40 days and 40 nights, when the rains come down and we are placed in quarantine

Masks from Venice … part of the tradition of Carnival before Lent, and part of the story of quarantine and the plague (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2021)

Patrick Comerford

Sunday 21 February 2021

The First Sunday in Lent (Lent I)

10 a.m., the Parish Eucharist

The Readings: Genesis 9: 8-17; Psalm 25: 1-9; Mark 1: 9-15

‘Noah and the Dove’ by Simon Manby (2006) … a sculpture in the gardens of Saint John’s Hospital, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

May I speak to you in the name of God, + Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen

One of the traditions associated with Lent throughout the English-speaking world is singing the hymn ‘Forty days and Forty nights’ (Irish Church Hymnal, No 207).

There are some people who feel Lent has not started until they sing ‘Forty days and Forty nights.’

But Lenten traditions are different everywhere. In many European countries, Lent begins when Carnival ends. There is great fun leading up to Lent: street parades, costumes, dressing up, often with a touch of bawdy behaviour.

The masks that are part of Carnival are a hint of those parties and traditions in Venice – apart from one particular mask. The mask of the plague doctor (medico delle peste) with its long beak is one of the most recognisable Venetian masks.

But this did not begin as a carnival mask. It began as a method of preventing the spread of the plague and was designed by a 17th century doctor who adopted the mask as one of many sanitary precautions while he was treating plague victims.

The plague doctors who followed this example wore a black hat and long black cloak as well as the mask, white gloves and a staff so they could move patients without having physical contact with them.

The Venetians also gave us the word quarantine, which comes from quarantena, or ‘40 days’ in the Venetian language. It was first used during plague epidemics in the 14th and 15th centuries to designate a period that ships were isolated before passengers and crew could go ashore in Venice.

For many of us, Lent is not just going to last for 40 days until Easter, but is going to appear like a continuation of the long quarantine we are going through because of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown.

There are descriptions of 40-day quarantines repeatedly in the Hebrew Bible, for many centuries before the Venetians introduced the maritime practice. And when these 40-day periods occur, they are virtually always momentous and life-altering.

During the story of the flood in the Book of Genesis, which is recalled in our first reading (Genesis 9: 8-17), Noah self-isolates with his family in a wooden ark for 40 days and 40 nights, while the rains pour down and the world as they know it drowns in a deluge of rain and rising seas.

In the Exodus story, Moses separates himself for 40 days and climbs Mount Sinai to put even more distance between himself and his people, who have committed idolatry by making and worshipping a golden calf.

At a crisis moment point in his life, the Prophet Elijah flees into the desert for 40 days and nights (see I Kings 19). There, he waits for his fears to subside and for God to give him direction.

The Epistle reading (I Peter 3: 18-22) compares the waters of the flood with the waters of Baptism.

In the Gospel, there are 40 days from the birth of Christ to his Presentation in the Temple (see Luke 2: 22-38).

The Gospel reading this morning (Mark 1: 9-15) recalls the 40 days Christ spends in the wilderness. Later in the Gospel stories, there are 40 days from Christ’s Resurrection to his Ascension.

What do these 40-day stories have to teach us today, during our own quarantine?

None of these 40-day quarantines is compulsory. Instead of seeing them as the result of outside coercion, we might see these Biblical examples of isolation as thoughtful expressions of free choice, voluntary decisions meant to respond constructively to an existential crisis.

Something happens to these biblical figures after their periods of seclusion and social distancing come to an end, once the crisis has passed and they emerge from their respective shelters.

They transform.

Noah and his family – as well as the large number of animals and birds – begin the process of re-populating the earth, as creation starts anew with a new covenant, marked by the rainbow. More than simply playing a role in God’s cosmic drama, Noah becomes the father of the world.

Moses returns to his people with a second set of the Ten Commandments – he had destroyed the first set out of anger – and with new maturity and insight, and he forgives their sins.

