A Latin Mass in Septuagesima

Our First Dublin Pilgrimage of 2016

 

On a glorious January morning, despite very short notice, members and friends of St. Laurence's Catholic Heritage Association make a pilgrimage north to St. Fintan's Church, Sutton.  The Mass was offered for a member recently deceased.  The Church is in the lea of the beautiful Head of Howth and looks across the northern stretches of Dublin Bay towards Bull Island and the harbour.  It was a magnificent way to begin our pilgrimage year in the Archdiocese of Dublin, which had ended in 2015 with the celebration of Mass in the Extraordinary Form by His Grace the Archbishop.  

Latin Mass Pilgrimage to Sutton

On Saturday, 30th January, at 12 noon, there will be a Traditional Latin Mass in St. Fintan's Church, Sutton, Dublin 13.  You are cordially invited to attend.

The Archiepiscopal See of Dublin (1161 - 1180)(Walsh)

From Walsh's History of the Irish Hierarchy, 1854, c. xvi, p. 106 ff:

St. Lawrence O'Toole, was the next archbishop of Dublin, was the youngest son of the hereditary lord of Imaile, the head of one of the septs eligible to the kingdom of Leinster, and which also maintained the privilege of electing the bishops and abbots of Glendaloch, even after the union of this see with Dublin. The father's principality was situated in the district of Wicklow, to which he was also attached in the maternal line, his mother having been of the O'Byrnes, a family revered by the Irish nation. St. Lawrence received his education in the school of the romantic valley of Glendaloch.

At the early age of ten years he was distinguished beyond his contemporaries and the ardor of his patriotic disposition soon manifested itself for, on receiving him as a hostage from his father, the cruel tyrant Mac Murrough, who oppressed the most worthy chieftains of Leinster, was induced to avert the worst inflictions of his abused power. When under the subjection of this tyrant, he began to endure persecution in perfect consonance with the cruel character of Mac Murrough. He was confined in a barren and unsheltered spot and only allowed a quality of food which would preserve his existence for torture and illtreatment treatment. Having heard of the sufferings to which his son was subjected, and fully aware that remonstrances or entreaty would be ineffectual, perhaps would be responded to with more barbarity, the distracted parent, by a successful sally from his mountain fastness, captured twelve of Mac Murrough's soldiers whom he threatened instantly to put to death unless his son was restored to his home. The threat was effective and the father once more embraced his beloved son in the Valley of Glendaloch.

In this valley, which nature marked as her favorite retreat for study and contemplation, Lawrence renewed his studies and resigning the claims of birth and inheritance devoted his talents to the service of religion and gave such preeminent signs of his knowledge, piety and purity that he was, in his twenty fifth year, at the solicitation of clergy and people, chosen to preside over the Abbey of Glendaloch. His charity to the poor during four successive years of distress was conspicuous and, by his uniform rectitude, he confounded the efforts of calumny, and by his firm yet merciful superintendence of his charge, converted the district from being a wicked waste to a state of moral and religious cultivation.

When the bishop of the see, Giolla na Naomh, died, Lawrence was at once chosen to fill the vacant chair but Lawrence, excusing himself on the fewness of his years, declined the honor which was intended. However, Providence was reserving him for a more exalted sphere of action for, on the death of Gregory, the archbishop of Dublin, he was elected his successor, a promotion which he would also have declined were he not induced to accede by the representations of the good he might accomplish. He was consecrated in Christ Church Dublin AD 1162 by Gelasius, archbishop of Armagh, assisted by many bishops and, thus, was discontinued the custom which the Danes introduced, of sending the bishops of their cities to Canterbury for consecration.

The Archbishop Lawrence assumed the habit of the regular canons of Aroasia, an abbey that was founded in the diocese of Arras about eighty years previously and justly celebrated for sanctity and discipline, in order that he might the more effectually engage his clergy of the cathedral to adopt the same rule. He caused the poor, sometimes forty in number, sometimes more, to be fed every day in his presence. The rich he entertained with becoming splendor, yet he never partook of the luxuries of the table. When the duties of his station would permit, he retired to the scene of his early training and, removed from worldly intercourse, his spirit communed with his God in the cave in which S. Kevin inflicted his voluntary chastisements.

