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Tag Archives: Archbishop of Armagh (Catholic Church)


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Birth of Cardinal Tomás Séamus Ó Fiaich

Tomás Séamus Ó Fiaich, Irish prelate of the Roman Catholic Church, is born in Cullyhanna, County Armagh, on November 3, 1923. He serves as the Catholic Primate of All Ireland and Archbishop of Armagh from 1977 until his death. He is created a Cardinal in 1979.

Ó Fiaich is ordained a priest on July 6, 1948. He spends his first year of ordination as assistant priest in Clonfeacle parish. He undertakes post-graduate studies at University College, Dublin, (1948–50), receiving a Master of Arts (MA) in early and medieval Irish history. He also studies at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium, (1950–52), receiving a licentiate in historical sciences.

In 1952 Ó Fiaich returns to Clonfeacle where he remains as assistant priest until the following summer and his appointment to the faculty of St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth. He is an academic and noted Irish language scholar, folklorist and historian in the Pontifical University in St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth, the National Seminary of Ireland. From 1959 to 1974 he is Professor of Modern Irish History at the college. In this capacity he suggests to Nollaig Ó Muraíle that he begin research on Dubhaltach Mac Fhirbhisigh and his works. He “was an inspired lecturer, an open and endearing man, who was loved by his students… Tomas O’Fiaich was my Good Samaritan.”

Ó Fiaich serves as vice president of the college from 1970 to 1974 and is then appointed college president, a post that traditionally precedes appointment to an episcopal position in the Irish Church. He holds this position until 1977.

Following the relatively early death from cancer of Cardinal William Conway in April 1977, Monsignor Ó Fiaich is appointed Archbishop of Armagh by Pope Paul VI on August 18, 1977. He is consecrated bishop on October 2, 1977. The principal consecrator is the papal nuncio Archbishop Gaetano Alibrandi. The principal co-consecrators are Bishop Francis Lenny, the auxiliary Bishop of Armagh, and Bishop William Philbin, the Bishop of Down and Connor. Pope John Paul II raises Ó Fiaich to the cardinalate on June 30, 1979, and he is appointed Cardinal-Priest of S. Patrizio that same day.

Ó Fiaich dies of a heart attack on the evening of May 8, 1990, while leading the annual pilgrimage by the Archdiocese of Armagh to the Marian shrine of Lourdes in France. He arrives in France the day before and complains of feeling ill shortly after saying Mass at the grotto in the French town. He is rushed by helicopter to a hospital in Toulouse, 125 miles away, where he dies. He lies in state at the cathedral in Armagh, where thousands of people lined up to pay their respects.

Ó Fiaich is succeeded as archbishop and cardinal by a man six years his senior, Cahal Daly, then the Bishop of Down and Connor.


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Birth of Cardinal Patrick Joseph O’Donnell

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Patrick Joseph O’Donnell, Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church, is born in Glenties, County Donegal, on November 28, 1856. He serves as Archbishop of Armagh from 1924 until his death and is elevated to the cardinalate in 1925.

O’Donnell, son of Daniel O’Donnell, a farmer, and his wife, Mary (née Breslin), is one of nine children in a family that claim descent from the O’Donnells of Tyrconnell. He is educated in the High School, Letterkenny, the Catholic University, Dublin, and St. Patrick’s Pontifical University, Maynooth. He is ordained to the priesthood on June 29, 1880. In that same year he is appointed to the staff of St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth, holding the chairs of Dogmatic and Moral Theology. In 1884 he becomes dean of the revived post-graduate Dunboyne Institute and in 1885 is awarded his STD. From his desk in Maynooth he pours out a continuous stream of articles on moral theology and canon law.

