A Legend of Donegal

Today we are staying at Saint Brigid's holy well in Donegal to explore another piece of its associated folklore. Whilst rural Catholics cherished holy wells and the rituals which took place at them, the sites themselves were often in the ownership of Protestant landlords who could be hostile to their tenantry's traditions. Such a story is told of the landowner of the site of Saint Brigid's well and it is typical of the type of accounts uncovered by folklore collectors in the nineteenth century. This tale of how the Protestant landlord tries to impede access to the well, only to have a vision of a beautiful maiden hover protectively over it, was published in the American periodical The Sacred Heart Review in 1889. The illustration above is a postcard from my own collection showing Saint Brigid hovering ethereally above the stream at her reputed birthplace of Faughart, in County Louth:

A LEGEND OF DONEGAL.

Not far from the picturesque little village of Stranorlar, renowned as the last resting-place of Butt, the founder of the Home Rule movement, lies a calm, placid sheet of water, known to the peasantry as Loch Lawne. In its southern side, about three feet from the pebbly shore, is the famous well of St. Brigid, surrounded by a mound of small white stones brought from almost every part of Ulster, and surmounted by pieces of linen, sticks, and crutches, left by those who had the happiness of being cured by its healing waters. It has long been considered a pious custom for the pilgrim, on his first visit, to place three white stones on the ever-increasing mound. 

In the year 18 —, the concourse of pilgrims being larger than usual, the owner of the estate on which the lake is situated, under pretence that his crops were in danger of being destroyed, closed all ingress to the holy well. The peasantry became excited; threats were indulged in by some; petitions were made by others, but in vain. He was a man of gentle, but by times (as in the present instance), of stubborn manner. He knew no fear, and threats as well as petitions were entirely disregarded. For three months his hateful mandate was in force. One morning the inhabitants of Stranorlar awoke to find the following placard on the trunk of a large beech-tree, long used for public notices. It was signed by the owner of the estate: 

"FREE ACCESS TO ST. BRIGID'S WELL." 

Many were the suppositions of the pious villagers as to the cause of his relenting; some said that his cattle were all dying; others, that good St. Brigid had sent him a warning from heaven. Be this as it may, a great change had come over him; his toleration was the wonder of all. Pilgrims might trample his oats, break his fences; he would only remark, "I will be nothing the poorer." 

Sitting one evening by his blazing peat-fire, many years after, he said to me: "I will tell you an incident that happened long years ago. You were then a mere boy. One morning I found my fences thrown into the lake. I became angry, and falsely suspecting the pilgrims, I poured forth threats and curses against them, and closed all ingress to the well; I even determined to drain it by means of a channel connecting it with the lake. To accomplish this spiteful work, I chose a clear, moonlight night. Taking a gun and spade, I set out by the shortest route to the well. Judge of my surprise on finding it illuminated as if by hundreds of candles! Trembling, I aimed my gun and fired. Not a light was extinguished; on the contrary, I seemed only to have increased the brilliancy of the scene. As I was pausing, not knowing whether to proceed to the well or return home, I saw a beautiful maiden rising, as it were, from the lake, attired in a long-flowing white robe, girded by a blue sash. On her breast sparkled gems more dazzling than the sun. She glided as I have seen swallows, without touching the earth, and hovered over the well. No doubt it was St. Brigid. . . . I often think of calling on Father C , and joining the Catholic Church." 

He is dead now, but his son, who inherits his liberal spirit, has made an excellent road to St. Brigid's well. And the peasants thereabout tell the strangers that linger on that romantic way the story I have told you.— S.D. in the Ave Maria.

 The Sacred Heart Review, Volume 1, Number 24, 11 May 1889, p6.

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St Brigid's Well in Donegal

Saint Brigid, like many Irish saints, has holy wells dedicated to her throughout the country. These sites were an important part of popular Irish devotion to the saints, and often involved the performance of set rituals on the saint's feast day plus the use of the well water for therapeutic purposes.  These activities could be rather shocking though to observers from outside the rural Catholic communities which practised them. Nineteenth-century writer Mary Frances Cusack (1829–1899), defended holy wells against the charge that their use and the rituals surrounding them were no more than pagan superstition:

...in Ireland, the people happen to believe that God hears the prayers of saints more readily than their own; and acting on the principle which induced persons, in apostolic times, to use "handkerchiefs and aprons" which had touched the person of St. Paul as mediums of cure, because of his virgin sanctity, in preference to "handkerchiefs and aprons" of their own, they apply to the saints and obtain cures. But they do not believe the saints can give what God refuses, or that the saints are more merciful than God. They know that the saints are His special friends, and we give to a friend what we might refuse to one less dear. Lege totum si vis scire totum, is a motto which writers on national customs should not forget

 M.F. Cusack, An Illustrated History of Ireland (London, 1868), p.105.

