THE CROAGH PATRICK PILGRIMAGE

New Zealand Tablet, 25 September 1913, Page 11

THE CROAGH PATRICK PILGRIMAGE

IRISH FAITH AND MISSIONARY ZEAL The Croagh Patrick pilgrimage took place on Sunday, July 27, and it was estimated that no fewer than 50,000 people ascended the mountain. Many Masses were celebrated, and an eloquent sermon was delivered by Rev. Dr. McCaffrey, Maynooth. The Rev. Father Augustine, 0.5.F.C., preached an impressive sermon in Irish. His Grace the Most Rev. Dr; Healy, Archbishop of Tuam, visited the foot of the mountain during the day, and made touching references to the pilgrimage during a discourse in the Westport church in the morning. The Most Rev. Dr. Higgins was among the pilgrims on the summit. Pilgrims from all parts of Great Britain and every village in Ireland, and even far overseas, flocked to Westport on Saturday and Sunday. The town was simply besieged for the accommodation of the enormous number of visitors, which far exceeded that of any previous year. As usual, many hundreds of devout visitors scaled the steep slopes of the mountain during the previous y night, keeping vigil on the ground where, 1500 years ago, the National Apostle watched and prayed. From dawn on Sunday pilgrims on foot and in every kind of vehicle wended their way to Murrisk, the picturesque hamlet some six miles from Westport, where the arduous climb was begun. The sermon in English was by Rev. Dr. McCaffrey * who said —■ ■

; Well nigh 1500 years have passed since this mountain on which we are assembled to-day was sanctified by the prayers and penance of our National Apostle. Whether we turn to the sea or to the. land, westward towards the myriad islands that are set like gems in the Atlantic, or eastward towards the mountains and plains of Mayo, the view that confronts us to-day is much the same as that which met the -eyes of St. Patrick during the memorable Lent that he passed on this lofty summit. In the lapse of centuries since then, the world has witnessed many remarkable changes. Kingdoms and dynasties have disappeared, to make way for new nations and new forms of government. In politics, in social life, in men's ideals, and in their outlook upon the world, striking developments have been witnessed. Among all these fluctuations of fortune, in one respect alone we can proudly boast that Ireland remains unchanged and unchangeable as is the mountain on which we stand to-day or the Atlantic which dashes itself against the western shores, and that is in its devotion and attachment to the faith that St. Patrick preached and in its loyal adherence to the See of Peter, to which he bound the Irish Church as with chains of steel. The pilgrimage to Croagh Patrick is not a thing of yesterday.. It is not a mere passing whim taken up to-day and to be put aside to-morrow. From the Fifth Century to the Present Time thousands of pilgrims following in the footsteps of St. Patrick have toiled up the bare and rugged slopes of this mountain-side to imitate the example of our Apostle, to pray to God on the very spot where he had kept his long and lonely vigil, and by mingling their prayers with his to ensure for themselves and their families the blessing and protection of God. So numerous were the pilgrims in the olden days that the route by which they came can still be traced from Aughagower to Croagh Patrick. The pilgrimage was indulgenced by Popes, and was under the protection of the chieftains of Connaught; and it was deemed a serious crime to interfere with those journeying to the shrines of Croagh Patrick. Even in the darkest days of Ireland's history, when the good monks who: inhabited yonder roofless walls were driven from their peaceful abode of penance and prayer, and when to profess oneself a Catholic meant to run the risk of plunder, imprisonment, and death, bands of pilgrims still dared to ascend this sacred mount to lay their sorrows before God and St. Patrick in the hope that he who in life was the Apostle and protector of the Irish race might plead for mercy for his adopted country. • Nor was

the intercession of St. Patrick without its results. The centuries of sorrow have passed away with all their bitter memories. The Storm and the Clouds Have Passed, the sun of prosperity has begun once again to shine on our country, and Ireland is to-day more devoted and more loyal to the preaching of St. Patrick than she ■was even before English kings set themselves the task of changing a nation’s faith. The old pilgrimage to Croagh Patrick has been renewed in these happy circumstances with the blessing of the Pope and the successors of St. Jarlath, and the thousands of pilgrims who have come together to-day, not merely from the province of Connaught or from all the provinces of Ireland, but from the farthest ends of the earth, afford striking testimony that, however Irishmen may be divided in politics and in their social condition, at home and abroad they are at one in their veneration for the Apostle of their race and country. It is without a shadow of doubt that when the Lent of 441 was approaching, St. Patrick, who then found himself at Aughagower, determined to wend his way to the very summit of Cruachan Aigli to spend the holy season in prayer and penance. His work in Ireland for so far had been attended with considerable success. At Tara, overlooking the plains of Royal Meath, he had preached in the very citadel of paganism and had won many chieftains to the faith. In his journey through the central districts of Ireland and across the plains of Roscommon and Mayo, he had found thousands of willing converts, but his courage almost failed him as he thought of his own weakness and the magnitude of the task that still lay before him in the rest of Ireland; and his heart was filled with sorrow as he pondered on the dangers that would assail his flock when he himself should have passed away. He understood, as only such a saint could understand, the weakness and frailty of human nature —its restlessness and its yearning after change. He ascended to the summit of Cruachan Aigli, and for more than forty days, exposed to the winds and rain, he gave himself up entirely to prayer. During this terrible vigil he thought not of himself or of his own salvation, but of the conversion and spiritual welfare of the Irish race. He prayed that God might bless his work and crown it with success; that He might take under His special protection the men of Erin, those who then, lived and the generations yet to come, and that He might keep them on the narrow path that leads to Heaven. And who that is acquainted with the history of the world since then can doubt about the efficacy of his prayers. Other Churches then flourishing, and likely to flourish, have long since disappeared. The great Christian centres of the East, of Greece and Macedonia, of Roman Asia, of Syria and Arabia, even the Church of Palestine, have at times wavered in their allegiance to the Holy See; but down through the ages the little island set in the Western Ocean The Home of the Race for Whom St. Patrick Wrestled in Prayer on this mounthas remained devoted to the faith that was delivered to it by its National Apostle. Nor was it merely that Ireland itself remained firm in its allegiance. On more than one occasion, when, humanly speaking, Christianity seemed in danger, and when the cry went up for help, Ireland hastened to the rescue. Again in modern times, when the faith of many in the Old World had grown cold, and when religious indifference threatened to be a greater danger than war or persecution, the Irish people set an example to the rest of the world by their deep religious fervor and by their willingness to sacrifice all rather than sacrifice their religious principles. The persecutions that were meant to extinguish Catholicism here at home have proved under the providence of God to be the means of building up the Church in foreign lands, so that wherever you turn to-day, whether, to the populous manufacturing cities of England or Scotland or across the Atlantic to those of the great Republic of the West, to Canada, South Africa, or Australia, you will find that the Irish exiles have not forgotten the lessons they learned at home, and the almost countless

