing a peaceful political settlement for Ireland than in rival political claims.  During the negotiation, an assailant attempted to fell Lorcan with an axe as he said Mass.  Noting the similarities between this and Beckett's martyrdom, most contemporaries cast a suspicious eye on Henry.

After Windsor, Lorcan had another test.  St Malachy of Armagh had achieved autonomy for the Irish Church a generation earlier.  It was now for Lorcan to defend it.  Alexander III broadly endorsed the Norman invasion of Ireland, in spite of his distrust of Henry.  He now angered Henry by naming Lorcan as Papal Legate in Ireland in 1179.  Lorcan had a high standing in the universal church and he participated in the Second Lateran Council that year.

As Papal Legate, Lorcan was concerned that the 12th Century reform should not be undone, as signs indicated it would be.  The role of the Norman in this process was interesting.  If the Bull Laudabiliter commissioned Henry to reform the Irish Church, Lorcan must have sensed some irony.  In slightly more than one year in office, he reported over a hundred Norman clerics holding Irish benefices to Roman ecclesiastic tribunals for sundry offences.

One would suspect that Lorcan would no longer be the best candidate to negotiate with Henry.  But this is exactly what Ruaidrí asked him to do in 1180.  Lorcan undertook to do so, to find that Henry refused to see him and left England for France.  Lorcan followed him to Normandy where he fell ill and died in the Abbey of Eu on the night of November 14.  The Augustinian Canons were convinced of his sanctity and investigated his life; one canon wrote his biography.  The cause for his canonisation is regarded as the first modern ecclesiastical legal process in history.  It received overwhelming support from old adversaries - the Ostmen of Dublin, once opposed to his appointment as archbishop, now wholeheartedly endorsed his sanctity.  Even the Normans attested to the prelate's virtue.  In 1225, he was canonised by Pope Honorius II and his feast is on November 14.  His body lies in Eu, but his heart is in his own cathedral - Christ Church.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 76, January-February 2005

Rebel Standun Stuck in a Rut

REBEL STANDÚN STUCK IN A RUT

by JOHN HENEGHAN

EAGLAIS NA gCATACÓMAÍ

by Pádraig Standún. Cló Iarchonnachta.  316pp.  €16.00

THIS book is an apologia pro vita sua in which the author defines the Church of the Catacombs as the Church of dissent: those who cannot accept the official Church.

The introductory chapter gives us the same definition of his role as a rebel.  However, in this regard Standún is not original - he is echoing the current intolerant criticism of the Church as evidenced in Shattered Vows by David Rice and Change and Decay: Irish Catholicism in Crisis by Brendan Hoban.

Chapter Two gives an interesting account of the author's youth in Mayo and how it pointed him in the direction of the priesthood.

Further on in the book he has rightly exposed the problems that existed in Maynooth - but he has used them as a propaganda tool to whip the entire official Church.

Tháinig scéalta chun solais i lár bliana 2002 a thugann le fios gur lú smacht arís, féinsmacht san áireamh a bhí ag Maigh Nuad sna blianta tar éis domsa é a fhágáil. (Page 182)

His clamouring for women priests despite the papal instruction that this is not a matter for discussion is a challenge to papal authority.

Tá a leithéid fireann nó baineann i ngach paróiste ar domhan.  Cén fáth mar sin a bhfuil Pobal Dé fágtha gan Eocaraist?  (Page 105)

Father Standún and his contemporaries find it difficult to accept that they are the greying generation and that their status as rebels has left them stuck in a rut.  Time and the Church have passed them by.

Surely true liberals are not threatened by Traditionalists?  (In fact they can accommodate both the Old Rite and the Novus Ordo despite its variation from parish to parish.)

In my Master's Thesis Pádraig Standún: Saol agus Saothar (unpublished, 1991) I accused Father Standún of a lack of depth in his work because of his use of literature instead of journalism as an instrument of propaganda.  Alan Titley's An tÚrscéal Gaeilge subsequently altered my perspective on this when he pointed out that there are several types of novel apart from the classical mode from Cervantes' Don Quixote.  Therefore any literary work can be described as a novel on its own terms.