The article below is from a 1936 Australian newspaper which describes a Donegal holy well dedicated to Saint Brigid. Interestingly, the emphasis here is less on Ireland's patroness and more on Ireland's experience of religious persecution in the centuries following the Reformation. For this well has an inscribed stone recording that "Father James Gallagher said his last Mass in Penal Days at Tobar Brighde." Although the 'Mass Rock' is the most iconic outdoor setting for Mass in the Penal times, holy wells also served this function and form part of its folklore. There are stories, for example, of strange mists descending at wells which hid the celebrants from the prying eyes of the 'priest hunter'. The account below suggests that in 1936 the popularity of Saint Brigid's well was undimmed, with Sunday the most popular day for visiting:

LINK WITH PENAL DAYS

ST. BRIGID'S WELL IN DONEGAL

In the heart of the Finn Valley, in Donegal, is the Well of St. Brigid. Eager workers from in and around Clady, the nearby little village across the Tyrone border, have now fashioned a grotto near the Well, and placed there a statue of the saint. Below the grotto, in black letters on a white slab, is the simple inscription: "Father James Gallagher said his last Mass in Penal Days at Tobar Brighde."

This Well links the people of the Valley of the Finn with the not too distant days when the heads of priests were bought for a few pounds and the more distant times when the work of saints like Brigid made possible the triumphant bridge that has been built ever the Penal Days. On Sundays there is a constant stream of visitors, and last Sunday made a record. Motor cars, cycles, and horse-drawn vehicles were parked along the road sides.

A circular wall has been built around the well five feet high, with coping stones on top, set in cement. Over the grotto covering there is a construction of rough stones, and on top a Celtic cross. At one side of the well is the raised grotto containing the Saint's statue, and again on the right is another with a statue of Our Lady. 

LINK WITH PENAL DAYS (1936, December 10). Examiner (Launceston, Tas. : 1900 - 1954), p. 9.

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Where Brigid is Honoured

We stay with the theme of devotion to Saint Brigid in Europe with a 1929 piece from Irish Benedictine writer Dom Patrick Nolan. He is perhaps best known for his 1908 book The Irish Dames of Ypres which looked at the history of the Irish Royal Abbey of Ypres founded by seventeenth-century Catholic exiles. Here, however, he provides us with a gazetteer of places outside Ireland which cherished Saint Brigid and describes some of the history and traditions associated with them. As the immediate inspiration for Dom Patrick's reflections seems to have been the return of a portion of the relics of Saint Brigid to Killester in 1929, he concludes with a brief sketch of the history of her relics:

WHERE BRIGID IS  HONOURED.

Europe's Devotion to Irish Saint.

BY DOM PATRICK NOLAN, O.S.B.

A recent interesting article in the 'Irish Independent' on St. Brigid and the celebrations in her honour at Killester, prompts me to remind Irish people that devotion to this great saint is not confined to Ireland, and that her 'cultus' is as far flung as are the numerous lands evangelised by Irish missionaries.

Devotion to St. Brigid has been a constant European tradition, and her fame has extended far beyond our Continent. It may, indeed, be said to be greater in some Continental countries than in her own native land.

St. Brigid and Britain.

On Sunday January 27, I announced to the congregation, mostly English Catholics, of a small Oxford village that Friday, February 1, would be kept as the feast of St. Brigid of Ireland throughout the diocese of Birmingham, and rightly so.

The ancient Saxon kingdom of Mercia, which comprised the territory of the present Archdiocese of Birmingham, was evangelised by the children of St. Brigid many long centuries go, and the erection of the present nourishing diocese was a direct result of the extensive immigration of St. Brigid's children in the 'forties and 'fifties of last century.

In Scotland.

Our Scottish kinsfolk do not yield to their Irish forebears in their veneration for our great Irish saint. To the Scottish Gael, as Fiona Macleod reminds us, she is the 'Fair Lady of February,' 'St. Bride of the Kindly Fire,' and 'St. Bride of the Shores.' February is her own month, the month of 'Bride Min,' gentle Brigid; or 'Brighid boidheach Muime Chriosd,' Bride the Beautiful, Christ's Foster Mother.

In the Gaelic Highlands and storm-swept Isles of the West her emblems are the dandelion, the lamb and the sea-bird known to the common folk as the 'oyster-opener.'

The humble dandelion, the harbinger of Spring and of St. Brigid, the dealan Dhe, 'the little flame of God,' or bhearnan Brighde, 'St. Bride's forerunner,' has from remotest times been associated with St. Brigid by the Scottish Gael.

St. Bride's Flocks.

'To this day shepherds on Ah Fhiell Brighde,' St. 'Brigid's feast, 'are wont to hear among the mists the crying of in numerable young lambs, and this without the bleating of ewes, and so by that token know that Holy St. Bride has passed by, coming earthward with her flocks of countless lambs. . . .'

