The Cistercians of Kildare and Leighlin - Baltinglass

We have seen that the Great Abbey of Mellifont had made seven foundations in the first eleven years.  Eight foundations in total were made before the suppression. The first seven were Bective (1146), Boyle (1148), Baltinglass (in Kildare and Leighlin)(1148), Inislounaght (1148), and Manister or Manisternenay, Co. Limerick (1148), Kilbeggan (1150), Newry (1153).  The final direct foundation by Mellifont was at Abbeyshrule (1200). By the time of the suppression, Mellifont had a further twenty indirect filiations. Baltinglass Abbey was founded under the patronage of Dermot Mac Murchadha, King of Leinster who was to betray his Race by inviting in the Normans twenty-one years later.  McMorrough was also responsible for the romanesque Church at Killeshin.  His descendants still reside in the heart of the ancient kingdom of Leinster at Borris House, near where our Mass for the Pope's Birthday was celebrated in 2012. The Abbey was given a kind of nickname in accordance with Cistercian custom, and was known as De Vallis Salutis or Valley of Salvation. Dr. Keating refers to it as 'Monasterium de Via' or the Monastery of the Way. The Abbey buildings were completed by 1170, the year before Mac Murchadha's death, when his son-in-law, the Anglo-Norman Richard de Clare, Earl of Pembroke took the kingdom for himself.

Baltinglass made four foundations Jerpoint, Co. Kilkenny (1160), Abbeymahon, Co. Cork (1172), Monasterevin (Diocese of Kildare and Leighlin)(1178), and Abbeyleix (also Diocese of Kildare and Leighlin)(1184).  Thus, the Baltinglass line accounts for all the Irish Cistercian Abbeys of Kildare and Leighlin, the only Continental Cistercian Abbey of Kildare and Leighlin being Duisk Abbey, Graignamanagh, founded from Stanley in Wales in 1204. Kilenny Abbey (1162), a foundation of Jerpoint close to Duiske Abbey, was suppressed in 1227, the year before the visitation of Stephen of Lexington, since it offended against the Cistercian Rule that monasteries should be at least 12 Burgundian Leagues apart.

After the Anglo-Norman conquest of Leinster, Baltinglass retained a strong Irish identity. In 1185 the abbot of Baltinglass, Albin O’Mulloy, was made bishop of Ferns. At the close of the year 1185, Albin O'Molloy, Cistercian Abbot of Baltinglass, was appointed bishop of Ferns in the Lent of 1187, at the Provincial Council of Dublin, he administered to the Archdeacon Gerald Barry (Cambrensis), a rebuke at his presumption at casting aspersions upon the character of the Irish clergy and spoke out against the clergy coming from England and Wales, criticising their evil ways and bad example for the innocent Irish clergy. Bishop O'Molloy was present at the coronation of Richard I on 3rd September 1189. On 3rd April, 1206, King John nominated him to the Archbishopric of Cashel but the Pope declined to ratify the appointment.

In 1227, the same year as Kilenny was suppressed, abbot Malachy was deposed and Baltinglass was made subject to Furness Abbey in Cumbria. A new Anglo-Norman abbot was installed but the community opposed him, drove him out of the abbey, knocked him off his horse and took the monastic seal. It took an armed force to get the abbot reinstated. The cellarer, who was principally held responsible, was expelled to Fountains Abbey where, for a year, he was to take the ‘lowest place among the priests’. The new abbot resigned soon after his reinstatement. In 1228 the Abbey had 36 choir monks and 50 lay brothers.

However, by the turn of the thirteenth century the internal standards of observance in the Irish Abbeys had been allowed to decline. The Cistercian General Chapter heard disturbing reports and, in 1216, organised a general visitation of the Irish houses. The Irish monks resented this interference from Clairvaux and when the visitors arrived at Mellifont the gates of the monastery were shut in their faces. The troubled soon spread to the other Irish Cistercian monasteries. The visitors were blocked from entry and their presence was greeted with riot. The rebellion soon became known as the ‘conspiracy of Mellifont’.