In fairness to Pádraig Standún one must admit he has not hesitated to highlight the social problems of the Gaeltacht.  However, while exposing the sexual problems is not a bad thing in itself, an obsession with sexual mores and their linkage with compulsory celibacy and child abuse is somewhat tiresome to the reader.  (So too was the kind of smuttiness suggested by Budawanny, the title of the film of Standún's earlier novel Súil le Breith).  Nevertheless, Standún must be given credit for raising these social issues.

However, from a literary perspective Eaglais na gCatacómaí  is weak.  As Breandán Ó Doibhlin, the eminent critic and novelist has pointed out: a novel must be assessed on its own merits: the author is irrelevant.  Father Standún's elementary mistake is to confuse literature with life.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 76, January-February 2005

St Fergal - Unconventional Apostle

SAINT FERGAL - UNCONVENTIONAL APOSTLE

by PEADAR LAIGHLÉIS

Nihil est opertum, quod non revelabitur;et occultum quod non scietur - St Matthw, 10, 26

One of the consolations of Pope Zachary's life...was the filial friendship of Saint Boniface...Among their correspondence..of especial interest...in the light of all the conjecture...over the past few years...of the possibility of "inhabited planets" other than our own...in answer to Saint Boniface's complaint that an Irish priest named Virgilius was disturbing men's minds by teaching that there was another world, other men on another planet beneath the earth, another sun, and another moon...[Pope Zachary] ordered Saint Boniface to reprimand Virgilius, and...to send him to Rome so that his doctrine might be examined...[I]t was not necessary...to condemn Virgilius, for the priest completely yielded to correction...of his Holy Father and went on...to sanctify himself.  He became Bishop of Salzburg, and lived such a life of holiness....that he was canonised by Pope Gregory IX.  (The above piece of papolatrous fantasy comes from Our Glorious Popes by "Sister" Catherine MICM of the Feeneyite Slaves of the Immaculate Heart, itself condemned by St Zachary's more recent successors)

I ONCE attended Mass in a German city on September 24, feast of Ss Rupert and Virgil, the patrons of Salzburg.  German-speakers principally know Salzburg at the birthplace of Mozart.  For most Anglophones, it is better known as the setting of The Sound of Music.  The city has ancient roots: its archbishop is the Primate of the Germans.  Salzburg was Bavarian until the Congress of Vienna in 1815 and rigid distinction between Germany and Austria only dates from 1945.

Ireland has an old association with Salzburg.  Some claim its first archbishop, St Rupert, Apostle of Bavaria and Austria, was an Irishman named Robartach, but more reliable sources say he was Frankish.  However, Irish monks largely provided his education and he brought many with him to Salzburg.  The pre-eminent had yet to come.  This was Rupert's successor, St Virgil or Fergal.
Abbot in Salzburg
Fergal was born in the south of Ireland around 700 and little is known of his early life.  He became a monk and was educated on the Aran Islands, returning to the mainland to succeed St Canice as Abbot of Aghaboe, Co Laois in the Ossory diocese.  In 739, he left Ireland for the Holy Land with two companions, Dobdagrecc and Sidonius.  At first, they worked under King Pepin in France.  In 745, Pepin commended them to his brother-in-law, Duke Odilo of Bavaria, who sent them to St Peter's Abbey in Salzburg.

 Fergal became Abbot of St Peter's.  He declined the episcopacy on the grounds of humility - Dobdagrecc, now Abbot of Chiemsee, was consecrated instead.  Actually, Fergal implemented an Irish hierarchical model where the bishop was subject to the abbot.  In Irish Church politics, Fergal was a conservative with little time for Roman innovations regarding the Easter date or ecclesiastical jurisdiction.  The liturgy in Salzburg under Fergal included commemoration of the 15 Abbots of Iona from St Colmcille down to the contemporary abbot; and he brought relics of St Brigid and St Samthann of Clonbroney with him, inspiring devotion to the two in what is now Austria - the latter virtually forgotten in her own country.