Elijah has a theophany, an experience of God, not in a whirlwind or an earthquake but through a ‘still, small voice.’ With this new understanding, he is able to calm his soul and eventually continue his mission as a prophet.

In today’s Gospel reading, Christ’s 40 days in the wilderness link his Baptism in the Jordan with the beginning of his public ministry in Galilee.

It may be a mistake to think of 40 days as a literal representation of time. The Talmud suggests it takes an embryo 40 days to form in the womb. For some later commentators, those 40 days are the time it takes for a new entity to come into being. So, 40 days may well be a metaphor for gestation, a pilgrimage towards new birth.

I cannot count how many days I have been in semi-isolation or in ‘quarantine’ in west Limerick this time. But it is far more than 40 days since I have been outside Co Limerick, and it is far more than 40 weeks since I have been outside Ireland.

It may take much more than 40 days before this lockdown eases. But the roll-out of the vaccine gives hope that it is not going to go on for another 40 weeks.

And yet, this crisis will pass.

The story of Noah reminds us that when the rains come, they will not continue ceaselessly, but shall end with a rainbow, a sign of hope. The story of the Flood says that despite human behaviour and failings, God rescues and saves us and holds out the promise of brighter days.

We are all changing, evolving, getting ready to emerge from our cocoons. Our social distancing from one another is not all bad. In fact, I think it will lead to new perspectives on ourselves, on our priorities, and on our world.

The challenge of this crisis has clear economic, social and political dimensions. But, like Lent, it has a spiritual dimension too. How we respond to it may well define or redefine our moral characters and priorities, as well as our souls, for many years to come.

And so, may all we think, say and do be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

He was in the wilderness for forty days (Mark 1: 13) … on Gramvousa, off the coast of Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Mark 1: 9-15 (NRSVA):

9 In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10 And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11 And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’

12 And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13 He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.

14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15 and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.’

‘He was in the wilderness for forty days’ (Mark 1: 13) … in the Kourtaliotilo Gorge in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Liturgical Colour: Violet.

The canticle Gloria is omitted in Lent.

Penitential Kyries:

In the wilderness we find your grace:
you love us with an everlasting love.
Lord, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.

There is none but you to uphold our cause;
our sin cries out and our guilt is great.
Christ, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.

Heal us, O Lord, and we shall be healed;
Restore us and we shall know your joy.
Lord, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.

The Collect of the Day:

Almighty God,
whose Son Jesus Christ fasted forty days in the wilderness,
and was tempted as we are, yet without sin:
Give us grace to discipline ourselves
in obedience to your Spirit;
and, as you know our weakness,
so may we know your power to save;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Lenten Collect:

Almighty and everlasting God,
you hate nothing that you have made
and forgive the sins of all those who are penitent:
Create and make in us new and contrite hearts
that we, worthily lamenting our sins
and acknowledging our wretchedness,
may receive from you, the God of all mercy,
perfect remission and forgiveness;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Introduction to the Peace:

Being justified by faith,
we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. (Romans 5: 1, 2)

Preface:

Through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who was in every way tempted as we are yet did not sin;
by whose grace we are able to overcome all our temptations:

Post Communion Prayer:

Lord God,
you renew us with the living bread from heaven.
Nourish our faith,
increase our hope,
strengthen our love,
and enable us to live by every word
that proceeds from out of your mouth;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Blessing:

Christ give you grace to grow in holiness,
to deny yourselves,
and to take up your cross and follow him:

‘He was in the wilderness for forty days’ (Mark 1: 13) … at the edge of Ireland on Mizen Head (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Hymns:

207, Forty days and forty nights (CD 13)
324, God, whose almighty word (CD 19)



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

Material from the Book of Common Prayer is copyright © 2004, Representative Body of the Church of Ireland.

