01 September 2021

September 2021 in the Rathkeale and
Kilnaughtin Group of Parishes

‘Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me’ (Mark 9: 37; see Sunday 19 September, Trinity XVI) … ‘Spectral Child’ on Thomas Street, Limerick, by Dermot McConaghy (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Saturday 4 September 2021:

7 p.m.: Open-air Ecumenical Service, Rathkeale Abbey ruins,
organised by Rathkeale Pre-Social Cohesion Group

Participants include: Canon Patrick Comerford (Church of Ireland), Siobhán Wheeler (Parish Reader), Father Robbie Coffey (Roman Catholic Church), the Revd Ruth Watts (Methodist Church).

5 September 2021 (Trinity XIV):

9.30 a.m.: The Parish Eucharist, Saint Mary’s Church, Askeaton

11.30 a.m.: Morning Prayer, Saint Brendan’s Church, Tarbert

Readings: Proverbs 22: 1-2, 8-9, 22-23; Psalm 125; Mark 7: 24-37

Hymns:

494, Beauty for brokenness (CD 29)
34, O worship the King all-glorious above (CD 2)

12 September 2021 (Trinity XV):

9.30 a.m.: Morning Prayer, Castletown Church

11.30 a.m.: Morning Prayer, Holy Trinity Church, Rathkeale

(both services with Siobhán Wheeler, parish reader).

Readings: Proverbs 1: 20-33; Psalm 19 or the Canticle The Song of Wisdom (Wisdom 7: 26 to 8: 1); Mark 8: 27-38

Hymns:

643, Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart (CD 37)
666, Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side (CD 39)

19 September 2021 (Trinity XVI):

9.30 a.m.: Morning Prayer, Saint Mary’s Church, Askeaton

11.30 a.m.: The Parish Eucharist, Saint Brendan’s Church, Tarbert

Readings: Proverbs 31: 10-31; Psalm 1; Mark 9: 30-37

Hymns:

651, Jesus, friend of little children (CD 37)
231, My song is love unknown (CD 14)

26 September 2021 (Trinity XVII):

9.30 a.m.: Morning Prayer, Castletown Church

11.30 a.m.: Parish Eucharist, Holy Trinity Church, Rathkeale

Readings: Esther 7: 1-6, 9-10, 9: 20-22; Psalm 124; Mark 9: 38-50

Hymns:

372, Through all the changing scenes of life (CD 22)
553, Jesu, lover of my soul (CD 32)

29 September (Saint Michael and All Angels):

11 am.: Festal Eucharist, Saint Mary’s Church, Askeaton.

Readings: Genesis 28: 10-17; Psalm 103: 19-22; Revelation 12: 7-12; John 1: 47-51

Hymns:

346, Angel voices, ever singing (CD 21)
332, Come let us join our cheerful song (CD 20)

Feast Days and Festivals in September:

8 September: Birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary
21 September: Saint Matthew the Evangelist
29 September: Saint Michael and All Angels

Saint Michael with the whales in a window depicting the story of Saint Brendan in Saint Michael’s Church, Sneem, Co Kerry (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Praying in Ordinary Time 2021:
95, Mount Saint Joseph Abbey, Roscrea

Roscrea Abbey was founded in 1878 by monks from Mount Melleray, Co Waterford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

Before the day gets busy, I am taking a little time this morning for prayer, reflection and reading. Each morning in the time in the Church Calendar known as Ordinary Time, I am reflecting in these ways:

1, photographs of a church or place of worship;

2, the day’s Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

My theme this week is Benedictine (including Cistercian) foundations. My photographs this morning (1 September 2021) are from Mount Saint Joseph Abbey, near Roscrea, Co Tipperary.

Roscrea Abbey was founded on the Mount Heaton Estate in Co Offaly (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Mount Saint Joseph Abbey and the school are across the county boundary in Co Offaly. The story of Roscrea Abbey involves an interesting story of the working relationship between a papal count and two brothers, William Beardwood, the abbey architect, and Joseph Beardwood, an architect who became the Abbot of Roscrea as Don Camillus.

For almost a century and a half, the Cistercian monks at Mount Saint Joseph have welcomed guests and visitors who come to experience the peace and prayer of the monastic environment. This monastery of the Order of Cistercians of Strict Observance, or Trappists, was founded in March 1878 when 31 monks from Mount Melleray Abbey in Cappoquin, Co Waterford, moved to Roscrea.

The property known as Mount Heaton Demesne was bought for the monks by Arthur John Moore (1849-1904) of Mooresford House, near Tipperary, and Aherlow Castle. He was born in Liverpool, was a Roman Catholic landlord and Home Rule MP for Clonmel (1874-1885) and Derry City (1899-1900), and became a papal count in 1879.

Moore was well known to the monks of Mount Melleray and, although he was only in his late 20s, he wanted to establish a second Cistercian monastery in Ireland. The Mount Heaton estate cost £15,000; Moore paid £10,000 of this himself, and the new community raised the remaining £5,000 with a mortgage.

The Mount Heaton Estate, about two miles east of Roscrea, took its name from the Revd Richard Heaton, who became owner in the 1630s and died there in 1666. Heaton is recognised as an early Irish botanist, and two of his botanical finds have been commemorated on Irish postage stamps. His son, Francis Heaton, changed the name of the Ballyskenagh estate to Mount Heaton by 1710.

Dom Athanasius Donovan, from Murroe, Co Limerick, was the first superior of the new community at Mount Saint Joseph. Under his guidance, the old mansion, which is now the guesthouse, was transformed into a temporary monastery.

In 1879, the year after the monks came to Roscrea, work began on building a new monastic church. The architect was William H Beardwood, who practiced in Dublin and Manchester.