St Boniface was unimpressed by Fergal's arrival in Salzburg.  Odilo had promoted Fergal over Boniface's candidate.  This was a challenge to Boniface's acknowledged German primacy.  Boniface has been accused of racism in his opposition to Fergal and some have suggested this clash of Anglo-Saxon and Celtic temperaments foreshadows future enmity between Ireland and England.  Boniface (né Wynfrith) came from Crediton, Devonshire, not far from the border between Celtic Cornwall and Saxon Wessex and he displayed no affection for his Cornish neighbours.  But he had many Irish monks working under him, two of whom were martyred with him in 754.

We might call Boniface an ultramontanist today.  Fergal may have had Gallican tendencies, but he was so from traditionalist grounds.  Tháinig idir Pheadar agus Phól - the Irish proverb tells us even the apostles Peter and Paul quarrelled.  The two had inevitable disagreements: each suspected the other of heresy.  Boniface knew of Fergal's leanings, but needed something more substantial to go to Rome.

The first occasion Boniface went to Pope St Zachary I concerned the sacrament of baptism.  Two Bavarian priests under Fergal's jurisdiction baptised catechumens with this apparently feminine formula: Baptizo te in nomine patria et filia et spiritu sancta.  This was ignorance, but when Boniface insisted the candidates be re-baptised, Fergal and Sidonius upheld the validity of the sacrament.  Boniface denounced them to Zachary.  The pope confirmed the baptisms were valid and rebuked Boniface instead.
Clash over geography
Fergal had been known for his interest in the natural sciences even in Aghaboe and he engaged in some scientific speculation.  Boniface believed Fergal overstepped the mark, as he appeared to suggest men inhabited the Antipodes.

The confrontation between Boniface and Fergal over geography is still relevant to Catholic apologetics as it deals with the relationship between faith and science.  Anticlerical polemicists hold the Church was staffed by flat-earthers until Columbus' day, by geocentrists until Galileo's and that now, at best, we grudgingly accept evolution (less of a problem for Catholics than sola scriptura Protestants, but this writer needs to see more evidence for macro-evolution). 

Adherents of scientism put the Columbus and Gallileo cases very disingenuously. The objection to Columbus was not that the world was flat but that the round world was a lot bigger than he thought it was.  Columbus extimated Japan was 2,800 miles from Spain.  It is in fact 14,000 miles distant.  Were it not for the hitherto unknown Americas, Columbus and his crew would have died at sea.  As Luther and Calvin's attacks on Father Copernicus trouble nobody, the anticlerical faction point at Gallileo, omitting some details.

Firstly, the Church wrongly accepted the consensus of leading contemporary scientists that the universe was geocentric.  Secondly, Gallileo unwisely strayed into philosophy and theology in self-defence.  This implied the Church herself was heretical and thus brought the Inquisition on to his own case.

Regarding evolution, the only facet of the subject I know anything about is linguistic evolution.  Asked to believe our complex languages developed from animal grunts when all the evidence shows language simplifies over time, I apply Occam's razor and find the Tower of Babel story more credible.  However Occam's razor was first wielded not by the English Francisan William of Occam but by his contemporary, the Anglo-Norman Archbishop of Armagh, Richard Fitzralph, formally canonised by the Church of Ireland in Henry VIII's day as St Richard of Dundalk.  But all this was in the future.
Excommunication threat 
The showdown between Boniface and Fergal anticipated some aspects of the Gallileo case.  Even in the eighth century, thinking people accepted the world was round.  This proposition went back to Greek times.  The problem was to state that men lived in the Antipodes.  Pope Zachary told Boniface that if Fergal taught there were another sun, another moon and another race of men on the other side of the Earth, he would convene a council to investigate Fergal - and if it found him guilty of teaching heresy, he would be deprived of his priesthood and excommunicated.