Some of the ideas in this sermon are in an article by Rabbi Niles Elliot Goldstein in the Jewish News of Northern California (10 June 2020)

A ‘virtual tour’ of the 12 ‘extreme’ points at the edges of Ireland

Sunrise on the banks of the River Shannon in Athlone in the heart of Ireland … but what are the furthest extremes of the island? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

I have to accept at this stage that I am not going to Greece this year, and – much to my regret – my holiday in Thessaloniki and Halkidiki at the end of August and beginning of September has now been cancelled.

Of course, I would prefer to be healthy this year, and hope to travel to Greece on a number of occasions next year, than to travel to Greece now and not be able to go there at all this year. And I would hate to find out that I had either brought Covid-19 with me to Greece or, instead, brought it back to Ireland.

Now, by way of compensation, I am planning 10 or 12 days in southern Ireland, visiting favourite places – and some new places – in counties Kerry, Cork, Waterford, Kilkenny and Wexford.

Living in Askeaton for the past three years or more, I have been able to visit parts of Ireland that might have been more difficult to reach in other circumstances, from the Aran Islands in Galway Bay to the extremities of the Kerry peninsulas.

What are the furthest extremes of Ireland that you have visited?

When we take the map of the full island and exclude offshore islands and rocky outcrops – ignoring Rockall and Rathlin for example – there are 12 ways of defining the extreme points of Ireland: the whole island; the Republic of Ireland, excluding Northern Ireland; and then Northern Ireland on its own.

On the cliffs above the Giant’s Causeway … the farthest north I have been in Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Four extreme points on the mainland of Ireland:

The extreme points of the mainland of Ireland, in clockwise direction, are:

North: Banba’s Crown at the tip of Malin Head on the Inishowen Peninsula, Co Donegal (Latitude: 55° 23′ 4″ N)

East: Burr Point on Ards Peninsula, Co Down (5° 25′ 58″ W)

South: Brow Head, near Mizen Head, Co Cork (51° 26′ 52″ N)

West: Dunmore Head, Dingle Peninsula, Co Kerry (10° 28′ 46″ W)

The geographical centre of Ireland is 8.85 km north-north-west of Athlone Town in the townland of Carnagh East, Co Roscommon on the west shore of Lough Ree.

It is interesting that the most northern point on the island is in the Republic of Ireland and not in Northern Ireland, that the point furthest east is in Northern Ireland, and the extreme points south and west are so close to one another (at least as the crow flies).

Mizen Head … the furthest south I have been in Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

I have not been to all these extremities. But the furthest north, east, south and west I have been on the island of Ireland to date are:

North: the Giant’s Causeway, Co Antrim (55° 14′ 27″ N). My most recent visit to the Giant’s Causeway was on 12 November 2016, when I was on a visit to the North Antrim coast.

East: Donaghadee, on the Ards Peninsula, Co Down (5.53° W). I was there in September 1998 to speak at the Annual Conference of the Church of Ireland Men’s Society in Donaghadee Parish Church on ‘The 1798 Rebellion and the Church of Ireland.’ During that visit I stood on the shoreline, with a clear view across to the coast of Scotland.

South: The furthest south I have been is at Mizen Head, visiting the lighthouse or signal station (51° 27' 00" north) on 21 May 2016. Earlier that same day I had lunch in O’Sullivan’s in Crookhaven (51° 28' 09" north), which claims to serve the ‘most southerly pint in Ireland.’

West: When I travelled through the Dingle Peninsula on 20 September 2017, I stood at the end of western tip of Slea Head (51° 28' 09" N), near Dunmore Head, looking at the Blasket Islands.

Looking out at the Blasket Islands from the western tip of Slea Head (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The geographical centre of Ireland, according to the Irish Ordnance Survey, is in the townland of Carnagh East, Co Roscommon on the west shore of Lough Ree, where the 8° Meridian West meets the 53°30' North Latitude. It is opposite the Cribby Islands and 8.85 km north-north-west of Athlone Town. Lecarrow is the closest population centre.

