Latin Mass in Smithfield Dublin

Saint Blath of Kildare

On January 29 the Irish calendars commemorate Saint Blath, or Blathnait. The Martyrology of Donegal records:

29. A. QUARTO KAL. FEBRUARII. 29.

BLATH, Virgin.

and the table of the Martyrology gives the Latin version of her name:

Blath, virgin (Flora V)..... 29 Jan.

Blath is the Irish word for 'flower', and so the Martyrology of Gorman makes a pun by recording her as 'blooming Blath'. Her name is thus Latinized as Flora. 

The notes to the Martyrology of Oengus also simply record her name for this day, but in the notes for the feast of Saint Brigid on February 1st we find that Saint Blath was a member of the monastic household of Kildare, where she had the role of cook. The stories of Saint Brigid often have a domestic aspect to them and the miracle of Loch Lemnachta  is a classic example:

Eight bishops came to Brigit out of Hui Briuin Cualann, i.e. From Telach na n-epscop to Loch Lemnachta beside Kildare on the north. Brigit asked her cook, Blathnait, whether she had food for the bishops. Dixit ilia non. Brigit was ashamed: so the angel told her to milk the cows again. The cows were milked and they filled the tubs, and they would have filled all the vessels in Leinster, so that the milk went over the vessels and made a lake thereof, unde Loch Lemnachta 'New-milk Lough' dicitur.

In his survey of the monasteries of Ireland, Mervyn Archdall assigned the repose of Saint Blath to the same year that he believed her mistress also departed:

523. Died Saint Blatha, or Flora, cook to Saint Brigid.

but he does not expand on the reasons for doing so.

M.Archdall, Monasticon Hibernicum, Volume II (Dublin, 1876), 271.

As not a great deal has been recorded about the life of Kildare's saintly cook, I thought it might be interesting to have a look at Saint Blath's domain - the monastic kitchen:

Domestic arrangements are mentioned incidentally in the texts. A monastery usually had a kitchen separate from the refectory, and this was where the food was prepared. Meat had to be dried and salted. We know very little about how the Irish obtained their salt, although it was an essential commodity, and a lump of salt was an attractive present. It could have been obtained from sea-water by a process of evaporation, but there is some evidence that seaweed was collected and burned and the salty ashes used in curing meat. The monastic kitchen seems to have had no oven, and pottery is rare from excavated Irish sites except in the north-east. Dough for the bread was kneaded in wooden troughs and then baked on a griddle or baking flag, and bullauns which are often found on sites may have been used for grinding and preparing food. A cauldron, suitable for stews, was a luxury article, whilst meat might be roasted on spits or boiled in water heated by hot stones: clay pits or wooden vats could be used for this purpose.

K. Hughes and A. Hamlin, The Modern Traveller to the Early Irish Church (London, 1977), 44.

This post has been taken from a series on the lives of the Irish saints at my blog Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae.

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Christmas Eve in Ireland

Frontispiece to The Irish Christmas (Dublin, 1917).

Today is Christmas Eve and as a child I remember hearing that on this night we should leave a light shining in the front window of the house. This was to act as a signal that even if there was 'no room at the inn' elsewhere, Saint Joseph and Our Blessed Lady would find shelter with us. Katharine Tynan in her poem 'Christmas Eve in Ireland' alludes to this tradition and also to the fact that people not only displayed lights but kept their doors unlocked. Obviously it was an earlier and more innocent age!

CHRISTMAS EVE IN IRELAND

NOT a cabin in the Glen shuts its door to-night,

Lest the travellers abroad knock in vain and pass,

Just a humble gentleman and a lady bright

And she to be riding on an ass.

Grief is on her goodman, that the inns deny

Shelter to his dearest Dear in her hour of need;

That her Babe of royal birth, starriest, most high,

Has not where to lay His head.

Must they turn in sadness to the cattle byre

And the kind beasts once again shake the bed for

Him?

Not a cabin in the Glen but heaps wood on the fire

And keeps its lamps a-trim.

Now the woman makes the bed, smooths the linen

sheet,

Spreads the blanket, soft and white, that her

own hands spun.

Whisht! is that the ass that comes, on his four

little feet,

Carrying the Holy One ?

Nay, 'twas but the wind and rain, the sand on the

floor.

A bitter night, yea, cruel, for folk to be abroad.

And she, not fit for hardship, outside a fast-closed

door,

And her Son the Son of God!

Is it the moon that's turning the dark world to

bright ?