O’Donnell becomes Bishop of Raphoe on February 26, 1888, and is consecrated by Cardinal Michael Logue on April 3 in Letterkenny. With superior qualities of mind and body, he is a benign figure who is yet gifted with sharp political acumen. He has the most distinguished episcopate, locally and nationally. He undertakes and completes prodigious building projects including a superbly sited neo-gothic cathedral, St. Eunan’s Diocesan College, and the Presentation Monastery and Loreto schools and an extension to Loreto Convent, all in Letterkenny.

He is appointed coadjutor Archbishop of Armagh on January 14, 1922, and succeeds Cardinal Logue on November 19, 1924. On December 14, 1925, Pope Pius XI makes O’Donnell a Cardinal.

O’Donnell takes an active part in the social, political, and economic life of Ireland. A staunch activist for social justice, as Bishop of Raphoe, he is a member of the first Committee of the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society, founded by Sir Horace Plunkett. In 1918, when representing the nationalist’s side at the Irish Convention, he opposes John Redmond‘s amendment intended to bring about unanimity on All-Ireland Home Rule.

Cardinal O’Donnell dies on October 22, 1927, in Carlingford, County Louth. The St. Connell’s Museum in his hometown of Glenties has a display about his life.


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Founding of the Pontifical Irish College in Rome

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The Pontifical Irish College, a Roman Catholic seminary for the training and education of priests, is founded in Rome, Italy, on November 6, 1628.

Towards the close of the sixteenth century, Pope Gregory XIII sanctions the foundation of an Irish college in Rome and assigns a large sum of money as the nucleus of an endowment. However, the pressing needs of the Irish chieftains make him think that, under the circumstances, the money might as well be used for religion by supplying the Irish Catholics with the sinews of war in Ireland as by founding a college for them at Rome.

The project is revived in 1625 by the Irish bishops, in an address to Pope Urban VIII. Cardinal Ludovico Ludovisi, who is Cardinal Protector of Ireland, resolves to realize at his own expense the desire expressed to the pope by the Irish bishops. A house is rented opposite Sant’Isodoro a Capo le Case, and six students go into residence January 1, 1628. Eugene Callanan, Archdeacon of Cashel, is the first rector, Father Luke Wadding, OFM being a sort of supervisor. Cardinal Ludovisi dies in 1632 and as he is of a princely family with a large patrimony, he makes provision in his will for the college. It is to have an income of one thousand crowns a year, a house is to be purchased for it, and he leaves a vineyard as Castel Gandolfo where the students might pass their villeggiatura. The cardinal’s will directs that the college should be placed under the charge of the Jesuits. Both the heirs and Wadding suspect that provision and disputed it. A protracted lawsuit is finally decided in 1635 in favour of the Jesuits.

On February 8, 1635, the Jesuits take charge of the college and govern it until financial difficulties force them to give up control in September 1772. An Italian priest, Abbate Luigi Cuccagni, is made rector. The rectorate of Cuccagni comes to an end in 1798, when the college is closed by order of Napoleon.

Dr. Michael Blake, Bishop of Dromore, who is the last student to leave the college at its dissolution in 1798, returns a quarter of a century later to arrange for its revival, which is affected by a brief of Pope Leo XII, dated February 18, 1826. He becomes the first rector of the restored college, and among the first students who seek admission is Francis Sylvester Mahony of Cork, known to the literary world as Father Prout. Having set the college well to work, Blake returns to Ireland and is succeeded by Dr. Boylan, of Maynooth, who soon resigns and dies in 1830. He is succeeded by a young priest, later Cardinal Paul Cullen.

Dr. Cullen is succeeded by Dr. Tobias Kirby, known for his holiness of life. He governs the college for more than forty years. His successor is Michael Kelly, later coadjutor to the Archbishop of Sydney.

In 2011, under orders from Pope Benedict XVI, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York, leads a root and branch review of all structures and processes at the college. He is assisted in the visitation report by then Archbishop of Baltimore and now Cardinal Edwin O’Brien and Msgr. Francis Kelly of the Northern American College in Rome. The report is highly critical of the college and, as a result of which, three Irish members of the staff are sent home and a fourth resigns.