An alternative centre-point for Ireland has been placed, at a point 3 km south of Athlone in east Co Roscommon. So, if I have to place myself in the middle of Ireland, then I have been to Athlone many times, and on the shores of Lough Ree, and enjoyed a rink in Sean’s Bar, which claims to be the oldest pub in Ireland, and perhaps the pub in the heart of Ireland too.

Wicklow Harbour … probably the furthest east I have been in the Republic of Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

But I have not been to all the extremities of the Republic of Ireland either. They are:

North: Banba’s Crown at the tip of Malin Head on the Inishowen Peninsula, Co Donegal (Latitude: 55° 23′ 4″ N)

East: Wicklow Head, Co Wicklow (05° 99′ 78″); although, if the islands are included, the point furthest east is Lambay Island (06° 00′ 54″ W)

South: Brow Head, near Mizen Head, Co Cork (Latitude: 51° 26′ 52″ N)

West: Dunmore Head, Dingle Peninsula, Co Kerry (Longitude: 10° 28′ 46″ W)

The furthest north, east, south and west I have been in the Republic of Ireland to date are:

North: The furthest north I have been in the Republic is Redcastle on the Inishowen Peninsula, Co Donegal, when I was at an ordination in the late 1980s, or Arnold’s Hotel, in Dunfanaghy, when the then Bishop Michael Jackson invited me to speak at the Clogher Clergy Conference. So, I need to make some careful calculations to figure out this piece of extreme tourism.

East: Wicklow Town, the tip of Howth Head or the shores of Portrane, Co Dublin, looking out onto Lambay Island. I never managed to complete a boat trip from Skerries to Lambay Island one summer’s evening some years ago, and I have not yet walked out to the edge of Wicklow Town. So, once again, I need to make some difficult calculations.

South: Mizen Head and Crookhaven.

West: The end of western tip of Slea Head on the Dingle Peninsula.

Looking out at Lambay Island from the shores of Portrane (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The four extreme points of mainland Northern Ireland, excluding the islands, are:

North: Benbane Head, Co Antrim (55°15′ N)

East: Burr Point, Ards Peninsula, Co Down (5° 25′ 58″ W)

South: a point south of Greencastle, Co Down (54° 2′ N)

West: Bradoge Bridge, Co Fermanagh (8°10′ W), and the most westerly town in Northern Ireland is nearby Belleek (8°10′ W).

The four extreme limits of Northern Ireland I have visited are:

North: the Giant’s Causeway, Co Antrim (55° 14′ 27″ N)

East: Donaghadee, on the Ards Peninsula, Co Down (5.53° W)

South: The furthest south I have been in Northern Ireland is Kilkeel, Co Down (54.059°N), on the road from Rostrevor to Newcastle.

West: A point west Belleek, Co Fermanagh (8°10′ W), crossing the border on a minor road from Bundoran, Co Donegal, into Garrison, Co Fermanagh, around 1970.

Sean’s Bar in Athlone, beneath the shadows of Athlone Castle, claims to date back to 900 AD (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2018)

Going to the ends of the earth … or to the remote ends of Ireland

Mizen Head …at the south-west tip of Ireland (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

Patrick Comerford

I went to ends of the earth – or at least, to the south-west extremity of Ireland – yesterday [21 May 2016] to visit Mizen Head, one of the extreme points of the island of Ireland and a place with dramatic cliffs and scenery.

Mizen Head is not actually the most southerly point on the mainland of Ireland – the honour goes to nearby Brow Head. But generations of Irish schoolchildren have been taught by generations of geography teachers that the length of Ireland is measured from Fair Head to Mizen Head, or from Mizen Head to Malin Head.

In Ireland, this is the equivalent of Land’s End.

We drove west from Bantry to Mizen Head through the villages of the Mizen Peninsula, including Ballydehob, Schull, Goleen and Crookhaven. At the end of the peninsula, the cliffs of Mizen Head rise high above the Atlantic Ocean, where the currents from the west and south coasts meet and waves from the mid-Atlantic crash into the craggy rocks and headlands.