Is it some wonderful dawning in the night and

cold ?

Whisht! did you see a shining One and Him to

be clad in light

And the wings and head of Him gold ?

Who are then those people, hurrying, hasting,

those,

And they all looking up in the sky this night of

wondrous things ?

Oh, those I think be shepherdmen, and they that

follow close

I think by their look be kings.

Not a cabin in the Glen shuts the door till day,

Lest the heavenly travellers come, knock again

in vain.

All the night the dulcimers, flutes, and hautboys

play,

And the angels walk with men.

The Flower of Peace - A Collection of the Devotional Poetry of Katharine Tynan, 11-12.

The Immaculate Conception - Ave Maria Purissima

The Eastern Churches have a number of religious salutations - 'funky' was the term I read once used to describe them - like "Glory to Jesus Christ" to which is responded "Glory forever" or "Christ is risen/baptized/born/in our midst" and so forth.

Actually the Western Church has them also, except nowadays they are not so well practiced.

One of the common salutations was this Marian one:

AVE MARIA PURISSIMA
SINE PECCATO CONCEPTA

Hail Mary Most Pure
Without sin conceived.

This greeting was the byword of the "Immaculists" during the years when the Immaculate Conception was not yet dogma. It was especially prevalent in Spain and all the Spanish influenced countries particularly in central and South America. Spain particularly was on the side of the Immaculists - the country was placed udner the patronage of the Immaculate Conception and had the Office Sicut Lilium and the Mass Egredimini granted to it.

If you are wondering what I'm nattering about, until the mid 19th century, approx. before the dogma was declared by Pius IX, the de facto Office and Mass for the Immaculate Conception was the same as the Mass and Divine Office for the Nativity, with the word "Nativity" subsituted by "Conception" (no "Immaculate"). However, certain countries and orders were allowed to use a special Office and Mass - Sicut Lilium and Egredimini - which made direct the reference to the Immaculate Conception.

I'm veering off topic so I'd better retun to Spain. Apparently people used to "bawl" it out, according to one Protestant visitor.

I think some effort should be made to restore such pious acclamations to daily use. I'm tempted to answer the phone and say "Ave Maria Purissima?". I'd probably get a non-salutary "Eh?" or hang up in reply, though.

But if I can't use it in real life, I can on the Internet! So for the Immaculate Conception I'm greeting everyone by saying "Ave Maria Purissima".

Sine peccato Concepta!

Latin Mass in Kilcock

 

Saint Nicholas: the Irish Connection

Below is a post which first appeared on my former blog Under the Oak in 2009. I have now closed this site but continue to blog about the Irish saints at my new blog Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae. 

December 6 is the commemoration of an eastern saint who is truly loved the world over - Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker of Myra. A Russian lady once told me that her people love Saint Nicholas so much that they are apt to forget he isn't actually Russian himself. This set me wondering if there might be an Irish dimension to the veneration of the great bishop of Myra. I found that there is, but that it owes more to the Normans and the Crusades than to the earlier native church. In his 12th-century Martyrology, Marianus O'Gorman begins the list of saints commemorated today with 'Nicolaus a holy man'. The Cathedral of Galway, constructed in 1320, was dedicated to Saint Nicholas in his capacity as a protector of seafarers. He was seen as an appropriate patron for a rising commercial city and indeed, the great bishop of Myra is the diocesan patron of Galway and is honoured as such in the Litany of Irish Saints. But Ireland makes an even more extraordinary claim in relation to Saint Nicholas - it claims to be the place where he is buried! Below is an article from an Irish newspaper which summarizes the story:

Santa's Irish resting place

CURIOSITIES: SANTA CLAUS may well be buried in a little country graveyard in south Kilkenny. Incredible as this might seem there is evidence to substantiate the possibility that Saint Nicholas of Myra, the original Santa Claus, is buried just west of Jerpoint Abbey, one of the finest Cistercian ruins in Ireland, in Co Kilkenny. The unmarked grave is in the ruined church at Newtown-Jerpoint (two kilometres outside Thomastown) once the site of a thriving Norman town that was abandoned in the 17th century probably due to plague, writes Gerry Moran.

St Nicholas, Archbishop of Myra in Turkey, died in AD 342 and was buried there. How his remains, or a portion of them, arrived in south Kilkenny has much to do with the Norman crusaders.