'In these desolate far isles where life is so hard ... a rejoicing sound is that in truth when the Gille-Bhride is heard calling along the shores.' And well may this welcome visitor to the bleak Scottish coasts be called the 'Servant of Bride,' for does not its incessant, cheery cry 'gilly-breed, gilly-breed, ' come to Gaelic ears like an invocation to the Mary of the Gael?

Alsace.

It is a far cry from Scotland to Alsace, but there too the traditional devotion to our Irish saint still flourishes.

The Canons of Old St. Peter's at Strassburg used to distribute 'St. Brigid 's Bread,' their best wine was known as 'St. Brigid's Wine.' Alsatian farmers had such devotion to her that they placed their fields and field work under her special protection, and 'Buren-bridel' was a generic title for Alsatian farmers' daughters, many of whom bore the name of Brigid, a name still not uncommon in Southern Germany.

The festival of St. Brigid was solemnly kept almost universally throughout the mediaeval German Empire, and by all the religious Orders. Churches and chapels were dedicated to her at Cologne, Mainz,
and elsewhere, from an early date.

At Fosses, in Belgium, an ancient chapel of St. Brigid still tops the hill so conspicuous from the railway station. At Piacenza, in North Italy, there is a church of St. Brigid, said to have been founded in 868 by the Irish saint, Donatus, Bishop of Fiesole. Annexed to it was a hospice for Irish pilgrims on their way to Bobbio or Rome.

Story of St. Brigid's Relics.

Much more could be said about the 'cultus' of St. Brigid on the Continent, but I must conclude with a few remarks as to her relics.

Cogitosus tells us that St. Brigid's relics were kept in a richly-decorated shrine in Kildare. It is not known when they were 'translated' and placed with St. Columba's and St. Patrick's at Downpatrick, but Columba's relics were still at Iona in the beginning of the ninth century.

During native political broils, devotion to the saint nagged and all knowledge of the whereabouts of her relics was lost. But they were miraculously re-discovered through the prayers of a holy Bishop, Malachy, in the year that Earl, later King John, came to Ireland (1185), as related in a special office for the day, printed in Paris in 1620. 

The Shrine Desecrated.

They were solemnly authenticated, or translated, on June 9 (St. Colum's day) in the presence of a Cardinal Legate, specially sent from Rome, and 15 Bishops; but the shrine was desecrated by Lord Leonard Gray, Viceroy of Henry VIII.

The head of St. Brigid is said to have been previously transferred to Newstadt in Austria, where it was venerated in the chapel of the imperial citadel. Later on the Emperor Rudolph II. gave it to John Borgia, son of St. Francis Borgia, and Ambassador of Philip II., who took it to Spain in 1587, and gave it to the Lisbon Jesuits, who kept it in the chapel of their house of studies at St. Roch, the solemn translation, one of the most magnificent ever seen, taking place in 1588.

St. Roch or Lumiar.

But Cardosus says that the head of St. Brigid is preserved with very great veneration in the church at Lumiar, formerly known as. St. John the Baptist's, but now as St. Brigid's. Three Irish knights are said to have taken it into Portugal to King Dionysius, or Denis (d. 1225).

Don Philip O'Sullivan Beare supports the Lumiar tradition, so that we may suppose the relic at St. Roch's, Lisbon, to be that of another St. Brigid, for there have been more than one saintly imitator of the great Irish original. We presume the great St. Brigid of Sweden had the Irish saint for her patron and model, and we know that Scandinavian pilgrims frequented the hospice of St. Brigid at Piacenza.

"WHERE BRIGID IS HONOURED." The Catholic Press, 28 March 1929

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Saint Brigid in the Empire of the Gael

When I first established this blog it was my custom to make an octave of posts in honour of Saint Brigid and it is a tradition which I am pleased to revive. Over the ten years that this blog has been running I have written a number of times on the devotion to Saint Brigid outside her native land. Earlier posts can be found tagged here. Today we have a brief reminder of the honour paid to our patroness on the continent of Europe as found in an Australian newspaper of 1929, the centenary year of Catholic Emancipation. The reputation of Saint Brigid that was carried to continental Europe by Irish missionaries was that she was 'the Mary of the Gael'.  The German reference in the article is to the (in)famous complaint of an anonymous poet that in Erfurt, the Irish when they were drunk claimed that 'Brigit is God's Mum'. Obviously the Irish traditions about Saint Brigid as 'another Mary, mother of the great Lord', suffered somewhat in translation!

SAINT BRIGID
In the Empire of the Gael

THERE are few countries that can boast of as great an empire as Ireland can — an empire not won by oppression and slaughter, but by the Gospel of Christ, as preached by the early Irish monks and priests. It has in truth been called the Spiritual Empire of the Gael. A cursory glance at the ecclesiastical map of Europe reveals the number of religious foundations which were the work of Irish monks of the seventh and eighth centuries.

Irish Missionaries and Saints

A remarkable feature of their work was the preaching of devotion to their national saints, St. Patrick and St. Brigid. Everywhere they preached they told the story of their home saints, and caused to spring up a devotion to them which has; lasted when all memory of the preachers and their foundations has faded out of popular memory and traditions.