In 1167 he assisted at the council which King Roderick assembled at Athboy and, though its object was to obtain more satisfactory and indisputable acknowledgment of the sovereignty of the monarch and to calculate the amount of aid he might expect in resisting the auxiliaries of Mac Murrough whom he had expelled from his throne, yet the council passed many ordinances relative to the privileges of churches and clergy and also the regulation of public morality and religious discipline. As legate he also presided at a synod held in Clonfert AD 1170.

The Welsh adventurers having invaded the kingdom, the prelate of Dublin firmly adhered to the independence of his country and encouraged the inhabitants of Dublin to make a vigorous defence but his efforts were unsuccessful, for the citizens, dismayed by the martial array and discipline of the invaders, entreated their prelate to become the mediator of peace, and while passing through the lines of the besiegers with this view and the terms being under discussion, Raymond le Gros and Milo de Cogan, with a party of young and fiery spirits, scaled the walls and, having possessed the city, committed frightful carnage. The charity of the archbishop was eminently conspicuous on this mournful occasion. At the risk of his own life he traversed over the streets of the metropolis protesting against the ruin which he could not control, from the invader's grasp he snatched the panting body and administered the consolations of religion to the dead, the hasty service of a grave and to the wretched survivors all that their necessities could require or his means afford.

On other occasions, his love of his country's cause prompted him to espouse every effort by which her independence might be reasserted. Having been sent to England in 1175 along with Catholicus O'Duffy, archbishop of Tuam, as the representatives of Roderick O'Connor, the monarch of Ireland, to arrange the terms of a treaty between him and the king of England, he visited the shrine of St. Thomas a Becket at Canterbury, and there narrowly escaped the hands of an insane individual who supposed that he would perform a meritorious action by assimilating his fate with the martyred prelate of Canterbury. While celebrating Mass, the maniac rushed upon him and inflicted grievous wounds upon his head. The king on hearing of the circumstance would have put the offender to death but the archbishop interceded and his life was spared. And when an ulcer in the foot terminated the life of Strongbow, St. Lawrence attended his obsequies, forgetting in the hopes that point to everlasting life, the desolation which his ruthless and savage career inflicted on the flock which was entrusted to his charge.

The extraordinary death of Strongbow is ascribed to the vengeance of Heaven for his sacrileges towards the churches of Saints Columba, Bridget and other saints whose shrines he had violated. He saw, as he thought, St. Bridget in the act of slaying him. In the Annals of Innisfallen he is described as the greatest destroyer of the clergy and laity that came to Ireland since the time of Turgesius, the Danish tyrant. The father in law of Strongbow, Mac Murrough, died in 1171 of an intolerable disease. He became putrid while living and died without the eucharist and extreme unction as his evil deeds deserved. Adrian IV, the Pontiff who authorised the second Henry of England to annex Ireland to his crown, died by swallowing a fly in a cup of water. In 1177 Cardinal Vivian presided as legate at a council held in Dublin where the right of the English monarch in virtue of the Pope's authority was further inculcated. There is, however, no evidence that the archbishop of Dublin took part in this proceeding.

In 1179 Lawrence with some other Irish prelates proceeded to Rome to attend the second general council of Lateran. On passing through England King Henry exacted from them an oath that they would not prejudice him or his empire in the progress of their mission. While at Rome, Lawrence was appointed legate of Ireland. In 1180 he again travelled out of Ireland with the son of Roderick O'Connor, whom he placed as a hostage in the hands of Henry II, then sojourning in Normandy. There he was detained by the King whose displeasure he had incurred through making representations to Rome of the harsh and cruel Anglo Irish government. Seeing the land of his birth and the patrimony of his ancestors become the inheritance of strangers, he labored to avert the evils that were permitted to exist under the name of English rule and to place his country, which its own internal divisions weakened and left an easy prey to the hardy adventurer, under the lawful protection of the English sovereign and rescue it from the despotism of English officials. The restraints thus put upon him unjustly hastened his dissolution. Sickness seized him in Normandy and anxious, as he was aware of his approaching demise, to close his days in the peaceful and silent cloister, he repaired to the monastery of Regular Canons at Eu and there expired on the 14th of November 1180. Even on his deathbed he despatched a monk of the brotherhood to implore peace for Ireland and the assent of the king was communicated before his death but peace was not the object of the sovereign of England.