For many, Mizen Head was their first – or their last sight – of Ireland and of Europe (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

Mizen Head was once on one of the main transatlantic shipping routes and for many seafarers this their first – or last – sight of Ireland and of Europe.

A series of paths and viewing platforms lead out to the tip of the peninsula, which is almost like an island, cut off from the tip of Mizen Head by a deep chasm. The deep gap is spanned by a bridge that is breath-taking in its construction and location.

A deep chasm separates the tip of the peninsula from the rest of Mizen Head (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

We crossed over the bridge to the old signal station, the weather station, and the lighthouse at the end of the world – we were told the US is the next stop.

The signal station, once permanently staffed, is now a museum with exhibits on the strategic significance Mizen Head once had for transatlantic shipping and communications, and on the pioneering work of Guglielmo Marconi (1874-1937).

The Marconi Radio Room tells the story of radio communications at Mizen Head Signal Station. Marconi was nearby in Crookhaven during his search for a suitable site to send the first transatlantic message. He had masts at Brow Head and put a telegraphic transmitter on the Fastnet Rock Lighthouse. A recent storm took all the sand out of Galley Cove and exposed the huge cables that once connected Fastnet with his radio room in Crookhaven.

In 1931, Mizen Head Signal Station had the first radio Beacon in Ireland – it spanned the whole gorge at the Bridge. This room is dedicated to this fabulous story.

There we could only but imagine the solitude of the keepers who worked here and lived with the fresh salt-laden sea air above the restless Atlantic and the swirl of the ocean currents.

A view under the bridge from the old Derrick platform (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

We walked back down the path to the old Derrick platform to look under the bridge, where we could see seals and their pups in the swell below as we listened for the sound of kittiwakes, gannets and choughs. The Derrick stand was used to supply the station from boats before the first bridge was built in 1909.

Having crossed back over the bridge, we returned by the “99 steps” that once formed part of the original access route to the visitor centre for two double espressos.

Crookhaven … now peaceful, but once a haven for pirates (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

Earlier, we had lunch in the village of Crookhaven, which Marconi used as his base when he worked there from 1901 until 1914. The village was an important port of call for shipping between Europe and North America, and in the past many villagers made their living by supplying ships that sheltered in Crookhaven before or after a long voyage.

Crookhaven has three pubs. We had lunch in O’Sullivan’s, which faces the harbour. Its walls are decorated with old bank notes, signed rugby shirts and historical pictures of the village and notes about the area. Outside, the painted gable wall proclaims that the pub serves “the most southerly pint in Ireland.”

O’Sullivan’s pub in Crookhaven claims to serve “the most southerly pint in Ireland” (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

The Welcome Inn or Nottages is only open during the summer. The pub was once owned by a man called Nottage from England who came to the village to work with Marconi. The Crookhaven Inn was once the bottle store for a larger pub and hotel that have since been was converted into apartments.

Crookhaven has a winter population of about 40, but this swells in the summer to about 400 when the families who own holiday homes arrive back in the area.

The earliest record of the area is found in 1199 in the Decretal Letter of Pope Innocent III, where Celmolaggi is listed and this has been identified with Crookhaven. There is also reference to the church being dedicated to Saint Molaggi, who came from Fermoy in the seventh century. He was the Patron Saint of Tegh-Molagga, now Timoleague, between Dunmanway and Bantry. A 15th century O’Mahony castle in Crookhaven was later used as a prison.

By the late 1500s and early 1600s, the village was a base for piracy. But the Dutch attack on the area in 1614 put an end to the activity of pirates.

The village takes its name from the Crooke family, who were granted large estates in West Cork in the early 17th century. Sir Thomas Crooke also founded Baltimore, Co Cork, ca 1610 at the same as Crookhaven. However, the Crooke family’s association with the area ended around 1665 with the death of Sir Thomas Crooke’s son and heir, Sir Samuel Crooke.