cathedrals and churches dedicated to St. Patrick scattered across the globe from San Francisco to Melbourne, constitute a unique memorial to a national apostle unparalleled in the annals of the Church. Even to-day a splendid opportunity is given to Ireland to do a great service to religion, and everything seems to indicate that the opportunity will not be neglected. The danger at the present time is religious indifference, and in consequence the attempt to drive out religion from the public life of the nation, to banish religious teaching from the schools, to view everything from the merely worldly point of view, and to treat religion as if it were something that might and ought to be disregarded by those engaged in government. Such an attitude has never found favor in Ireland, and, please God, it never shall. Under a Native Parliament persecution for religion’s sake and intolerance will be unknown, as they have ever been unknown, amongst Irish Catholics. Every man, it is to be hoped, .will be rewarded according to his merits but at the same time, considering the deeply religious character of the people, it will for those charged with the conduct of affairs to show that a thoroughly progressive and democratic policy is not out of harmony with the traditions of the Catholic Church,, and that the dreams of Lacordaire and Montalembert of a union of democracy, liberty, and religion, can be realised in real life. On this bleak summit, when St. Patrick was harassed by fears for the future, and when all the , powers of evil were leagued against him to induce him to despair, after "God, Whose help he had invoked, his thoughts turned instinctively towards Rome /as the natural guardian and protector of his work. While here on this mountain messengers arrived to inform him that a new Pope had been elected, and his first thought was to despatch one of his assistants to bear his congratulations to the Pontiff, and to invoke his blessing on the work that he had undertaken. The new Pope, Leo the Great, was as deeply interested in the conversion of Ireland as his predecessor had been, and immediately he Confirmed St. Patrick in his mission, and sent him as a pledge of his affection a portion of the relics of the Apostles SS. Peter and Paul, which relies were for centuries The Greatest Treasures of the Cathedral at Armagh. The attachment and submission to Rome practised and taught by St. Patrick have never been forgotten by the Irish race. In the old days, before Ireland was disturbed by the Danes and the Normans, bands of pilgrims, bishops and priests, princes and tribesmen, braved the dangers of sea and land in their anxiety to worship at the shrines of the sacred city and to do homage ' to him whom they regarded as head of the Christian world. Nor was it merely in the days of its prosperity that Ireland showed its devotion to Rome. In the stormy years of the sixteenth century, when so many countries raised the standard of revolt, and when almost every . month that passed - brought news of other defections, when the whole of Northern Europe, Germany, Denmark, Norway and Sweden, England and Scotland, seemed lost to the Faith, Ireland alone withstood the storm, and refused to accept a royal dictator as the head of the Catholic 'Church. Irishmen might have saved Their Churches, Their Schools, Their . Lands, and Their Lives, had they been content to act against their consciences, and to accept the King, Council, and Parliament as their , religious guides, but, mindful of the teaching of St. Patrick, and of the' example of generations of their ancestors, they preferred to abandon all rather than to allow themselves to be wrenched from the centre of unity. Men of the world may scoff at such sacrifices. They may rail at the foolishness of the Irish people in risking their property and lives over what they regard as a side issue, but Irish Catholics know better than to pay attention to such scoffers. They realise, as their forefathers realised, that the Church of Christ should be one and undivided, and that such unity can be maintained only by dutiful submission to

the authority set up by Christ, and that whenever religion is at stake money and lands must count as nothing. Even from the worldly point of view their devotion to principle has not been unrewarded. They are winning back inch by inch and year by year whatever they had lost, and even their strongest opponents have begun to understand what the Roman Emperors understood centuries before, that penal codes, imprisonment, and death are of little avail against a people who are ready to die In Defence of Their Religious Convictions. Our pilgrimage to-day is held under very auspicious circumstances. A new era is about to open in the history of our country. The long struggle that has been waged for centuries is about to be ended, and the government and administration of Ireland are to be committed to the hands of Irishmen. Difficulties and misunderstandings are sure to arise, and views that are current elsewhere may find advocates at home. Here on the summit of Croagh Patrick a prayer should go up from this great national pilgrimage, representative of the entire Irish race, that our National Apostle may continue to guard our country in the future as he has guarded it in the past, that he may intercede with God to bless and protect it, so that it may stand, as it has always stood, true to the faith delivered to it by St. Patrick.