In 2012, four Irish archbishops, Cardinal Seán Brady, Archbishop of Armagh, Dr. Diarmuid Martin, Archbishop of Dublin, Dr. Michael Neary, Archbishop of Tuam, and Dr. Dermot Clifford, Archbishop of Cashel, are sent a copy of the visitation report by the Vatican. A response prepared for them says “a deep prejudice appears to have coloured the visitation and from the outset and it led to the hostile tone and content of the report.”

Today the Pontifical Irish College serves as a residence for clerical students from all over the world. Every year over 250 Irish couples choose the college chapel as a means to marry in Rome. It organises events for the Irish and wider international community who are currently residing in Rome and has over the years become an unofficial centre for Irish visitors to Rome seeking advice and information.


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Canonisation of Sir Oliver Plunkett

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Sir Oliver Plunkett is canonised in Rome by Pope Paul VI on October 12, 1975, the first new Irish saint in almost seven hundred years, and the first of the Irish martyrs to be beatified. For the canonisation, the customary second miracle is waived.

Plunkett is born on November 1, 1625, in Loughcrew, County Meath, to parents with Hiberno-Norman ancestors. Until his sixteenth year, his education is entrusted to his cousin Patrick Plunkett, Abbot of St. Mary’s, Dublin, and brother of Luke Plunkett, the first Earl of Fingall, who later becomes successively Bishop of Ardagh and of Meath. As an aspirant to the priesthood, Plunkett sets out for Rome in 1647.

Plunkett is admitted to the Pontifical Irish College in Rome and proves to be an able pupil. He is ordained a priest in 1654 and deputed by the Irish bishops to act as their representative in Rome. Meanwhile, the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland (1649–1653) has defeated the Roman Catholic cause in Ireland. As a result, it is impossible for Plunkett to return to Ireland for many years, so he petitions to remain in Rome. At the Congregation of Propaganda Fide on July 9, 1669, he is appointed Archbishop of Armagh and is consecrated on November 30 at Ghent. He returns to Ireland on March 7, 1670, as the English Restoration of 1660 has begun on a basis of toleration.

Plunkett sets about reorganising the ravaged Roman Church and builds schools both for the young and for clergy. The Penal Laws have been relaxed in line with the Declaration of Breda in 1660 and he is able to establish a Jesuit College in Drogheda in 1670, which becomes the first Catholic-Protestant integrated school in Ireland.

On the enactment of the Test Act in 1673, to which Plunkett does not agree for doctrinal reasons, the college is closed and demolished. Plunkett goes into hiding, travelling only in disguise, and refuses a government edict to register at a seaport to await passage into exile.

In 1678 the so-called Popish Plot, concocted in England by clergyman Titus Oates, leads to further anti-Roman Catholic action. Archbishop Peter Talbot of Dublin is arrested, and Plunkett again goes into hiding. Despite being on the run and with a price on his head, Plunkett refuses to leave his flock.

Plunkett is arrested in Dublin in December 1679 and imprisoned in Dublin Castle. He is tried at Dundalk for conspiring against the state by allegedly plotting to bring 20,000 French soldiers into the country, and for levying a tax on his clergy to support 70,000 men for rebellion. The trial soon collapses as the prosecution witnesses are themselves wanted men and afraid to appear in court. Plunkett is moved to Newgate Prison in London in order to face trial at Westminster Hall. The first grand jury finds no true bill, but he is not released. The second trial is generally regarded as a serious miscarriage of justice as Plunkett is denied defending counsel.

Archbishop Plunkett is found guilty of high treason in June 1681 “for promoting the Roman faith,” and is condemned to death. Plunkett is hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn on July 1, 1681, the last Roman Catholic martyr to die in England. His body is initially buried in two tin boxes in the courtyard of St. Giles in the Fields church. The remains are exhumed in 1683 and moved to the Benedictine monastery at Lamspringe, near Hildesheim in Germany. His head is brought to Rome, and from there to Armagh, and eventually to Drogheda where it has rested in St. Peter’s Church since June 29, 1921. Most of the body is brought to Downside Abbey, England, where the major part is located today, with some parts remaining at Lamspringe.