In 1227 the abbot of Clairvaux sent two French monks to address the problems but they were able to remove no more than six abbots from office and they appointed the Anglo-Norman abbot of Owney to act in their stead. The Irish bitterly resented him and did all they could to hinder his progress.
From the foundation of Mellifont itself there had been conflict between the ethos of the French monks and their Irish brethren to such an extend that St. Malachy received the complaints of St. Bernard when the French returned home in dispute.

Those mutual misunderstanding were only intensified within the Order after the Norman invasion, when the Mellifont filiation acted as a native congregation in contrast to those Cistercian houses of directly Norman foundation. The misunderstanding came to a head in the early 13th century. The Mellifont filiation resisted efforts of the general Chapter to subject it to regulation, but was eventually compelled to submit. After those abortive attempts to impose continental observance, Stephen of Lexington, abbot of Stanley, Graiguenamanagh’s motherhouse undertook a visitation of the Irish Cistercian houses in 1228 on behalf of the General chapter, to reform them radically. The Mellifont filiation was broken up and its member houses were re-assigned to the oversight of English, French and Welsh houses, Margam, Buildwas, Furness, Fountains and Clairvaux and Lexington placed groups of Anglo-Norman monks in the Irish houses and deposed those abbots involved in the rebellion, appointing some twelve abbots himself.

The specific causes of dispute are hard to discover. It seems, however, that at least some of what was in Anglo-Norman eyes abuse, and infringement of Cistercian rule, was to the Irish simply the accommodation of traditional monastic practice. Thus, for example, Irish monks preferred to dwell in individual cells, rather than communionally. Equally, a nun’s monastery, adjacent to that of the male religious, might be unacceptable to Lexington but was perfectly respectable in Gaelic Ireland - and indeed to the modern-day Institute of Chrust the King, the Canons Regular of the New Jerusalem, or the Abbey of La Barroux!

Lexington’s condemnation of sins of the flesh may refer not to abuse in the strict sense, but a ‘monasticism’ that encompassed a ‘para-monastic' married Christian laity, in the older Irish manner, which we could call Third Orders or secular Oblates today.

Only gradually did the General Chapter cast off Anglo-Norman dominance and realise the true situation. In 1274 the General Chapter condemned the laws being enforced under Norman control, forbidding the reception of native Irish novices or the appointment of Irish monks to any position of authority in their communities. Finally it reversed its earlier decision and returned to Mellifont its jurisdiction over its filiations and Baltinglass returned to the restored Mellifont filiation. The following thirty years brought a succession of Irish abbots. It was a period of hope but that hope was again stifled by political pressure. The civil powers ignored the General Chapter's condemnation of Anglo Norman discrimination. The infamous Statutes of Kilkenny merely institutionalized that discrimination and the Black Death struck another blow to the once flourishing Order in Ireland. By the end of the 14th century Mellifont had become a recognised Anglo Norman institution and was never again to see the phenomenal flourishing of monastic life, substituting instead royal patronage and the acquisition of property.

Henry Tudor's commissioners described Baltinglass in 1541 as owning castles at Graungeforth, Knocwyre, Mochegraunge, Graungerosnalvan, Grangecon, Littlegraunge amongst others. In the early sixteenth century the annual income of the abbey was estimated at £76 (£126 in peacetime) making it one of the richest Cistercian abbeys in Ireland at that time. The Dissolution came quickly to Baltinglass. It was one of only five Irish Cistercian monasteries suppressed in the first round of closures, 1536-7.

Not content with the dissolution of the monastery, the Anglicans also raped the monastic church and buildings. The sanctuary, as can be seen from the pictures was crudely adapted as a Protestant church. As can be seen from the late 18th century engraving in the National Library of Ireland collection, the tower at the central crossing, a common, if un-Cistercian, feature of the Irish Cistercian Churches, was still extant, and the monstrously rustic tower at the entrance to the Protestant Church, sitting with ill-informed arrogance in the middle of the Nave, was a very late excresence.

The gate house, a feature that is still prominent at Mellifont also, became the home of the FitzEustace family. The gate house was broken down, along with parts of the monastery, when James FitzEustace rebelled in 1580. In 1587 the gate house restored and survived until 1882 when it was knocked down to provide building materials for the new house and church of the Church of Ireland.

