REVIVAL OF THE FAITH IN ENGLAND.- OPENING OF ST. DOMINIC'S CHURCH. NEWCASTLE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume I, Issue 39, 24 January 1874, Page 12

REVIVAL OF THE FAITH IN ENGLAND.- OPENING OF ST. DOMINIC'S CHURCH. NEWCASTLE.

vfs read in the • Tablet ' of the solemn opening of St. Dominic's Church, Newcastle,- when Pontifical High Mass was sung by the Bishop of Hexham.-and a termon wa» preached by his Grace the Archbishop of Westminster. The Bishops of Clifton and Northampton were present, and also a large number of clergy. In the afternoon there was a banquet in the Assembly Booms the Bishop of Hexham the chair ; and in the evening another service in the church, Father Burke delivering the sermon. It should be added that the church has cost £9,000, and will seat over 1,000 persons. It was in the year 1260 that Sir Peter Scott, the first Mayor of Newcastle, introduced into the town the Friar Preachers. The Friary, near VTestgate street, was th? old Dominican monastery: The site was given by three sisters, whose names have not been preserved. At the dissolution of the monasteries under Henry VIII., the community consisted of a Prior and twelve Friars. His Majesty sold the property to the Corporation, and the Orders appears to have been dispersed in this neighbourhood. Speaking of t\\e monastery, a lecturer£alluded to says : " For 300 years the Ifoly Sacrifice was offered up there ; for 300 years the Divine Office •was sung there j communions and confessions were practised there. As you gaze on its walls and muse, you almost seem to see again issue forth the goodly procession from that old portal to visit Our Lady's well, near the garden wall." But the Friary saw other scenes than these. It was there Baliol did homage to King Edward, where kings and nobles had knelt before the altar of the Friars. After an absence of 300 years the Dominicans once more settled in Newcastle in 1860 and have now reared the noble edifice which was opened as narrated. Although to some extent dispersed, the Dominicans have never been altogether absent from the North tiace the Order first settled tlnre.