Barley Cove, where the best beach in West Cork was formed by a tsunami in Portugal (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

On our way from Bantry and Schull to Crookhaven and Mizen Head, we stopped for a while at Barley Cove, which must have one of the best beaches in West Cork – and it challenges Curracloe in Co Wexford for being best beach in Ireland.

The area around Barley Cove is one of natural beauty and is popular throughout the summer months. Because of the variety of wildlife and interesting habitats in the sand dunes, the EU has designated the beach as a Special Area of Conservation.

But the story of Barley Cove and its sand dunes must be one of the most fascinating stories in the annals of Irish environmental and conservation efforts.

Almost two and a half centuries ago, Lisbon was devastated by a catastrophic earthquake on 1 November 1775, and the coast of Portugal was hit by a destructive tsunami. A day later, according to reports in the Cork Journal, 15 ft waves hit the coasts of Co Cork on 2 November 1775. As a side-effect, the sands of Barley Cove were displaced and the dunes and unusual coastal features were formed as a consequence of the tsunami.

The beach is nestled in between two cliffs and is fed by a meandering river coming down from the hinterland. A boardwalk and a floating bridge lead from the car park to the beach, where the large dunes are surrounded on three sides by water.

The Portuguese link with this extremity of Ireland should not have surprised me. It brought back memories of a visit to Cabo de Roca in Portugal, which is the western-most point in Europe, while I was staying in Lisbon about 18 months ago.

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Teampol na mBocht, a church for the poor, built by the poor

Teampol na mBocht … the Church of the Poor, at Altar or Toormore, west of Schull, Co Cork (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

Patrick Comerford

On the way out to Mizen Head from Bantry on Saturday afternoon [21 May 2016], there was one sandy beach after another, with each golden stretch of sand on this peninsula in West Cork washed by waves of blue and white and basking beneath blue skies.

At Schull we stopped to enjoy the harbour, to stroll through the narrow streets with their brightly painted shops and houses, and to browse in Anna B’s bookshop and mull over coffee as we sat out on the street.

In the Diocese of Cork, Cloyne and Ross in the Church of Ireland, Schull is part of group of parishes that includes the churches of Holy Trinity in Schull, Teampol na mBocht in Altar and Saint Brendan in Crookhaven.

Before reaching Crookhaven in time for lunch, we stopped at Teampol Na mBocht, or the Church of the Poor, in Altar, or Toormore, five miles outside Schull. The name Teampol na mBocht tells much about the origins of this church. During the Great Famine in the 1840s, the Rector of nearby Kilmoe, the Revd William Allen Fisher (1808-1880), set up soup kitchens and distributed aid. Funds donated to him were used to build the church in 1847, providing much needed employment in the area.

Fisher had inherited over 250 acres in Co Cork and 320 acres in Co Waterford, and was one of the principal lessors in Kilmoe parish at the time of Griffith’s Valuation. He was a son of Joseph Devonsher Fisher of Woodmount, Co Waterford. He was a fluent Irish speaker wanted to build the church by subscription, and John Ainsworth donated an initial £125.

In 1847, during ‘Black ’47, the Illustrated London News reported that in the village of Schull an average of 25 men, women and children were dying every day of starvation, dysentery or famine fever. At nearby Cove, the population fell from 254 in 1841 to 53 in 1851.

In Toormore, however, over the same period, the fall was relatively slight – from 370 to 343. Why this was is not known, but some believe that one factor was the relief carried out by Fisher.

As the crisis deepened, Fisher begged for help from well-wishers both in Ireland and England. As the money came in, Fisher set up soup kitchens and distributed food, medicine, blankets and clothing. But he wanted to do more than hand out charity. A man of his time, he firmly believed in the dignity of labour and wanted to provide paid work.

According to his son-in-law, Fisher ‘asked for and obtained the permission of some of those who had made him their almoner’ to use the gifts on a building project. This was originally to have been a new schoolhouse but, as more money came in, Fisher embraced a more ambitious plan that involved building a church for the townlands of Toormore and Altar.

