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
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
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