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Archbishop Paul Cullen Elevated to First Irish Cardinal

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Archbishop Paul Cullen, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin and previously of Armagh, is elevated to the cardinalate as Cardinal-Priest of San Pietro in Montorio on June 22, 1866, becoming the first Irish cardinal.

Cullen is born at Prospect, Narraghmore, Athy, County Kildare. He enters St. Patrick’s, Carlow College, in 1816, and proceeds to the Pontifical Urban College in Rome in 1820.

Cullen is ordained in 1829 and is appointed Rector of the Pontifical Irish College in Rome in late 1831. He successfully secured the future of the college by increasing the student population and thereby strengthening the finances of the college.

Cullen is promoted to the primatial See of Armagh on December 19, 1849, and is consecrated by the Cardinal Prefect of Propaganda at the Irish College in Rome on February 24, 1850. He is also named Apostolic Delegate. Cullen is transferred to the See of Dublin on May 1, 1852.

Cullen is sent to Ireland to bring the Irish church into conformity with Roman canon law and usage. His first major act as Archbishop of Armagh is to convene the Synod of Thurles, the first national synod held in Ireland since the Reformation. This occurs during the period of the debilitating Irish Famine which reduces the population of the country by over 2 million people through starvation, disease, and emigration. After a series of disastrous harvests in the 1860s, he founds, along with the Lord Mayor of Dublin, the Mansion House Relief Committee in 1862. Cullen also starts the practice of Irish priests wearing Roman clerical collars and being called “Father” rather than “Mister” by their parishioners.

Cullen pays frequent visits to Rome. He takes part in the definition of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary in 1854, and with the eighteenth centenary of the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul in 1867.

After his elevation to cardinal, Cardinal Cullen takes an active part in deliberations during the Vatican Council. Towards the close of the council at the express wish of the Central Commission, Cardinal Cullen proposes a formula for the definition of Papal Infallibility. It is a matter of great delicacy, as promoters of the definition are split up into various factions, some anxious to assign a wide range to the pope’s decisions, while others wish to set forth in a somewhat indefinite way the papal prerogative.

Cullen is the most important Irish political figure in the thirty years between Daniel O’Connell and Charles Stewart Parnell. In political matters Cullen makes it a rule to support every measure, whatever its provenance, conducive to the interests of his vision for the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland. Cullen is also a frequent visitor at the vice-regal lodge to lobby the government.

Cardinal Paul Cullen dies in Dublin on October 24, 1878, at the age of 75. He is buried at Holy Cross College in Drumcondra.


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Oliver Plunkett Beatified by Pope Benedict XV

oliver-plunkett

Oliver Plunkett, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland, is beatified by Pope Benedict XV on May 23, 1920.

Plunkett is born on November 1, 1625, in Loughcrew, County Meath, to well-to-do parents with Hiberno-Norman ancestors. He is ordained a priest in 1654 and deputed by the Irish bishops to act as their representative in Rome. Meanwhile, the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland (1649–1653) has defeated the Roman Catholic cause in Ireland. In the aftermath, the public practice of Roman Catholicism is banned, and Roman Catholic clergy are executed. As a result, it is impossible for Plunkett to return to Ireland for many years.

He eventually sets foot on Irish soil again on March 7, 1670, as the English Restoration of 1660 has begun on a basis of toleration. After arriving back in Ireland, he sets about reorganising the ravaged Roman Church and builds schools both for the young and for clergy, whom he finds “ignorant in moral theology and controversies.” The Penal Laws have been relaxed in line with the Declaration of Breda in 1660 and Plunkett is able to establish a Jesuit College in Drogheda in 1670.