Indeed, so great was the propaganda spread, consequently their popularity, that it raised the ire of a German writer of the 12th century. He poked fun at the exaggerations the Irish foreigners, as he styled them, were led into by their unlimited admiration for the saints of their race.

Doubtless the exaggeration he referred to was the custom of referring to St. Brigid as 'the Mary of the Gael.' Even in the poetic 12th century the Gaelic imagination was too much for the realistic mentality of the German.

St. Brigid Abroad.

The saint of Kildare, says Dom Gougaud, enjoyed a remarkable popularity through all Europe. She seems to have captured the imagination of the people, and was honored above all the women of her time. 

As far back as the seventh century her festival was kept in Germany. The peasantry of Wallon knew of her kindness to animals in the eighth and ninth centuries, and they invoked her aid for their cattle and crops in the chapel dedicated to her honor in the town of Fosse — a town which owes its origin to an Irish saint, and which is linked once more with Ireland through the White Canons. The return of her relic from Portugal has told us of the veneration she enjoyed at Lumier. Cologne, Strasbourge, Liental, Genoa, Liege, are a few of the many places that know and honor the 'Pearl of Ireland.' In order to follow her cult, says Gougaud, it is only necessary to let the eye' roam over the map of Irish establishments on the Continent. Where an Irish monastery was, there Brigid was honored.

Brittany is a land full of odd memories, full of old churches, and full, too, of old pilgrimages and Pardons. Amongst all these old memories of saints and pilgrimages the memory of St. Brigid of Kildare is still found.

There is no saint — after their own national saint— enjoys such a popularity as the saint of Kildare. The tenacity of the Breton in clinging to old beliefs and devotions have often expressed itself on her behalf.

The celebration of a saint's festival is called a 'Pardon' in Brittany. Saint Brigid's festival, February 1, is celebrated by a Pardon at La Turbaille in Brittany, and all the neighborhood gather for this day of prayer and festival in honor of the Brigid of Kildare. On February 1, on the banks of the Loire, the sweet clear voices of Breton boys and girls rise in chant in honor of our dear saint from the Church of the Oaks.

 This year calls up the glories of the past — the glory of those who suffered for the faith of Patrick and Brigid at home and abroad.

JOHN O'DRISCOLL,
In 'Irish Catholic.'

SAINT BRIGID (1929, June 20). Freeman's Journal (Sydney, NSW: 1850 - 1932), p. 34. 

Retrieved December 18, 2017, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article118097731
 

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Saint Brigid: 'a type of all that is best in the character of the Irishwoman'

Today to mark the feast of Saint Brigid of Kildare we can enjoy a nineteenth-century view of her which I came across in the Papers Past digital newspaper archive of the National Library of New Zealand. It is one of the many items relating to Irish saints which were syndicated from a worldwide variety of publications. This particular one from 1888 is attributed to The Woman's Suffrage Journal and it is fascinating to see the view of Ireland's patroness presented by this historic feminist source. For one thing, there is no mention whatever of a goddess, for it was only in 1880 that the Continental Celticist, Henri d'Arbois de Jubainville, first suggested that the saint had inherited some of the supposed attributes of a pagan deity. The anonymous writer of the piece below is happy to draw upon the traditional hagiography of Saint Brigid and to see the various supernatural events connected with her as evidence that she was no ordinary woman. Victorian feminism advocated for women to be allowed to exercise a positive moral influence on society and the writer is thus delighted by the stories which show Saint Brigid as someone whose opinion was sought by Bishops. Indeed, the writer feels that 'Brigid appears a type of all that is best in the character of the Irishwoman' before concluding with a short list of her virtues which she hopes 'the daughters of Erin' will long emulate. Wishing everyone the blessings of the Feast of our national patroness, Saint Brigid!
 

SAINT BRIDGET OF KILDARE.

Out of the mists of miracle there looms before us, 13 centuries ago in Ireland, the figure of a mighty woman — Brigid (or Bridget) of of Kildare. A woman, who without any doubt, impressed her personality on her time and country, but whose character and actions can only be outlined by the uncertain light of the traditions of miracle and legend which both conceal and. reveal her life.

In whatever way the stories strike us, that a globe of fire hovered over the place where Brigid was born; or that the frighted mother came home from the fields one day to find her cottage all ablaze, and to the baby lay laughing with rosy cheeks unscathed amid the flames; or that a pillar of light shone over the head of the maiden when she took her vows— believe we these things or believe we them not, they mark one unmistakeable truth — they point to a life of no common order.

Through the halo of these and many other legends which surround her, Brigid appears a type of all that is best in the character of the Irishwoman. We see her first as a bright, assiduous child, sharing all she has with the poor; then as an earnest girl, striving to fulfil her filial duties under difficult and complex conditions; finally as the self-sacrificing, devout woman, who felt that throughout all her life in all things she had the help of an angel of God while she spent her life for others, teaching and healing their quarrels as well as their diseases.