The arches of the Abbey are it's most distinctive feature, having both squared and rounded piers still standing along the south side of the nave. The north-east crossing pier is decorated with a lion and foliage ornaments. The striking similarity between these nave arches and those of Jerpoint Abbey are notable. One depicts a warrior thrusting forward with a circular shield. Another strikingly similar feature are the stone tiles decorated, it is said by the same master craftsman, the so called 'Baltinglass Master', who also worked on Jerpoint Abbey. Some of these tiles have been placed for display so that you can get a close up view. To the side of the Church wall is a huge plinth with a large stone pyramid atop, which was constructed as a mausoleum for the Stratford family. Another example of Anglican barbarism that has breached the East Wall of the first chapel in the Southern Transept.

The Cistercians of Kildare and Leighlin - Mellifont Foundations

Mellifont Abbey, named the fountain of honey, was the first foundation of the Cistercian Order, or any Continental religious order, in Ireland. It was the foundation of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, the Doctor Mellifluous, and his friend St. Malachy Ua Morgair, Archbishop of Armagh. It was a foundation sponsored by native Gaelic Princes and Prelates and was the fountainhead of a renewed monasticism for Ireland, the mother house of Saints and Scholars.

We read in St. Bernard's account that St. Malachy made a pilgrimage to Rome about the year 1139, visiting St. Bernard en route, to petition Pope Innocent for palliums for the Sees of Armagh and Cashel. He was appointed legate for Ireland at that time. Visiting Clairvaux on his return visit he received five monks as companions to return to Ireland to make a Cistercian foundation in Ireland, under Christian, an Irishman, as superior. St Malachy died at Clairvaux on a second journey to Rome on 2nd November, 1148. He was canonized by Pope Clement (III), on 6 July, 1199, and his feast is celebrated on 3rd November, transferred on account of the Feast of All Souls.

An account of the consecration of the Abbey Church is to be found here.

Two years after the death of St. Malachy, Christian, the first Abbot of Mellifont, was appointed Bishop of Lismore, and succeeded St. Malachy as Legate of the Holy See in Ireland, by will of Pope Eugenius III, who had been his fellow-novice in Clairvaux. Christian's brother, Malchus, succeeded as Abbot. Under Abbot Malchus Mellifont flourished and by 1152, the tenth anniversary of its foundation, the same year as the death of St. Bernard, six daughter houses, Bective, Newry, Boyle, Athlone, Baltinglass (in Kildare and Leighlin), and Manister or Manisternenay, Co. Limerick, had been established. It is to Baltinglass that the next part of this series will turn.

In that same year, Bishop Christian presided at his first Synod of the Irish Church and Dervorgilla, wife of Tiernan O'Rourke, Prince of Breffney, eloped with Diarmuid McMorrough, King of Leinster, a conflict that was to lead to the betrayal of Ireland to the Norman Lords and the occupation of Ireland for a further eight centuries.



The tower that greets the visitor to Mellifont today is the porter's lodge, through which the medieval visitor would have passed into the monastic enclosure. It is a common feature of the Cistercian standard plan. The lodge at Aiguebelle most closely resembles that at Mellifont.


The total length of the transepts is 116 feet; the width 54 feet. The northern one is some four feet longer than the southern. They seem to have had aisles, an unusual arrangement in churches of the Order where simplicity was the overwhelming note. In the northern transept were six chapels, the piscinas of which are still to be seen in the piers adjoining. These fixed wash-hand basins were for the Priest to perform a 'lavabo' before starting Mass.

When Sir Thomas Deane had carried out the first excavations at Mellifont, he discovered the foundations of two semi-circular chapels in each transept, in a line with the site occupied by the High, or principal Altar. He wrote: "Within the circuit of the external walls are the foundations of an earlier church which indicate four semicircular chapels, and two square ones between. Of this church we have no distinct record, but the bases of semi-detached pillars would indicate the date given for the erection of Mellifont." These four semi-circular chapels in line with the High Altar, follow precisely the plan of the church of Clairvaux erected in 1135, only seven years before the foundation of Mellifons and which served at its model. The sanctuary is 42 feet deep by 26 feet wide. On the Epistle side, are a piscina surrounded with a dog-tooth moulding, and the remains of the sedilia or stalls, which were occupied by the celebrant, deacon, and subdeacon at High Mass. Under the sedilia a tomb was discovered during Sir Thomas' excavations.