Jerpoint Abbey was founded around 1158 by Donnchadh Mac Giolla Phádraig, King of Ossory. In 1180, it was taken over by the Cistercian order. In 1200, William Marshall, Earl of Pembroke, of Kilkenny Castle, decided to build a new town just across the river from Jerpoint Abbey. He called the town Nova Villa Juxta Geripons meaning "The New Town Across from Jerpoint". That same year the Church of St Nicholas of Myra was built in the town and, according to the historian Canon Carrigan, the tomb was laid that same year also.

When Strongbow invaded Ireland in 1169, his most trusted lieutenant was Sir Humphrey De Fraine. When the church of Newtown-Jerpoint was built and dedicated to St Nicholas of Myra in 1200, the most powerful Anglo-Norman baron in south Kilkenny was Nicholas De Fraine, son of Sir Humphrey.

The story goes that the Norman Knights of Jerpoint, the crusading De Fraines (or De Freynes) when forced to evacuate the Holy Land exhumed the remains of St Nicholas of Myra and brought them to Normandy from where they eventually found their way to Jerpoint. The remains were laid to rest beneath a slab, now broken across the centre, depicting a monk in habit and cowl. The grave, whether it be that of the real Santa Claus or not, can still be seen to this day. [see photograph above]

I am cynical about these old stories that supposedly go back into the mists of time, often the truth is that they cannot be traced back beyond the beginnings of the Victorian tourist era. I would be interested to know how far back this one about Saint Nicholas can really be charted in the historical record, if this is a genuine medieval tradition, one would expect to find some mention of it somewhere. I wouldn't be surprised at all if it cannot be traced back any further than the 19th century. I wouldn't be surprised either if it receives a new lease of life in our own time when yarns about secret lore, knights, crusaders and relics have topped the bestseller lists.

Mass in Bagenalstown - December, 2012

Requiem Mass for Deceased Members - Kilcock 2012

Pilgrimage to Vienna September 2010 - Day 3

So, the third day had arrived - and with it the dreaded climb, on which there will be more written further down, but we must start from the beginning. After breakfast, excellent as always, we went on a trip just outside of the city centre to visit the summer palace of Prince Eugene of Savoy; the baroque Belvedere castles. Prince Eugene became rather rich fighting the Turks and had, apart from the two Belvedere castles, a palace in central Vienna. The palaces are now used for art exhibitions and between them lies a beautiful garden with everything one could possibly want from a garden- fountains, sphinxes, statues...and trees.

Walking down from the Upper Belvedere to the Lower Belvedere and exiting the garden we came upon the Karlskirche (OK, there was also a short walk).

Pilgrimage to Vienna September 2010 - Day 2

After an intensive first afternoon the next morning started with Mass in the Kapuzinerkirche, where they celebrate the Latin Mass every morning, then back to the monastery on the Freyung for breakfast before the group of pilgrims were back on the streets to experience more of Catholic Vienna. The guest house is part of the Schottenstift, named after the Schotten (Scots); Irish monks involved in missionary work, a Benedictine monastery.

First stop on this days walk was the Stephansdom - St. Stephen's Cathedral - with its incredible roof and towers. There's been a church on the site since 1147, and indeed the entrance and towers of that church are the ones in the cathedral today, the rest of the church is the result of several rebuilds and additions - all in the gothic style, but differing slightly in age. After another excellent pilgrims presentation we looked around inside the church. Going up in a lift to the top of the North Tower we had a look at the bells in the tower (the famous Pummerin bell, third largest in Europe) as well as a great view of the entire city of Vienna (and a close up-view of the roof!), but there was, of course, also much to see in the church itself. A Byzantine style icon of the Madonna and child can be found just inside the doors to the church. It was brought to Vienna in the late 1600s by the Emperor Leopold I after the Mother in the picture had on several occasions been crying real tears.

The last thing on the agenda was the Kapuzinerkirche and its Kaisergruft. This Capuchin church, officially named Church of St. Mary of the Angels, is the one where the Latin Mass is celebrated each morning. It was finished in 1632 after having been delayed by the outbreak of the 30 years war. Underneath the church is a mausoleum where most of the remains of all the members of the Habsburg dynasty are laid to rest - 143 Habsburgs are entombed here. The first people to be buried here were Emperor Matthias and Empress Anna of Tyrol, who also provided the money to build both the church and the crypt, whose sarcophagi are kept in the Founder's Vault. The crypt is an impressive, though somewhat scary, place full of coffins and decorative skeletons.