That her father was of noble birth all the accounts agree. The earlier narratives relate that her mother was a bond-woman, a second Hagar. May it not be that the difficulties brought to her earlier years by the unequal conditions of her parents aided to develop in Brigid that universal sympathy for all living creatures which she seems to have possessed — she not only fed the starving dog, but the wild boar from the woods, rushing down on the swine she was watching, at a word from her became tame. The wild fowl at her call came hovering around, and let her fondle them.

Whether a temporary and opportune blindness really came to her aid in the matter or not does not alter the fact that she overcame the plans her father had made for the marriage of his beautiful and attractive daughter and early devoted herself to a religious life.

The great apostle of his age and country, St. Patrick, received her us his daughter, and became to her as a father. What the great, council of bishops was which sought her opinion is not apparently very clear, nor the occasion of the visit paid by seven bishops to the saint at Kildare, but those references to her opinion show that her judgment was valued, and that she inspired confidence in the best minds of her time.

Her birthplace was at Fochart, in County Louth, but her childhood and youth were, passed partly in the west, partly in the south. When her fame grew the inhabitants of Leinster besought her to return to them, and she, seeing in their wishes a divine call, fixed her place of abode under an oak which she much loved — the thenceforth famous Kildare (Church of the Oak), where in after years a holy fire was kept perpetually burning on her shrine. Then, during her life both a monastery and a nunnery grew up, under her rule, with one church in common. At Kildare she was buried, and thence, about 1185, her remains were translated to the tomb of St. Patrick and St. Columba, that the remains of Ireland's three greatest saints might rest side by side. There are churches to her honour in many lands, and many places have sought to be connected with her.  She is said to have dwelt, for a time on the Isle of Man. Abernethy in Scotland, Glastonbury in England have claimed to be her place of burial, the fame of lesser Brides being absorbed in the light, of this greatest; Bride, Brigid, or Bridget, 

Who rode on the waves of the world, 

As the sea-bird rides upon the billow.

Strong in affection, ready in pity, clear in judgment, bright in spirit — long may Brigid be the type of the daughters of Erin. —  Woman's Suffrage Journal.


SAINT BRIDGET OF KILDARE. Otago Witness, Issue 1921, 14 September 1888.

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The Apostolate of Saint Patrick

To celebrate the feast of Saint Patrick, I offer the reflections of one of the great Irish churchmen of the nineteenth century, Patrick Francis, Cardinal Moran (1830-1911). This native of Leighlinbridge was a man of tremendous energy who, in between fulfilling the duties of first a priest, then a bishop and finally of Cardinal Archbishop of Sydney, managed to produce a series of important books on the history of Ireland, its saints and its martyrs. We can see these scholarly interests reflected in his 1889 Saint Patrick's Day homily below, where we are offered not only a stirring vision of Saint Patrick and his apostolate, but of the entire golden age of the 'Celtic church' and of its missionary saints. The sacrifices of the later Irish martyrs are also not forgotten. Speaking some sixty years after Catholic Emancipation the Cardinal is filled with hope and confidence for the future as he addresses his Irish emigrant audience who also have their part to play in the continuation of the apostolate of Saint Patrick:

 

THE APOSTOLATE OF ST. PATRICK.

We take the following report of an address delivered on St. Patrick's Day by Cardinal Moran, from our contemporary the Sydney Nation. His Eminence entered the pulpit, and gave the text of his discourse as follows:—

Arise, arise, put on thy strength, O Sion, pat on the garments of thy glory, O Jerusalem; loose the bonds from off thy neck, O captive daughter of Sion. How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, and that preacheth peace, of him that showeth forth good, that preacheth salvation, that saith to Sion, Thy God shall reign." (Isaias, chap. 52). 

He said:— These words were addressed by the prophet of old to the children of Israel, who, though seated by the pleasant waters of Babylon, were weighed down with sorrow in the bondage of slavery. They would not intone the songs of their fathers, for they were in an alien land; but now the prophet summoned them to tune their harps and chant their gladsome anthems of rejoicing, for the day of their freedom was at hand. The same words were addressed by the Apostle to the faithful who were called from spiritual death to life in Imperial Rome, and from age to age they have never ceased to find an echo in holy Church as nation after nation was gathered into the saving fold of Christ. And what shall I say of the joyous anthems of thanksgiving and praise which were caught up by the choirs of angels, and were re-echoed through the wide-spreading plains of Ireland when her apostle, St. Patrick, landed upon her shores, and when, through his preaching, the light of the faith shone upon her green hills never more to set. Beautiful, indeed, was the message of this Apostle of salvation, this missioner of peace. And those anthems of thanksgiving shall never cease. At 10,000 altars the feast of St. Patrick is kept to-day with solemn pomp; the Church loves to proclaim his praise, the hearts of his children are thrilled with joy, and the nations whose lamp of faith was kindled at Erin's shrines are made partakers of their rejoicing.