Sir William Wilde, who visited in 1848, describes the octagonal 'Lavabo' structure like this: "This octagonal structure, of which only four sides remain, consists of a colonnade or series of circular-headed arches, of the Roman or Saxon character, enclosing a space of 29 feet in the clear, and supporting a wall which must have been, when perfect, about 30 feet high. Each external face measures 12 feet in length, and was plastered or covered with composition to the height of 10 feet, where a projecting band separates it from the less elaborate masonry above. The arches are carved in sandstone, and spring from foliage-ornamented capitals, to the short supporting pillars, the shaft of each of which measures 3 feet 5 inches. The chord of each arch above the capitals is 4 feet 3 inches. Some slight difference is observable in the shape and arrangement of the foliage of the capitals, and upon one of the remaining half arches were beautifully carved two birds ; but some Goth has lately succeeded in hammering away as much of the relieved part of each, as it was possible. The arches were evidently open, and some slight variety exists in their mouldings. Internally a stone finger-course encircled the wall, at about six inches higher than that on the outside. In the angles between the arches there are remains of fluted pilasters at the height of the string-course, from which spring groins of apparently the same curve as the external arches, and which, meeting in the centre, must have formed more or less of a pendant, which, no doubt, heightened the beauty and architectural effect. Like the pillars and stone carvings in the Chapter-house, this building was also painted red and blue, and the track of the paint is still visible in several places. The upper story, which was lighted by a window on each side of the octagon, bears no architectural embellishment which is now visible."

The Cistercians of Kildare and Leighlin - Introduction

In arranging Latin Masses in the Diocese of Kildare and Leighlin one is hit by a number of obstacles, not least the physical impossibility of such celebrations that seems to be a key element of the "liturgical requirements of Vatican II" as interpreted by the local ecclesiastical architects and authorities, as well as clerical intransigence. However, we are making best efforts to make pilgrimages to sites in the Diocese that bring us closer to various elements of our Catholic heritage. One of those themes has been the former Cistercian houses in the Diocese. We were blessed to have our annual retreat directed this year by a monk of Heiligenkreutz, who also celebrated Mass in Doonane, and we have been blessed to have organised Mass in Duiske Abbey, one of the few restored Cistercian Abbey Churches in Ireland, which is towards the south of the Diocese of Kildare and Leighlin. This series is going to trace those Cistercian houses in the Diocese.


Prior to the Norman Invasion of Ireland in 1169, the Cistercian Order had established 15 houses in Ireland: Mellifont, Bective, Inislounaght, Dublin, Monasteranenagh, Baltinglass (K&L), Newry, Kilbeggan, Abbeydorney, Boyle, Jerpoint, Holycross, Aghamanister. Of those, Baltinglass and is within the boundaries of the present Diocese of Kildare and Leighlin. Only St. Mary's at Dublin was not a filiation of Mellifont.

In the years following the Norman Invasion, 9 'Norman' Cistercian Houses were established: Inch, Dunbrody, Grey Abbey, Comber, Tintern, Graignamanagh (KNL), Abington, Abbeylara, Tracton. Of those, Graignamanagh (Duiske) was within the boundaries of the Diocese.

In the years following the Invastion there were also 10 'Irish' Cistercian foundations: Assaroe, Midleton, Corcumroe, Killeny (K&L), Kilcooley, Monasterevin (K&L), Abbeyleix (K&L), Abbeyknockmoy, Abbeyshrule, Macosquin. Both Abbeyleix and Monasterevin lie within the bounds of the Diocese.

To be exact, the Abbeys of Baltinglass, Killeny, Abbeyleix and Graignamanagh are in the Diocese of Leighlin and the Abbey of Monasterevin is in the Diocese of Kildare.

Baltinglass (1148) was a daughter house of Mellifont (1142) and mother house of Jerpoint (1160).

Killeny (1162), which was just to the north of Graignamanagh, was suppressed in 1228 at the time of the visitation of Stephen of Lexington.