Immediately after the burial of the archbishop at Eu, Henry II dispatched Jeoffrey de la Hay, his chaplain, into Ireland to seize the revenues of the see which he retained for a year. The remains of the holy prelate were placed in a shrine before the altar of the martyr Leodegarius but, when the prelate was canonized in 1218 by Pope Honorius III, they were translated with great solemnity and placed over the high altar and there preserved in a silver shrine. St. Lawrence is the patron saint of the diocese of Dublin.

Pontifical Low Mass, Church Street, Dublin 7

On Saturday, 21st November, 2015, His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin honoured our Association by celebrating a Pontifical Low Mass for the feast of the Presentation in the Capuchin Church, Church of St. Mary of the Angels, Church Street, Dublin 7.  The choir of the Augustinian Church, John's Lane, lent great beauty to the ceremonies with their singing.  The Capuchin Community opened their doors and extended great hospitality to us for the use of the Church for Holy Mass, their refectory for refreshments afterwards, catered by the nearby Cinnemon Café.

Afterwards the Annual General Meeting of the Catholic Heritage Association of Ireland was held jointly with the first General Meeting of St. Laurence's Catholic Heritage Association.  Immediately following the election of our Committee, Judge Peter Smithwick introduced a talk by Lord Gill, retired Lord President of the Court of Session of Scotland.  Afterwards, Judge Smithwick made presentations to some of the members of the Assocation for distinguished service over the years.  The afternoon concluded with Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament given by Fr. Padraig, O.F.M.Cap.

The Archiepiscopal See of Dublin (c. 750 - 1161)(Walsh)

From Walsh's History of the Irish Hierarchy, 1854, c. xvi, p. 106 ff:

St. Sedulius son of Luaith is called bishop and abbot of Dublin as those were synonymous terms. Many abbots distinguished by their merit were promoted to the episcopacy without having sees attached to their places of residence. Such was his neighbor and contemporary the abbot and bishop Ferfugill of Clondalkin. Offices perfectly distinct were thus vested in the same person as it was necessary that episcopal functions should be exercised within the precincts of monastic establishments too remote from a regularly fixed see.

Besides assistant bishops such as coadjutors there were in Ireland others of a more subordinate dignity. Of this latter description the annals of Ireland make mention. To minister more effectually to the spiritual wants of his flock who might have dwelt at a distance from the abode of the bishop it was sometimes deemed prudent to remedy such an inconvenience by selecting priests in the remote districts to whom was confided the care of the faithful and that such clergymen were invested with a sort of episcopal jurisdiction appears certain but whether dignified always with the holy order of the episcopate is a question as yet to be decided. Some maintain it as the more probable that they were not exalted to this dignity others allow that they were consecrated and that they could with the permission of the ordinary confer the orders of deaconship and the priesthood. Other writers hold the opinion that they were always and without exception invested with the order of the episcopacy.

In Ireland, the usage of conferring consecration on those ecclesiastics appears to have been generally adopted. In the early annals of the kingdom they are represented as persons belonging to the episcopal order such an ecclesiastic as we treat of is honored with the appellation of bishop and among the Irish as there was but one name for bishops and chorepiscopi it is often difficult to determine whether this class of ecclesiastics were the ordinaries of sees or the subordinates. If we find mention of bishops who discharged episcopal functions in different dioceses or provinces we are to suppose that they acted in the capacity of assistants as the discipline of the Church obliged the ordinary of each see to exercise the duties of his order within the limits of his own diocese.

Cormac was living in 890 When Dublin was besieged by Gregory king of Scotland and the inhabitants were reduced to extremity Cormac a man of singular virtues and of upright life was deputed to lay before the king of Scotland the distressed state of the city. The King absolutely refused to extend any hope until the city was surrendered to his discretion and on being given up he forthwith advanced on foot till he came to the bishop and falling down on his knees he reverently kissed the crucifix which the prelate bore and ratified the wishes of the bishop.

Donatus was the first amongst the Ostmen or Danes who was bishop of Dublin. By some he is called Dunan. He built by the aid of Sitricus the cathedral of the Holy Trinity in the heart of the city of Dublin about the year 1038 to which Sitric gave considerable landed possessions. Donatus lived to an advanced age died on the 6th of May 1074 and was buried in his own cathedral in the upper part of the chancel on the right.