 [The preacher, after sketching the eventful career of St Patrick in Ireland, and pointing out the special fruits of his apostolate, thus proceeded]:

The time was now come that he should rest from his labours. He was as Saul when the summons came to enter into his eternal reward. This was the first Church which he had founded in Ireland. It was now destined to be the place of his repose. St. Bridget was privileged to prepare the shroud to enshrine his remains. To her and her virgin companions he addressed sweet parting words on the glory of the blessed, and the joys of paradise. Bishops and priests, whom he had formed to virtue and led to the sanctuary, gathered round him for his last blessing. He exhorted them to peace, forbearance, and charity. At the hands of a loved disciple, St. Thassack, he received the viaticum of eternal life, and praying a blessing upon the Irish Church, and again and again repeating the words which were so familiar to him during life, "Deo Gratias," - 'Thanks to Thee, O God, for all Thy wondrous' mercies," he rested in peace. The whole clergy of Erin kept vigil around his hallowed remains for seven days; but what with the chant of the religious choirs and the fragrance of paradise, and the heavenly light that lit up the sanctuary, and the melody of the angels, the whole time seemed to them to be but one short hour.

St. Patrick had gone to his reward, but his apostolate did not cease, and through his prayers the fruitfulness of heavenly blessings which he bestowed upon his spiritual children shall be their inheritance till the end of time. It is recorded in one of the lives of the Saint that in an ecstacy of prayer he asked of God a ninefold share of reward for the chosen people whom he had led to Christ. And this manifold reward was granted in the triple merit of their heroism of sanctity, the triple merit of their zeal in spreading the light of divine truth, and the triple merit awarded by the nations of Christendom for their unparalleled fortitude in enduring martyrdom for the faith. Thus the apostolate of St. Patrick was complete. It was complete in that he had gathered the whole nation of Ireland into the fold of Christ. It was complete in that during his lifetime, the convents and cloisters and sanctuaries were filled with chosen bands of the sons and daughters of Erin, and priests and bishops whom he had himself trained to piety ministered with devotedness among the people whom he loved. It was complete in the peaceful triumph achieved by Divine truth, for, though St Patrick had himself to suffer a great deal at the hands of wicked men, yet the sword of persecution was not unsheathed against the Church, and the princes and chieftains and people alike embraced the faith. It was above all complete in the perfection of sanctity which adorned the Irish Church. From the chill spell of the winter of idolatry, Ireland had passed almost without a springtime into the summer glow of spiritual life, and the land which St. Patrick found immersed in the darkness of paganism was at the close of his apostolate an island of saints. Everywhere the profane altars of superstition were overthrown and the idols forsaken. Religion triumphed and the blessings of God filled the land. The people in crowds hastened to satiate their thirst at the fountains of mercy, the divine lessons of life and light were caught up with joy, the anthems of piety resounded through every smiling valley of Ireland, and those ornaments of virtue, temperance, charity and peace, each one of which, when distributed among the nations of Christendom, suffices for the privileged blessedness of a Christian people, were all blended and entwined to form the peerless aureola of Ireland's sanctity.

 One of the ancient Irish writers has described under poetic imagery, the marvellous conversion of the nation. The daughter of Lir— it is thus he designates the people of Erin—was held captive under Druidical spell for 400 years. Clothed in the snow-white plumage of the swan she moved silent and solitary over the waters of Lough Foyle. St. Patrick, arriving on the shores of the lake, erected his altar to offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving and praise. At the moment of the elevation, when the tinkling of the little bell was heard over the still waters, the spell of enchantment was broken, and the fair daughter of Lir arose once more in the full grace and bloom of youth, and arrayed in heavenly comeliness.and enlightened by divine faith, knelt for the Saint's blessings at the altar of God. Thus was the blessing of heaven set as a seal on the apostolate of St. Patrick. The hills, and valleys, and glens of Erin were lit up with the light of the Gospel and the various tribes of the nation, with a heroism and fervour, and devotion, and gratitude never surpassed in the history of the Church, embraced the Catholic Faith, and were gathered into the one true fold.

For 300 years after the advent of St. Patrick the lamp of faith burned brightly throughout the length and breadth of the land. Ireland was the joy of Christendom, an island of saints, a shrine of piety, a garden of the Christian virtues, a sanctuary of civilisation and learning. Happy was it for Europe that Divine Providence had thus prepared a home for religion in the hearts of the Irish race. Triumphant barbarism was very soon to trample down the pride of Imperial Rome, uprooting its civilisation and transforming its most favoured province into a desolate and barren wilderness. The Saxons will ravage Britain with fire and sword. The Franks will occupy the fruitful territories of Gaul, Atilla and his Huns shall plunder Italy. Goths, Allemanni, and Burgundians shall lay waste the other fairest districts of Christendom, till it may seem that Europe can never again rise from the fetters of barbarism, and that her sun of civilisation and learning has for ever set. It was then that the Island of Saints entered upon her mission as the burning and shining light of the Western world. Her Church in those days has been likened to the luminous beacon of some lofty lighthouse planted on a rock amid the foaming surge of the ocean and casting us light over the dark sea to guide the mariner in his course. Venerable Bede writes that the sons of the Anglo Saxon Knights and Thanes proceeded in crowds to the Irish schools, to be trained in the paths of knowledge— human and divine. Others came from France and Switzerland, from Germany and Italy. Even from the remote monasteries of Egypt and the East men bent their pilgrim steps towards Erin to trim at her sanctuaries their lamp of faith, and to perfect themselves in the knowledge of divine truth and in the science of the saints.