On the enactment of the Test Act in 1673, to which Plunkett does not agree for doctrinal reasons, the college is closed and demolished. Plunkett goes into hiding, traveling only in disguise, and refusing a government edict to register at a seaport to await passage into exile. In 1678, the so-called Popish Plot, concocted in England by clergyman Titus Oates, leads to further anti-Roman Catholic action. Archbishop Peter Talbot of Dublin is arrested, and Plunkett again goes into hiding.

Despite being on the run and with a price on his head, Plunkett refuses to leave his flock. At some point before his final incarceration, he takes refuge in a church that once stood in the townland of Killartry, in the parish of Clogherhead in County Louth, seven miles outside Drogheda. He is arrested in Dublin in December 1679 and imprisoned in Dublin Castle. Plunkett is tried at Dundalk for conspiring against the state by allegedly plotting to bring 20,000 French soldiers into the country, and for levying a tax on his clergy to support 70,000 men for rebellion.

Plunkett is found guilty of high treason in June 1681 “for promoting the Roman faith” and is condemned to death. He is hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn on July 1, 1681, the last Roman Catholic martyr to die in England.

Oliver Plunkett is beatified on May 23, 1920, and canonised in 1975, the first new Irish saint for almost seven hundred years, and the first of the Irish martyrs to be beatified. For the canonisation, the customary second miracle is waived. Plunkett has since been followed by 17 other Irish martyrs who were beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1992. Among them are Archbishop Dermot O’Hurley, Margaret Ball, and the Wexford Martyrs.


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Birth of Cardinal Joseph MacRory in County Tyrone

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Joseph MacRory, an Irish Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church who serves as Archbishop of Armagh from 1928 until his death in 1945, is born in Ballygawley, County Tyrone, on March 19, 1861.

MacRory is one of ten children of Francis MacRory, a farmer, and his wife, Rose Montague. He studies at St. Patrick’s College, Armagh, and St. Patrick’s Pontifical University, Maynooth. He is ordained to the priesthood on September 13, 1885, and serves as the first president of St. Patrick’s Academy, Dungannon from 1886 to 1887. MacRory teaches Scripture and Modern Theology at St. Mary’s College, Oscott in England until 1889, when he is appointed Professor of Scripture and Oriental Languages at his alma mater of Maynooth College. In 1906, he co-founds the Irish Theological Quarterly. In 1912, he is made Vice-President of Maynooth.

On August 9, 1915, MacRory is appointed Bishop of Down and Connor by Pope Benedict XV and receives his episcopal consecration on November 14 from Cardinal Michael Logue. During his tenure, his life is threatened repeatedly due to the turbulent atmosphere in Belfast. He is a member of the Irish Convention from 1917 to 1918.

MacRory is promoted to Archbishop of Armagh and thus Primate of All Ireland on June 22, 1928, in succession to Patrick O’Donnell. He is elevated to the cardinalate on December 16, 1929, by Pope Pius XI.

MacRory is the papal legate at the 1933 laying of the foundation stone of Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral in England. He also serves as one of the cardinal electors who participate in the 1939 papal conclave which ultimately selects Pope Pius XII.

MacRory is a strenuous opponent of social injustice, National Socialism, Protestantism, and the Partition of Ireland. It is MacRory who suggests to Eoin O’Duffy that he raise an Irish Brigade to aid Generalissimo Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War. In 1940, he voices strong objections to conscription in the North.

MacRory is a supporter of the Gaelic League. Errigal Ciarán GAC, one of the most famous GAA clubs in Ireland, plays at Cardinal MacRory Park in Dunmoyle, County Tyrone, which is built in 1956 in his honour.

After a brief illness, Cardinal MacRory dies on October 13, 1945, at the age of 84 from a heart attack at Ara Coeli, the residence in Armagh. He is interred in St. Patrick’s Cathedral Cemetery, Armagh.