Patrick called in the Annals of the Four Masters Giolla Patricianus was elected bishop of Dublin at the instance of Gotred king of the Isle of Man who conquered Dublin and the adjacent country. He was sent to England to receive consecration from Lanfranc archbishop of Canterbury with an epistle to the following effect. "To Lanfranc the venerable metropolitan of the Holy Church of Canterbury the clergy and people of Dublin tender their bounden obedience. It is known unto your fatherhood that the Church of Dublin the metropolis of Ireland is bereft of her pastor and destitute of her ruler. Wherefore we have elected a priest called Patrick a person whom we thoroughly know one noble both by birth and morals well imbued in apostolical and ecclesiastical discipline in faith a Catholic and in the interpretation of Scripture wary in the tenets of the Church well versed and whom we desire without delay to be ordained our bishop that under God he may rule over us orderly and profit us and that we under his government may exercise a spiritual warfare with security. Because the integrity of the ruler is the safety of the subject and where safety of obedience is there is the sound form of doctrine."

Patrick was consecrated and made unto Lanfranc promise of submission and obedience in all things pertaining to the Christian religion. Patrick was an Ostman and the Danes of the sea ports being more inclined to attribute their conversion to the Anglo Saxons than to the Irish and who moreover considered William the Conqueror and the Normans their countrymen did not deem it politic to have their bishops derive their sanction from the see of Armagh hence they applied to the English primate for the consecration of their bishops. Patrick governed the see about ten years and being sent to England by King Turlough on business to Lanfranc perished by shipwreck on the 10th of October 1084.

Donat O'Hanly succeeded by similar authority as his predecessor was consecrated by Lanfranc AD 1085. Having spent some time in the pursuit of useful learning in Ireland he passed over to England and became a Benedictine monk at Canterbury. With Lanfranc to whom he also made profession of obedience Donatus was a particular favorite he gave him several presents books and church ornaments for his cathedral. This prelate died of a plague in 1095 leaving a reputation among his countrymen for industry learning and sagacity.

Samuel O'Hanley, nephew of Donatus succeeded AD 1095 by similar authority; was also a Benedictine; obtained from Lanfranc vouchers of his consecration. Soon after his return to Ireland he expelled some monks from the cathedral of the Holy Trinity stripped the church of the books and ornaments which the archbishop of Canterbury had bestowed on it and commanded the cross to be carried before him Lanfranc laving heard of those doings remonstrated with the bishop of Dublin and desired Malchus, bishop of Waterford to expostulate with him. Samuel died on the 4th of July AD 1121.

Gregory the First, archbishop of Dublin, was elected in 1121 and went to England to receive consecration from the archbishop of Canterbury. He brought letters from the king in his favor and also from the clergy and people of Dublin in which it was notified that the bishops of Ireland, particularly the primate of Armagh, had taken great hatred towards them because they would not obey the orders of the said bishops but showed themselves always willing to live under the jurisdiction of the see of Canterbury. He was consecrated at Lambeth by Ralph, archbishop of Canterbury, and made the usual profession of obedience to him.

Having presided over the see of Dublin thirty one years the archiepiscopal dignity was conferred upon him at the council of Kells held under John Paparo legate from the Holy See in 1152. The distribution of sees has been already noticed in the life of St. Malachy of Armagh and the names of the bishops who attended are also enumerated. Besides the bishops there were three thousand ecclesiastics present at this synod though at this synod were men of acknowledged sanctity and ecclesiastics of unblemished character though the purity of the native priesthood of Ireland was above reproach a fact to which Gerald Barry reluctantly assents and one which is particularly avowed in the thirteenth canon of the council held by Archbishop Comyn in 1186 bearing testimony to the chastity for which the Irish clergy were always remarkable. Moore in his History of Ireland draws an inference from a canon of this synod enacted against marriages in the prohibited degrees of kindred unfavorable to the Irish clergy and that they assimilated themselves to many of the clergy on the Continent who disregarded the salutary discipline of celibacy. The conduct of the lay usurpers of the see of Armagh has left the imputation on this see alone and it is worthy of notice that the Irish annals do not record instances of profligacy among the priesthood of Ireland until the adventurers of England introduced their system of morals. The Archbishop Gregory died on the 8th of October AD 1161 having sat forty years. He was a wise man and well skilled in languages.