And from the schools and monasteries of Ireland innumerable missionaries fearlessly went forth on the arduous mission to renew the spent glories of civilisation, and to revive the Christian life of Europe. So many were these missionary bands that a French writer a thousand years ago cried out in astonishment, "All Ireland with her train of saints and sages is migrating to our shores." And what was the work in which the zealous missionaries were engaged, I will allow another eloquent Frenchman of our own day to answer: "It was to preach the gospel to unbelievers; to reanimate Christians crushed under barbarian invasions; to arouse to nobleness, degenerate souls; to raise up powerful races; to rekindle the extinguishing torch of arts and of letters; to carry everywhere the light of science and of faith." The missionary field of the saints and scholars of Erin in those days embraced almost the whole of Europe, from the Orkneys to the Thames— from the shores of the Channel to the sources of the Rhine and the banks of the Danube. They penetrated to the southernmost provinces of Italy; they bore the Gospel northwards, over stormy and icy sea, even to the Faroe Islands and the shores of Iceland. Austria honours St. Colman as her patron; St. Kilian, with a chosen band of assistants, evangelised a great part of France, and penetrating thence into the heart of Thuringia, laid deep the foundations of the Holy Church, which he cemented with his blood. Need I name St. Columbanus and St. Gall, St. Cathaldus of Taranto, St. Donatus of Fiesole, St. Romuald of Mechlin, St. Virgilius the Apostle of Corinthia; St. Boniface, whom all Germany salutes as patron and apostle. When I was proceeding from Rome to Ireland a few months ago I turned aside from the direct road to visit the relics of St. Fridolin at Seckingen. He is still honoured there as chief patron. His memory is still cherished by his devoted children, and new honours are every day decreed to his name. Suffice it to say that more than 300 of the Irish missionaries of those days have received the honours of the altar —a well-deserved tribute to their heroic devotedness and self sacrifice—from the grateful churches of Christendom. Nor was it a mere passing breath of sanctity that was thus wafted from the shrines of Ireland to the nations of the continent. The schools and monasteries and other institutions founded by those missionaries continued for centuries to reflect lustre on the fair name of Ireland as centres of enlightenment and bulwarks of morality and piety. Who is there that can pretend to enlightenment at the present day, and not feel grateful to the Irish Monastery of Bobbio, which jealously guarded the literary treasures of Greece and Rome in perilous times, and handed them down in safety to us? From that Irish Monastery went forth two of the greatest Pontiffs of the middle ages, Sylvester the Second and Hildebrand, who did so much to stimulate the practice of Christian virtue, and to revive the sacred and polite studies throughout Europe. The Monastery of St. Gall, on the shores of Lake Constance, was a pharos of light for all Germany. Luxeuil and Fontaines were for centuries like fruitful vines, whose religious fruit gave joy to the dioceses and monasteries of France. 

Nearer to their parent home, need I recall the island sanctuaries of Iona and Lindisfarne. A classic writer in England has in fond admiration linked together the names of Iona and Marathon ; but how far more glorious and beneficent than the battlefields of worldly strife were the achievements of the saintly armies of the Celtic monastery, whose long roll of heroes and victories is inscribed in the imperishable pages of the Book of Life. Lindisfarne, the Holy Island of North Britain, vied with Iona in the fruitfulness of sanctity. Its missionaries evangelised the whole territory from the Humber to the Thames, and continued for twelve generations to lead innumerable souls to Christ. When the tide of ruin swept over Christendom in the fifth and sixth centuries, many names of invading tribes and peoples were heard for the first time in Europe, and they were the symbol of everything that was rude and barbarous. All that has been changed. Those same tribes and peoples have for more than a thousand years been the synonym for Christian enlightenment and chivalry. Whence came this marvellous change? The world is indebted for it to the Irish Missionaries and saints who bore with them to the continent the blessing and the fruitful zeal of their own apostle; and who can wonder if to-day these regenerated nations of Christendom rejoice whilst offering their tributes of gratitude and praise to the Island of Saints and to St. Patrick from whose bright sanctuary were reflected upon them of old the quickening rays of civilisation and Christian virtue.