Monasterevin (1172) was a daughter house of Baltinglass. It was a continuation of the monastic life of St. Evin at Rosglas.

Abbeyleix (1183) was established thanks to a grant by Conor O'More, Prince of Laois and, according to Sir James Ware (The Antiquities and History of Ireland), was a daughter house of Baltinglass.

Graignamanagh (1204) was a daughter house of Stanley in Wales.

Discipline in the Cistercian Houses in Ireland was a concern of the General Chapter, which, in 1216 sent the Abbot of Clairvaux to investigate the situation at Mellifont, its filiation. He was met by closed gates and rebellious monks. The same was true of the visitation of Jerpoint, where the abbot was supported in his dissent by the abbots of Baltinglass, Killeny, Kilbeggan and Bective. These houses were later to be involved in what was known as the Conspiratio Mellifontis. The Chapter General deposed the abbots of Mellifont and Jerpoint and new visitors were appointed but the issue of discipline in certain Irish houses continued until 1228, when the Abbot of Clairvaux appointed Stephen of Lexington, the Abbot of Stanley (mother house of Graignamanagh) as his deputy for the visitation. Stephen was to be elected Abbot of Clairvaux itself in 1249. He held a colloquium of abbots at Graignamanagh and a chapter of abbots at St. Mary's, Dublin.

Stephen reported to Pope Gregory IX that everything of Cistercian life had disappeared from the Irish monasteries except the wearing of the habit: "Nam in abbiciis Hiberniae censura et ordo noster excepto habito vix in aliquo seruabitur."

One of the outcomes of the visitation was that most of the Irish monasteries were given new mother houses outside Ireland. Baltinglass, (Jerpoint) and Monasterevin were to be daughter houses of Fountains Abbey in England, where Eva, the daughter of Diarmuid MacMurrough, was patroness and was buried. After his visitation, French and Latin were to be the two languages of all Cistercian houses in Ireland. While discipline markedly improved after 1228, the Chapter General of 1271 referred to the "quaestio taediosa" of Irish indiscipline and by 1274 the houses in Ireland had been returned to the supervision of their original mother houses.

St. Malachy of Armagh, pray for us!
St. Bernard of Clairvaux, pray for us!

Mount Melleray Retreat

Members of St. Conleth's Catholic Heritage Association made a retreat in Mount Melleray Abbey again this year. The theme chosen for the retreat was Lectio Divina, to take account of the fact that the Cistercian Abbey where the retreat was being held follows the Rule of St. Benedict (Chapter 48), which gives Lectio Divina an important place in its rule of life, along with Liturgical Prayer and manual labour. Mount Melleray Abbey is situated in the lea of the Knockmealdown Mountains, just to the north of Cappoquin, Co. Waterford. It has been the home of monks of the Strict Observance of the Cistercian Order, known as Trappists, since 1832. The foundation stone of the Monastery was laid on St. Bernard's Day, 20th August, 1833.

"First the tower, austere and massive, gleaming white against the sun,
With its crown of brazen crosses all aflame,
Rose above the circling pine-woods; then the gables, one by one,
To the field of my delighted vision came."

"Now the whole monastic city lay unshrouded to my view,
As a picture on a screen in spendour thrown,
Every snowy arch and angle pointing upward to the blue,
An ecstatic Benedicite in stone."

"Earth's cocoon of light and air,
Wondering Angels peering through,
Find reflections here and there,
Of their home beyond the Blue."


The Abbey Church is in Gothic style and cruciform in plan. Although extended, it follows mainly the lines of the original chapel built by the first community of Cistercian monks. The foundation stone for the new Church was laid by his Eminence John Cardinal McRory on the occasion of the centenary celebration. The Public Church and Monastic Church are the main elements of the magnificent Church-building project undertaken under Dom Celsus O'Connell, O.C.S.O., seventh Lord Abbot of Mount Melleray. The foundation stones were laid on 17th April, 1933, only twelve days after Dom Celsus was elected at Lord Abbot and a few months before the Abbey celebrated its centenary. The Monastic Church, the Church where the monks of Mount Melleray Abbey celebrate the Divine Office every day, was completed and solemnly blessed in November, 1940, but it wasn't until August of 1952, the 120th Anniversary of Mount Melleray, that the Church was solemnly consecrated. Prominent in the monastic Church, as is the custom in all Cistercian churches, was a massive crucifix suspended over the nave and containing relics of St. Bernard and many Irish saints, now, unhappily, removed. The smaller suspended crucifix in the Public Church remains.