The abbey church, built in 1880-1884, was the first structure the Cistercians built when they moved to Mount Heaton to establish Mount Saint Joseph Abbey. The stone for the church was quarried on the land, although some accounts say the stones were taken from the old goal in Tullamore.

Several monks, as well as many outside masons and labourers, worked on building the church, which was built with a nave, chancel, side aisles. The abbey church was designed by the Dublin-born architect, William Henry Beardwood (1842-1930), eldest son of William Haughton Beardwood and a brother of John Francis Beardwood.

The elder WH Beardwood was a carpenter and builder originally from Lancashire who became a Roman Catholic and moved to Ireland. His son, William Henry Beardwood, was practicing as an architect and developer in Manchester by 1875. When his business failed in Manchester, he returned to Dublin in 1880, setting up his own practice but also working for Dublin Corporation.

Outside, the abbey church has black limestone walls, buttresses, pointed-arched windows and doors, paired windows, lancet windows to apse, a projecting gabled entrance bay, and a broach tower with a belfry and pinnacles. The most significant feature of the church is the carved entrance arranged in three orders. The door surround contributes to the significance of the church.

Inside, the church is devoid of embellishments. There is an arcaded, 11-bay nave, side aisles and an apse, and the wonderful arcading to the side aisles with simple limestone columns makes an appealing arrangement.

The monks’ graves in the community graveyard are marked with metal crosses, but there are some stone Celtic crosses too.

The church was dedicated on 18 September 1881 and opened to the public – an extraordinary achievement in such a short period by a community burdened by a large mortgage. The preacher that day referred to ‘the pious donations that have poured in from benefactors near and distant, the tasteful devotion which has raised these massive columns, and converted the very windows into books of golden instruction’ – a reference to the 11 stained glass windows in place in the church from the beginning.

Three years later, the church was solemnly consecrate on 9 August 1884. By then, the altars, choir stalls, and rood screen were all in place.

Mount Saint Joseph became an abbey at the end of 1886, and in August 1887, Dom Camillus Beardwood, the Bursar of Mount Melleray, was elected Abbot. Dom Camillus was born Joseph Beardwood, and he was a brother of the architect of Mount Saint Joseph. Before becoming a monk, he had trained as an architect with Sir George Moyers (1836-1916), who was Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1881.

Under the guidance of the two Beardwoods, abbot and architect, the monastery buildings were completed and a fine farmyard begun. From the beginning, farming provided the main source of income for the community and involved many of the monks.

Beardwood also designed alterations for the Mount Melleray Abbey in Cappoquin, Co Waterford, and then designed the secondary school built at Roscrea in 1902-1905.

Count Moore, the abbey’s great benefactor, visited Mount Saint Joseph on 4 February 1902, when he, Abbot Camillus and William H Beardwood, chose the site for a new college.

This school was designed by WH Beardwood on a U-plan, with nine-bays, two-storeys and an attic. There are square-headed twin-light windows, limestone surrounds with hood-moulding, pointed-arched window that are both triple-light and twin-light, dormer windows, decorative finials, and limestone steps leading up to a Tudor arched door with timber panelled double doors.

Inside, there is a large stair-hall with an attractive double return stairs.

The cost of the new college buildings was £21,000. Count Moore donated £2,600 towards the costs, and the college opened for the first 50 students in September 1905. But by then Count Moore had died on 9 January 1904. He is buried under the altar in Saint Joseph’s Chapel in the abbey church, and is commemorated by a monument in the church.

The abbey church is connected to the monastery buildings to the south-west. This is an L-plan, two-storey multiple-bay, Gothic Revival monastery, built ca 1905, with cloisters to the rear and with the addition of an extra wing. This building incorporates outbuildings and yard from the former Mount Heaton House to the rear, built around 1800.

The tower and spire were added to the abbey church in 1938-1940. They were designed by the Dublin-based practice of Jones and Kelly and provide a focal point in the complex, providing a striking addition to the church.

The college chapel was built in the Gothic Revival style in 1940 within the grounds of Mount Saint Joseph’s Abbey. It is joined to the school by corridor. It has a four-bay nave with triple-pile transepts, and a canted-bay. A stone plaque outside at the apse reads: ‘Dom Sub Invocatione Deiparae Immaculate Reginae Virginum Ad MCMXL.’

As time went by, the strength of the community at Mount Saint Joseph led to the foundation of other monasteries, including Nunraw, near Edinburgh, in 1946, the first Cistercian house in Scotland since the Reformation, and Bolton Abbey in Moone, Co Kildare, in 1965.

Inside the abbey church at Roscrea Abbey, designed by William Henry Beardwood (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Luke 4: 38-44 (NRSVA):

38 After leaving the synagogue he entered Simon’s house. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was suffering from a high fever, and they asked him about her. 39 Then he stood over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her. Immediately she got up and began to serve them.

40 As the sun was setting, all those who had any who were sick with various kinds of diseases brought them to him; and he laid his hands on each of them and cured them. 41 Demons also came out of many, shouting, ‘You are the Son of God!’ But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew that he was the Messiah.

42 At daybreak he departed and went into a deserted place. And the crowds were looking for him; and when they reached him, they wanted to prevent him from leaving them. 43 But he said to them, ‘I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other cities also; for I was sent for this purpose.’ 44 So he continued proclaiming the message in the synagogues of Judea.

The stained glass windows in the apse in the abbey church at Roscrea Abbey (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Prayer in the USPG Prayer Diary today (1 September 2021) invites us to pray:

Let us pray for people of African descent across the world. May we stand against discrimination in all its forms and recognise the pain caused by racism both in the past and present.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

The college at Roscrea Abbey was also designed by WH Beardwood (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

The abbey church at Roscrea Abbey, with the tower and spire added in 1938-1940 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)