Inside Teampol na mBocht, built in 1847 by the Revd William Allen Fisher (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

The building was begun and completed in 1847. Local tradition says that in order to maximise the work and to give as much paid employment as possible to the poorest of the poor, Fisher decided that no horses or carts would be used in building the church.

The stone was quarried nearby and carried to the site by hand alone. As Fisher wrote in a report on the church, “the employment was given chiefly by contract, so that the poor were able to work about their cabins, fishing etc. at the same time that they earned a subsistence for themselves.”

Fisher called it ‘The Church of the Poor’ because it was the poor people who built it. Fisher loved the Irish language and was so fluent that the British Museum often sent him ancient manuscripts for translation. This also explains why Teampol na mBocht is the only church in the Church of Ireland Church that has an Irish name.

For many in the Church of Ireland, William Fisher is a saintly figure, a scholarly man who was happiest with his books, but who worked ceaselessly and selflessly for 40 years in a remote parish, giving all his time and strength to the poor, the hungry and the sick, until he himself died of famine fever in 1880.

But for his detractors, Fisher was a ‘souper,’ whose many projects on the Mizen Peninsula, including building his church, had only one purpose: to win converts from the Roman Catholic Church to the Church of Ireland.

Certainly, Fisher impoverished himself on behalf of his parishioners. The Fisher estates in Co Cork, Co Waterford and King’s County (Offaly) was offered for sale in the Landed Estates Court in November 1865. The Waterford property was advertised again in July 1866 as it had been offered for sale in April that year but the sale had been adjourned for want of bidders.

The three-light Fisher windows in the chancel of Altar Church (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

The walls of the church in Altar are of natural undressed stone bonded with earth. In an unfinished letter, Fisher explained that the church was “built in the pattern of the old Irish churches. The vestry and southern porch give it a cruciform appearance. It has a chancel, the arch entering which is a cyclopic arch, and the tops of the windows are the same. Its nave is 65 foot by 25 foot. Its gable is an equilateral triangle.”

The octagonal font is said to date from the 15th Century and came from Kilkirean Church on Cape Clear Island. It was donated by Tullagh Parish, Baltimore, and installed in 1935. The original font is said to be buried in the church grounds.

The organ was built in 1824 by Flight and Robson of London, and is one of the few remaining organs in Ireland built by that famous company, it was bought in 1918 to replace an old harmonium, and the cost, including installation, was £147.

At the east end, the three stained glass windows in the sanctuary were given by Fisher’s grandson, the Revd RBC Carson. The central window is dedicated to Fisher’s wife, Anna Waggett Fisher. The two outer windows commemorate Elizabeth Carson, Fisher’s daughter and the mother of the donor.

The plaque in Altar Church honouring the Revd William Allen Fisher (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)

A marble plaque on the north side of the chancel arch honours the Revd William Fisher. The inscription reads:

Sacred to the memory of
Rev. William Allen Fisher A.B.
Born 14th Nov 1808 Died 7th Aug 1880
For 38 years Rector of Kilmoe
his zeal for the spiritual and temporal
good of his people never abated
Faithfulness to his divine master
and benevolence to the poor of his
flocked ever marked his course.
To his untiring energy are due to the erection
and endownment of this church
“His being dead yet speakth”
Heb[rews] IX.4.

“I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me
write blessed are the dead
which died in the Lord henceforth
yea saith the spirit that they may
rest from their labours
and their works do follow them”
Heb[rews] XIV.13

At the west end of the church, the entrance porch has a stained glass window of Saint Michael the Archangel in the memory of Michael Allen, a parishioner who served in the Indian Mutiny.

Other plaques around the church record other gifts, donations and parishioners. In the vestry are portraits and photographs of the incumbents who have served Teampol na mBocht since it was built almost 170 years ago.

The window at the west end of the church commemorates Michael Allen (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2016)