The east window seen below is the work of the Harry Clarke studio. The central panel represents Christ the King crowning Our Lady Assumed into Heaven. Each evening at the Office of Compline the lights of the Church are extinguished and, according to Cistercian tradition, the figure of Our Lady is illuminated for the singing of the Salve Regina. To the right of the central panel are St. Catherine of Alexandria and St. Carthage of Lismore, patron of the Diocese of Waterford and Lismore, where Mount Melleray is found, and to the far right are St. Robert, one of the three founders of the Cistercian Order, and St. Patrick of Ireland. To the left of the central panel are St. Brigid of Kildare and St. Columba and to the far left are St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Doctor of the Church and the father of Cistercian monasticism, and St. Malachy of Armagh, who invited St. Bernard to send Cistercian monks to make their first foundation in Ireland.


"...that marvellous melody in whose haunting cadence all the immortal aspirations and emotions of humanity seem to struggle for expression..."

The Consecration of the Monastic Church was carried out by the Ordinary of the Diocese, Bishop Coholan of Waterford and Lismore beginning at 8 a.m. on 20th. The Public Church was consecrated contemporaneously, with Dom Benignus Hickey, O.C.S.O., Abbot of New Mellifont, consecrating the High Altar. During the consecration festival from 20th August to 29th August, 1952, well over 100,000 people visited Mount Melleray, an echo, surely, of the great occasion that was the consecration of the first Cistercian Church in Ireland, at Mellifont in Co. Louth. Mellifont Abbey was founded in 1142, with St. Christian Ó Connarchy as first Abbot. The consecration of the Church, the largest in Ireland at the time, was attended in state by the High King, Murtach Ó Loughlin, together with the flower of the nobility, including MacMurrough, as yet "guiltless of his country's blood." St. Christian, by this time Bishop of Lismore and Papal Legate, presided at the consecration, another direct link, through the Diocese of Waterford and Lismore, to the Abbey at Mount Melleray. Gelasius, Archbishop of Armagh, was principal consecrator, assisted by 17 Bishops.


At Mount Melleray in 1952, the Abbot General of the Cistercians of the Strict Observance, Dom Gabriel Sortais, was liturgically received on the morning of 20th August and His Excellency, the President of Ireland, Séan T. Ó Ceallaigh and Mrs. Ó Ceallaigh were given a liturgical reception that evening. From noon on Thursday, 21st, until Friday, 29th, the law of enclosure was suspended to permit ladies to enter the precincts of the Monastery. On 21st August, the Apostolic Nuncio to Ireland, Archbishop O'Hara, sang Pontifical Mass. On Sunday, 24th, Dom Celsus O'Connell, Lord Abbot of Mount Melleray celebrated Pontifical High Mass in the open air next to the Public Church. On the final day of the festival, Pontifical Vespers in the open air were followed by Benediction and a procession of the Blessed Sacrament through the grounds of the Monastery and was brought back to the High Altar of the Monastic Church for the Office of Compline. The conclusion of the festival was the turning of the key in the lock of the enclosure by the Lord Abbot.


During the course of the retreat conferences, Father McCarthy said that all Catholics should take the words of Pope Benedict XVI seriously when he said: "I would like in particular to recall and recommend the ancient tradition of Lectio divina: the diligent reading of Sacred Scripture accompanied by prayer brings about that intimate dialogue in which the person reading hears God who is speaking, and in praying, responds to him with trusting openness of heart. If it is effectively promoted, this practice will bring to the Church - I am convinced of it - a new spiritual springtime." He said that the starting point for any Lectio divina was the Divinity of Christ. He added that the aim was not to obtain some kind of personal magisterium on the meaning of S. Scripture but rather to converse with God.