Pilgrimage to Vienna September 2010 - Day 1

This years pilgrimage went to Vienna - a city full of Catholic heritage. We started in the afternoon of the 19th with a walk around the city centre including presentations of the Peterskirche (St. Peter's Church) and the Pestsäule (Plague monument), both on the Graben ("graben" meaning grave or ditch - one of the main streets in central Vienna). The presentations were held by different pilgrims and were all very good (well, my own might have been a little short... and slightly confused).

The Peterskirche, here to the left, is one of the oldest churches in Vienna, the first church on the site was built in the early Middle Ages and there have been several churches there before the current baroque one which was built in the beginning of the 18th century. It has a rather impressive exterior, the kind you want to take a step back to really admire. This, however, is impossible since this rather grand church has been squeezed into, in my mind, far to small a spot. The interior, too, is interesting, with a golden image of St. John of Nepomuc being thrown off the Charles Bridge in Prague. I was in Prague a few weeks before the pilgrimage to Vienna and I saw the tomb of St. John in St. Vitus' Cathedral at Prague Castle, designed by Fischer von Erlach, the very famous architect who also did much work in Vienna. John of Nepomuc lived in the 14th century and was considered a martyr after being drowned in the Vltava river for refusing to divulge secrets from the confessional of the queen of Bohemia, to whom he was the confessor. He's the patron against calumnies and a protector from floods. He was canonized in 1729 by Pope Benedict XIII.

The Pestsäule is a magnificent column crowned by golden statues of the trinity and a stone one of Emperor Leopold I kneeling in front of them. It was he who erected the column after God answered his prayer to end the 1678 plague epidemic a little early. The original monument was made of wood but when God was nice enough to also help drive out the Turks from Vienna in 1683 the Emperor replaced it with the one you can see here on the right.

But Vienna has more to offer the fun loving catholic; a couple of us who were early to arrive made good use of the extra time and went to Mass in the Hofburg Chapel, with the boys choir singing, and then went to see the Spanish Riding School - amazing horses performing the most advanced and exquisite dressage movements, the performance being set to music. The Spanish Riding School is thus called because the horses they use, called Lipizzaners, were brought from Spain by the Emperor Charles VI who founded the riding school in the 18th century. Up until two years ago all the riders at the school were men but they now also allow girl riders and have, we learned from the guide as we walked through the stables, two female riders training now. The riding school itself is an incredible building located in the Hofburg with the stables just across the Herrengasse.

October Devotions in Limerick

The following news has just been received from the Institute of Christ the King in Limerick:

Dear Friends,

The Holy Rosary will be prayed solemnly before the Blessed Sacrament exposed at Sacred Heart Church in Limerick, beginning Monday 1st October at 6pm (every day of October except Sunday)

--
Yours in Christ
Canon Lebocq
Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest
Sacred Heart Church
16, The Crescent
Limerick
Ireland

www.institute-christ-king.ie

God bless Christ the King!

St. Pius X - Part XI

On this day one hundred years ago, St. Pius X issued his Encyclical Singulari Quadam on Labour Organisations.

Sancte Pie Decime, Gloriose Patrone, ora pro nobis!

Mass in Abbeyleix in October

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Mass in Newbridge in September

Another cause for rejoicing, the Manchester Oratory

Today we heard that approval has been given to the establishing of an Oratory in Manchester.  The following information appeared on the website of the Church of the Holy Name of Jesus website.

"With great thanksgiving to Almighty God, our Blessed Lady and our Holy Father St Philip, we can announce that the Bishop of Salford given his approval for the erection of the Congregation of the Oratory of St Philip Neri in Manchester.

The Manchester Oratory will be close to the city centre at St Chad’s, Cheetham Hill, which is the Mother Church of the City.

We will continue to be at the Holy Name until Advent, or when arrangements have been finalised. The Holy Name will then be part of the Chaplaincy to the Universities on Oxford Road staffed by the Society of Jesus.

A Letter from His Lordship will be read the weekend of 1st / 2nd September to the Congregations at the Holy Name and St Chad’s.

Please keep us in your prayers at this time."

The Manchester Oratory will be the fourth English Oratory.  The first, Birmingham, was established by Bl Cardinal John Henry Newman in 1848, and was shortly followed by London and more recently Oxford.  St Chads Church is associated with Sister Elizabeth Prout who converted to Catholicism having heard a talk by Blessed Dominic Barberi who also received Bl Cardinal John Henry Newman into the Church.  Some pictures of the church can be found here.

It is particularly welcome to hear this news following so quickly on the heels of the announcement of the Institute of Christ the King's purchase of the Sacred Heart Church in Limerick.