Greek science held the world was round, but that the equator was in the Torrid Zone, a region of uncrossable heat.  The intelligentsia held this view, and also that no descendent of Adam could have traversed this divide.  This made the premise appear unbiblical: if there were a race of men on the far side, from whom were they descended?

To bring this into the 21st century, many people have an uninformed belief about the possibility of life on other planets.  As it is highly improbable (I gave up using the term impossible a long time ago) that sons of Adam reached hypothetical life-sustaining planets elsewhere in the universe, one must conclude that any alien race differs in lineage.
The shots in Fergal's locker
C.S. Lewis, Irish Anglicanism's foremost apologist, suggested there might be life on other planets, which had not experienced the Fall.  This was the challenge facing Fergal now.  Did he posit there was another race of men on the other side of the world?  Did they experience the Fall and Redemption?  Simply put, the problem was not scientific but theological, though it only arose in the context of accepted science.

So Fergal had to account for this problem before the Pope.  This is where the saint's erudition came into play.  When Ptolomy insisted Africa could not be circumnavigated, he was reacting to an account in Heredotus that Phoenician sailors had already achieved this in the reign of Pharoah Necho, an adversary of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon.  Modern research has confirmed both the possibility and plausibility of Heredotus' account of this incredible seventh century BC voyage.  Other accounts hinting at undiscovered countries south of the equator exist in Greek and in the eighth century, Ireland led the west in its knowledge of Greek.

Someone of Fergal's learning and interests would have been aware of this corpus as well as extensive writings in Irish and Hiberno-Latin on the same topic.  The Navigatio Brendani is the best known, but it is not unique.   Like the tale from Heredotus, it was only conclusively shown to be possible in the 20th century.  The Venerable Bede, St Isidore of Seville and St Jerome all mention the Antipodes.  It was on the authority of the latter that St Fergal based his defence.

There was a work in circulation at the time named the Cosmographia by Aethicus Ister.  This alluded to life in the Antipodes in sections attributed to St Jerome, though Jerome's authorship of any of the book is now disputed.  Fergal returned to Salzburg vindicated, but many now hold he was the sole author of the Cosmographia, which is also unlikely. 
First Austrian school
Fergal was eventually consecrated as Archbishop of Salzburg in 766.  He astonished his contemporaries by undertaking a 33 by 66 metre cathedral in 769 which was completed in 774.  Following Irish practice, he established a cathedral school.  This was the first known school on what is now Austrian territory and its foundation precedes the Bavarian Council's decree on schools in 774.

At this stage, Fergal was well advanced in what proved to be his life's work: the conversion of the Slavs in the Carinthian Alps.  This area, inhabited by peoples we now call Slovenes, extended from southern Austria to Slovenia to northeastern Italy.

The Slavs came into contact with Christianity as they moved westward.  St Columbanus preached to them in the seventh century.  Fergal began his earnest mission.  He baptised Duke Chetimar in Chiemsee.  He consecrated Modestus and sent him with 13 companions to Carinthia.  Modestus established his diocese at Maria Saal, dying in 763, but Fergal continued to supervise the missionary work until his own death.

After that, not even a heathen rebellion following Chetimar's death could reverse evangelisation.  Fergal's successor Arno came to an agreement with Patriarch Paulinus II of Aquileia on diocesan boundaries enabling the completion of this work, but Fergal was known as the Apostle of Carinthia ever after.  He also sent missionaries to many unknown parts - including what is now Hungary.

Fergal maintained an active life into old age, falling ill while preaching near the River Dravo in Carinthia.  He died on November 27, 784.  He might well have been forgotten as Bavaria was absorbed into the Frankish kingdom in 788.  However, St Fergal's tomb was rediscovered when the cathedral was destroyed in 1181.  This renewed interest and devotion to the dead archbishop who was canonised by Pope Gregory IX in 1233.  More relics of St Fergal were discovered after the Allied bombing of Salzburg during the Second World War.  His feast is on 27 November, though some Germany dioceses commemorate him with St Rupert on September 24.

The Brandsma Review, Issue 77, March-April 2005