Fr. McCarthy introduced the retreatants to the words of Guigo II, the twelfth-century prior of Grande Chartreuse, and spoke about the four elements of Lectio divina: Lectio, to read the Scriptures; Meditatio, to meditate upon them and to settle upon some element that strikes one particularly; Oratio, to pray, the intimate dialogue of which the Pope speaks; and Contemplatio, to contemplate upon all the elements.

Each day was begun with Mass in the Gregorian Rite and concluded with devotions and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament in the traditional manner. The retreat began on the feast of the Annunciation, carried on through the feast of the Seven Sorrows of Our Lady, and concluded on the Saturday of Passion Week.



The Abbey Guest House accommodated the retreatants throughout and gave direct access to the Public Church, dedicated to the Assumption of Our Lady and Saint Philomena. It was once the National Shrine to Saint Philomena, although her statue was removed when her name was removed from the Roman Calendar. The Guest House formed part of the older monastery complex.



The interior of the Public Church has five bays consisting of aisles on either side and double lancets above. The Sanctuary is decorated in mosaic, both in nave and aisles. The walls surrounding the side aisles being decorated with adoring Angels. The walls of the Sanctuary having the instruments of the Passion in quatrefoils on the lateral walls, the east wall having the Sacred Heart represented to the Gospel side of the east window and St. Joseph to the Epistle side, each having the appropriate monogram in the quatrefoil beneath.



Perhaps one of the most interesting of all sights in Mount Melleray is the Miraculous Bin which is kept in the farm-yard near the Monastery garden. A long wooden structure about 3 metres long by 1 1/2 metres wide by 1 metre deep, it is regarded the greatest wonder of Mount Melleray. On the cover of the bin is a small notice which tells the story as follows: "DURING THE FAMINE OF 1840, THE COMMUNITY AND MORE THAN SEVENTY POOR PEOPLE WERE FED DAILY WITH MEAL STORED IN THE BIN. AFTER THREE MONTHS THE SUPPLY WAS FOUND UNDIMINISHED." The story is one well known to visitors to Mount Melleray. The then Lord Abbot, Dom Vincent Ryan, left instructions that nobody was to be turned away from the monastery hungry during his absence, which was to last three months, beginning just after Easter. The stock of Indian meal in the bin was found to be undiminished upon his return, although the daily measure required for 100 monks and the more than 70 poor people was taken from it each day. Dom Vincent's written and signed statement attesting to the incident is still extant: "Who will not here admire and praise the wonderful dispensation of Divine Providence. A poor and numerous community of religious men, located on the side of a barren mountain, improvided with funds, resources, or human means necessary to support existence, labouring incessantly in the arduous and painful enterprise of reclaiming its stubborn and neglected soil, depending on the casual charity of humane friends, are thus enabled, I will presume to say miraculously, not only to maintain their own existence, but to feed and preserve the lives of nearly five thousand of their fellow creatures during a period of no ordinary calamity and distress!"


The east window of the Public Church is in two levels, above, in the central panel is Our Lady assumed into Heaven flanked by Angels, while below are, from left to right, St. Brigid, St. Malachy of Armagh (who introduced the Cistercian Order to Ireland), St. Bernard of Clairvaux, friend of St. Malachy, greeting him, and St. Patrick. This is a window of old associations. Mention of St. Malachy and St. Bernard draws the mind back to Mellifont and the first Irish foundation of the Cistercians. The seven main panels of this window were originally in the east window of the old Monastic Church.



To the East of the Monastic Church is 'God's Acre,' the monks' grave-yard, where generations of Cistercians lie. The three High Crosses in the foreground (and another two in the distance) mark the graves of the Lords Abbot of Mount Melleray.

"To my ears as thus I pondered came the sweet and soothing sounds,
Of the Abbey chime, from workshop and from cell,
From the field and from the forest, from the grange's distant bounds,
Calling all to choir, for that's the Office Bell."

If you would like to explore a monastic vocation in Mount Melleray Abbey, the Novice Master of Mount Melleray Abbey can be contacted by letter at:

Revd. Novice Master, O.C.S.O.,
Mount Melleray Abbey,
Cappoquin,
Co. Waterford,
Ireland.

Or by 'phone at:

+353 58 54404

Or by e-mail by clicking here.