Pilgrimage to Church Street

Eighth Anniversary of Summorum Pontificum

Thank God for Summorum Pontificum and for the author of Summorum Pontificum!

Mass for the Holy Name of Mary

On 12th September, the monthly exercises of the Sodality of Our Lady took place in St. Joseph's Church, Berkeley Road, Dublin 7. A Latin Mass for the feast of the Holy Name of Mary was offered.

Mass for Persecuted Christians

Latin Mass Pilgrimage to Wicklow Town

St. Patrick's Church, is set strikingly on a hill overlooking the scenic and historic coastal town of Wicklow.  Although the area has been populated for thousands of years, the town itself was settled by the vikings about the year 800.  To that extent, it is older even than Dublin City.  The Irish name Cill Mhantáin, or Church of the toothless, is replaced by the Norse Vikló, or harbour of the meadow.

 

The town would have found itself in the Gaelic Diocese of Glendalough, which extended across the whole of what is now the Archdiocese of Dublin.  Viking Dublin did not have a Bishop until Donatus was consecrated in 1038.  At the Synod of Rathbreasail in 1118, Dublin is not mentioned.  At the Synod of Kells in 1152, the Diocese of Glendalough was divided, giving the northern portion of its territory to Dublin, which also received a Metropolitan pallium.  Gregory became the first Archbishop of Dublin and was succeeded by St. Laurence O'Toole.  In 1185, King John decreed the union of Glendalough to Dublin but it wasn't sanctioned by the Pope until 1216.

 

In the valley between the Catholic Church and Anglican church and at the medieval town gate lie the ruins of a Franciscan Abbey, built about the year 1265.  Only elements of the south transept and nave are visible today.

 

As already noted in the post on the pilgrimage to Bray, the facade of the Church is remarkably similar to that of the original facade of the Church of the Holy Redeemer, Bray, and to other Churches by W.H. Byrne.  It was completed about 1840 to an unknown architect's design, where there is a gap in Byrne's list of works.  Therefore, it may cautiously be attributed to him. 

 

Members and friends of St. Laurence's Catholic Heritage Association made a pilgrimage there on Saturday, 22nd August, including a Mass celebrated by a Priest of the Diocese.

 

National Latin Mass Pilgrimage to Knock

Latin Mass in Wicklow Town

A Timeline of St. Laurence O'Toole

1128 - Born in Castledermot, Co. Kildare
1154 - Became Abbot of Glendalough to succeed Abbot Dunlaing
1161 - First Native Irish Archbishop of Dublin
1162 - Consecrated Bishop by Galesius, Archbishop of Armagh
1163 - Established the Canons Regular of Arouasia at the Cathedral of the Most Holy Trinity
1166 - Established the Priory of All Hallows of the Canons Regular of Arouasia
1167 - Attended the Council of Athboy
1170 - Presided as Papal Legate at the Council of Clonfert
1171 - Visited Henry II in Normandy, violently attacked while processing to Mass
1172 - Attended the Synod of Cashel
1175 - Negotiated the Treaty of Windsor
1176 - Presided at the funeral of Strongbow
1178 - Synod of Dublin presided over by Cardinal Vivian as Papal Legate
1179 - Attended the Third Lateran Council under Pope Alexander III
1180 - Died at Eu in Normandy
1225 - Canonised by Pope Honorius III
1227 - The body of St. Laurence enshrined at Eu

Traditional Latin Mass in Bray, County Wicklow

This is the first occasion on which our Association has made a pilgrimage to Wicklow, the Garden of Ireland. On 4th July, we made a pilgrimage to Bray for a Traditional Latin Mass in the Church of the Holy Redeemer on the Main Street. Building upon the existing Chapel of c. 1824, our old friend Patrick Byrne enlarged the Church and added a tower and facade strikingly similar to St. Patrick's, Wicklow Town (c. 1844) and to Byrne's St. John's, Blackrock (c. 1845).  W.H. Byrne further enlarged the Chapel into the present envelope, a Romanesque Church with colonnaded transepts and an apsidal Sanctuary c. 1894-1898, for Most Reverend Nicholas Donnelly, D.D., P.P., V.G., then Parish Priest of Bray and Greystones, Bishop of Canae and Auxiliary Bishop of Dublin.  Presumably at the same time as the modernist facade was added (1965) the sanctuary was re-ordered and the organ erected in the apse.