There was a wreath yet wanting to mark the victory of Ireland's faith, the crown which is granted only to the Church and nation that have won the triumph of martyrdom. St. John Chrysostom, in one of his eloquent discourses, remarks that like the purple radiance which at morning's dawn marks the victory of light over darkness, even so peerless in beauty must be the wreath merited by the heroism of the martyrs. And what shall I say of Ireland's sufferings for the faith, a nation's martyrdom which was without a parallel in the history of the Church. The persecution which her people suffered for the faith was the most intense and most prolonged ever endured by any Christian nation. The broken arches, the burned shrines, the ivy-clad walls, the moss-grown ruins, the whole land thrice confiscated, tell the tale of Ireland's endurance in the cause of truth and justice. Other churches may point with pride to the blight array of names which they have added to the roll of the martyrs of Christ. It is Ireland's glory that she has offered to God a whole nation of martyrs. When some years ago an illustrious Irish bishop was asked for relics of saints, be with deep emotion, replied, "I have no relics of saints on whose sanctity the Church has as yet set the seal of her authority; but go to the first roadside cemetery that you shall meet, and take a handful of its hallowed dust, for it is the resting-place of martyrs of Christ." And how terrible was that martyrdom. For three centuries death, exile, or the prison was the birthright of the Irish Catholics; and every means that the power and wealth of this world could wield, or which the perverted ingenuity of man could devise, was availed of to corrupt their fortitude and destroy their faith. But Ireland continued true to the faith and to the teaching of St. Patrick. The oak in the forest, when the tempest rages around it, casts deeper its roots in the genial soil. It was even so that the Catholic faith, amid the trials and storms of persecution, struck deeper its sacred roots in the hearts and the affections of the Irish people. Many were the branches that were torn from the parent trunk, and were borne by the violence of the storm to distant lands. But they did not wither or decay. They took root in every land. They have grown with the vigour of the tree planted by the running streams, and, under the blessing of heaven, they have been clothed with comeliness, with blossoms of peace, with fruits of charity and mercy, and they have yielded to those around them a saving shade.

Now that the era of persecution for the faith has closed, what do we see? We see the whole people of Ireland unshaken in its devotedness to the divine faith preached by St. Patrick, and as fervent in works of charity and in every exercise of religion as were their fathers in the golden age of piety. Renewed in strength, like the eagle, the Church of Erin stands erect in all the freshness of her youth, with the seal of heaven on her brow. Her colleges and schools, her convents and monasteries, churches and cathedrals, and myriad institutions of piety and charity, proclaim a living faith and a devoted generosity which maybe rivalled, but cannot be surpassed. Her missionaries have again gone forth to most distant lands, the heralds of the Catholic faith. I should rather have said that the whole nation has been impressed with the missionary spirit of its apostle. Wherever the true Irish emigrant finds a home, churches are sure to spring up and schools shall be erected, and piety shall abound. Like the children of God described by the Psalmist, they may go forth in sadness, and weep when casting their seeds. With sorrow they forsake their mother-land, its green hills, its fairy glens, the friends so dear to them, the acre of God where their fathers sleep. But wherever they go they cast the seed of the Catholic faith, and that sacred seed produces fruit an hundredfold." Coming, they shall come with joyfulness, carrying their sheaves." (Psalm 123.) The children of Ireland are true to the traditions of their Apostle, and to the piety of their fathers. In England and Scotland, in Canada and the United States, in our own fair Australian land— thanks to those sons and daughters of St. Patrick— nourishing churches have arisen, full of vigour and life, radiant with charity and faith, and worthy of the golden days of Christendom. May we not say that heaven has set us seal upon the fruitfulness of St. Patrick's apostolate? Oh, that that apostolate may ever be the prize inheritance of his children! The time is at hand when the blessings of freedom and just laws shall remove the clouds of gloom and sadness that still cast a shadow over the dear old land of the West. May the blessing of St. Patrick be with his people in the days of their prosperity and freedom. In whatever land their lot may be cast may they love their country as their fathers loved it, may they be fervent in hope and charity, and may their lamp of faith never be extinguished. Thus shall the apostolate of St. Patrick continue to be the inheritance of his children, and the Celtic race, on which it was his mission to set the seed of heaven, shall be in the future, as it has been in the past— the consolation of holy church and the glory of Christendom.

THE APOSTOLATE OF ST. PATRICK.,New Zealand Tablet, Volume XVII, Issue 1, 26 April 1889

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'After her victory Saint Brigit departed this life..'

After her victory saint Brigit departed this life amid choirs of patriarchs and prophets and apostles and martyrs and all the holy men and virgins and amid the ranks of angels and archangels to the eternal diadems of the heavenly kingdom, to the heavenly Jerusalem, to the kingdom without end where everlasting rewards are bestowed through Our Lord Jesus Christ together with the Father and Holy Spirit through endless ages. Amen.

 

S. Connolly, ed. and trans., Vita Prima Sanctae Brigitae: Background and Historical Value, JRSAI, Vol. 119 (1989), p.49.

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